Junot woke his general at dawn, an anxious expression on his face.

‘What’s the matter?’ Napoleon sat up. ‘What’s happened?’

‘The men have heard about the plague, sir.The rumour spread through the camp last night.They’re saying that this land is cursed. You should give up the siege and lead the army back to Egypt.’

‘What good would that do?’ Napoleon snapped. ‘We can hardly leave the plague behind. Besides, the men are overreacting. The victims have been isolated and the plague will run its course soon enough.’

‘I doubt that is going to satisfy the men.’

‘You may be right,’ Napoleon conceded. ‘Then we must act now to reassure them. They have to be shown that there’s nothing to fear. Have my staff officers summoned. I think it’s time for a little demonstration.’

‘What kind of demonstration, sir?’ Junot asked warily.

A smile flickered across Napoleon’s lips. ‘You’ll see soon enough, and I pray to God we live to tell the tale.’

As soon as he had dressed, Napoleon and his staff officers mounted up. He had given them no explanation and just wheeled his horse and trotted out of camp. The staff officers and a squadron of the guides followed him back down the road towards Jaffa before turning off into the hills a few miles from the camp. There on a small rise stood an old monastery with weathered walls. Outside stood several carts, tended by French soldiers. As Napoleon reined in outside the monastery the orderlies hurriedly rose to their feet and stood to attention.

‘Where is Dr Desgenettes?’

‘Inside, sir. With the patients.’

‘Well, send him my compliments and ask him to join me out here.’

‘Yes, sir.’ The orderly hurried inside and Napoleon turned back to his staff officers. ‘Junot, tell the guides to dismount and rest their horses. The rest of you are coming with me.’

‘Where, sir?’ Berthier asked nervously as he stared at the monastery. ‘Not in there, surely?’

‘You’re not afraid, are you, Berthier?’

‘Sir, I know what this place is. It would be madness to remain here another moment. We should leave. At once.’

‘Not until I’ve made my point.’ Napoleon turned at the sound of footsteps crossing the threshold of the monastery’s arched entrance, and saw Dr Desgenettes emerge from the dim interior. He looked exhausted and the surgeon’s apron he wore was soiled and stained with blood. He saluted. ‘I must say, I’m surprised to see you here, sir.’

‘Good. My staff and I have come to inspect your field hospital, doctor. Would you be kind enough to show us inside?’

‘Inside?’ Desgenettes’s eyebrows rose in surprise. ‘Very well then, sir. If you’d follow me.’

Napoleon turned to his staff and was amused to note their horrified expressions as he beckoned to them. ‘Come, gentlemen.’

Inside the monastery it was cold, despite the small braziers burning at each end. On both sides of the main hall was a line of palliasses on which lay the sick. Most were still and quiet, but here and there men moaned in agony.

‘This end is where we keep the recently admitted cases,’ Desgenettes explained. ‘If the symptoms progress, as they almost invariably do, then we move them to the far end.When they die they are taken out of the monastery for burial.’

‘What can be done for them?’ asked Napoleon, glancing down at the nearest man, a youngster no more than twenty. He had fine features and a shock of light brown curly hair and would have cut a handsome figure in his uniform. Already there were blackened swellings about his neck.

‘We try to keep them warm and comfortable, and alleviate the pain when the sickness gets to its most advanced stage. The men with the strongest constitutions might survive, but their recovery will be slow. If they show arrested symptoms they are moved to another room where we can minimise the risk of further infection - in theory.’

‘Aren’t you at risk, doctor?’ Junot asked.

‘Of course. So is any man in close contact with the sick.’

‘Then why haven’t you caught it?’

Desgenettes smiled. ‘How do you know I haven’t?’

Some of the men were still well enough to recognise their commander and tried to sit up.

‘No!’ Napoleon waved his hand at them.‘Lie still, soldiers.You must conserve your strength, or I’ll have you back on latrine duty in double time.’

Some managed a smile at that, but most stared at Napoleon with a lucklustre expression of despair and even resignation to their awful fate. He stopped at the foot of one of the makeshift beds and stared at the man lying there.

‘This one’s dead.’

Desgenettes came over and knelt beside the man, and felt for his pulse. After a moment he rose up and called out, ‘Stretcher bearers! Here!’

Two men came from outside carrying a stretcher and set it down beside the dead man. One took the body by the heels while the other lifted him under the shoulders and they hoisted him awkwardly across on to the stretcher. The blanket slid from his body, and there was a sharp intake of breath from Junot as the bare flesh of his torso was revealed.

‘Good God, look.’

Some of the buboes had burst and the discharge was smeared across his neck and chest.

‘Shit . . .’ muttered one of the orderlies, turning his nose away from the foul odour and instinctively stepping back a pace. His companion had already grasped his end of the stretcher and looked up angrily.

‘Come on, we have to get him out.’

‘Wait,’ Napoleon interrupted. ‘Let me.’

He pushed the reluctant orderly aside and grabbed the stretcher handles. ‘Ready? Let’s go then.’

The body was heavier than he expected and Napoleon strained his muscles to hold up his end of the stretcher.The other orderly backed out slowly and the staff officers followed behind them, looking at their general in surprise and awe.

‘Over there, sir.’ The orderly nodded towards a mound of earth to one side of the main hall, and they set off across the broken ground. As they drew closer, Napoleon breathing heavily from the strain and fighting the nausea threatening to well up in his stomach, it became apparent that the mound was the spoil from a large open grave. They paused at the edge and Napoleon glanced down on half a dozen soldiers sprawled in the pit.

‘Sir, when I say, we tip the stretcher. Ready? One . . . two . . . three!’

The body rolled off and tumbled down the side of the hole on to the other corpses. At once the orderly led the way back to the side of the monastery and they laid the stretcher down.

‘Thanks for the help, sir.’

‘The very least I could do.’ Napoleon nodded and turned to make his way back to the staff officers and Dr Desgenettes.‘Time we got back to the siege, gentlemen. Doctor!’

‘Sir?’

‘If there’s anything you need, just send word to Junot, and he’ll deal with it. In the meantime, since the army knows about the plague outbreak, there’s no point in remaining here. I noticed a small hill not far from the camp. Make arrangements to move your hospital to that site.’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘Carry on, then.’ Napoleon strode over to his horse and swung himself into the saddle. He was well aware of the astonished looks from his staff and the men of the escort, and had to stop himself from smiling. He knew that word of his act would spread round the army just as quickly as the news of the plague, and the men would, once again, take him as one of their own, enduring every risk that they did in the common bond that made them march as hard and fight as hard as they did. He knew it had been a risk, but a calculated one. He had not come into direct contact with the body and hoped that would spare him from infection. He would find out soon enough, he reflected, and then wheeled his horse about and spurred it back towards the camp.

When Napoleon and his staff returned to his headquarters he found the commander of the artillery train waiting for him. The man jumped to his feet and shuffled to attention as his commander rode up to his tent. With a weary sigh Napoleon realised that something had gone wrong. Steeling himself for the man’s report, he dismounted.