the dunes at the top of the beach. Neither the cavalry nor the infantry seemed concerned by the French possession of the hill and the sound of the fighting did not come from its slopes, but from beyond the pinewood on Sharpe’s left.
Sharpe offered the glass to Galiana who shook his head. “I have my own,” he said, “so what are they doing?”
“Who? The French?”
“Why don’t they attack down the hill?”
“What are those Spanish troops doing?” Sharpe asked.
“Nothing.”
“Which means they’re not needed. Which probably means there’s a lot of men waiting for the Crapauds to come down the hill, and meanwhile the fighting’s over there”—he nodded toward the pinewood—“so that’s where I’m going.” The panicked mass of mules had gone by. The muleteers were still hurrying north, scooping up the loaves of hard bread jolted out of the animals’ panniers. Sharpe picked one up and broke it in half.
“Are we looking for the 8th, sir?” Harper asked him as they walked toward the pines.
“I am, but I don’t suppose I’ll find them,” Sharpe said. It was one thing to declare an ambition to find Colonel Vandal, but in the chaos he doubted he would be successful. He did not even know if the French 8th were here, and if they were they might be anywhere. He knew some Frenchmen were behind the creek where they threatened the army’s route to Cadiz. There were plenty more on the distant hill, and plainly others were beyond the pinewood. That was where the guns sounded so Sharpe would go that way. He walked to the top of the beach, scrambled up a sandy bluff, then plunged into the shade of the pines. Galiana, who seemed to have no plan except to stay with Sharpe, dismounted again because the pine branches hung so low.
“You don’t have to come, Pat,” Sharpe said.
“I know that, sir.”
“I mean we’ve got no business here,” Sharpe said.
“There’s Colonel Vandal, sir.”
“If we find him,” Sharpe said dubiously. “Truth is, Pat, I’m here because I like Sir Thomas.”
“Everyone speaks well of him, sir.”
“And this is our job, Pat,” Sharpe said more harshly. “There’s fighting and we’re soldiers.”
“So we do have business here?”
“Of course we bloody do.”
Harper walked in silence for a few paces. “So you never were going to let us go back, were you?”
“Would you have gone?”
“I’m here, sir,” Harper said as if that answered Sharpe. The musketry from their front was heavier. Till now it had sounded like skirmish fire, the thorn-splintering snap of light infantry firing independently, but the heavier noise of volley fire was punching through the trees now. Behind it Sharpe could hear the fine flurry of trumpets and the rhythm of drums, but he did not recognize the tune, so knew it must be a French band playing. Then a series of louder crashes announced that cannons were firing. Balls whipped through the trees, bringing down needles and twigs. The French were firing canister and the air smelled of resin and powder smoke.
They came to a track rutted by the wheels of gun carriages. A few mules were picketed to the trees, guarded by three redcoats with yellow facings. “Are you the Hampshires?” Sharpe asked.
“Yes, sir,” a man said.
“What’s happening?”
“Don’t know, sir. We were just told to guard the mules.”
Sharpe pushed on. The cannons were firing constantly, the volley fire was crashing rhythmically, but the two sides had not come to close quarters because the skirmishers were still deployed. Sharpe could tell that by the sound. Musket and canister balls flicked through the trees, twitching the branches like a sudden wind. “Buggers are firing high,” Harper said.
“They always do, thank God,” Sharpe said. The sound of battle became louder as they neared the edge of the wood. A Portuguese rifleman, his brown uniform black with blood, lay dead by a pine trunk. He had evidently crawled there, leaving a trail of blood on the needles. There was a crucifix in his left hand, the rifle still in his right. A redcoat lay five paces beyond, shuddering and choking, a bullet hole dark on his jacket’s yellow facing.
Then Sharpe was out of the trees.
And found slaughter.
MAJOR BROWNE climbed the hill on foot, leaving his horse tied to a pine trunk. The major sang as he climbed. He had a fine voice, much prized in the performances that whiled away the time in the Gibraltar garrison. “Come cheer up, my lads!” he sang. “’Tis to glory we steer, to add something more to this wonderful year; to honor we call you, not press you like slaves, for who are so free as the sons of the waves?” It was a naval song, much sung by the ships’ crews ashore in Gibraltar, and he knew it was not quite appropriate for this attack up the Cerro del Puerco’s northern slope, but the major liked “Heart of Oak.” “Let me hear you!” he shouted, and the six companies of his makeshift battalion sang the chorus. “Heart of oak are our ships, heart of oak are our men,” they sang raggedly. “We always are ready; steady, boys, steady! We’ll fight and we’ll conquer again and again.”
In the brief silence after the chorus, the major distinctly heard the clicking sound of dogheads being pulled back at the hill’s summit. He could see four battalions of French infantry up there and suspected there were others, but the four he could see were cocking their muskets, readying to kill. A cannon was being manhandled forward so that its barrel could point down the hill. A band was playing on the hill’s summit. It played a jaunty song, music to kill by, and Browne found himself tapping his fingers on his sword hilt to the rhythm of the French tune. “Filthy French noise, lads,” he shouted, “take no note of it!” Not long now, he thought, not long at all, wishing he had his own band to play a proper British tune. He had no musicians, so instead he boomed out the last verse of “Heart of Oak.” “We’ll still make them fear, and we’ll still make them flee, and drub them on shore as we’ve drubbed them at sea. Then cheer up, my lads! And with one heart let’s sing, our soldiers, our sailors, our leaders, our king!”
The French opened fire.
The crest of the hill vanished in a great gray-white rill of choking powder smoke, and in the center, where the battery was deployed, the smoke was thicker still, a sudden explosion of churning darkness, streaked through with flame in the midst of which the canisters shredded apart and the balls whipped down the hill and it looked to Browne, following close on his men’s heels, that almost half of them were down. He saw a mist of blood over their heads, heard the first gasps, and knew the screaming would start soon. Then the file-closers, sergeants, and corporals were shouting at the men to close on the center. “Close up! Close up!”
“Up, boys, up!” Browne shouted. “Give them a drubbing!” He had started with 536 muskets. Now he had a little over 300. The French had at least a thousand more and Browne, stepping over a thrashing body, saw the enemy ramrods flicker in the thinning smoke. It was a miracle, he thought, that he was alive. A sergeant reeled past him, his lower jaw shot away and his tongue hanging in a dripping beard of blood. “Up, boys,” Browne called, “up to victory!” Another cannon fired and three men were snatched back, slamming into the ranks behind and smearing the grass with thick gouts of blood. “To glory we steer!” Browne shouted, and the French muskets started firing again and a boy near him was clutching his belly, eyes wide, blood oozing between his fingers. “On!” Browne shouted. “On!” A ball snatched at his cocked hat, turning it. He had his sword drawn. The French were firing their muskets as soon as they were reloaded, not waiting for the orders to fire in volleys, and the smoke pumped out on the hilltop. Browne could hear the balls striking home in flesh, rapping on musket butts, and he knew that he had done his duty and he could do no more. His surviving men were taking shelter in the slightest dips of the slope or behind thickets, and they were firing back now, serving as a skirmish line, and that was all they could be. Half his men were gone—they were stretched on the hill or limping back down, or bleeding to death, or weeping in agony—and still the musket balls buzzed and whistled and slashed into the broken ranks.
Major Browne walked up and down behind the line. It was not much of a line. Ranks and files were gone, blown to ragged ruin by the artillery or blasted by the musket balls, but the living had not retreated. They were shooting back. Loading and firing, making small clouds of smoke that hid them from the enemy. Their mouths were sour from the saltpeter of the gunpowder and their cheeks burned by sparks from the locks. Wounded men struggled up to join the line where they loaded and fired. “Well done, my boys!” Browne shouted. “Well done!” He
