There was silence again. Sharpe felt an immense relief that the Sergeant was alive and well. He knew he should say something to that effect, but it would be too embarrassing. Instead he waved at the window-ledge. ‘Paddock made some tea.’
‘Grand!’
‘Is Isabella well?’
‘She’s just grand, sir.’ Harper tipped the cup up and drained it. ‘Mr Leroy gave us permission to get married.’
‘That’s wonderful!’
‘Aye, well.’ Harper shrugged. ‘There’s a wee one on the way, sir. I think Mr Leroy thought it would be best.’
‘Probably.’.
Harper smiled. ‘I had a bet with Mr d’Alembord that you’d be back, sir.’
Sharpe laughed. ‘You’ll need money if you’re going to marry, Patrick.’
‘Aye, that’s true. Nothing like a woman for spending a man’s money, eh?’
‘So when’s the wedding?’
‘Soon as I can find a priest. She’s got herself a dress, so she has. It’s got frills.’ He said it gloomily.
‘You’ll let me know?’
‘Of course!’ Harper was embarrassed. ‘You know what women are like, sir.’
‘I’ve seen one or two, Patrick.’
‘Aye well. They like marrying, so they do.’ He shrugged.
‘Especially when they’re pregnant, yes?’
Harper laughed. There was silence again. The huge Sergeant put the cup down. ‘It is grand to see you, sir.’
‘You won your bet, eh?’
‘Only a bloody pound.’
‘You had that much faith in me, eh?’
They laughed again.
A horse’s hooves were loud outside. A voice shouted. ‘South Essex!’
‘In here!’ Sharpe shouted back, glad suddenly of the distraction from the emotion he felt.
A staff officer dismounted and ducked under the lintel. ‘Colonel Leroy?’ He straightened up.
It was Lieutenant Michael Trumper-Jones, in his hand a folded order for the Battalion. He stared at Sharpe, his mouth dropped open, and, his head slowly shaking and his eyes widening, he fell backwards in a dead faint. His scabbard chains clinked as he slumped on the floor. Sharpe nodded at the prostrate body. That’s the bugger who defended me.’
Harper laughed, then cocked his head. ‘Listen!’
The French guns had stopped. The bridge must have fallen, and suddenly Sharpe knew what he wanted to do. ‘Angel!’
‘Senor?’
‘Horses! Patrick?’
‘Sir?’
‘Grab that fool’s horse.’ He pointed at Trumper-Jones. ‘We’re going hunting!’
‘For what?’ Harper was already moving.
‘Wedding presents and a woman!’ Sharpe followed Harper into the street, looked around, and spotted a Captain of the South Essex. ‘Mr Mahoney!’
‘Sir?’
‘You’ll find orders in that house! Obey them! I’ll be back!’ He gave the mystified Mahoney the letter for Hogan, swung onto Carbine’s saddle, and rode towards the bridge.
To the north of Gamarra Mayor, at a village called Durana, Spanish troops cut the Great Road. The defenders at Durana had been the Spanish regiments loyal to France.
Countrymen fought countrymen, the bitterest clash, and Wellington’s Spaniards, faithful to Spain, won the bridge at five o’clock. The Great Road to France was cut.
The Spanish troops had climbed barricades of the dead. They had fought till their musket barrels were almost red hot, till they had savaged the defenders and won a great victory. They had blocked the Great Road.
The French could still have broken through. They could have screened themselves to the west and thrown their great columns at the tired, — blood-soaked Spaniards, but in the confusion of a smoke filled plain no one knew how few men had broken through in the rear. And all the time, minute by minute, the British Battalions were coming from the west while the great guns, massed wheel to wheel by Wellington, tore huge gaps in the French lines.
The French broke.
King Joseph’s army, that had started the day with a confidence not seen by a French army in Spain for six years, collapsed.
It happened desperately fast, and it happened in pieces. One Brigade would fight, standing fast and firing at their enemies, while another would crumble and run at the first British volley. The French guns fell silent one by one, were limbered up and taken back towards the city. Generals lost touch with their troops, they shouted for information, shouted for men to stand, but the French line was being shredded by the regular, staccato volleys of the British Battalions while overhead the British shells cracked apart in smoke and shrapnel and the French troops edged backwards and then came the rumour that the Great Road was cut and that the enemy came from the north. In truth the French guns still held the British at Gamarra Mayor and the Spaniards further north were too tired and too few to attack south, but the rumour finally broke the French army. It ran.
It was early evening, the time when the trout were rising to feed in the river that flowed beneath the now unguarded bridge at Gamarra Mayor. The French who had guarded the bridge so well had seen their comrades run. They joined the flight.
The men who watched from the western hills or from the Puebla Heights were given a view of magnificence, a view granted to few men, an eagle’s view of victory.
The smoke cleared slowly from the plain to show an army marching forward. Not in parade order, but in a more glorious order. From the mountains to the river, across two miles of burned and bloodied country, the allied Regiments were spread. They marched beneath their Colours and the sun lanced between the smoke to touch the ragged flags red, white, blue, gold, and red again where the blood had soaked them. The land was heavy with the men who marched, Regiment after Regiment, Brigade after Brigade, climbing the low hills that had been the French second line. Their shadows went before them as they marched towards the city of golden spires.
And in the city the women saw the French army break, saw the troops come running, saw the cavalry heading the panicked flight. The tiered seats emptied. Through the city, from house to house, the news spread, and the camp-followers and families and lovers of the French began their own headlong flight from Vitoria. They were spurred on their way by Marshal Jourdan’s last orders in Vitoria, orders brought by harried cavalrymen who shouted at the French to make for Salvatierra.
The Great Road was cut and the only road left for retreat was a narrow, damp track that wound its way towards Salvatierra and from there to Pamplona. From Pamplona, by tortuous paths, the army might struggle back to France through the high Pyrenees.
The chaos began. Civilians, coaches, wagons and horses blocked the narrow streets while, to the west, beneath a sun hazed by the smoke of battle, the victorious Battalions marched in their great line towards the city. The victors darkened the plain and their Colours were high.
While to the south three horsemen crossed Gamarra Mayor’s bridge. They had to pick their way through the corpses, which were already thick with flies, onto the Zadorra’s northern bank.
Sharpe touched his heels to Carbine’s flank. He had his victory, and now, with Harper and Angel beside him, he would ride into the chaos of defeat to search for the Marquesa.
