'That's right, Henry.'
'Why doesn't the Duke simply issue us with razors so that we can all cut our throats? That's a much easier way to commit suicide than trying to storm well-defended French positions. They'll pick us off like so many rabbits.'
'The whole of the Lines are not fortified,' Daniel pointed out.
"That doesn't matter, Dan. As soon as we attack any part of it, Villeroi will rush troops to that particular spot and repel us.'
"They didn't repel us at Blenheim.'
'We had luck on our side that day.'
'I didn't think you believed in luck.'
'I don't believe in anything,' said Welbeck, gloomily. 'And I certainly don't believe in walking to certain death by leading my men against the Lines of Brabant.'
'You've led them into fierce skirmishes before now.'
"That was different. There was always a faint chance I'd come out alive, give or take a few nasty wounds.'
'You've certainly had your share of those, Henry.'
Whenever they'd bathed together in a river, Daniel had seen the injuries that Welbeck had collected over the years. Fearless in battle and driving his men on in the teeth of enemy fire, he had acquired many grotesque mementoes, including the marks on his thigh where a French musket ball had passed clean through and miraculously missed the bone. The slash of an enemy sword had been responsible for the gash on his cheek and the missing finger on one hand. His chest, back and shoulders were crisscrossed with other souvenirs of enemy blades. Only a strong man with a capacity to tolerate intense pain could have survived the battering taken by Henry Welbeck. He was a walking portrait of the perils of warfare.
'The Duke has finally taken leave of his senses,' he declared.
'He has a plan,' Daniel told him.
Welbeck sneered. 'Oh, yes, he always has a plan. He had a plan to strike into the heart of France through the Moselle valley but it came to nothing. All we did was to shiver in the cold and eat short rations because there wasn't enough food for us or the horses — so much for that brilliant fucking plan!'