Sharpe's Enemy (26 page)

The sparks were brighter as the French accelerated through the gateway of the Castle. Sharpe looked at the stables. Six men, all in artillery uniform, stood gaping in the doorway. He swore at them, had a Sergeant take their names, and hoped that Dubreton had drawn no conclusions other than that Sharpe was hiding some guns. Tomorrow would reveal all.

It was nightfall, Christmas Day, in the Castle of the Virgin.

German voices, singing carols, faded behind them as they rode horses slowly towards the village. Eight officers and Josefina were dining with the French.

The torches that illuminated the village street flamed inside soft haloes. There was a night mist. Sir Augustus was in a playful mood, a heavy playfulness, perhaps because Josefina was looking as sultry and beautiful as artifice could make her. He looked across her at Sharpe. ‘Perhaps they’ll serve you frog’s legs, Sharpe!
^?

‘One can only hope, sir.’

There would be a hard frost tonight. To the south and overhead the stars were visible through the fine mist, Christmas stars, but the northern sky was dark, spreading south, and Sharpe could smell bad weather in the air. Pray God it would not be snow. He did not relish struggling from the Gateway of God, guarding the British, Portuguese and Spanish prisoners who were crammed into the Castle’s dungeon, struggling with them and Gilliland’s carts down the snow covered pass. Then, he thought, they might not be leaving in the morning. It depended on the French and their plans.

Dubreton waited for them at the door of the inn. It was a large building,‘far too large for such a tiny village, yet once it had served as a house for travelling men who crossed the Sierra and wanted to avoid the tolls of the southern road. The war had dulled trade, but still the building looked inviting and warm. A tricolour hung from an upstairs window, lit by two straw and resin torches, while unarmed soldiers came forward to take the horses. Farthingdale left the introductions to Sharpe. Four Captains, including Brooker and Cross, and two Lieutenants including Harry Price.

Once inside, Dubreton conducted Josefina to the room where the Frenchwomen prepared themselves. Sharpe heard delighted voices greeting their former companion in misfortune, and then he smiled as he saw the trouble that had been taken for the meal.

All the inn’s tables had been pushed together, making one great table covered in white cloths, and tall candles showed more than two dozen place settings. Forks, as Hagman had feared, gleamed silver beneath the flames. Wine bottles stood open on a sideboard, ranks of them, a whole Battalion of wine, while bread, hard crusted, waited in baskets on the table. A fire burned in the hearth, its warmth already reaching to the inn’s main door.

An orderly took Sharpe’s greatcoat, another brought a great bowl from which steam arose and Dubreton ladled out glasses of punch. A dozen French officers waited in the room, their smiles welcoming, their eyes curious to see their enemy so close. Dubreton waited till the orderly had passed the punch around. ‘I wish you gentlemen a happy Christmas!’

‘A happy Christmas!’

There was a smell from the inn’s kitchens that could have been a foretaste of paradise.

Farthingdale raised his glass. ‘To a gallant enemy!’ He repeated it in French.

‘To a gallant enemy!’

Sharpe drank and his eye was caught by a French officer who, unlike the others, was not dressed as either an infantry-man, a Lancer, or a Dragoon. His uniform was plain blue, very dark, without a single badge of rank or unit mark. He wore spectacles, wire bound, and his face showed the ravages of childhood smallpox. The eyes, small and dark like the man himself, caught Sharpe’s and there was none of the friendliness that the other officers showed.

Dubreton returned Sir Augustus’ compliment and then announced that dinner would be another half hour yet, that the orderlies would keep their glasses charged, and that his officers had been chosen for their English, mostly bad, but please would they consider themselves welcome. Farthingdale made a small response and then chivvied the British officers towards the waiting French. Sharpe, hating small talk, moved to a shadowed corner of the room and was astonished that the small dark man in his blue, plain uniform headed for him. ‘Major Sharpe?’

‘Yes.’

‘More punch?’

‘No, thank you.’

‘You prefer wine?’ The voice was harsh, the tone mocking.

‘Yes.’

The Frenchman, whose English accent was almost too perfect, snapped his fingers and Sharpe was startled by the alacrity with which an orderly responded to the summons. This man was feared. When the orderly was gone the Frenchman looked up at the Rifleman. ‘Your promotion is recent, yes?’

‘I don’t have the honour of your name.’

A quick smile, instantly gone. ‘Ducos. Major Ducos, at your service.’

‘And why should my promotion be recent, Major?’

The smile came again, a secret smile as if Ducos harboured knowledge and revelled in it. ‘Because in the summer you were a Captain. Let me see, now. At Salamanca? Yes. Then at Garcia Hernandez where you killed Leroux. A pity that, he was a good man. Your name didn’t come to my ears at Burgos, but I suspect you were recovering from the wound Leroux gave you.’

‘Anything else?’ The man had been absolutely right in everything, annoyingly right. Sharpe noticed the buzz of conversation growing in the rest of the room, the beginning of laughter, and he noticed too that all the French had given this small man a wide berth. Dubreton looked over, caught Sharpe’s eye, and the French Colonel gave a tiny, almost apologetic shrug.

‘There’s more, Major.’ Ducos waited for the orderly to give Sharpe his wine. ‘Have you seen your wife in the last few weeks?’

‘I’m sure you know the answer to that.’

Ducos smiled, taking it as a compliment. ‘I hear La Aguja is in Casatejada, and in no danger from us, I assure you.’

‘She rarely is.’

The insult went past Ducos as if it had never been uttered. The spectacles flashed circles of candle-light at Sharpe. ‘Are you surprised I know so much about you, Sharpe?’

‘Fame is always surprising, Ducos, and very gratifying.’ Sharpe sounded wonderfully pompous to himself, but this small, sardonic Major was annoying him.

Ducos laughed. ‘Enjoy it while you can, Sharpe. It won’t last. Fame bought on a battlefield can only be sustained on a battlefield, and usually that brings death. I doubt you’ll see the war’s end.’

Sharpe raised his glass. ‘Thank you.’

Ducos shrugged. ‘You’re all fools, you heroes. Like him.’ He jerked his head towards Dubreton. ‘You think the trumpet will never stop.’ He sipped his glass, taking very little. ‘I know about you because we have a mutual friend.’

‘I find that unlikely.’

‘You do?’ Ducos seemed to like being insulted, perhaps because his power to hurt back was absolute and secret. There was something sinister about him, something that spoke of a power which could afford to ignore soldiers. ‘Perhaps not a mutual friend, then. Your friend, yes. Mine? An acquaintance, perhaps.’ He waited for Sharpe’s curious ity to give voice, and laughed when he knew Sharpe would say nothing. ‘Shall I give a message to Helene Leroux for you?’ He laughed again, delighted by the effect of his words. ‘You see? I can surprise you, Major Sharpe.’

Helene Leroux. La Marquesa de Casares el Grande y Melida Sadaba, Sharpe’s lover in Salamanca, whom he had last seen in Madrid before the British retreated to Portugal. Helene, a woman of dazzling beauty, a woman who spied for France, Sharpe’s lover. ‘You know Helene?’

‘I said so, didn’t I.’ The spectacles flashed their circles of light. ‘I always tell the truth, Sharpe, it so often surprises people.’

‘Give her my respects.’

‘Is that all! I shall tell her you gaped at the mention of her name, not that that surprises me. Half the officers in France fall at her feet. Yet she chose you. I wonder why, Major? You did kill her brother, so why did she like you?’

‘It was my scar, Ducos.’ Sharpe touched his face. ‘You should get one.’

‘I stay clear of battles, Sharpe.’The smile came and went. ‘I hate violence, unless it is necessary, and most battles are just brawls where nobodies make fleeting names for themselves. You haven’t asked me where she is.’

‘Would I get an answer?’

‘Of course. She has returned to France. I fear you won’t see her for a long time, Major, not till the war is over, perhaps.’

Sharpe thought of his wife, Teresa, and he thought of the guilt that he had felt when he had betrayed her, but he could not erase the blonde Frenchwoman, married to her ancient Spanish Marques, from his mind. He wanted to see her again, to see again a woman who matched a dream.

‘Ducos! You’re monopolizing Major Sharpe.’ Dubreton cut in between them.

‘I thought Sharpe the most interesting of your guests.’ Ducos did not bother to say ‘sir’.

Dubreton’s dislike of the Major was obvious. ‘You should talk to Sir Augustus, Ducos. He’s written a book so he must be fascinating.’ Dubreton’s scorn of Sir Augustus was equally evident.

Ducos did not move. ‘Sir Augustus Farthingdale? A functionary only. Large parts of his book were drawn from Major Chamberlin’s of the 24th.’ He sipped his punch and looked about the room. ‘You have officers of the Fusiliers, one man from the South Essex, and one Rifleman, excluding yourself, Major Sharpe. Let me see now. One full Battalion? The Fusiliers. One Company of the 6oth, and your own Company. You were hoping to make us think you had more men?’

Sharpe smiled. ‘One Battalion of French infantry, one hundred and twenty Lancers, and one hundred and fifty Dragoons. And one functionary, Major. Yourself. We’re well matched.’

Dubreton laughed, Ducos scowled, and then the French Colonel took Sharpe’s elbow and led him away from the small man. ‘He is a functionary, but more dangerous than your Sir Augustus.’

Sharpe looked back at Ducos. ‘What is he?’

‘What he wills. He’s from Paris. He used to be one of Fouche’s right hand men.’

‘Fouché?’

‘How fortunate you are not to know the name.’ Dubreton took another glass of punch from a passing tray. ‘A policeman, Sharpe, working behind the scenes. He is periodically disgraced and loses the Emperor’s favour, but these men always come back.’ He jerked his head at Ducos. ‘Another fanatic, spying on his own side. For him today is not Christmas Day, it is the 5th of Nivose, year 20, and it does not matter to him that the Emperor abolished the Revolutionary Calendar. He bums with the passion.’

‘Why did you bring him?’

‘What choice do I have? He decides where he will go, who he speaks to.’

Sharpe turned to look at Ducos. The small Major smiled at Sharpe, revealing teeth stained red by the punch.

Dubreton ordered more wine for Sharpe. ‘You leave tomorrow?’

‘You must ask Sir Augustus. He’s in command.’

‘Really?’ Dubreton smiled, then turned as a door opened. ‘Ah! The ladies!’

New introductions were made all round, introductions that seemed to last five minutes, and hand after hand was ‘kissed, elaborate courtesies made, and then, with equal elaboration, Dubreton seated his guests. He himself had reserved a chair in the centre of the table, facing the door, and he steered Sir Augustus to a place beside him with exquisite grace. Ducos immediately took the chair on Farthingdale’s other side, and Sir Augustus looked in alarm for Josefina. Dubreton saw the look. ’Now, now, Sir Augustus! We have talking to do, much talking, and your beautiful wife is ever with you, whereas we only have the pleasure of your company for such short time.‘ He gestured with his hand to Josefina. ’Can I persuade you to sit opposite your husband, Lady Farthingdale? I trust there is no draught from the door. It is well curtained, but perhaps Major Sharpe would consent to sit beside you to protect you from the winter?‘

It had been neatly done. The French had Farthingdale where they wanted him. They planned to negotiate and were giving him no place to turn. Dubreton sat next to his own wife, rubbing salt into Sir Augustus’ wound, and Sharpe saw Sir Augustus looking painfully at Josefina. He wanted her close, he hated to see her away from him, and it seemed pathetic to Sharpe that a man should be so bereft because his whore was seven feet away.

Madame Dubreton smiled at Sharpe. ‘We meet under happier circumstances, Major.’

‘Indeed we do, Ma’am.‘

‘The last time I saw Major Sharpe,’ she addressed the table at large and conveniently forgot the meetings they had had in the Convent since her rescue, ‘he was bespattered with blood, holding a very large sword, and was extremely frightening.’ She smiled at him.

‘I apologize for that, Ma’am.‘

‘Please don’t. In retrospect it was a wonderful sight.’

‘It was your remembrance of Alexander Pope that made it possible, Ma’am.‘

She smiled. The tiredness had gone, her face seemed to be smoother, and she and Dubreton radiated a happiness in each other. ‘I always said poetry would be useful one day. Alexandre never believed me.’

Dubreton laughed, shrugged off the embarrassment of his name, and then conversation died away as a soup was served. Sharpe tasted it. It was a soup so delicious that he feared the second mouthful could not possibly live up to the promise of the first, yet it did, and seemed better, and he took more and then saw Dubreton was watching him with amusement. ‘Good?’

‘Magnificent.’

‘Chestnuts. It’s very simple, Major. Some vegetable stock, crushed chestnuts, butter and parsley. Cooking is so simple! The most difficult thing is to peel the chestnuts, but we have so many prisoners. Voila!’

‘Is that all there is in it?’

A French Dragoon Captain insisted there was cream in the soup, and a German Lancer protested that cooking was never simple because he had never managed to cook anything other than a boiled egg and even then it came out hard as a Cuirasseur’s breastplate, and a Fusilier Captain insisted he had seen men boil eggs by whirling them round and round in a cloth sling, taking forever, and Harold Price insisted on giving the recipe for a ‘tommy’, the British Army pancake, which consisted of nothing but flour and water, but still took Price two minutes to describe. Sir Augustus, feeling left out, said how astonished he was that the Portuguese ate only the leaves of the turnip and Josefina, feeling her country slighted, delicately insulted him by suggesting that only a heathen would eat any other part of a turnip, and then the soup was gone and Sharpe looked wistfully into the empty bowl.