Thus it was that I was with the Emperor the day it all came down.
It was a dank and chilly morning, three days before year's end. A heavy gray fog had moved in off Lake Borgne during the previous evening, and now hung above the river and the eastern swamps, and the plantation fields between, as we rolled southward along the river road. Sitting up on the seat next to the driver, I wrapped a blanket about myself and cursed through my chattering teeth. What a ghastly day to go out, but the Emperor was quite insistent. Nelson's ships had been sighted on the river the previous afternoon, only a few miles south of English Turn; clearly the time was almost at hand.
Suddenly a horseman appeared through the fog up ahead, riding hard toward us. Seeing us, he took off his hat and began waving it frantically up and down.
The driver and I looked at each other. I shrugged and, after a moment, the driver pulled the horses to a stop.
Almost immediately a window opened beneath us and the Emperor's voice came up to us, demanding to know why we were stopping. But by that time the rider was upon us; a slender handsome young man, dressed, I saw now, in the bright uniform of an ensign in the Louisiana Hussars.
"Please," he gasped, "sir-uh, y'r Majesty-"
"Never mind," the Emperor said impatiently. "What do you want, lad?"
The boy-he really was not much more-took a deep breath and gathered himself visibly. "I have to report, your Majesty," he said with strained formality, "that the enemy are attacking our position in strength."
The Emperor's head appeared through the carriage window. "What?" he cried, and then paused, hearing, now that the horses' hooves were silent, the distant rattle and pop of musket fire from somewhere on down the river.
"But the guns," he said then, staring at the horseman. "I hear neither our artillery nor the ships' guns!"
The lad shook his head. "Not the ships, sir. They came in from the east-looks like they crossed Lake Borgne yesterday, in the fog, and moved up through the bayous, and then early this morning they came up out of the swamp and across the plantation fields-one of Colonel Crockett's scouts spotted them, but, uh, well, General Jackson didn't believe him at first-" He stopped, looking appalled at his own indiscretion. "Uh, that is to say-"
The Emperor said, "Name of God! They attacked from the landward side?"
"Yes, sir." The ensign nodded. "Where our defenses were weakest, and of course all the big guns are emplaced to cover the river-"
"The English," the Emperor said, "do they have artillery?"
"Don't know, your Majesty. Haven't brought them into play yet, if they do. Plenty of infantry, though. Must be a thousand, maybe two thousand, hard to tell in this fog. They just keep coming." The ensign's eyes were blinking rapidly. "General Jackson sent me to warn you-"
"Yes, yes." The carriage door opened; the Emperor began clambering down, not waiting for me to attend him. Before I could get down from the seat, he was already standing in the road, snapping his fingers at the young officer. "Your horse," he said. "Give me your horse."
"Sir? Your Majesty?" The ensign looked blank, but then he must have seen the Emperor's expression more clearly. "Yes, sir," he said hastily, and swung down. "Uh, shall I-"
"You shall get out of my way." The Emperor was already hauling himself into the saddle, clumsily and with obvious pain. "Driver, follow me. Let the ensign ride with you."
Swinging the horse about, digging his dress boot heels into its flanks, the Emperor disappeared at a gallop into the fog, toward the growing noise of battle. After a moment the driver raised his eyebrows and put the team in motion again, while the young ensign scrambled aboard and pulled himself up beside us.
Already we could see the flashes of gunfire through the mist ahead, and now louder explosions came rolling up the road to meet us: cannon getting into the action at last. I looked inquiringly at the young hussar, but he shook his head. "No idea," he said hoarsely. "No telling whose-"
Then there was a blast like all the thunder in the world, and another right on its heels, and his face went even paler. "Oh, my God," he whispered. "Warships firing broadsides. The bastards are hitting us from the river too."
It hardly required a formal military education to see the implications: the defenders caught between advancing British infantry in one direction and the fire of the ships' guns raking them from the other.
The ensign was climbing down now. "You better wait here," he called up to the driver.
The driver pulled the carriage to a stop, while the ensign dropped to the ground, just as the first soldiers appeared through the fog coming the other way. Infantry, wearing the blue uniforms of the Empire, and running very hard…
Perched up on top of the carriage, I had a fine view of the rout. They ran past us on either side, hardly a man even seeming to notice us except as an obstacle; their eyes were enormous in their smoke-blackened faces and their mouths mostly hung open. A few clutched at bloody wounds.
Horsemen appeared now, most of them in flight as well, a few-officers, I supposed-evidently trying, without success, to stop the retreat. Horse and foot, the hurrying tide jammed the road and spread out over the open fields to our left, without order or discipline but with a splendid unity of direction: away from the British, toward the city and safety, while behind them the guns still bellowed and muskets and rifles cracked.
Our hussar ensign stood in the middle of the road, waving his sword, shouting at the fleeing men, ordering them to turn back, till he tripped-or was tripped-and went down and disappeared under all those running feet. I closed my eyes for a moment in revulsion.
When I opened them I saw that the driver was pointing. "Look," he said, and after a moment I saw them, the Emperor and General Jackson, charging their horses this way and that amid the hurrying throng, slowly being forced back along the road by weight of numbers. Jackson was slashing this way and that with his sword, without apparent effect; the Emperor, who rarely wore side arms, was in any case having to use both hands to control the hussar's frightened horse.
And quite soon they went past us too, Jackson on the left-he turned and gave me a furious look as he passed, God knows why-and the Emperor on the right. The Emperor did not even glance our way. His face was terrible to see.
Finally they were all past, leaving us alone on the levee-top road, though off across the open ground a few stragglers still picked their way through the sugar-cane trash. And, a few minutes later, a fresh batch of men came out of the fog, moving less hurriedly and in a far more orderly manner. Even in the misty light, their red coats looked very fine.
The driver's nerve broke, then; without a word he scrambled down from the seat and took off up the road, after the departing Imperial troops. Left alone, I took the reins and quieted the restive horses, and a few minutes later found myself surrounded by grinning red-coated infantrymen. "Wot's the matter, then, Uncle?" one called up to me. "Run off and leave you, did they?"
Another cried, "Look, boys! Burn my arse if this ain't Boney's carriage! Look here, on the doors!"
They all gathered around, staring and chattering; then all fell silent as an elegantly uniformed man came riding up on a horse. "You men!" he called. "Who gave the order to break formation?" Then, seeing the carriage, "Damme!"
He looked at me. "Emperor's driver, are you?"
"Merely a manservant," I told him. "Sir."
"Major Grigsby, 7thFusiliers." He gave a mocking little half-salute. "Can you drive this thing, then, my man?"
"After a fashion."
"Then," he said, "be so good as to do so, until you reach a point where you can turn off this road, which you are now blocking, and which we need for the guns." He turned. "Sergeant, detail four men to escort this vehicle, and guard it against the light-fingered. The commander will enjoy this, I should think."