The men on the vessels anchored around the general’s Indiaman did not have long to wait. Scarcely half an hour after Arthur had returned from the flagship, signal flags rose up the halyards. Arthur and Fitroy turned to the first mate for an explanation.

‘All ships, prepare to make sail. Course, west by north,’ the mate intoned.

‘What does it mean?’ Fitzroy asked as the first orders were bellowed across the deck of the transport and the sailors went to their stations.

The mate scratched his chin.‘It means that we’re heading back to Calcutta.’

‘Calcutta . . .’ Fitzroy repeated quietly in a tone of disgust. ‘What a bloody waste of time.’

Arthur pressed his lips together. Once again, another chance to win his spurs had been snatched away from him.The war was likely to be over long before he could prove himself, and the only prospect that the future would hold out for him would be an undistinguished oblivion. He cursed the latest twist of fate with all his heart, and bitterly began to wonder how much more he could have achieved if only he had been one of the blessed few young soldiers who were the darlings of fate, like that damned fortunate Frenchman, Bonaparte.

Chapter 27 - Napoleon

Chapter 27

Napoleon

Paris, December 1797

The treaty that France had signed with Austria at Campo Formio brought peace to Europe, for the moment. Only the old enemy, England, remained, watching warily from the other side of the Channel. When Napoleon and Junot returned to his modest home on Rue Chantereine Napoleon was surprised to see how quickly the people of Paris had responded to peace. The shop windows were full of luxury items and well-dressed dandies and their ladies walked the streets cheek by jowl with the dowdy masses, almost as if there had never been a revolution. Expensive carriages rattled over the cobbled boulevards, weaving through the pedestrians and sedan chairs.

‘You’d never guess this was the same city described by Augereau,’ Junot muttered. ‘I thought the place was supposed to be simmering on the edge of a violent uprising.’

‘Seems peaceful,’ Napoleon agreed, his bright eyes flickering from side to side as they rode down a street close to his home. ‘We’ll find out soon enough.’