Doctor Who_ World Game - Doctor Who_ World Game Part 37
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Doctor Who_ World Game Part 37

Boney favours a white charger, I believe. Get the Doctor the best one you can find. Goodbye, gentlemen, and good luck.

And pray God that our own troops don't shoot you before you reach the French lines!'

He turned and gazed down into the valley below, where the battle raged on. French infantry supported by cavalry was attacking the English squares. The squares were fewer now and more ragged, but still they held. From both sides of the lines, batteries of cannon roared and thundered.

'Dammed hard pounding, gentlemen,' said the Duke. 'We shall see who can pound the longest!' He turned to an aide and began scribbling a note. 'Tell Lambert to bring his brigade forward in support...' Soon he was issuing a stream of orders, the Doctor and Grant forgotten.

Chapter Thirty-four.

The Impostor

The Doctor and Colonel Grant were riding down the side of the valley towards a little wood. The Doctor was mounted on a spirited white charger, which he was just about managing to control. Grant wore a cloak over his cuirassier uniform and the Doctor had tucked his bicorn hat inside his coat. As Wellington had pointed out, there was no point in being captured, or even shot by their own side.

'Boissy Wood,' shouted the Colonel. 'It lies right across our route. Temporarily in French hands. We'd better put on the fancy dress!'

He took off his cloak and folded it away in a saddlebag and the Doctor resumed his Napoleonic hat. The Doctor in the lead, they trotted down the little path that led into the shadowy wood.

It was dark and gloomy between the trees and they hadn't penetrated far into the wood before they were challenged. As they rode into a little clearing, a huge, blue-coated, heavily moustached French infantry sergeant loomed up before them, musket trained on the Doctor.

'Halt! Who goes there? Answer or we fire!'

There was a rustle of movement, and more soldiers appeared around the edge of the clearing. They were surrounded.

The Doctor rose in his stirrups. 'Pigs!' he shouted. 'Is this how you receive your Emperor? Let he that has a heart to kill his Emperor shoot!'

It was the appeal Napoleon had used on his escape from Elba. Now, as then, it worked like a charm.

'Present arms!' roared the sergeant, and the threatening muskets whirled in salute. The sergeant came to attention and saluted. 'Your pardon, my Emperor. Nobody expected to see you here, so far from headquarters and with so small an escort...'

'I was making a tour of the front line,' snapped the Doctor.

'We were ambushed by English cavalry in a sudden sortie.

Only this brave lieutenant here managed to stay with me. We were lucky to escape.'

'All France was lucky, my Emperor,' said the sergeant.

'We will escort you back to HQ.'

'No, no,' said the Doctor hurriedly. 'That is not my destination. I seek the road to Waivre.'

'Waivre? But that is the direction of the Prussians.'

Was there a hint of suspicion in the big sergeant's voice?

'Do you dare to question the decisions of your Emperor?'

screamed the Doctor. 'If my orders have been obeyed, Waivre is also the direction of a brigade of my troops. I mean to give those dammed Prussians a touch of cold steel.'

'Your pardon, my Emperor,' said the sergeant hurriedly.

'The road to Waivre it shall be. Come on lads, let us escort our Emperor upon his way.'

The infantrymen gathered around them, and amidst cries of 'Make way for the Emperor!' they were escorted to a crossroads just outside the wood.

'There lies the road to Waivre, my Emperor,' said the sergeant, pointing. 'Give the Prussians a bloody nose for us!'

'My thanks, brave fellows,' said the Doctor. 'You have served your country well.'

To the cheers of the soldiers, the Doctor and Grant galloped away.

'You did well there, Doctor,' called Grant when they'd covered a safe distance. 'For a moment I thought you'd overdone it.'

'It's the advantage of being a dictator,' replied the Doctor.

He had been saddened by the need to trick the French soldiers perhaps even seal their fate. But for the sake of so many more people in the future it simply had to be done. 'In an authoritarian society,' he told Grant, 'people obey the voice of authority.'

They rode on their way.

It was some time later and the Doctor was beginning to feel saddle-sore, when they saw a little village in the distance, just beyond a crossroads. Clustered around the village, and covering the fields beyond, were hordes of black-uniformed soldiers.

'It's the Prussians!' said Grant in astonishment. 'They're much nearer than I thought. But what are they sitting there for when they ought to be advancing on Waterloo?'

The Doctor had his suspicions. In a way this was what he had expected. 'Let's find out,' he said.

They rode towards the village and were halted almogt immediately by a guard picket of Prussian foot soldiers. 'Who goes there?'

Adjusting his hat the Doctor stared down at them. 'Don't you know who I am?'

The sentry stared up at him in awe. 'No...It can't be!'

The lieutenant in charge of the picket came hurrying up.

He looked at the Doctor in equal amazement. 'Sir, what are you doing here?' A wild thought struck him. 'Have you come to surrender?'

'Not to an officer of your rank,' said the Doctor haughtily.

'Take me to General Blucher.'

'This way, sir. He's in the village.' They dismounted and one of the soldiers took their horses. The lieutenant led them into the village and up to the door of what was obviously the village inn.

He stopped at the door and hesitated. 'You will please to make allowances for the General, sir. He is no longer young, and he has recently been wounded. And, of course, he is not expecting so distinguished a visitor.'

He opened the door to reveal a primitive-looking bar.

Stretched out on a pallet on the floor was a tubby, be-whiskered, white-haired old gentleman. At the sight of the Doctor he bounded energetically to his feet.

' Mein Gott Mein Gott, are we being invaded? Or has he come to surrender?'

'So he says, my General,' said the young lieutenant.

General Blucher marched up to the Doctor. As he came closer, the Doctor noticed that his face was covered in bruises, and that he was giving off a powerful reek, a mixture of embrocation, garlic and rum. He peered into the Doctor's face.

'This man is not Napoleon,' he announced. 'I have seen the Emperor many times and this is not the man. It takes more than a hat to make an emperor.'

The Doctor took off the hat and tossed it on the bar. 'Quite right, General. I am not Napoleon any more than this man is a French cuirassier.'

Blucher stared at the tall cuirassier. 'Colonel Grant! What is going on here?'

'We used these disguises as a means to reach you,' said the Doctor. 'To bring you an urgent dispatch from the Duke of Wellington. He needs your support.'

Grant handed over the message and Blucher studied it.

'But this is absurd. The Duke asks me to take the field immediately. That was my original plan. When I reached this point I received a dispatch from the Duke. I was to hold my position and await further orders. The Duke was most emphatic. On no account was my army to move until he had decided where we were most needed.'

'May I see this dispatch sir?' asked Grant.

Blucher rummaged in some papers on the bar and produced the dispatch.

Grant studied it. 'A forgery,' he announced. 'An excellent forgery, but still a forgery. I can assure you my dispatch is genuine, General. I had it from the Duke's own hand.'

'Who brought the forged dispatch?' asked the Doctor.

Blucher shrugged. 'A young Guards officer. Thin, young fellow, very elegant. One of the Duke's aides or so I believed. I did not know him personally.' Blucher laughed. 'He had a woman with him. I thought how typical of the Guards to bring their mistresses to battle.'

'What did she look like?' asked the Doctor, though he felt he already knew the answer.

'Very beautiful. She had dark hair and blue eyes, most unusual.'

'The Countess!' growled Grant. 'A dangerous French spy.

The man is her accomplice. Tried to assassinate the Duke at the Duchess of Richmond's ball.'

'We're wasting time,' said the Doctor. 'Can you carry out the Duke's orders, General Blucher?'

'Of course, and very quickly, even in my condition. You see the state of me? Knocked off my horse and ridden over by cavalry my own my own cavalry!' cavalry!'

'We must get back to the Duke and give him the good news,' said Grant.

As they turned to the door, the Doctor wondered if the fake dispatches were the whole of the Countess's plan. He was soon to have his answer.

A Prussian captain rushed into the bar and saluted. 'Large body of French troops approaching, sir. Infantry and cavalry.'

Blucher snatched up a telescope and ran to the door. He raised the telescope and studied the troop movements on the distant hills. Snapping the telescope shut he said, 'Here we have a pretty problem, my friends. I am very willing to carry out the Duke's orders. But how can I take the field at Waterloo if I am fighting a running battle with those gentlemen yonder?'

Chapter Thirty-five.

Duel

So that was the Countess's plan, thought the Doctor. The way that Napoleon could win at Waterloo, even against Wellington. The Prussians lured into a trap, and severely mauled, prevented from bringing Wellington their vital last-minute support, the support that would tip the balance in the French favour. The battle over, the victorious Napoleon would then send his Grand Army to finally annihilate the Prussians.

His eye fell on the bicorn hat on the bar and he picked it up.

'Then we'll just have to ask our French friends to go away, won't we?' He settled the bicorn on his head and thrust a hand inside his jacket. 'And we'll just have to hope that a hat makes an emperor after all!'

Grant looked hard at him. 'Are you suggesting what I think you're suggesting?'

'Why not? It worked before.'

'It worked against a confused sergeant in a dark wood.