Sharpe's Gold rs-9 Page 8

  Harper was staring aghast. Sharpe ignored the Frenchman. 'Patrick!'

  'Sir?'

  'Get the men in here. Through the window! And next door!'

  The girl spat at the Colonel, who had collapsed in his own blood, swore at him, and then looked at Sharpe with a glance that seemed to convey pure disdain because he had not killed the Frenchman himself. Sharpe was reeling from her, thrown off balance by her hawk-like beauty, hardly hearing the commands from the landing, the banging muskets. He snapped his attention back, despising himself, but the girl was faster. She had the Colonel's sabre, her freedom, and she ran out the door, ignoring the fight, and turned right. Sharpe followed, caution gone, just the instinct left that some things, just one thing perhaps, could turn a man's life inside out.

  CHAPTER 7

  Knowles had done well. The hall was on fire but empty of the enemy, and the Redcoats backed up the stairs, still loading and firing their muskets, ignoring the fresh blood that made the steps slippery, and then the Riflemen took over, the Bakers spitting into the hallway below, and Major Kearsey, sabre in hand, was pushing the men into a bedroom, towards a window, and shouting, 'Jump!'

  'Aim low! Aim low!' Harper's voice bellowed at the Riflemen. Hussars were coming into the hall, choking on the smoke. Redcoats were pouring from the first-floor windows, forming up in the field beneath, and only Sharpe was absent.

  Knowles looked round. 'Captain!'

  'He's missing!' Major Kearsey grabbed Knowles. 'Get outside! There may be cavalry!'

  The girl had run through a door and Sharpe followed, noticing, irrelevantly, a small statue of the Virgin Mary with a host of candles flickering at its base. He remembered the Catholics in the Company deciding that today – no, yesterday – was the fifteenth of August, the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary, and he was grateful because the stairs beyond the door were pitch dark and he grabbed a candle and followed the fading footsteps. He hurried, heels sliding over steps, banging down the stairs. He cursed himself. His place was with his men, not chasing some girl because she had Josefina's long black hair, a slim body, and a beauty that had overcome him. But this was not a night for sensible action; it was a mad darkness, a gambler's last throw, and he reasoned that she had been kept a prisoner and that made her important to the enemy, and so important to him.

  The rationalization lasted to the bottom of the stairs. The stairway was four-sided and he knew it had plunged below ground, into the cellars, and he was still hurtling down, almost out of control, with the candle flame blown out, when a white arm shot out and her voice hushed him. They were by a door, light leaking through its gaping planks, but there was no point in pretending that anyone on the far side had not heard their feet on the stairway, Sharpe pushed it open, ignoring her caution, and in the cellar a lantern hung from a hook, and beneath it, fear across his face, was a lancer holding a musket and bayonet. He lunged at Sharpe, thinking perhaps that he could kill with a blade point more easily than by pulling a trigger, but Sharpe had cut his teeth on just such fighting. He let the bayonet come, stepped aside, and used his enemy's own motion to run the sword blade into his stomach. Then Sharpe nearly gagged.

  The cellar was spattered with blood, with bodies that showed death in a dozen horrid ways. Wine-racks stood by the walls, looted empty, but the floor was black with Spanish blood, strewn with mutilations obscene as nightmare. Young, old, men and women, all killed horribly. It struck Sharpe that these people must have died the day before, as he watched from the hilltop, killed as the French pretended the village was empty. He had lain in the gully, the sun warm on his back, and in the cellar the Spanish had died, slowly and with exquisite pain. The bodies lay in the crumpled way of the dead, their number impossible to count, or to tell the ways in which they had died. Some were too young even to have known what had happened, killed no doubt before their mothers' eyes, and Sharpe felt an impotent rage as the girl stepped past him, searching the shambles, and from far away, as if across a whole town, Sharpe heard a volley of shots. They must get out! He grabbed the girl's arm.

  'Come on!'

  'No!'

  She was searching for one person, pulling at the bodies, oblivious of the horror. Why would there be a guard on dead men? Sharpe pushed past her, took the lantern, and then heard the moaning from the far, dark end of the old wine cellar. The girl heard, too.

  'Ramon!'

  Sharpe stepped on dead flesh, flinched from a spider's web, and then, dimly at first, he saw a man manacled to the far wall. He did not ask himself why a wine cellar should be equipped with manacles; there was no time. He took the lantern closer and saw that what he had thought were chains were blood trails. The man was not manacled but nailed to the stone wall, alive.

  'Ramon!' The girl was past Sharpe, pulling ineffectively at the nails, and Sharpe put down the lantern and hammered at the nail-heads with his sword's brass hilt. He knocked them left and right, hearing the thunder of hooves outside, shouts and a volley, and then the nail was loose, blood trickling afresh, and he pulled it out and started on the second hand. Another volley, more hooves, and he hammered desperately until the prisoner was free. He gave the girl his sword and heaved Ramon, if that were his name, on to his shoulder.

  'Go on!'

  The girl led him past the doorway they had come through, past the welter of blood and bodies, to the far corner of the cellar. A trapdoor was revealed by the lantern she was holding and she gestured at it. Sharpe dropped his moaning burden, reached up, heaved, and a sudden breeze of welcome night air dispelled the foul stench of the blood and dead. He pulled himself up, surprised to find that the trapdoor emerged outside the house walls, and then realized it was so supplies could reach the house without being trampled through the courtyard and kitchens. He looked round and there was the Company, marching steadily in three ranks.

  'Sergeant!'

  Harper turned, relief visible on his face in the light from the burning house. Sharpe dropped back into the cellar, heaved the wounded man on to the ground, leaped up himself, and reached down for the girl. She ignored him, pulled herself up, rolled into the grass, and Sharpe had a glimpse of long legs. There were cheers from the men and Sharpe realized they were for him. Harper was there, thumping his back, saying something unintelligible about thinking Sharpe was lost, and then the Sergeant had the wounded man and they were running towards the Company and Sharpe, for the first time, saw horsemen in the darkness. Harper gave the wounded man into the ranks. Knowles was grinning at Sharpe, Kearsey gesturing to the girl.

  'Are they loaded?' Sharpe gestured at the muskets, screamed at Knowles over the sound of the burning house.

  'Most, sir.'

  'Keep going!'

  Sharpe pushed Knowles on, driving the Company towards the barley field and the comforting darkness, and turned to face the house and see what the cavalry were doing. Harper was already there, running backwards, the seven-barrelled gun threatening any horsemen. Sharpe wondered how long it had been since they had burst through the gate. No more than seven or eight minutes, he decided. Enough time for his men to have fired seven or eight hundred shots into the astonished French, set fire to the house, rescued Kearsey, the girl and the prisoner, and he grinned in the darkness.

  'Watch right!' Harper called. A dozen lancers, in line, with the wicked points held low so that they glittered by the ground were coming at a trot, to take the Company in the flank. But there was still time. 'Right wheel!'

  The Company turned, three ranks swivelling. 'Halt!' A ragged line, but it would do. 'Rear rank about turn. Hold your fire!' That looked after the rear. 'Present! Aim at their stomachs; give them a bellyache! Fire!'

  It was inevitable. The enemy became a turmoil of falling horses and tumbling lancers. 'Right turn! Forward! Double!' He had the small company in a column now. Running for the barley, for the unharvested crop that would give them a little cover. There were more hoof-beats behind, but not enough loaded muskets to fight off another charge. Time only to run. 'Run!'

&nb
sp; The Company ran, sprinting despite their burdens, and Sharpe heard a wounded man groan. Time later to count the wounded. Now he turned, saw lancers coming in desperate chase, one aiming at Harper, but the Irishman dashed the lance aside with the squat gun and reached up a huge hand that plucked the Pole clean out of the saddle. The Sergeant was screaming insults in his native Gaelic. He held the lancer effortlessly, his huge strength making the man seem to be weightless, and then threw him at the feet of an other horse. A rifle cracked behind Sharpe, another horse down, and Hagman's voice came through the din. 'Got him.'

  'Back!' Harper was shouting, the other horses still yards away, and suddenly the barley was under Sharpe's feet, and he ran into the field, and for a moment the trumpets meant nothing to him. He was just running, remembering the Indian with the razor point, the desperate and futile attempt to run from the lance, and then he heard Harper's triumphant voice.

  'The recall! Bastards have had enough!' Harper was grinning, laughing. 'You did it, sir!'

  Sharpe slowed down, let the breath heave in his chest. It was strangely quiet in the field, the hooves muted, the gunfire stopped, and he guessed that the French refused to believe that just fifty men had attacked the village. The sight of red jackets and crossbelts would have convinced them that more British troops would be out in the darkness and it would be madness to throw the lancers into the massed volley of a hidden regiment. He listened to the men panting, some moaning as they were carried, the excited mutterings of victorious troops. He wondered what the price would be and turned to Harper. 'Are you all right?'

  'Yes, sir. Yourself?'

  'Bruised. What's the bill?'

  'Don't know for certain, sir. Jim Kelly's bad.' Harper's voice was sad and Sharpe remembered the wedding, only weeks ago, when the massive Pru Baxter had woven daisies into her hair to marry the small Irish Corporal. Harper went on. 'Cresacre was bleeding, says he's all right. We lost a couple, though. Saw them in the courtyard.'

  'Who?' He should have known.

  'Don't know, sir.'

  They climbed, up into the hills, up where horses could not go, back to the gully, which they reached as the far hills were lined with the faintest grey of dawn. It was a time for sleep and the men crumpled like the bodies in the cellar. Some were posted as picquets at the gully's rim, their eyes red with exhaustion, smeared with powder, grinning at Sharpe, who had brought them through. The girl sat with Kearsey, binding up his leg, while Knowles looked after the other wounded. Sharpe stood over him.

  'How bad?'

  'Kelly's going, sir.'

  The Corporal had a chest wound and Knowles had picked away the shreds of jacket to show a mangled horror of glistening ribs and bubbling blood. It was a wonder he had lived this long. Cresacre had been shot in the thigh, a clean wound, and he dressed it himself, swore he would be all right, and apologized to Sharpe as if he were making a nuisance of himself. Two others were badly wounded, both cut with sabres, but they would live, and there was hardly a man who did not have a scratch, a bruise, some memento of the night. Sharpe counted heads. Forty-eight men, three Sergeants, and two officers had left the gully. Four men had not come back. Sharpe felt the tiredness wash through him, tinged with relief. It was a smaller bill than he dared hope for. Once Kelly died, his body kept from the vultures by a shallow grave, he would have lost five men. The lancers must have lost three times that number. He went round the Company, to those who were awake, and praised them. The men seemed embarrassed by the thanks, shaking as the sweat dried on their bodies in the cold air, their heads jerking as some tried to stay awake and look, red-eyed, into the dawn.

  'Captain Sharpe!' Kearsey was standing in a clear patch of the gully. 'Captain!'

  Sharpe went down the side of the gully. 'Sir?'

  Kearsey stared at him, his small eyes fierce. 'Are you mad, Sharpe?'

  For a second the meaning did not percolate into Sharpe's head.

  'I beg your pardon, sir?'

  'What were you doing?'

  'Doing, sir? Rescuing you.' Sharpe had expected thanks.

  Kearsey winced, whether from the pain of his leg or from Sharpe's ingenuousness it was difficult to tell. The dawn was revealing the details of the gully: the collapsed men, the blood, the anger on Kearsey's face. 'You fool!'

  Sharpe bit back his anger. 'Sir?'

  Kearsey waved at the wounded. 'How do you get them back?'

  'We carry them, sir.'

  'Carry them, sir.' Kearsey mimicked him. 'Over twenty miles of country? You were only here to help carry the gold, Sharpe! Not fight a battle in the back of beyond!'

  Sharpe took a deep breath, suppressing the urge to shout back. 'Without you, sir, we would have had no chance of persuading El Catolico to let us take the gold. That was my judgment.'

  Kearsey looked at him, shook his head and pointed at Jim Kelly. 'You think it was worth that?'

  'The General told me the gold was important, sir.' Sharpe spoke quietly.

  'Important, Sharpe, only because it is a gesture to the Spanish.'

  'Yes, sir.' It was no time for an argument.

  'At least you rescued them.' The Major waved at the two Spaniards.

  Sharpe looked at the girl's dark beauty. 'Them, sir?'

  'Moreno's children. Teresa and Ramon. The French were holding them as bait, hoping Moreno or El Catolico would try a rescue. At least we've earned their thanks and that's probably more valuable than carrying the gold for them. Besides, I doubt if the gold is there.'

  The sun split across the gully's rim. Sharpe blinked. 'Pardon, sir?'

  'What do you expect? The French are there. They probably have the gold. Or hadn't that occurred to you?'

  It had, but Sharpe was not in a mood to give Kearsey his thoughts. If the French had found the gold he suspected they would have ridden it straight to Ciudad Rodrigo, but doubtless Kearsey would not be convinced. Sharpe nodded. 'Did they say anything about it to you, sir?'

  Kearsey shrugged, not liking the reminder that he had been captured. 'I was unlucky, Sharpe. Not to know lancers were there.' He shook his head, sounded suddenly tired. 'No, they said nothing.'

  'So there's hope, sir?'

  The Major looked bitter, waved at Kelly. 'Tell him that.'

  'Yes, sir.'

  Kearsey sighed. 'I'm sorry, Sharpe. Undeserved.' He seemed to think for a moment. 'You do know, though, don't you, that they'll be after us today?'

  'The French, sir?'

  The Major nodded. 'Who else? You'd better sleep, Sharpe. In a couple of hours you'll have to defend this place.'

  'Yes, sir.'

  He turned away, and as he did he caught Teresa's eyes. She looked at him without interest, without recognition, as if the rescue and the two shared killings meant nothing. El Catolico, he thought, is a lucky man. He slept.

  CHAPTER 8

  Casatejada was like a shattered ants' nest. All morning the patrols left, searched the valley, then galloped in their dust clouds back to the houses and the thin spires of smoke that were the only signs left of the night's activity. Others rounded up stray horses, circling the valley floor, reminding Harper of the pony drives on his native Donegal moors. In the gully the men moved slowly, quietly, as if their sound could carry to the village, but in truth the elation of the attack had given way to weariness and sadness. Kelly's breath bubbled through the morning, a constant pink froth at the corner of his mouth, and the men avoided him as if death were contagious. Sharpe woke up, told Harper to sleep, replaced the picquets, and struggled to scrape the clotted blood from his sword with a handful of wiry grass. They dared not light a fire to heat the water that could scour out their muskets, so the men used the battlefield expedient, urinating into the barrels, and grinned self-consciously at the girl as they sloshed the liquid around to loosen the caked powder deposits of the night. The girl did not react, her face seemed unmovable, and she sat holding her brother's hand, talking quietly to him and giving him sips of tepid water from a wooden canteen. The heat bounced from the rocky
sides of the gully, attacked from all sides, roasting the living and the dying alike.

  Kearsey climbed up to lie alongside Sharpe and took the telescope so that he could spy down on the French. 'They're packing up.'

  'Sir?'

  Kearsey nodded at the village. 'Mules, Sharpe. String of them.'

  Sharpe took his telescope back and found the village street. Kearsey was right, a string of mules with men lashing ropes over their burdens, but it was impossible to tell whether there was gold or just forage in the packs.

  'Perhaps they won't look for us.'

  The Major had calmed down since dawn. 'Bound to. Look at the track we left.' Running across the barley field, like a giant signpost, was the trampled spoor of the Light Company's retreat. 'They'll want to look over the ridge, just to make sure you've gone.'

  Sharpe looked at the bare rocks and turf of the hillside. 'Should we move?'

  Another shake of the head. 'Best hiding place for miles, this gully. You can't see it from any side; even from above it's difficult. Keep your heads down and you'll be all right.'

  Sharpe thought it strange that Kearsey should talk of 'you', as if the Major himself were not part of the British army, or as if the survival of Sharpe in enemy territory were not his concern. He said nothing. The Major nibbled nervously at a strand of his moustache; he seemed to be deep in thought, and when he spoke he sounded as if he had come to the end of long deliberation.

  'You must understand why it's important.'

  'Sir?' Sharpe was puzzled.

  'The gold, Sharpe.' He stopped and Sharpe waited. The small man flicked at his moustache. 'The Spanish have been let down badly, Sharpe, very badly. Think what happened after Talavera, eh? And Ciudad Rodrigo. A shameful business, Sharpe, shameful.'

  Sharpe still kept silent. After Talavera the Spanish had forfeited Wellington's support by failing to provide the food and supplies they had promised. A starving British army was of no use to Spain. Ciudad Rodrigo? Five weeks ago the Spanish fortress town had surrendered, after an heroic defence, and Wellington had sent no help. The town had been an obstacle to Massena's advance, Almeida was the next, and Sharpe had heard savage criticism that the British had let their allies down, but Sharpe was no strategist. He let the Major go on.