By the Whim of Fate
Book the First
in the Ney Chronicles

An Historical Novel
Chapter 1

Copyright © Ben Longstreet, 2001

1769 had been a relatively ordinary year for Pierre Ney. The cooperage in Saarlouis was making enough money to just about get by, although with a population of only four thousand souls no-one who was not already rich would end up that way. True his second boy Michel had been born during the year, but what else had happened? And what since? Very little, if Pierre Ney was to judge.

He could not know that as years of destiny are measured, 1769 could have been considered almost magical. Across Europe the offspring of varied and different parents would grow up to create history and reshape the world. Napoleon, Wellington, Soult, Lannes, Pitt the Younger, Humboldt and Cuvier. And Michel Ney. For the first four and for Ney that writing would be in blood.

“Marguerite!” called Pierre in German, “fetch me some wine, there’s a good girl.” It was a warm day for December, but 1788 had been a hot year.

“Coming, my dear,” replied his wife from within the cooperage. She too spoke in German, yet both Pierre and his wife considered themselves true French patriots, as did every other man, woman and child in the garrison town defended by French troops behind fortifications built by Vauban himself.

Marguerite Ney stepped out into the surprisingly bright morning sunlight, squinting as she gently guided the mug of cheap red wine towards her husband. She had not been well, and nearing fifty was losing some of the comfortable weight that she had put on since the birth of their fourth and final child, another Marguerite, who was now a more than passing 16 year old attracting the unwanted - at least by her mother - attentions of many of the local garrison. That will finish in tears for us all, she regularly prophesied.

Holding the mug out towards her husband, Madame Ney felt a twinge of irritation that he did not turn to accept the waiting refreshment. Instead he was looking up the road towards the fortress gates, where a single mounted man in hussar uniform was walking a handsome grey horse towards the cooperage.

“Come Pierre,” she chided, “as if you have never seen a soldier before.” She nudged him with the mug, spilling a few drops of wine onto his leather apron, watching the liquid entwine with the years of marks already weathered into it, and expecting his quick temper to flare.

“God’s damnation!” roared Pierre. At least it felt like a roar to his wife, yet in truth he had spoken through clenched teeth. She froze, wondering if he would punish her with one of the infrequent blows that he sometimes used to chastise her, but instead he remained looking at the hussar, and such was his interest in the cavalryman that she too was drawn, and as she squinted through her fading eyes towards the figure a sudden premonition caused her to curtail her breath, as if choking. “It cannot be,” she said, to herself as much as to her husband.

He did not reply, instead watching the young hussar exchange pleasantries with old Lejeune the blacksmith.

The hussar pointed towards the cooperage, said something indistinguishable to Lejeune and nudged his horse forward. His uniform was a sparkling delight of colours. He wore a dark blue dolman jacket frogged with yellow braid, and hanging over his left shoulder in the distinctive hussar style was a red pelisse, frogged with more yellow and lined with white sheepskin. His sabretache was also a bold scarlet, embroidered with the arms of the Duke of Chartres. Slung across the front of the white sheepskin saddle cover was a dark blue cavalry cloak, recently worn by the rider - not for the cold but to protect his finery on the road - and now discarded to attain the impression he required. Beneath the conical black shako with its wound-red pendant little of the face was visible beneath the mass of red hair, which crossed both cheeks in a mighty whisker and met at a full moustache. The chin had of course been scraped clear, but behind his head the hussar had carefully plaited his as yet still growing hair into a pigtail. Close to, the smile which split his features was far less cocky and certain than it appeared from the cooperage door.

Pierre Ney was stunned. To a degree he was scared, and he had not felt that way since he had fled with the rest of a French army from Frederick the Great at Rossbach. He watched the rider approach and had to approve as he saw the young man dismount with a graceful ease that marked the natural horsemen. “You will break your mother’s heart,” said Pierre.

Michel Ney took off the shako, and the smile vanished. For a second he felt his own temper rising, but the look in his mother’s eyes as she stepped from her husband’s shadow reduced it instantly.

“Oh Michel, why?” she asked, the sound of her voice pitiful.

“But why not?” Ney replied. “It’s good enough for Jean.”

At first she was unable to reply. She wanted to tell him of her fear at losing all her boys. Jacques was already gone. Her third son, he had never breached his childhood before disease had claimed his little body. It was bad enough that her eldest, Jean had already joined the army, and her hopes had all been pinned on Michel. He would not die young. He alone of the boys had inherited his father’s awesome constitution, which seemed unaffected by whatever the weather could throw at it.

“It is all your fault,” she accused her husband, throwing the mug against a half completed barrel and storming into the house. She had tried everything to guide Michel away from this. They had both hoped that Jean would inherit the cooperage, and whilst there was still a slim chance of that, his destiny too seemed to be in uniform. She had wanted Michel to go into the legal profession, and he had been educated by the wise Monks of St Augustin at their college in the town. At thirteen he had gone to work for Maître Valette, the chief notary of Saarlouis. It had been a great opportunity, but the youngster was too full of life, and had clearly been dissatisfied with a job which required him to be desk-bound. After two years they had obtained for him a place as junior clerk with the Procureur du Roi, hoping that prosecuting wrongdoers might be more to the boy’s liking. It was not. Thinking that an outdoor life might be more to Michel’s fancy they had arranged for a post as an overseer at the Appenweiler mine and ironworks, and that had seemed to be the solution. Michel had proved so capable a student that he was soon transferred to Saleck as a superintendent, and there he stayed for three years.

Until now.

The distinctive sound of cavalry spurs on the floor of the cooperage’s small dining and sitting room was not enough to halt the welter of tears dashing down Madame Ney’s face. She felt strong hands on her shoulders, and knew it was not her husband’s touch. She turned instinctively, burying her face in the blue dolman, and feeling the yellow braid brush away her tears. She was more than able to replace them. At 5’8”, Ney towered above his mother, who barely came up to his chest. He looked down into the bright auburn hair, from whence came his own, and saw how ravaged by grey it had become. A sudden spasm of sadness brought tears to his own eyes, and guilt drove them down into his whiskers and from there onto her head.

Madame Ney felt their light touch on her hair, and knew instinctively what they were. She pulled back, sniffing away her own tears, and smiled weakly into her son’s eyes. How hard they are, she thought, and yet at the same time so gentle. There was something within them which danced between blue and grey. Something which until this day she had not noticed. Another thought occurred to her.

“What do you mean it’s my fault?” Pierre Ney had given them a head start, stopping to clear the wine stains from Monsieur Desvaux’s future barrel. “Well, come on. Out with it.”start, stopping to clear the wine stains from Monsieur Desvaux’s future barrel. “Well, come on. Out with it.”

Ney turned to his father. “Mama is right. It really is your fault, sir.”

“And just how the hell can that be?”

“Pierre!” his wife chided, crossing herself.

Pierre raised his eyebrows resignedly to his son, suitably chastised. “Well boy, sit down, and tell me how it’s my fault you’ve joined the Colonel-General’s Hussars.”

Michel smiled, obeying orders, pleased that his father had recognised the uniform.

“What’s so funny?” his father asked.

“I see you know the regiment.”

“Insolent pup! Of course I do. I was at Rossbach, unless you don’t recall.”

Michel laughed again, slapping the arm of his chair lightly. “That is exactly my point, papa. Ever since Jean and I were children, you have continually told of Rossbach and your army days. What did you expect to happen?”

Pierre Ney was dumfounded. “I do not,” he protested weakly.

It was Marguerite’s turn to chuckle. “I fear that you do, husband.”

She was unable to appear pleased for her son, too drowned in her own impending loss, yet the change that she had seen in his eyes had told her that for him the decision had been correct. Pierre Ney intended to argue further, but when he opened his mouth to speak the words seemed to drift away of their own volition. Instead he sat down, defeated. “My own fault,” he muttered, more than once.

“Where’s the depot now?”

“Metz,” replied Ney, the smile returning to his face, this time with a certain comfort lacking before. He recognised his father’s tone.

“Metz, eh?”

“Yes.”

“There’s no future in it, you know. Oh, some glory to be sure, and perhaps you might make sergeant-major, but that’s it. Only the aristocrats get to be officers.” The look in his son’s eyes once more flared the Ney temper. “What? You think I don’t know what I am talking about?”

“No sir, it’s not that,” Ney said quickly, placating his father.

“Then what?”

“I don’t really know how to put it,” said Ney, struggling to express himself. The German language was fine for war but of little value for description. He switched to French, taught to him so well by the monks. “I believe that I have found my true path. I believe that I was born to be a soldier yet I cannot for my life tell you how I know this.”

“He is right, husband,” Marguerite Ney said. Her son had confirmed for her the look in his eyes.

“You agree with him?” asked Pierre, incredulous. “Why a minute ago you were bleating like a child.”

“A woman can be unhappy and happy at the same time,” she explained, which was too much for Pierre he shrugged again at his son in confusion and briskly walked back into the winter morning. Ney looked at his mother, and she smiled gently and gestured at the open door with a nod of her head. Ney nodded in return, and gathering his brass mounted leather scabbard and his sabretache, gracefully rose and followed his father’s course. As he went out his mother’s eyes never left him, although the words she silently spoke were directed elsewhere. How handsome he looks. Keep him safe for me. An invasive thought would not leave her and she went to her husband’s open desk, wherein lay his small and rarely used diary. She opened it, scanning the pages, seeking something. Yes, there it was. December the seventh. Today’s date. Closing the diary she shuddered in prescience. The depth of her feeling brought on tears again, and it did not take long for her despair to return. This date is cursed, she thought. Cursed!

-----

Ney found his father not far from the door of the cooperage, staring at the fortifications rearing about the town. The whole place spoke of war. How could he have been so foolish as to believe that his sons would not follow their father, when from the moment they were born their surroundings were dominated by soldiers. He sensed his son behind him, and was undeniably impressed by how easily he had mastered his noisy accoutrements. “You are a natural cavalryman.”

“I believe I am, sir,” Ney confirmed., nearly bursting with pride at his father’s complement.

“You never showed much inclination when I taught you to ride.”

Ney sighed. “Oh but I did, father. I did.”

“You kept it well hidden then,” said his father, pausing suddenly in recognition of his own words. “That’s exactly what you did, didn’t you?”

Ney nodded solemnly.

“For your mother and I?”

“Yes.”

“How long have you wanted this?”

“Always. Since you used to tell us about Rossbach and the other battles.”

Pierre caught the sparkle in his son’s eyes, noticing it like his wife before for the first time. “It’s a shame,” he said, ruefully. “You’d have made a splendid officer. It’s a shame that we’ll never know.”

“Time will tell, father,” said Ney happily, clapping his father around the shoulder and guiding him back towards where Madame Ney waited with fresh wine.

Continued next issue

By Whim of Fate Book the First in the Ney Chronicles: An Historical Novel

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