Wellesley did approve, spoke very warmly of the Irishman.
„So,” Wellesley summed up the situation, „they’re on the road between here and Amarante, and they can’t come back without fighting us and they can’t go forward without meeting Beresford, so they must go north into the hills. And where do they go after that?”
„To this road here, sir,” Hogan answered, pointing a pencil at the map. „It goes from Braga to Chaves, sir, and if he manages to get past the Ponte Nova and reach Ruivaens, which is a village here”-he paused to make a pencil mark on the map-”then there’s a track that will take him north across the hills to Montalegre and that’s just a stone’s throw from the frontier.” Sir Arthur’s aides were huddled about the dining table, looking down at the candlelit map, though one man, a slight and pale figure dressed in elegant civilian clothes, did not bother to take any interest, but just stretched languidly in an armchair where he managed to convey the insulting impression that he was bored by this talk of maps, roads, hills and bridges.
„And this road, sir,” Hogan went on, tracing his pencil from the Ponte Nova to Montalegre, „is a real devil. It’s a twister, sir. You have to walk five miles to go a half-mile forward. And better still, sir, it crosses a couple of rivers, small ones, but in deep gorges with quick water, and that means high bridges, sir, and if the Portuguese can cut one of those bridges then Monsieur Soult is lost, sir. He’s trapped. He can only lead his men across the mountains and they’ll have the devil on their heels all the way.”
„God speed the Portuguese,” Wellesley grunted, grimacing at the sound of the rain which he kriew would slow his allies who were advancing inland in an attempt to sever the roads by which the French could reach Spain. They had already cut them off at Amarante, but now they would need to march further north while Wellesley’s army, fresh from its triumph at Oporto, would have to chase the French. The British were the beaters driving their game toward the Portuguese guns. Wellesley stared at the map. „You drew this, Hogan?”
„I did, sir.”
„And it’s reliable?”
„It is, sir.“
Sir Arthur grunted. If it were not for the weather, he thought, he would bag Soult and all his men, but the rain would make it a damned difficult pursuit. Which meant the sooner it began the better and so aides were sent with orders that would start the British army on its march at dawn. Then, the orders given, Sir Arthur yawned. He badly needed some sleep before the morning and he was about to turn in when the big doors were thrown open and a very wet, very ragged and very unshaven rifleman entered. He saw General Wellesley, looked surprised and instinctively came to attention.
„Good God,” Wellesley said sourly.
„I think you know Lieutenant… „Hogan began.
„Of course I know Lieutenant Sharpe,” Wellesley snapped, „but what I want to know is what the devil is he doing here? The 95th aren’t with us.”
Hogan removed the candlesticks from the corners of the map and let it roll up. „That’s my doing, Sir Arthur,” he said calmly. „I found Lieutenant Sharpe and his men wandering like lost sheep and took them into my care, and ever since he’s been escorting me on my journeys to the frontier. I couldn’t have coped with the French patrols on my own, Sir Arthur, and Mister Sharpe was a great comfort.”
Wellesley, while Hogan offered the explanation, just stared at Sharpe. „You were lost?” he demanded coldly.
„Cut off, sir,” Sharpe said.
„During the retreat to Corunna?”
„Yes, sir,” Sharpe said. In fact his unit had been retreating toward Vigo, but the distinction was not important and Sharpe had long learned to keep replies to senior officers as brief as possible.
„So where the devil have you been these last few weeks?” Wellesley asked tartly. „Skulking?”
„Yes, sir,” Sharpe said, and the staff officers stiffened at the whiff of insolence that drifted through the room.
„I ordered the Lieutenant to find a young Englishwoman who was lost, sir,” Hogan hurried to explain. „In fact I ordered him to accompany Colonel Christopher.”
The mention of that name was like a whip crack. No one spoke though the young civilian who had been pretending to sleep in the armchair and who had opened his eyes wide with surprise when Sharpe’s name was first mentioned now paid very close attention. He was a painfully thin young man and pallid, as though he feared the sun, and there was something feline, almost feminine, in his delicate appearance. His clothes, so very elegant, would have been well suited to a London drawing room or a Paris salon, but here, amidst the unwashed uniforms and suntanned officers of Wellesley’s staff, he looked like a pampered lapdog among hounds. He was sitting up straight now and staring intently at Sharpe.
„Colonel Christopher.” Wellesley broke the silence. „So you’ve been with him?” he demanded of Sharpe.
„General Cradock ordered me to stay with him, sir,” Sharpe said, and took the General’s order from his pouch and laid it on the table.
Wellesley did not even glance at the paper. „What the devil was Cradock doing?” he snapped. „Christopher’s not even a properly commissioned officer, he’s a damned Foreign Office flunkey!” These last words were spat at the pale young man, who, rather than respond, made an airily dismissive gesture with the delicate fingers of his right hand. He caught Sharpe’s eye then and turned the gesture into a small wave of welcome and Sharpe realized, with a start of recognition, that it was Lord Pumphrey whom he had last met in Copenhagen. His lordship, Sharpe knew, was mysteriously prominent in the Foreign Office, but Pumphrey offered no explanation of his presence in Oporto as Wellesley snatched up General Cradock’s order, read it and then threw the paper down. „So what did Christopher order you to do?” he asked Sharpe.
„To stay at a place called Vila Real de Zedes, sir.”
„And do what there, pray?”
„Be killed, sir.”
„Be killed?” Sir Arthur asked in a dangerous tone. He knew Sharpe was being impudent and, though the rifleman had once saved his life, Sir Arthur was quite ready to slap him down.
„He brought a French force to the village, sir. They attacked us.”
„Not very effectively, it seems,” Wellesley said sarcastically.
„Not very, no, sir,” Sharpe agreed, „but there were twelve hundred of them, sir, and only sixty of us.” He said no more and there was silence in the big room as men worked out the odds. Twenty to one. Another peal of thunder racked the sky and a shard of lightning flickered to the west.
„Twelve hundred, Richard?” Hogan asked in a voice which suggested Sharpe might like to amend the figure downward.
„There were probably more, sir,” Sharpe said stoically. „The 31st Leger attacked us, but they were backed up by at least one regiment of dragoons and an howitzer. Only the one, though, sir, and we saw them off.” He stopped and no one spoke again, and Sharpe remembered he had not paid tribute to his ally and so turned back to Wellesley. „I had Lieutenant Vicente with me, sir, of the 18th Portuguese, and his thirty-odd lads helped us a lot, but I’m sorry to report he lost a couple of men and I lost a couple too. And one of my men deserted, sir. I’m sorry about that.”
There was another silence, a much longer one, in which the officers stared at Sharpe and Sharpe tried to count the candles on the big table, and then Lord Pumphrey broke the silence. „You tell us, Lieutenant, that Mister Christopher brought these troops to attack you?”
„Yes, sir.”
Pumphrey smiled. „Did he bring them? Or was he brought by them?”
„He brought them,” Sharpe said vigorously. „And then he had the bloody nerve to come up the hill and tell me the war was over and we ought to walk down and let the French take care of us.”
„Thank you, Lieutenant,” Pumphrey said with exaggerated civility.
There was another silence, then Colonel Waters cleared his throat. „You will recall, sir,” he said softly, „that it was Lieutenant Sharpe who provided us with our navy this morning.” In other words, he was saying to Sir Arthur Wellesley, show some damned gratitude.
But Sir Arthur was in no mood to show gratitude. He just stared at Sharpe, and then Hogan remembered the letter that he had rescued from the House Beautiful and he took it from his pocket. „It’s for you, Lieutenant,” he
