Nearer now, much nearer, came the sound of swordplay, of sparks being struck off sabres and metal applied to fragile fresh. Several more servants melted away.
‘Come with me, sir,’ said the Prince’s senior cravat folder. ‘We may yet escape through the kitchens…’
He meant well but Talleyrand frowned at him. He had never, even in extreme youth, so lowered himself as to run, and didn’t intend to sample such dubious delights now. Quite apart from anything else, his club foot debarred him from having both haste and poise. Better death than even a moment without dignity.
‘A thousand pardons, highness…,’ said the flunky, remembering whom he addressed. Talleyrand graciously waved all remembrance of the faux pas away and remained sitting calmly to await Fate’s decree.
Loseley House had a garrison of guards—elements of the famed ‘Scots Guards,’ to be precise. Dark, dour, men with an distressing propensity for wearing colourful skirts. Loseley locals termed them the ‘poison dwarfs.’ Talleyrand, though a tolerant man, and never for a second doubting their professional skills, always requested they kept out of sight when his friends called.
Yet, despite the suddenness of this attack it was clear they were in plain view now. Interspersed with the sounds of combat could be heard their peculiar variant of the English language, expressing orders, protests at pain and some rather wince-worthy profanity.
Talleyrand tutted.
‘I can understand men wishing to kill one another,’ he observed to the company, ‘but surely there’s no need to be rude about it…’
The Prince also had two Home Office bodyguards allocated to him, though they chanced to be elsewhere when this present unpleasantness began. Talleyrand had every confidence they were now making best efforts to be with him, but he wouldn’t weep over their non-arrival. He suspected the grim duo had orders he should not fall into enemy hands alive. In the present context they were a decidedly two-edged weapon.
Likewise, the Loseley Estate and adjacent Littleton boasted a force of militia, as did every last hamlet in modern militarised Britain, but it was highly debatable they would influence events. For one thing, most would be scattered across fields and farms, far from the action. Secondly, it was necessary that they be willing to arrive. Foreign invasion was one thing, but saving a ‘furriner’ another.
Yet, in the distance the Prince heard St Francis’ church bell begin to ring. So, now that the alarm had been raised some response might—indeed, could—be expected. The State required a return on those muskets provided gratis to every (trusted) homestead, and if no one in the locale stirred then questions would be raised. Conscription-for-life-if-you-answer-wrong sort of questions. Therefore, loyal Littleton would soon be on their way.
Too late. Beneath his unconcerned facade, Talleyrand’s keen ear detected a silence in the lower house. The enemy had passed through there and prevailed. Now the maelstrom was up the main stairs and onto the landing. It appeared that the invaders had precise knowledge of where they wanted to go. The West Wing and Chapel, the expanse and charm of the Great Hall with its family portraits and stags’ heads, tempted them not at all. They were an arrow travelling direct at a pre-selected target.
Footsteps thundered along the corridor leading to Talleyrand’s boudoir. A Scottish voice rose above the clatter to roar ‘fire!’
Following the storm heavy objects thumped the floor hard. A French voice in pain called for his mamam.
After the briefest of interludes a counter volley sounded. A bullet penetrated the bedroom door and ricocheted round to explore the room. Beyond, there were Caledonian howls.
Senior cravat-folder never learnt. He leant closer again.
‘I have a gun, sir…,’ and proof was shown in the form of an enamelled gambler’s pistol of exquisite design.
‘‘So I see,’ said Talleyrand, though not actually deigning to look. ‘Good boy…’
For a second there had been the implied offer that the Prince might actually take up the weapon! Talleyrand kindly let the awkward moment die in silence as if it had never been.
Comparative silence. The fighting was almost in the room beyond now, proxy revealed in every particular by a libretto of nasty noises. Hostile boots blundered in haste towards the sanctity of Talleyrand’s bedroom. En route, firearms boomed in confined spaces and sharp steel screeched horribly together, ten times worse than chalk on a blackboard.
Actions have consequences—serious for some, judging by the sound effects. One life ended groaning at the bedroom’s threshold before the door was slammed shut in the face of French imprecations. Then they heard Talleyrand’s four-poster bed (of so many, so much sweeter, memories) heaved across the floor to serve as barricade.
An impasse. Both sides re-evaluated their options in the light of recent developments.
Talleyrand sat up straighter still and smiled, hands at ease atop the silver top of his walking cane. However, like all the others with him, the unseen scene in the room beyond was vivid in his mind. Every sound was interpreted into instant pictures probably even worse than the reality.
Evidently, the attack on Loseley House was no impulse action. The invisible enemy had come well informed and equipped. Axes began hacking at the bedroom door.
Musket balls have little respect, even for hallowed oak; even less than axe-heads. ‘Fire!’ said the Guards officer in charge, and a volley ripped through the wooden panels.
The sound of an axe-head hitting the floor delighted most ears, but soon after the blade was taken up again, and reinforced by another. Simultaneously, French firearms replied through the splintered barrier. Talleyrand heard a Guardsman expire and greatly feared the body had fallen atop his beloved black silk sheets. Meanwhile, the wrenching of wood and hinges announced the death of the bedroom door. A babbling gaggle entered into the room beyond, shooting profusely. Grunting hand-to-hand conflict ensued. Or else they were mating.
Talleyrand was nearly alone now. In ones and twos his attendants deserted the scene via the back door. To the best of the Prince’s knowledge that led to a servants’ staircase and various obscure underling sorts of places. It had never crossed his mind to investigate before and he didn’t intend to start now.
Only the core cravat team—his sartorial elite force—had lingered. He addressed them in farewell.
‘Gentlemen,’ (for such they’d proved themselves to be), ‘I think you should go now. My guests are almost here.’
They gulped, they were pale, but they shook their heads.
Talleyrand sniffed in suppressed amazement. Who would have expected the most from the least? Life-lessons still kept on coming, even at its end.
‘Well, then, bravo!’ he said. ‘But, if that is your considered decision, oblige me one last time. Am I presentable?’
They craned round, giving the rouged old man their full professional scrutiny. A minor adjustment to a lock there, a straightening of a cuff there, but nothing serious.
‘Perfectment!’ their captain cried and dashed two fingertips off his lips in tribute.
Prince Talleyrand was reconciled and awaited the inevitable.
Sight unseen, there were a few more shots and stabs, plus a few, quite excusable in the circumstances, extreme reactions to them. Then there was hush.
The Prince adopted a polite but non-committal smile.
The door handle turned. The door opened. A Frenchman strode in. He pointed a pistol straight at Talleyrand ‘s head. He pulled its trigger.
However, being preoccupied with dying because of the bayonet in his back, his departing mind quite forgot the weapon was already discharged. Its hammer sparked upon an empty pan and sparked only residual powder. A ‘flash in the pan’ as the English say.