The Tricolor and the Scimitar

By John-Paul Sinclair Lewis

The Tricolor and the Scimitar is the first historical novel in a brilliant and compelling four-part series that recounts Napoleon Bonaparte and l’Armée d’Orient’s invasion and occupation of Egypt and the Holy Land between 1798-1801. The book opens with the conquest of Malta in June 1798 and then moves to Egypt and the death march to Cairo, the Battle of the Pyramids, and the annihilation by Admiral Nelson of the French Mediterranean fleet at the Battle of the Nile. Initially victorious on land but marooned, Bonaparte and his troops of thirty-five thousand soon confront fanatical resistance, insurrection, guerrilla desert warfare, the plague, ancient superstitions, slavery, harems, and the birth of Egyptology. Using nineteenth-century French military records and journals, Lewis brings to life the historical actors of this incredible time in history, from rankers to famous generals, to a young Bonaparte and the ruthless leaders that resisted him.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Page Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Oct 31, 2017
• ISBN: 9781640279896

Book preview

cover.jpg

The Tricolor and the Scimitar

The Adventures of Captain Hélie Chevalier in Egypt and in the Holy Land

John-Paul Sinclair Lewis

Copyright © 2017 John-Paul Sinclair Lewis

All rights reserved

First Edition

PAGE PUBLISHING, INC.

New York, NY

First originally published by Page Publishing, Inc. 2017

ISBN 978-1-64027-988-9 (Paperback)

ISBN 978-1-64082-887-2 (Hard Cover)

ISBN 978-1-64027-989-6 (Digital)

Printed in the United States of America

To my friend Christopher Dubais, who always believed.

To Denis Hill, my teacher and mentor.

To the soldiers, sailors, and women who perished in l’Armée d’ Orient.

Selles-sur-Cher July 30, 1852

I am a very old man now, and I feel that the shadow of death will soon be upon me. I have no more family, and all my comrades in arms are dead. I have spent my life in the service of France and fought for the principles of the French Revolution!

The manuscripts I leave behind are the tales of personal adventures in Egypt and Syria when I was with the Seventh Hussars in l’Armée d’ Orient. It has been over half a century since I was with Bonaparte in that godforsaken expanse of wasteland. Not a day passes by that I do not reflect upon the three years I spent with my comrades surviving in the land of the pharaohs and in the so-called Holy Land. It was a world where if the climate, food, scorpions, and plague did not kill you, the Muslims would, because we were infidels invading the holy soil of Islam. We came as liberators, bringing enlightenment to a suppressed people, but they declared jihad against us. It was a place where I lost my innocence and a piece of my heart was cut out and left on the desert floor.

I wrote these manuscripts thirty years after returning to France from Egypt. In my writings, I have chosen to describe my exploits and the events as if I were a mere observant and just one of the many characters in this tapestry of Islam, antiquity, glory, courage, desolation, and endless death. When I was not present at an event, I have borrowed the tales from others.

I had hoped that a reputable Parisian publisher would print my chronicles, but they were not interested. Hélas! The bourgeois publishers are only amorous with Napoleonic victories. It is my last wish that a good French man or woman will seek to have my manuscript printed one day so this incredible and largely forgotten enterprise about what had happened to thirty-five thousand of my compatriots can be told. They must not be forgotten!

Hélie Godefroy-Roland Chevalier,

Général de Division et Chevalier de la Légion d’honneur

Département de Loir-et-Cher, December 1856

The coupé was moving rapidly. The vehicle jolted on its springs on the ribbed dirt road leading out from Selles-sur-Cher. The carriage’s sole passenger lowered the window and saw the bridge that crossed the river Cher, leading toward the dense, mist-laced woods of Sologne. The traveler saw an opportunity to gain speed on the smoothly paved long limestone overpass. He pulled down the window and craned his neck outside to yell up at the coachman.

The whip, my good man, crack the whip!

The horses are galloping at top speed now, Admiral. They can’t be pushed any further, or they’ll drop, rebuffed the coachman, looking backward to address his important passenger, his teeth biting on the short stem of an upside-down clay pipe.

Jagged ribbons of purple-white light flashed against a pearl-gray sky, illuminating the bleak winter landscape of brown fields, naked oak trees, and dark pines. A sudden, earsplitting crack of thunder caused the driver to duck, spooking the horses.

Reacting to the loud boom, the admiral blinked and fell back onto the stiff leather seat. A downpour commenced immediately, and he listened to the heavy water and slamming storm winds lash the coach. "L’Orient et Tonnant! he whispered. He squeezed his gold-trimmed bicorn admiral hat resting on his lap, and his mind started to drift. He mumbled, l’Orient et Tonnant-Désastre d’Aboukir!"

The flash of lightning, violent thunder, whipping wind, and hard rain took the admiral back in time to the magazine explosion that eviscerated the great flagship of the French Mediterranean fleet. He closed his eyes and recalled the time when he was just a young novice on board Tonnant, with Captain Dupetit-Thouars, during the Battle of the Nile. His body twitched, as if he were having a nightmare. He was still haunted by the memory of the explosion and the avalanche of fiery debris that descended upon the watery battle site. He could still smell the stench of sulfur and coal, burning flesh and timber, and hear the desperate cries of thousands of drowning and wounded men.

"We are approaching the manoir, mon amiral!" yelled the coachman, pulling on the reins. The carriage slowed, the brakes squeaking as it pulled into the circular driveway and stopped at the massive oak door. The rain had stopped as well, but a waft of fog slowly crept through the oaks and pines.

The traveler set his ornate headwear back on his head and opened the coach door and stepped down. The horses, lathered up and soaked from the rain, snorted and breathed heavily, their thick winter hides steaming vapor into the air. A raucous cawing of magpies and ravens, perched on branches and hovering around the turrets, announced his arrival. The air was damp, so he wrapped his heavy blue cloak around his frame. He stomped his feet to get the circulation going. He inspected the manoir’s tall limestone walls and ashlar facade, leaded red-and-blue stained glass windows, and the two squat towers crowned by overextended conical roofs as he would the rigging of a warship. The creeping fog enveloped the towers, and the admiral imagined the manoir resembled a slow-moving sailship floating in a mist. A gust of wind abruptly lifted the fog, and the traveler heard the sharp sound of a wrought iron lock and latch coming from the big front door. An elderly but physically robust woman, dressed entirely in black, greeted the traveler.

"Mon dieu, finally! She clasped her hands in front of her sagging chest. I am Mademoiselle Estelle, la maîtresse de maison. We are so glad that you have come, Admiral. The whole household has been waiting for your arrival."

I am very glad to be here, mademoiselle, and I hope I am not too late.

"Non, non, you’re not too late. But the general, I am afraid, is in a bad way. He is suffering from severe gout, and his old wounds are in his bones. He screams at night because of the pain in his legs, and his mind is plagued by nightmares."

General Chevalier has often mentioned you in the kindest terms in his letters to me. Please, mademoiselle, if it is not too much trouble, my coachman has driven me at great speed all the way from Blois. He is cold, hungry, and in a bad mood. But he is a good man. Is it possible for the exhausted horses to be rubbed down and fed? And can he have a bowl of soup with some bread and wine?

"Yes, yes, of course, monsieur l’amiral. I will instruct the stableboy to take your luggage to your quarters and unharness the horses and give them a big feed and lodge them in the stables. She gestured to the driver, who was still sitting in the coach box. His top hat and greatcoat with short cape were soaked, and Estelle saw that he was shivering. Go around back and see the cook. She will take care of you. You can take off your coach boots and warm your feet by the kitchen hearth."

Estelle gestured to the admiral. Please follow me. She lifted her black skirt and stepped onto the front stoop. As he followed her, he noticed that above the doorway, emblazoned into the stone was the figure of a salamander with its dragonish head looking backward, with a raised crown over its head.

They entered the great hall, where an immense fire was burning in the fireplace. The traveler approached it, removed his leather gloves, and rubbed his hands near the flames. A young servant girl approached and asked if she could take his cloak and brocaded bicorn. He obliged her with a smile, admiring her perfect skin and white teeth. When he removed his heavy garment from his broad shoulders, she gasped at the sight of his gold-braided chest and oversize crimson epaulets.

Have you never seen a man in uniform before, my child? he asked teasingly.

Not one as beautiful as yours, Your Excellency, she responded meekly and made a curtsy.

The admiral stroked one of her plump cheeks and looked into her doe-like eyes. Please, my child, don’t call me Your Excellency. I come from the same background as you do. Admiral will do fine.

Yes, Your Excellency. She bowed and carried away his cloak and clutched his headwear as if it were a newborn puppy.

The admiral noticed that within the upper part of the beautifully carved mantelpiece, on the escutcheon, was the Chevalier family’s coat of arms, which he recognized all too well because of the wax seal on the back of the envelopes he had received from his friend over the many years. The hall was decorated in Early Renaissance chestnut paneling, and the ceiling was very high, with enormous exposed oak beams.

Estelle returned and beckoned, "Please, monsieur l’amiral, this way."

They scaled the dogleg staircase and continued down a narrow gallery lined with oil portraits of ancestors and moth-eaten tapestries depicting hunting scenes of the Loire Valley. Halfway down the gallery, a medium-size copper tub was placed in the middle of the passage to catch the waterdrops from the leaking ceiling.

Estelle turned to the visitor. "Eh oui, the roof has holes, since forever."

They reached the end of the passage, where a wide door stood ajar.

"Here is the general’s room. It’s in the tower, as you can see. It’s always been monsieur le général’s room since he was a boy. This is the oldest part of the manoir, going back to the thirteenth century. It’s the chamber’s storybook quality, I suppose, that appeals to his soul."

The admiral grinned. Yes, it certainly sounds like him, adhering staunchly to the ancient, noble code of knighthood.

Estelle smiled, then gently knocked on the door and stuck her head through the opening. "Monsieur le générale? The admiral is here." She stepped back into the hallway.

I’m awake, damn it! Now what?

The tapping of a cane on the wooden floor advanced toward the door. The soft, labored shuffling of slippered feet followed the beat of the walking stick on the parquet flooring, almost painful in their slow and methodical rhythm. The traveler was becoming impatient and felt awkward waiting by the door with the housemother.

With an effort, Estelle opened the oak door, and for the first time in over fifty years, the two former comrades in arms came face-to-face.

"Eh bien, look at you! Covered in gold braid, red sash, and wearing the epaulets of an admiral of the Second Empire, quipped General Hélie Chevalier, in a coarse voice, while rubbing his gold earring. My god, man! You look like a peacock." His blue eyes flashed with joy upon seeing his dear old friend. He straightened his posture with his cane, trying to look military in his blue silk robe and velvet sleeping pillbox hat. His face was completely lined and wizened, and saber scars marked his cheeks, chin, and forehead. His thin hair was shoulder-length, completely gray, but well combed, and his moustache was a thick white bush that covered his mouth. He peered through his spectacles at his guest and gave a wide smile.

"Alors … what are you waiting for, Citoyen Amiral Victor Correze? Embrace-moi, mon petit."

Admiral Correze’s eyes started to tear up as he approached Hélie. The men hugged and kissed each other’s cheeks.

So how are you feeling?

I’m old as dirt! Shit, I’m eighty-six. Everything is shot. Eyesight and muscles, skin, and let us not speak about my poor balls. Hell, they went south a long time ago. The best part of my day is when I can have a decent crap.

Well, I’m only in my midsixties, and I feel old. You look great for your age, like an older, well-preserved woman. Oh! What happened to your hand? The admiral took his host’s right hand to examine the stumps of his two missing middle fingers.

The general grinned. Frostbite, my old friend. They fell off on the road toward Vilna on the retreat from Moscow. But come now, let us sit by the fire. I feel cold. He gestured with his stump to two overstuffed red leather English chairs.

I will bring you some green tea, my general, said Estelle.

Damn your green tea, old woman. Bring us eau-de-vie.

The turreted bedchamber smelled of tobacco smoke, old leather, and time. The living space was an overflowing menagerie of mismatched items belonging to a military man who had traveled and fought on three continents. Admiral Correze gazed about and thought that the room resembled an overcrowded museum. Weather-beaten cavalry pennons, shredded regimental flags, Mamluk lances and shields leaned against the round walls, all wedded together by heavy and dusty cobwebs. On one section, he noticed an affixed display of Turkish and Cossack scimitars, pistols, and Mamluk lances and shields. In the middle of the chamber, a leather-topped table with a thick layer of dust was crowded with tarnished Russian dragoon helmets, Austrian hussar headwear, and soiled British infantry shakos.

One item in particular caught his attention—a mummified cat in a glass box. The creature was completely wrapped in wide strips of linen that had aged into a gold coloring. Hélie saw that his friend was intensely interested in the hideous object.

I smuggled that bloody cat out of Egypt, he said proudly. "I was afraid the English would take it from me, like when they stole the Rosetta Stone and so much of the savants’ discoveries after General Menou’s shameful capitulation. I can still remember the day, like it was yesterday, when the survivors of l’Armée d’Orient were forced to leave Egypt on British transports. I still can taste the bitterness in my mouth."

Estelle brought the green tea and a full bottle of eau-de-vie, and the men talked and laughed the hours away until lunch and through the afternoon. Hélie’s color improved, and his voice grew stronger as the two men slowly emptied the bottle. At dinner, however, toward the end of the meal, Victor Correze saw that his old comrade was no longer listening to him; his mind was obviously somewhere else.

So, my friend, your last letter to me possessed a sense of urgency.

Hélie downed the rest of the brandy in his snifter and leaned back into his chair to gaze at the roaring fire, the tall flames flickering light onto the massive limestone walls and medieval family paraphernalia that decorated the great hall.

I need your help.

Of course, what can I do?

He abruptly rose and extracted a large paper bundle from the seat next to him and dropped it ceremoniously on the huge baroque dining table. He pulled the red silk ribbon that held the package together and handed his friend the first several pages.

This is volume 1 of my memoirs of our adventures in Egypt and the so-called Holy Land. I want you to help me get them published.

I will do anything within my power, my dear friend. But haven’t you tried to get them published yourself?

The general ran his mutilated hand through his long and thinning hair, revealing the nasty scar on the left side of his face where the ear had been. Of course I have tried, but I have been unsuccessful. I thought that considering your high position in the Imperial Navy and your association with Louis Napoleon, you could use your influence and contacts to help me.

The admiral pointed to the nasty gash. I remember when you got that. With Kléber at Mont Thabor, no?

Yes, a Mamluk swine removed my ear with his scimitar. But my blade found his chest! Listen, Victor, you have been a Bonapartist most your life, is that not true?

Yes, that’s true. I have always believed in the Napoleonic ideal. Only a Bonaparte could make it possible for people like me, once an orphan and an illiterate cabin boy, to rise as far as I have. But you also believe in the Napoleonic ideal.

There are many attributes that I believe are worthy in Bonapartism, but I cherish the principles of ’89. Remember, my friend, I was once a Fayettiste, and I retain those convictions still after all these years. I am also an unrepentant Freemason! I never had a family, and my ancestral fortune is growing smaller by the day, so the only characteristic that has defined me as a man are my ideals. I fought for France, not for Napoleon. I think his so-called nephew, Napoleon III—my god, he looks nothing like his father, Louis, whom I knew in Egypt—this Louis Napoleon and his wretched political enforcement police have put the word out that if a publisher would print my chronicles, they would be harassed, because I do not paint a very pretty portrait of our current ruler’s uncle. But come now, let us retire to the library, where we can be more comfortable. I want to share a bottle of port with you that I had brought back from Lisbon when I was with Junot in ’08.

The men entered the library, a moderate-size room lined with oak bookcases stuffed with hundreds of old leather volumes and files. Victor Correze carried the first several pages of the volume of the manuscript and sat on a divan and placed his pince-nez on his nose and read the introduction.

You depict a bleak picture here.

Don’t you remember always feeling hunted by those fiends?

Even to this day, I never let anybody stand behind me.

My friend, not even when I was in Saint-Domingue, during the insurrection with Leclerc, compare with my Egyptian nightmares and nocturnal cold sweats.

Principal Historical Characters of the Egyptian Expedition

(In Order of Appearance)

Andoche Junot (1771–1813)

Beginning with the Siege of Toulon in 1793, Bonaparte’s personal adjutant and devoted confidant. Bonaparte advanced Junot’s career, and he distinguished himself during the Egyptian and Holy Land campaigns. He was to become Duc d’Abrantes.

Napoleon Bonaparte (1761–1821)

General-in-Chief of l’Armée d’Orient. Married to Joséphine de Beauharnais. The Egyptian expedition was Bonaparte’s second military venture after the 1796–1797 Italian campaign. The quest to conquer and colonize Egypt was partially his concept, but he was under the direct orders of the French revolutionary government, the Directory.

Eugène de Beauharnais (1781–1820)

Joséphine de Beauharnais’s firstborn from her first marriage and Bonaparte’s adopted son. He accompanied the expedition in the capacity as aide-de-camp to his adoptive father. He would become a prince of the First French Empire and viceroy of Italy.

Louis-Alexander Berthier (1753–1815)

Bonaparte’s trusted chief of staff. A veteran soldier, he was one of the oldest officers in l’Armée d’Orient. He participated in the Battle of Yorktown with Lafayette and was considered as the best chief of staff of the Napoleonic Wars. He was to become a marshal of France, Duc de Neufchatel, and prince of Wagram.

Louis Charles Desaix (1769–1800)

General of division and veteran of the 1796 Italian campaign. Desaix was one of Bonaparte’s most trusted field commanders and a real friend to Napoleon. Extremely popular with his men because he would share their privations and believed always in attacking, he was destined to become a legend in French military history.

Louis Bourrienne (1769–1834)

A fellow student with Bonaparte at the military academy of Brienne, Bourrienne was a political animal who loved money. He was unsuited for a military career and entered the diplomatic corps under the ancien régime and held minor posts in Leipzig, Warsaw, and Stuttgart. He was imprisoned in Saxony as a revolutionary, and upon returning to France, he was once again arrested and incarcerated as a counterrevolutionary. Bonaparte intervened on his behalf, had him released, and made him his personal secretary. Bourrienne then became a Bonaparte devotee. The general-in-chief appreciated Bourrienne’s knowledge of languages, his diplomatic skills, and his prodigious memory.

Alexandre Dumas (1762–1806)

Commander of the cavalry division of l’Armée d’Orient and former general-in-chief of the Army of the Alps. He was the father of the novelist Alexandre Dumas. His reputation as a man of great physical strength was legendary in the French Revolutionary Army. He believed firmly in the principles of the French Revolution and was suspicious of Bonaparte’s ambitions. Born in Saint-Domingue, he was the son of a minor aristocratic French planter and his mother was a mulatto slave.

Jean-Baptiste Kléber (1753–1800)

General of division and veteran of the Rhine campaigns. He was a towering Alsatian who deeply believed in the republic. Born in Strasbourg, he spoke French with a German accent and was often at odds with Bonaparte. He was a practical man who believed in protecting his troops and was known for his bravery and coolness on the battlefield.

Gaspard Monge (1746–1818)

Professor of mathematics and former minister of the French Navy. He was responsible for the mass production of arms and artillery for the French Revolutionary Army. He was a father figure to Bonaparte whom the Corsican entrusted to seize and deliver the most valuable treasures in Italy during the Italian campaign of 1796 and bring them back to France. He was also one of the founders of l’École Polytechnique and was a member of the Scientific Institute.

Vivant Denon (1747–1825)

Official illustrator for the Egyptian expedition and member of the Scientific Institute, he was the first director of the Louvre. A former member of the Ancien Régime, he was a minor diplomat at Saint Petersburg and a courtier in Madame de Pompadour’s entourage at Versailles. He was briefly imprisoned during the Reign of Terror but escaped the guillotine through the intervention of Bonaparte’s wife, Joséphine de Beauharnais.

Joachim Murat (1769–1815)

General of brigade and Bonaparte’s future brother-in-law. He was to become a marshal of France and king of Naples. He would become the most flamboyant and reckless cavalry commander of the nineteenth century.

Aristide Aubert Dupetit-Thouars (1760–1798)

A veteran of naval action in the War of American Independence, he saw action in the West Indies and became a rising star in the French Royal Navy. Persecuted as a royalist marine officer, he spent most of the Revolution in the United States. He returned to France after the Reign of Terror and became the captain of the eighty-gun ship of the line Tonnant.

Nicolas-Jacques Conté (1755–1805)

Chief of the Aerostat Brigade, physicist, balloonist, and inventor extraordinaire who had lost one eye in an explosion. He helped measure the Great Pyramid of Giza, and Bonaparte said of him, Capable of creating the arts of France in the middle of the deserts of Arabia.

François-Paul Brueys d’Aigalliers (1743–1798)

Vice admiral of the French Mediterranean fleet. He was a veteran of many engagements against the English in the Antilles with Admiral de Grasse. He was an aristocrat by birth and was briefly stripped off his titles and honors during the French Revolution. He was devoted to Bonaparte and commanded the French fleet against Lord Nelson at the Battle of the Nile.

Louis Caffarelli du Falga (1756–1799)

General of brigade and siege specialist, he commanded the sappers (engineers) in the l’Armée d’Orient. He lost a leg in 1795 and replaced the limb with a wooden stump. He was extremely popular with the men and was a member of the Egyptian Institute.

Murad Bey (no dates)

Albanian by birth and middle-aged when the French invaded Egypt, he was the chief of the military caste the Mamluks and ruled jointly over Egypt with Ibrahim Bey. Known to have the strength of an ox and the cunning of a fox, he proved to be a formidable military opponent and led a guerrilla war against the French infidels.

Pauline Fourès (1776–1869)

The wife of Lieutenant Fourès of the Twentieth Chasseurs à Cheval, she followed her new husband on the ship to Egypt disguised in his regiment’s uniform and became Bonaparte’s mistress.

Lady Fatima Nafissa (no dates)

She was a former slave and concubine who became Murad Bey’s wife as compensation for a military victory. She was beautiful, charming, gentle, generous, rich, and as sly as her husband. She became popular in the small French community in Cairo and especially among the officer corps.

Louis de Casabianca (1755–1798)

Captain of the French fleet’s flagship, l’Orient. Like Bonaparte, he was born in Corsica but spent most of his life in the navy. Following in his father’s footsteps, his ten-year-old son, Giocante, accompanied him on the Egyptian expedition as a ship’s novice pilot.

Jean Lannes (1769–1809)

Bonaparte brought him from the Army of Italy, where he was a general of brigade and where he established his reputation for courage and leadership. Made a general of division for the invasion of the Holy Land, he subsequently became known as the Roland of the Army. He became a marshal of France and duke of Montebello.

Part One

We Will March to the Indus Valley

—General-in-Chief Napoleon Bonaparte

Chapter 1

I

June 1798

Malta, Aboard the French Flagship, l’Orient

Hélie Chevalier felt sick. He’d emptied too many bottles of mediocre red wine the night before with his fellow officers of the Seventh Hussars. His head throbbed. His tongue felt like a dry stick, and his lips were parched and cracked. He rubbed his glassy eyes and focused on the brown soles of a pair of barefoot, well-calloused feet of a powder monkey fast asleep and splayed on his back across the barrel of a thirty-four-pounder bronze cannon.

The lower decks in the vast hold of the 124-gun ship of the line l’Orient, the proud queen of the French armada, resembled a catacomb. The living quarters were shallow, narrow, and dank. In agony, Hélie listened to the grunts, groans, and offensive snoring of hundreds of men, cocooned in endless rows, suspended from rope-creaking hammocks. With seventy-nine other hussar and dragoon cavalry officers, he inhabited one of the larger chambers, each of them divided by blankets on the equally cramped middle deck.

The night was balmy, and though the gunports were swung wide open, the Central Mediterranean air was stagnant and humid. The stench of moist, half-naked bodies; woolen uniforms reeking of stale perspiration, tar, tallow, boiling salt-cured meat, tobacco smoke, garlic, olive oil; and empty boots that stank of ripe cheese converted the interior of l’Orient’s decks into a suffocating, foul-smelling, cavernous space of humanity.

Hélie shifted his gaze from the cabin boy’s feet to a copper cistern situated almost within his grasp. He longed for water but thought, The damn thing might as well be a hundred feet away. Eh bien, en avant, he whispered, deciding he could no longer stand his parched mouth. When his feet landed on deck, he kneaded his temples to ease his throbbing headache. He reached for a header and steadied himself. Confident he could walk without too much pain, he made his way to the cistern and turned the spigot and waited, and waited. Faint sounds of flowing water raised his hopes, but only a few drops of brown liquid trickled out.

"Bordel! I am fed up with this nonsense! he yelled. He slammed the side of the water tank, causing some of his comrades in arms to stir in their hammocks. Food stuffed with maggots, foul water, rock-hard meat, and cooped-like geese for weeks."

Oh, be quiet! Damn it, man, we want to sleep! yelled a dragoon.

Go to the devil! retorted Hélie.

The few drops of water that seeped from the spigot reminded Hélie of his father. It was a deeply haunting memory. The vision was of his bleeding and dying old man lying prostrate on the limestone floor of his family’s manoir near Selles-sur-Cher. He had been pitchforked through the stomach and chest by a mob of peasants led by Jacobins during the height of the Reign of Terror and left to bleed to death. His last words were that he wanted some water, and Hélie silently sobbed when he poured the drops down his quivering mouth.

He shook his head, as if he were chasing away a flying pest, and then gently rubbed the gold ring that pierced his right earlobe. The previous night’s escapade slowly became clear. He recalled how he had bribed an orderly to steal bottles from l’Orient’s vast hold of wine and spirits and invited some of his brother officers to empty them. The hussars chose to gather at the forecastle to drink and watch for the lights of Valletta, Malta’s main city. The officers’ bravado grew as they drank. In their eyes, l’Armée d’Orient was the most formidable force to set sail from France since the First Crusade, seven hundred years earlier. In a drunken revelry, the hussars compared themselves to latter-day knights that accompanied Godefroy de Bouillon to the Holy Land. When the dim lights of Valletta appeared on the horizon, their enthusiasm climaxed. Boisterous claims and vows were pledged among the officers that they would lead Bonaparte’s army into the Indus Valley and throw the English out of India and conquer it for the republic.

Still suffering from dehydration, Hélie proceeded to the nearest alternative cistern located outside, on the upper deck, near the mizzenmast. He fixed his gaze on the ladder and sighed. Hungover and feeling lousy, he decided he would rather die than make the effort to climb the steep steps. His burning thirst, however, compelled him.

Emerging on the open deck, which supported the twelve- and eight-pounder gun batteries and sea howitzers, he became transfixed by thousands of tiny flickering lights that dotted the surface of the sea. Visibility was slightly obscured by the early-morning fog, but he could see the lights coming from the hundreds of anchored warships and troop transports that filled the great harbor of Malta.

"Quelle magnificence," he said in marvel, drawing on what little saliva he had left to express the words. He stared in awe at the huge fleet. What a powerful and overwhelming sight! Nelson cannot possibly stop us now! he thought.

He walked over to the enormous container, anticipating the pleasure of quenching his thirst. He grabbed the large tin flagon chained to the cistern, turned the spigot, and impatiently filled it. Ah, thank God there’s water. He eagerly gulped the entire amount. Although the water was not fresh and cool, the liquid quenched his dry mouth and moistened his lips. He refilled the container and slowly drank from it, gazing in wonderment at the countless glowing lights of the ships. He was about to take another sip when he felt a firm hand compress his right shoulder.

Admiring the glorious view, citizen?

He turned around and saw that it was his companion from the Army of Italy Andoche Junot, Bonaparte’s favorite aide-de-camp and confidant. The usually irascible Junot looked calm, almost serene, which surprised him. The man was very close to the general-in-chief and first met him during the Siege of Toulon, where he chose to follow his commander’s rising star.

Hélie smiled. It is truly an amazing sight, no? Then his expression suddenly changed, reflecting concern. Any news of the English fleet? he asked.

You worry too much, my friend. In a short time we will be masters of the island of Malta, and the Mediterranean will be our lake! Junot scrutinized him and became concerned, seeing his companion in arms in such a disheveled state. Hard night, citizen?

Hélie was wearing his tight blue hussar breeches, but that was all. He was barefoot, shirtless, and his shoulder-length blond hair was unbraided, tangled, and matted from perspiration.

It’s just the rocking of the ship that makes me a little unsettled. He nervously touched the gold band that pierced his ear. Of course, this fetid water and a month’s diet of wormy biscuits, rotting rice, and salt pork certainly don’t help. The only thing fit to consume on this giant tub is bad Italian wine.

Well, I urge you to pull yourself together, ordered Junot gently but firmly. The general-in-chief wants to see us at six o’clock.

Bonaparte wants to see me? Since we left Toulon, he hasn’t given me the time of day. Why now?

The thought of seeing the temperamental Corsican sent a rush of adrenaline through his body, and his hangover suddenly vanished. He had first met him on the bridge at Arcole two years earlier, when he had become a hussar. He was at Bonaparte’s side when the general seized a tricolor from a standard-bearer and urged his troops onward to cross the crucial bridge. He knew that the general-in-chief had a fondness to call upon those men that served with him during the Italian campaign for special assignments.

Well, if he wants to see you, then it must be important. I will meet you in the grand chamber at six. Remember, don’t be late.

Hélie gave a mischievous grin. Would I upset Citizen Bonaparte if I were just one minute tardy?

Junot chuckled. If you do, it will be at your own peril.

II

For the first time since leaving Toulon, Bonaparte was in good spirits. He had spent most of the voyage in his cabin, lying on his side, feeling seasick and vomiting into a water pitcher. His mind was also plagued by the specter of Nelson and the English fleet that had been sent to intercept his armada in the Central Mediterranean. Bonaparte loathed the possibility of losing control, particularly over events that he knew stood well within his capabilities. Countless rounds of vomiting hadn’t helped matters. His situation made him more anxious and cantankerous than usual. Now, however, with the strategically vital island fortress a league within reach and the English fleet nowhere in sight, his spirits soared, and he relished the prospect of accomplishing the first step in his Egyptian campaign.

The commander in chief placed his hands on the surface of a large oak table to examine the land maps and naval charts. The great room in the roundhouse had been converted into a vast library consisting of thousands of books and served as the temporary nerve center for the expedition. Bonaparte glanced at the crammed bookshelves. He was pleased at his selection of works and felt confident that they would prove vital when he would land in Egypt and colonize the land for revolutionary France. Hundreds of books on contemporary European literature, political philosophy, world and military history, astronomy, physics, geology, chemistry, architecture, medicine, and civil administration encased the cabin.

Sitting at one end of the table was his adopted son, Eugène de Beauharnais, the eldest child of Joséphine from her previous marriage. Bonaparte had brought the seventeen-year-old lad with him to serve as one of his many aides-de-camp and intended to tutor the lad in the skills of war. Eugène was a shy boy who rarely spoke but was patient, attentive, and worshipped his stepfather.

Bonaparte stared at the map of fortifications, and his gaze turned to the island’s north side, where Malta’s formidable peninsula battlements, numerous dry dock facilities, and the port city of Valletta were located. He marveled at the drawings of the towering natural rock walls that protected the city from a coastal attack. He also scrutinized Malta’s interior interlocking fortifications consisting of two-dozen minor forts that protected the capital from the south, east, and west.

A knock on the door interrupted Bonaparte’s train of thought. "Entrare!" he barked in his rough Corsican accent.

A tall and impeccably dressed officer in a general’s uniform advanced into the room, elegantly closing the door behind him. He held his large red-white-and-blue-plumed bicorn hat under his arm.

Ah, Berthier! I hope you slept well, for we have a long day. Bonaparte barely gazed at his chief of staff; he was still studying Malta’s fortifications as if it were a mathematical problem.

Berthier solemnly stood at attention and slightly bowed his head. "Je suis a votre service, mon général-en-chef."

Where are the others? Bonaparte