still existed“ if the colours flew and defied the enemy. They were a rallying point in the smoke and chaos of battle, but more than that; there were men who would hardly fight for England’s King and Country but they would fight for the colours, for their Regiment’s honour, for the gaudy flags that cost a few guineas and were carried in the centre of the line by the youngest Ensigns and guarded by veteran Sergeants armed with long wicked-bladed pikes. Sharpe had known as many as ten men to carry the colours in battle, replacing the dead, picking up the flags even though they knew that then they became the enemy’s prime target. Honour was all. The flags of the South Essex were new and gleaming, the Regimental Colour devoid of battle honours, neither was torn by bullet or roundshot, but seeing them filled Sharpe with a sudden emotion, and it changed the farce of Simmerson’s mad hopes into an affair of honour.
The South Essex followed the Regimienta towards the horsemen. Like the Spanish the British line was a hundred and fifty yards wide, its four ranks tipped with bayonets, the company officers riding or walking with drawn swords. The Spanish had halted, some four hundred yards up the road, and Simmerson had no choice but to stop the Battalion to find out what the Regimienta intended. Hogan joined Sharpe and nodded at the two Regiments.
“Not joining in the battle?”
“I think it’s a private party. Captain Sterritt and I are guarding the bridge.”
Sterritt, a mild man, smiled nervously at Sharpe and Hogan. Like his Colonel he was appalled at the appearance of these veteran soldiers and secretly frightened that the enemy might prove to be as tough and carefree as the Rifleman or the Engineer. Hogan was wiping his hands on a piece of rag and Sharpe asked him if the job was finished.
“Aye. It’s all done. Ten kegs of powder snuggled down, fuses laid, and the hole filled in. As soon as these gallant soldiers get the hell out of the way I can find out whether it works or not. Now what’s happening?”
The Spanish were forming square. A good Battalion could march from line into square in thirty seconds but the Spanish took four times as long. It was the proper formation when faced by attacking cavalry, but as the French showed no lunatic inclination to charge four times their own number the Spanish convolutions were hardly necessary. Sharpe watched as the officers and sergeants harried and chivvied their men into the rough semblance of a square, a slightly lopsided square, but it would do. Sharpe remembered the three women. He could not see them with the Regimienta, and he looked round to see them watching decorously from the river-bank. One of them saw his glance and raised a gloved hand.
“It’s a good job the French don’t have those guns.”
Hogan raised his eyebrows. I’d forgotten that rumour. That would heat things up.“
There was no more fatal combination than cavalry and artillery for men on foot. Infantry in square were totally safe from cavalry; all the horsemen could do was ride round and round the formation, hacking uselessly at the bayonets. But if the cavalry were supported by cannons the square became a deathtrap. Grapeshot would blast holes in the ranks; the cavalry would ride into the gaps and slice down with their sabres. Sharpe looked at the skyline. There were no guns.
Simmerson had watched the Regimienta form their square. He was obviously nonplussed. It must have occurred to him that he could not attack the French, so the French had to attack him. There was a pause in proceedings. The Spanish had formed their rough square on the right of the track; Simmerson gave his orders and with a marvellous precision the South Essex demonstrated, on the left, how a Battalion should form a square. Even at half a mile Sharpe could see the horsemen clapping ironically.
Now there were two squares, the Spanish nearer the French, and still the horsemen made no move. Time passed. The sun climbed higher in the sky, the grassland shivered in the haze, the French horses lowered their necks and cropped at the thin pasture. Captain Sterritt, guarding the bridge with his company, became plaintive.
“Why don’t they attack?”
“Would you?” Sharpe asked.
Sterritt looked puzzled. Sharpe could understand why. Simmerson was looking increasingly foolish, he had marched to war with drawn sword and unfurled banners and the enemy was refusing to fight. Now he was stranded, like a beached whale, in a defensive square. It was virtually impossible to make an ordered march while in a square formation; it was easy enough for the leading edge, they marched forwards, but the sides had to step sideways, and the rear edge walk backwards, all of them fighting off encircling horsemen. It was not impossible, Sharpe had done it, but when survival depends on doing the impossible then men will find a way. Simmerson wanted to move but he did not want his neat, ordered square to be torn out of alignment as he advanced. He could have resumed the line formation but then he would look even more foolish for having formed a square at all. So he stayed where he was and the French looked on, filled with wonderment at the strange antics of the enemies.
“Someone’s got to do something!” Captain Sterritt frowned in bewilderment. War was not supposed to be like this! It was glory and victory, not this humiliation.
“Someone’s doing something!” Hogan nodded at the South Essex. A horseman had been released from the square and was galloping towards the bridge.
“It’s Lieutenant Gibbons.” Sterritt raised a hand to his Colonel’s nephew, who pulled his horse to a violent stop. His features were stern, filled with the seriousness of the moment. He looked down on Sharpe.
“You’re to report to the Colonel.”
“Why?”
Gibbons looked astonished. “The Colonel wants you. Now!”
Hogan coughed. “Lieutenant Sharpe is under my orders. Why does the Colonel want him?”
Gibbons flung an arm towards the immobile French. “We need a skirmish line, Sharpe, something to sting the French into action.”
Sharpe nodded. “How far ahead of the square am I supposed to take my men?” He spoke in sweet reasonableness.
Gibbons shrugged. “Near enough to move the cavalry. Hurry!”
“I’m not moving.”
Gibbons stared down at Sharpe. “I beg your pardon.”
“I will not kill my men. I go more than fifty yards from that square and the French will ride us down like hares. Don’t you know that skirmishers fall back from cavalry?”
“Are you coming, Sharpe?” Gibbons made it sound like an ultimatum.
“No.”
The Lieutenant turned to Hogan. “Sir? Will you order Lieutenant Sharpe to obey?”
“Listen, laddie.” Sharpe noticed that Hogan had broadened his Irish accent. “Tell your Colonel from me that the sooner he gets back over the bridge the sooner we can put a hole in it, and the sooner we get home. And, no, I will not instruct Lieutenant Sharpe to commit suicide. Good day, sir.”
Gibbons wrenched his horse round, tearing at its mouth with the bit, and clapped his spurs into its side, shouted something unintelligible at Sharpe or Hogan, and galloped back towards the impotent square in spurts of dust. Sterritt turned to them, appalled.
“You can’t refuse an order!”
Hogan’s patience snapped. Sharpe had never heard the little Irishman lose his temper but the events had exasperated him. “Don’t you bloody understand? Do you know what a skirmish line is? It’s a line of men scattered in front of the enemy. They’ll be ridden down like scarecrows! Christ! What does he think he’s doing?”
Sterritt blanched in front of Hogan’s anger. He tried to placate the Engineer. “But someone’s got to do something.”
“You’re quite right. They’ve got to get back over the bloody bridge and stop wasting our time!”
Some of Sterritt’s company began tittering. Sharpe felt his own patience snap. He ignored Sterritt’s presence.
“Quiet!”
An embarrassed silence settled over the end of the bridge. It was broken by the giggling of the three Spanish women.
“We can start with them.” Hogan turned to them and shouted in Spanish. They looked at him, at each other, but he shouted again, insisting. Reluctantly they walked their horses past the Riflemen, past the officers, and back
