United States of Atlantis a-2 Read online

  "Yes, and at Croydon," Victor Radcliff replied. "We must do everything in our power to keep their two armies from joining forces."

  "That seems sensible," the escaped printer said. "Nevertheless, we will try not to hold it against you."

  Before Victor had to respond to that, Matthew Radcliffe asked him, "How do you view the situation in the west?"

  "Through a glass, darkly," Victor told his distant cousin. A ripple of laughter ran through the Assembly. He wondered why; he meant it. "I have visited Avalon and New Marseille only once- most of my life has passed on this side of the Green Ridge Mountains, as you well know. I understand the importance of holding all we can there, but I would be lying if I said I had any certainty as to ways and means."

  An Assemblyman he didn't know said, "It sounds as though we have too much to do and not enough to do it with."

  It sounded that way to Victor, too. Admitting as much would probably result in the army of the National Assembly getting a new commander on the instant. With a shrug, he replied, "Sir, I can but promise my best effort and full dedication to victory. I do not believe it will come swiftly. Anyone who does, in my view, has charged his brier with something stronger than pipeweed." He got another laugh for something he didn't intend as a joke.

  After more questions and more back-and-forth among the illustrious Assemblymen-they all thought they were, anyhow-they finally got around to calling the question. No one voted against putting Victor in charge of their makeshift army, although several Assemblymen abstained. If things went wrong later, they could say it wasn't their fault.

  If things went wrong later, chances were what they said wouldn't matter a farthing's worth.

  Somewhere close to two thousand men had gathered outside of New Hastings. Victor's first order of business was to give them the rudiments of drill, so they could-with luck-perform as an army, not a mob. Veterans from the war against French Atlantis had some notion of marching and countermarching and deploying from column to line and other such mysteries.

  Understanding them well enough to teach them to men who had no notion they existed, though… In the whole encampment, Victor found two men he trusted with the job. One was a deserter from the redcoats, a barrel-chested sergeant who'd fallen in love with an Atlantean barmaid and changed sides because of her. Tim Knox had a manner that brooked no argument and a voice that carried halfway to Hanover.

  The other drillmaster was Blaise.

  A few people objected to taking orders from a Negro. Victor had seen that in the last war, too. After Blaise knocked the stuffing out of a couple of the grumblers, the rest of the men stopped complaining. Blaise took it all in stride. "In Africa, my clan wouldn't want to do what a white man said, either," he remarked.

  "Had you ever seen a white man before you were brought to the coast and sold?" Victor asked him.

  "Once. A trader. He died of a fever in our village," Blaise said. "We took what he had-iron needles and little shears and the like. The women were so happy!" He smiled at the memory.

  "Poor trader wasn't," Victor Radcliff said.

  "True." Blaise nodded. "You white men have learned all sorts of tricks we don't know: everything from those good needles- ours are bone, and not so slender-to books and guns and ships, But you have not got the trick of staying healthy in our country."

  Radcliff had heard the same thing from men who dealt in slaves off the African coast. They'd sounded irked, not-relieved?- the way Blaise did. Victor had another question for Blaise, one that mattered more than how Africans thought about white men: "Are we ever going to make soldiers out of these militiamen?"

  "Maybe," Blaise said. "Chances are, about the time their enlistments run out."

  "Ha!" Victor said, not that Blaise was kidding. Since the war that swallowed French Atlantis, militias had sadly decayed. There was no one left to fight-the Spaniards in the south weren't going to cause trouble, so why worry about drilling? Unless Hanover went to war with New Hastings, people in Atlantis could live in peace, and they did.

  And, because they did, most of them didn't know the first thing about soldiering. Even the young men who took up arms against England weren't thrilled about learning, either.

  "Do the best you can, that's all," Victor said. "If we can keep our armies in the field for a while-and if we can keep the same people in them-the men will pick up what they have to know."

  "If we can't, we lose," Blaise said.

  Radcliff nodded. "I know. I figured that out, too. Quite a few people in the Atlantean Assembly haven't yet."

  "But they are supposed to be the smartest men in Atlantis," Blaise said.

  "So they are," Victor agreed. "And if that isn't a judgment on all of us, I don't know what would be. One more thing, too." He waited till the Negro made a questioning noise, then went on, "In their infinite wisdom, they're the ones who chose me for chief general. Makes you wonder, eh?"

  Blaise said not a word.

  The courier rode into the encampment outside of New Hastings five minutes after Victor Radcliff had sat down to half a fat roasted capon with starberry sauce spooned over it. The green sauce, tart and sweet at the same time, came from one of Atlantis' few native berries, a product of the thinly settled southwest.

  It went well with chicken, and even better with greasier fowl like duck and goose.

  A sentry let the courier into Victor's tent, making him pause with a bite halfway to his mouth. "Yes?" he said.

  "Sir, the English are coming," the courier said, and then, "Could I have a bite of that? I'm powerful hungry."

  Victor liked white meat better than dark. He tore off the drumstick and handed it to the newcomer. As the fellow started to eat, Victor demanded," Where are the English coming?" The courier had interrupted his supper; he saw no reason not to return the disfavor.

  " Wumbumpf," the courier said with his mouth full-that was what it sounded like, anyhow.

  "Would you care to try that again?" Victor asked.

  The man swallowed heroically. "Weymouth," he managed, and took another bite, this one even bigger than the last

  "Ah," Victor said. That did make sense-an unpleasant amount of sense, in fact. Weymouth was a small coastal town that lay between New Hastings and Hanover, closer to the latter. Victor would have said the English were welcome to the place-if ever a town had a fine future behind it, Weymouth was the one-if only it didn't have a sizable arsenal. He couldn't afford-Atlantis couldn't afford-to lose the tons of powder and lead bars stored there.

  As things were, he wasn't sure how much he could do about it. If the enemy started out closer to Weymouth and moved first… Maybe he should just send as many wagons as he could, and hope to salvage at least part of the military supplies.

  "When did they march?" he asked. "How fast are they going? Is anyone trying to hold them back?"

  "Powerful thirsty, too," the courier said. At Victor's shouted order, he got a mug of beer. He drained it at one long blissful pull, his Adam's apple bobbing up and down as he swallowed.

  Then he told Victor what he knew. General Howe wasn't moving south very fast. He didn't think he needed to, even though loyalists had told him about the armory. He didn't believe the Atlanteans had an army that could fight his. He also didn't believe they would even if they could.

  Militiamen and enthusiastic volunteers between Hanover and Weymouth were doing their best to make him think twice. They were shooting at his men from behind fences and from the woods. They were blocking the roads with barricades of rocks and fallen trees. One enterprising group had dammed a roadside stream and turned the roadbed to water and mud. No, the redcoats weren't making good time.

  Which meant it behooved the Atlanteans to hurry if they wanted to hold Weymouth. Victor set them in motion the morning after he got the news the English were advancing on the town. He wanted to leave New Hastings at the crack of dawn. In fact, the army started marching more than two hours later.

  The column straggled much more than it should have, too. Men fell out w
henever they grew tired or got sore feet. At every stream and pond, militiamen splashed water on their faces. When sergeants and officers screamed at them to keep going, the soldiers yelled back. As far as they could see, they were in this because they felt like it, or for a lark. That the war and what came from it might be important didn't seem to have entered their heads.

  They might have advanced ten miles by the time they halted for the evening. A properly trained army would have gone twice as far. Seeing that, Victor was almost ready to despair.

  "If they get there before us-" he groaned.

  "Then we don't stop them," Blaise finished for him. The Negro grunted with relief as he took off his boots. "I've got sore feet myself. I'm more used to riding than to marching."

  "Good for you!" Victor said, snapping his fingers. "You've reminded me of something, anyhow."

  "What's that?" Blaise examined his heels and the balls of his feet and the bottoms of his toes.

  "I can send horsemen ahead of the main body. Maybe they'll keep the redcoats out of Weymouth till the rest of us get there." Victor scowled blackly. "Or maybe they'll stop at every tavern along the way, drink rum, pinch the barmaids, and never get there at all. Christ, maybe they'll ride off toward the Green Ridge Mountains after butterflies! Nobody knows till I try it-I'm sure the dragoons don't."

  "I don't… think… they'll go chasing butterflies, General." Blaise spoke with exaggerated care, as if humoring a lunatic

  Victor Radcliff felt fairly lunatic just then. "Well, maybe not," he allowed. Though he had no enormous confidence they would do what he wanted, he summoned the leaders of the mounted infantry and gave them their orders.

  "You're sending us off as a forlorn hope, then," said a bright young captain named Habakkuk Biddiscombe.

  "Forlorn hope" was what people called the advance parties who tore up the abatis in front of enemy earthworks. Those parties got the name because not many of the men in them usually lived through the attempt. Radcliff shook his head. "No, Captain. I want you to delay the redcoats, yes. But I don't want you to throw away your men's lives or your own doing it."

  "You want us to fire and fall back, then," another officer said.

  "Yes!" Victor nodded gratefully. "That is exactly what I want of you."

  "The only way we can fire and fall back is to get well north of Weymouth before we meet the enemy," Habakkuk Biddiscombe said. "We'd best commence straightaway if we are to have any hope of gaining so much ground."

  "Bless my soul," Victor murmured. Someone grasped the essence of the situation, then. Radcliff made himself nod. "I couldn't have put it better myself, Habakkuk."

  "In that case, let's get moving." Captain Biddiscombe herded the other officers of dragoons out of Victor's tent. A few minutes later, some loud and profane swearing came from the mounted infantrymen. A few minutes after that, aided by a waxing gibbous moon, they rode out of the camp, heading north.

  "Can they get there soon enough to do any good?" Blaise asked.

  "I don't know," Victor answered. "I do know they have a better chance setting out now than they would if they left tomorrow morning. And I think-I don't know yet, but I think-Captain Biddiscombe will get everything they have to give from them, and maybe a little more besides. An officer like that is worth his weight in gold."

  "And maybe a little more besides?" Blaise's voice was sly. "Yes, by God!" Victor nodded. "Every once in a while, maybe a lot more besides."

  Victor ordered the buglers to wake the army before sunrise, so the men could start marching at first light. By the groans and oaths that greeted the horn calls, the buglers won no friends doing it. In an army that elected most of its officers and underofficers, friendship was important. Victor didn't care. As far as he was concerned, getting to Weymouth was important. Everything else could wait.

  Militiamen gnawed hard bread and gulped tea or coffee or beer. The army drove some unhappy beeves with it, too. The cooks knocked a few of them over the head, just enough to leave everybody dissatisfied with the portion he got.

  Victor Radcliff was certainly dissatisfied with his portion. "This is some of the most odious beef I ever had the misfortune to eat," he said.

  "Better than no beef at all," Blaise said, grease running down his chin. "Better than slave rations, too. And we won't work as hard when we fight as I did out in the fields. Sergeants don't have whips, either."

  "Do you feel the lack?" Victor inquired, not altogether ironically.

  "Only every now and again," Blaise answered-also not altogether ironically. He took another bite of beef. He had better teeth than Victor did. Dentistry wasn't quite hell on earth, but it came close. Even after heroic doses of brandy and opium-or of laudanum, which combined the two-losing a tooth hurt like blazes.

  "As long as your men fear you worse than they fear enemy musketry, they'll hold the line," Victor said. "That's what we need."

  Blaise's wave took in the Atlantean army's encampment. "Can we fight the redcoats with troops like this?" he asked. "Seems to me we had better men when we took on the French settlers. And we had England to back us up then, too-we didn't go against her."

  "The second is true, of course," Victor said. "As for the first…" He shrugged. "This is a raw force. No one would say any different. But as soon as the men gain some experience-"

  "Their enlistment time runs out, and they go home," Blaise broke in.

  "That isn't what I was going to say, dammit!" Victor burst out, which made it no less true. He sighed and took a careful bite of his tough, stringy beef. "Before long, we shall have to improve our system of recruitment. In the meanwhile, what choice have we but to do the best we can with what the Atlantean Assembly, in its infinite wisdom, has seen fit to give us?"

  "If we lose a few times, how well we fought won't matter." Yes, Blaise was ruthlessly pragmatic.

  Again, Radcliff thought his comment altogether too likely. Still… "The first few times, I would not be completely discontented with any result that demonstrates we can confront English soldiers on terms approximating equality. Our men need to believe that-and so does the enemy."

  "If it be true," Blaise said.

  "Yes. If." Victor Radcliff might not have admitted that even to his wife. As much to raise his own spirits as for any other reason, he went on, "The last time around, you will recall, we fought not only French settlers but also French regulars. We did well enough against 'em, too. I see no reason we can't do the same against King George's redcoats. Am I overlooking anything?"

  "Only that, when we fought the French, all these settlements joined together against them," the Negro said. "How many settlers now aim to fight on King George's side?"

  Victor grunted uncomfortably. He'd already talked about loyalists. He knew too well that this fight would split families. It had already split some. Custis Cawthorne's press and his formidable wit were at the Atlantean Assembly's disposal. Richard Cawthorne, his eldest son, was royal governor of Freetown, south of New Hastings. Richard was not the man his father was. But he was, by all accounts, capable and conscientious: a good enough servant for the king.

  "Not many settlers who aim to fight for King George are in camp with us here," Victor said, again trying to buck himself up.

  "Nooo," Blaise said, which sounded like agreement but was anything but. He found another unpleasant question to ask: "But how many of 'em are hotfooting it off to General Howe, to tell him how many men we've got and how they're accoutered? By the time we fight, he'll know everything about us except the holes in our stockings."

  "Well, it's not as if we won't know as much about his men," Radcliff replied. Patriots came south with word of Howe's movements and of his regiments. And more than a few redcoats, having come to Atlantis, wanted nothing more than to strip off their uniforms and either join the Assembly's army and take aim at their former comrades or to go off into the wilderness where neither side would trouble them again.

  "How soon before we meet him?" Blaise asked. "Two or three days," Victor said. "Three
, I hope: that will mean our skirmishers are making his march a misery. It will also mean we've passed through Weymouth and saved what's in the arsenal. We won't get powder from England any more, either."

  "Not unless we take it from the redcoats' baggage train after we beat them." Blaise understood how war worked, all right.

  "I hope we can do that. I expect we will, some of the time. But we are going to have to make our own, too. If we need to depend on what we can steal, we're ruined," Victor said.

  From horseback, he urged his men to hurry north. Every so often, a horseman would come down and tell him where General Howe's army was-or rather, where it had been when the horseman rode off to report on it. Victor had to calculate how long it had taken each rider to come from one army to the other. That told him about where the redcoats were at any moment, and about how fast they were coming.

  "Whole countryside's in arms against 'em," one scout told him. "They've got to battle their way past every copse of trees and every stone fence within range of the road to Weymouth."

  "Good," Victor said. He scowled at the map he held open between his knees. How much nonsense would his horse put up with before it tried to buck him off onto his head? If he was doing his sums correctly, Howe and the Englishmen ought to be about… there. He did some more sums in his head. Then he blinked in sudden glad surprise. "By God! We really may get to Weymouth ahead of them! Who would have believed it?"

  "Way they go stealing anything that ain't nailed down, no wonder everybody wants to take a shot at 'em," the Atlantean scout said.

  "Well… yes." Victor Radcliff hid as much of a smile as he could. The redcoats' thievery was far from unique. The French Atlanteans had robbed just as enthusiastically in the last war. So had the English Atlanteans, come to that. Soldiers in the Atlantean Assembly's army-his army-were bound to plunder, too. Victor dared hope they would mostly steal from farmers who favored King George. Sometimes, though, it didn't do to inquire too closely.

  Heavy wagons carried hogsheads of gunpowder out of Weymouth and down toward New Hastings. The Atlantean soldiers moved off the road to let those wagons by, where all the other traffic had had to move aside for the army's sake. Other wagons brought muskets and lead away from the redcoats. Victor was glad to see them. Even if Weymouth fell, the precious munitions stored there wouldn't fall into English hands.