‘What’s that?’
Three-quarters of a mile away French horsemen were firing their carbines. Sharpe could see no target. He watched the puffs of smoke and listened to the faint crackle.
‘Dragoons.’
‘I know that,’ Hogan said. ‘But what are they firing at?’
‘Snakes?’ During his walks up the Portina Sharpe had noticed small black snakes that wriggled mysteriously in the dank grass by the stream. He had avoided them but he supposed it was possible they lived out on the plain as well, and the horsemen were merely amusing themselves with target practice. It was evening and the flames from the carbine muzzles sparkled brightly in the dusk. It was strange, Sharpe thought, how often war could look pretty.
‘Hello.’ Harper pointed down. ‘They’ve woken up our brave allies. Looks like a bloody ants’ nest.’
Below the wall the Spanish infantry had become excited. Men left the fires and lined themselves behind the earth and stone walls and laid muskets over the felled and piled trunks Hogan had placed in the gateways. Officers stood on the wall, their swords drawn, there was shouting and jostling, men pointing at the distant Dragoons and their twinkling muskets.
Hogan laughed. ‘It’s so good to have allies.’
The Dragoons, too far away to be seen clearly, went on firing at their unseen targets. Sharpe guessed it was just horseplay. The French were oblivious of the panic they were causing in the Spanish ranks. Every Spanish infantryman had crowded to the breastworks, their backsides illuminated by the fires, and their muskets bristled towards the empty field. The officers barked out commands and to Sharpe’s horror he watched as the hundreds of muskets were loaded.
‘What the hell are they doing?’ He listened to the rattle of ramrods being thrust down barrels, watched as officers raised their swords. ‘Watch this,’ Hogan said. ‘You might learn a thing or two.’
No order was given. Instead a single musket fired, its ball thrumming uselessly into the grass, and it was followed by the biggest volley Sharpe had ever heard. Thousands of muskets fired, gouted flame and smoke, a rolling thunder assailed them, the sound seemed to last for ever and mingled with it came the yells of the Spaniards. The fire and lead poured into the empty field. The Dragoons looked up, startled, but no musket ball would carry even a third of the distance towards them so they sat their horses and watched the fringe of musket smoke drift into the air.
For a second Sharpe thought the Spanish were cheering their own victory over the innocent grass but suddenly he realised the shouts were not of triumph, but of alarm. They had been scared witless by their own volley, by the thunder of ten thousand muskets, and now they ran for safety. Thousands streamed into the olive trees, throwing away muskets, trampling the fires in their panic, screaming for help, heads up, arms pumping, running from their own noise. Sharpe shouted down to his men on the gate.
‘Let them through!’
There was no point in trying to stop the panic. Sharpe’s dozen men would have been swamped by the hundreds of Spanish who crowded into the gate and streamed into the town. Others circled north towards the roads that led eastwards, away from the French. They would loot the baggage parks, raid the houses in town, spread alarm and confusion but there was nothing to be done. Sharpe watched Spanish cavalry use their swords on the fugitive infantry. They would stop some of them, perhaps by morning they might collect most of them, but the bulk of the Spanish infantry had evaporated, scared, defeated by a handful of Dragoons three-quarters of a mile away. Sharpe began laughing. It was too funny, too idiotic, somehow exactly fitting for this campaign. He saw the Spanish cavalry slash furiously at the infantry, forcing groups of them back to the line, and far away he heard the bugles call more Spanish horse into the hunt. On the plain the French fires formed lines of light, thousands and thousands of flames marking the enemy lines, and not one of the men round those fires would know they had just routed several thousand Spanish infantry. Sharpe collapsed on the wall and looked at Harper.
‘What is it you say, Sergeant?’
‘Sir?’
‘God save Ireland? Not a chance. He’s got his hands full coping with Spain.’
The noise and panic subsided. There were a handful of men left in the grove, others were being driven back by the Spanish cavalry, but Sharpe guessed it would take the horsemen all night to round up the fugitives and force them back to the breastworks, and even then thousands would escape to spread rumours of a great French victory outside Talavera. Sharpe stood up. ‘Come on, Sergeant, time we were getting back to the Battalion.’
A voice called up from the street. ‘Captain Sharpe! Sir!’
One of the Riflemen was gesticulating and, next to him, stood Agostino, Josefina’s servant. Sharpe felt his carefree mood disappear to be replaced with an awful dread. He scrambled down the broken stonework, Harper and Hogan behind him, and strode across to the two men. ‘What is it?’
Agostino burst into Portuguese. He was a tiny man who normally said little but watched all from his wide, brown eyes. Sharpe held up his hand for quiet. ‘What’s he saying?’
Hogan knew enough Portuguese. The Engineer licked his lips. ‘It’s Josefina.’
‘What about her?’ Sharpe had the inklings of disaster, a cold feeling of evil. He let Hogan take his elbow and walk him, with Agostino, away from the listening Riflemen. Hogan asked more questions, let the small servant talk, and finally turned to Sharpe. His voice was low. ‘She’s been attacked. They locked Agostino in a cupboard.’
‘They?’ He already knew the answer. Gibbons and Berry.
Sergeant Harper crossed to them, his manner formal and correct. ‘Sir!’
‘Sergeant?’ Sharpe forced the hundreds of jostling fears down so that he could listen to Harper.
‘I’ll take the men back, sir.’
Sharpe nodded. It occurred to him that Patrick Harper knew more of what was going on than Sharpe had assumed. Behind the careful words there was a concern that made Sharpe regret that he had not taken Harper more into his confidence. There was also a controlled anger in the Irishman. Your enemies, he was saying, are mine.
‘Carry on, Sergeant.’
‘Yes, sir. And sir?’ Harper’s face was bleak. ‘You will let me know what happens?’
‘Yes, Sergeant.’
Sharpe and Hogan ran into the dark streets, slipping on the filth, pushing their way through the fugitives who were forcing the doors of wine-shops and private houses. Hogan panted to keep up with the Rifleman. It would be a bad night in Talavera, a night of looting, destruction, and rape. Tomorrow a hundred thousand men would march into a maelstrom of fire, and Hogan, catching a glimpse of Sharpe’s snarling face as he hurled two Spanish infantrymen out of his way, feared for the evil that seemed to be welling up in preparation for the morrow. Then they were in the quiet street where Josefina was living and Hogan peered up at the quiet windows, the closed shutters, and prayed that Richard Sharpe would not destroy himself with his huge anger.
CHAPTER 19
Sharpe’s boots crunched on broken plaster; he listened to the voices murmuring in the room, on the other side of the splintered door, and stared unseeing through a small window at the high ragged clouds which raced past the moon. Hogan sat on the top step of the steep stairs next to the sheets they had taken from Josefina’s bed. In the half light of the candles seeping through the doorway the sheets seemed to be patterned in red and white. There was a cry from the room. Sharpe spun round in irritation.
“What are they doing to her?”
Hogan hushed him. ‘The doctor’s bleeding her, Sharpe. He knows what he’s doing.’
‘As if she hasn’t lost enough blood already!’
‘I know, I know.’ Hogan spoke soothingly. There was nothing he could say that would ease the turmoil in Sharpe’s head, to soften the blow or deflect the revenge which Hogan knew was being minutely plotted as the Rifleman paced up and down the tiny landing. The Engineer sighed and picked up a tiny plaster head. The house belonged to a s
eller of religious statues, and the stairs and corridors were stacked with his wares. When Gibbons and Berry had forced their way into the girl’s room they had trampled on twenty or thirty images of Christ, each with a bleeding heart, and the scraps of statues still littered the landing. Hogan was a peaceful man. He enjoyed his job, he liked the fresh challenges of each day, he was happy with his head full of angles and reentries, yardages and imperial weights; he liked company that laughed easily, drank generously, and would pass the time with stories of happiness past. He was no fighter. His war was fought with picks, shovels and powder, yet when he had burst with Sharpe into the attic room he had felt in himself a searing anger and lust for revenge. The mood had passed. Now he sat, saddened and quiet, but as he watched the tall Rifleman he knew that in Sharpe the mood was being refined and fed. For the twentieth time Sharpe stopped.
‘Why?’
Hogan shrugged. ‘They were drunk, Richard.’
‘That’s no answer!’
‘No.’ Hogan carefully replaced the broken head on the floor, out of reach of Sharpe’s pacing. ‘There isn’t an answer. They wanted revenge on you. Neither you nor the girl are important. It’s their pride…’ He tailed away. There was nothing to say, just the enormous sadness to feel and the fear of what Sharpe would do. Hogan regretted his first reaction to the girl; he had thought her calculating and cold, but as he escorted her from Plasencia to Oropesa, and from there to Talavera, he had been captivated by the charm, the easy laughter, and the honesty with which she planned a future away from a cloying past and a fugitive husband.
Sharpe was staring through the window at the clouds patterning the moon. ‘Do you think I’ll do nothing?’
‘They’re terrified.’ Hogan spoke flatly; he was afraid of what Sharpe might do. He thought of the line of Shakespeare: ‘Beauty provoketh fools’. Sharpe turned on him again. ‘Why?’
‘You know why. They were drunk. Good God, man, they were so drunk they couldn’t even do that properly. So they beat her. It was all on the spur of the moment, and now? They’re terrified, Richard. Terrified. What will you do?’
‘Do? I don’t know.’ Sharpe spoke irritably and Hogan knew he was lying.
‘What can you do, Richard? Call them out to a duel? That will ruin your career, you know that. Will you charge them with rape? For God’s sake, Richard, who’d believe you? The town’s full of bloody Spanish tonight, raping anything that moves! And everyone knows the girl was with Gibbons before you. No, Richard, you must think. You must think before you do anything.’
Sharpe turned on him and Hogan knew there could be no argument with that implacable face. ‘I’ll bloody murder them.’
Hogan sighed and rubbed his face with both hands. ‘I didn’t hear that. So you get hung? Shot? Beat the bones out of them if you must, but no more, Richard, no more.’
Sharpe did not answer and Hogan knew he was seeing in his mind the body they had found with the blood-soaked sheets. She had been raped and beaten and when they arrived the landlady was screaming at the girl. It had taken more money to silence the woman, find a doctor, and now they waited. Agostino peered up the stairs, saw Sharpe’s face, and went back to the front door where he had been told to wait. New sheets had been carried into the room, water, and Sharpe had listened to the landlady tidy up the floor, and he remembered the girl, bruised and bleeding, crawling among the broken saints and stained sheets.
The door opened, scrunching on the shards, and the landlady beckoned to them. The doctor was kneeling beside the bed and his eyes flicked warily at the two officers. Josefina lay on the bed, her black hair fanned on the pillow, but her eyes were tight shut. Sharpe sat beside her, saw the spreading yellow bruise on her unnaturally pale skin, and he took one of her hands that clutched at the fresh linen. She pulled away but he held on and her eyes opened.
‘Richard?’
‘Josefina. How are you?’ It seemed a stupid thing to say but he could think of nothing else. She closed her eyes and the faintest smile came and went.
She opened her eyes again. ‘I’ll be all right.’ There was a flash of the old Josefina, but as she spoke a tear ran from her eye and she sobbed and turned away from him. Sharpe turned to the doctor. ‘How is she?’
The doctor shrugged and looked hopelessly towards the landlady. Hogan intervened and rattled in his Spanish at the doctor. Sharpe listened to the voices and as he did he stroked the girl’s averted face. All he could think of was that he had failed her. He had promised to protect her and now this had happened, the worst, the unthinkable. Hogan sat beside him. ‘She’ll be all right. She lost some blood.’
‘How?’
Hogan closed his eyes and took a deep breath before opening them. ‘She was beaten, Richard. They were not gentle. But she’ll mend.’
Sharpe nodded. There was silence in the room but from the street outside Sharpe could hear the screams and shouts generated by the drunken Spanish soldiers. The girl turned back to him. She had stopped crying. Her voice was very low. ‘Richard?’
‘Yes?’
‘Kill them.’ She spoke flatly. Hogan half shook his head but Sharpe bent down and kissed her by the ear. ‘I will.’
As he straightened up he saw another half smile on the face, and then she forced it into a proper smile that went oddly with the tears. She squeezed his hand. ‘Will there be a battle tomorrow?’
‘Yes.’ Sharpe spoke as if the subject could be brushed away, as if it was not of importance.
‘Be lucky.’
‘I’ll come and see you afterwards.’ He smiled at her.
‘Yes.’ But there was no conviction in her voice. Sharpe turned to Hogan.
‘You’ll stay?’
‘Till daybreak. I’m not needed till then. But you should go.’
Sharpe nodded. ‘I know.’ He kissed her again, stood up, and put on his rifle and pack. Hogan thought his face was as cruel as a face could be. The Engineer walked with him to the stairs.
‘Be careful, Richard.’
‘I will.’
Hogan put a hand on his shoulder to stop him moving. ‘Remember what you have to lose.’
Sharpe nodded again. ‘Bring me news when you can.’
Sharpe pushed his way into the street, ignoring the Spaniards, and as he walked towards the north he did not see the tall man in the blue coat with the white facings who watched from a doorway opposite Josefina’s lodgings. The man looked at Sharpe sympathetically, then up at the windows, and settled back into the doorway where he tried to make himself comfortable despite the broken arm with its splints and sling that would keep him from the battle tomorrow. He wondered what was happening on the second floor but he would soon know; Agostino would tell him all in exchange for a piece of gold.
Sharpe hurried up the track that led away from the town between the Portina stream and the Spanish lines. The frightened infantry were being forced back into their positions, but even as he hurried through the trees he could hear the occasional musket shot from the town, the shouting, the coinage of Talavera’s night of fear and rape. The moon had disappeared behind a bank of clouds but the lights of the Spanish fires showed the path and he half ran as he headed north towards the Medellin Hill. To his right the sky was glowing a deep red where the thousands of French fires were reflected in the air. He should have been concerned for the morning; he knew it would be the greatest battle he had ever fought, yet his mind was dominated by the need to find Berry and Gibbons. He came to the Pajar, the tiny hill that marked the end of the Spanish lines and the place where the Portina bent to his right and, from running behind the Spanish troops, the stream now flowed in front of the British position. He saw the shapes of the field guns Wellesley had placed on the small hill, and part of his mind registered how the fire of those guns would sweep protectively in front of the Spanish lines and deflect the massive French attack onto the British lines. But tomorrow was another battle.
The track melted away into the grass. He could see the scattered fires of the British but he
had no idea which was the South Essex. They were positioned at the Medellin Hill, he knew that, so he ran by the stream, tripping over tussocks of grass, splashing through patches of marsh, keeping the silvered Portina as his guide to the Medellin. He was alone in the darkness. The British fires were far off to his left, the French even further to the right, the two armies still and quiet. Something was wrong. The old instinct prickled him and he stopped, sank to one knee and searched the darkness ahead. In the night the Medellin Hill looked like a long, low ridge pointing at the French army. It was the key to Wellesley’s left flank; if the French assaulted the hill they could turn and crush the British between the Medellin and Talavera. Yet there were no fires on the ridge. He could see a bright smear of flames at the western end, furthest from the enemy, but on the side facing the town, and on the half of the flat summit nearest the enemy there were no lights. He had thought the South Essex to be bivouacking on the gentle slope that faced him but it was black and empty. He listened. There were the sounds of the night, the noises from the town that had faded to a dull murmur, the wind in the grass, insects, the splashing of the stream, and the far-off sounds of a hundred thousand men crouching by fires waiting for morning. Behind him the small Pajar hill was bright with fires, the guns silhouetted against the white wall of the farmhouse on its crest, but in front it was dark and quiet. He stood up and walked softly on, his instincts alive to a danger he could not define, his mind searching for clues in the darkness and from the murmured sounds of the night. Why had he not been challenged? There should be picquets on the line of the Portina, sentries huddled against the chill wind looking towards the enemy, but no-one had stopped him and asked his business. He kept by the stream until the black loom of the Medellin was above him, then turned left and began to climb the slope. By daylight it looked a gentle slope but as he climbed with his pack and rifle the ground felt steep and each step made the muscles at the back of his legs ache. Tomorrow, he thought, this is precisely where the French columns will come. They will march up this slope, heads down, while the guns crack iron shot into their ranks and the muskets wait in silence at the crest.