Sharpe's Havoc (18 page)

“I thought it was liberty,” Kate suggested.

“Liberty! Man has no liberty except the liberty to obey rules, but who makes the rules?
With luck, Kate, it will be reasonable men making reasonable rules. Clever men. Subtle men.
In the end, Kate, it is a coterie of sophisticated men who will make the rules, but they
will make them according to the tenets of reason and there are some of us in Britain, a few of
us in Britain, who understand that we will have to come to terms with that idea. We also have
to help shape it. If we fight it then the world will become new without us and we shall be
defeated by reason. So we must work with it.”

“With Bonaparte?” Kate asked, distaste in her voice.

“With all the countries of Europe!” Christopher said enthusiastically. “With
Portugal and Spain, with Prussia and Austria, with Holland and, yes, with France. We have
more in common than divides us, yet we fight! What sense does that make? There can be no
progress without peace, Kate, none! You do want peace, my love?”

“Devoutly,” Kate said.

“Then trust me,” Christopher said, “trust that I know what I’m doing.”

And she did trust him because she was young and her husband was so much older and she knew
he was privy to opinions that were far more sophisticated than her instincts. Yet the
following night that trust was put to the test when four French officers and their
mistresses came to the House Beautiful for supper, the group led by Brigadier General
Henri Vuillard, a tall elegantly handsome man who was charming to Kate, kissing her hand
and complimenting her on the house and the garden. Vuillard’s servant brought a crate of
wine as a gift, though it was hardly tactful, for the wine was Savages’ best, appropriated
from one of the British ships that had been trapped on Oporto’s quays by contrary winds when
the French took the city.

After supper the three junior officers entertained the ladies in the parlor while
Christopher and Vuillard paced the garden, their cigars trailing smoke beneath the black
cypress trees. “Soult is worried,” Vuillard confessed.

“By Cradock?”

“Cradock’s an old woman,” Vuillard said scathingly. “Isn’t it true he wanted to withdraw
last year? But what about Wellesley?”

“Tougher,” Christopher admitted, “but it’s by no means certain he’ll come here. He has
enemies in London.”

“Political enemies, I presume?” Vuillard asked.

“Indeed.”

“The most dangerous enemies of a soldier,” Vuillard said. He was of an age with
Christopher, and a favorite of Marshal Soult. “No, Soult’s worried,” he went on, “because
we’re frittering troops away to protect our supply lines. You kill two peasants armed with
matchlock guns in this damn country and twenty more spring up from the rocks, and the twenty
don’t have matchlocks any longer, instead they have good British muskets supplied by your damn
country.”

“Take Lisbon,” Christopher said, “and capture every other port, and the supply of arms
will dry up.”

“We’ll do it,” Vuillard promised, “in time. But we could do with another fifteen thousand
men.”

Christopher stopped at the garden’s edge and stared across the Douro for a few seconds. The
city lay beneath him, the smoke from a thousand kitchens smirching the night air. “Is Soult
going to declare himself king?”

“You know what his nickname is now?” Vuillard asked, amused. “King Nicolas! No, he won’t
make the declaration, not if he’s got any sense and he’s probably got just enough. The local
people won’t stand for it, the army won’t support it and the Emperor will poach his balls for
it.”

Christopher smiled. “But he’s tempted?”

“Oh, he’s tempted, but Soult usually stops before he goes too far. Usually.” Vuillard
sounded cautious for Soult, only the day before, had sent a letter to all the generals in
his army, suggesting that they encourage the Portuguese to declare their support for him
to become king. It was, Vuillard thought, madness, but Soult was obsessed with the idea of
being a royal. “I told him he’ll provoke a mutiny if he does.”

“That he will,” Christopher said, “and you need to know that Argenton was in Coimbra. He
met Cradock.”

“Argenton’s a fool,” Vuillard snarled.

“He’s a useful fool,” Christopher observed. “Let him keep talking to the British and
they’ll do nothing. Why should they exert themselves if your army is going to destroy
itself by mutiny?”

“But will it?” Vuillard asked. “Just how many officers does Argenton speak for?”

“Enough,” Christopher said, “and I have their names.”

Vuillard chuckled. “I could have you arrested, Englishman, and given to a pair of
dragoon sergeants who’ll prize those names out of you in two minutes.”

“You’ll get the names,” Christopher said, “in time. But for the moment, Brigadier, I give
you this instead.” He handed Vuillard an envelope.

“What is it?” It was too dark in the garden to read anything.

“Cradock’s order of battle,” Christopher said. “Some of his troops are in Coimbra, but
most are in Lisbon. In brief he has sixteen thousand British bayonets and seven thousand
Portuguese. The details are all there, and you will note they are particularly deficient
in artillery.”

“How deficient?”

“Three batteries of six-pounders,” Christopher said, “and one of three. There are rumors
that more guns, heavier guns, are coming, but such rumors have always proved false in the
past.”

“Three-pounders!” Vuillard laughed. “He might as well chuck rocks at us.” The Brigadier
tapped the envelope. “So what do you want from us?”

Christopher walked a few paces in silence, then shrugged. “It seems to me, General, that
Europe is going to be ruled from Paris, not from London. You’re going to put your own king
here.”

“True,” Vuillard said, “and it might even be King Nicolas if he captures Lisbon quickly
enough, but the Emperor has a stableful of idle brothers. One of those will probably get
Portugal.”

“But whoever it is,” Christopher said, “I can be useful to him.”

“By giving us this”-Vuillard flourished the envelope-”and a few names that I can kick out
of Argenton whenever I wish?”

“Like all soldiers,” Christopher said smoothly, “you are unsubtle. Once you conquer
Portugal, General, you will have to pacify it. I know who can be trusted here, who will
work with you and who are your secret enemies. I know which men say one thing and do another.
I bring you all the knowledge of Britain’s Foreign Office. I know who spies for Britain and
who their paymasters are. I know the codes they use and the routes their messages take. I know
who will work for you and who will work against you. I know who will lie to you, and who will
tell you the truth. In short, General, I can save you thousands of deaths unless, of course,
you would rather send your troops against peasants in the hills?”

Vuillard chuckled. “And what if we don’t conquer Portugal? What happens to you if we
withdraw?”

“Then I shall own Savages,” Christopher answered calmly, “and my masters at home will
simply calculate that I failed to encourage mutiny in your ranks. But I doubt you’ll lose.
What has stopped the Emperor so far?”

“La Manche,” Vuillard said dryly, meaning the English Channel. He drew on his cigar. “You
came to me,” he said, “with news of mutinv. But you never told me what you wanted in exchange.
So tell me now, Englishman.”

“The port trade,” Christopher said, “I want the port trade.”

The simplicity of the answer made Vuillard check his pacing. “The port trade?”

“All of it. Croft, Taylor Fladgate, Burmester, Smith Woodhouse, Dow’s, Savages, Gould,
Kopke, Sandeman, all the lodges. I don’t want to own them, I already own Savages, or I will
soon, I just want to be the sole shipper.”

Vuillard took a few seconds to understand the scope of the demand. “You’d control half
the export trade of Portugal!” he said. “You’d be richer than the Emperor!”

“Not quite,” Christopher said, “because the Emperor will tax me and I can’t tax him. The
man who becomes impressively rich, General, is the man who levies the tax, not he who pays
it.”

“You’ll still be wealthy.”

“And that, General, is what I want.”

Vuillard stared down at the black lawn. Someone was playing a harpsichord in the House
Beautiful and there was the sound of women’s laughter. Peace, he thought, would eventually
come and maybe this polished Englishman could help bring it about. “You’re not telling me the
names I want,” he said, “and you’ve given me a list of British forces. But how do I know you’re
not deceiving me?”

“You don’t.”

“I want more than lists,” Vuillard said harshly. “I need to know, Englishman, that you’re
willing to give something tangible to prove that you’re on our side.”

“You want blood,” Christopher said mildly. He had been expecting the demand.

“Blood will do, but not Portuguese blood. British blood.”

Christopher smiled. “There is a village called Vila Real de Zedes,” he said, “where
Savages have some vineyards. It has been curiously undisturbed by the conquest.” That was
true, but only because Christopher had arranged it with Argenton’s colonel and fellow
plotter whose dragoons were responsible for patrolling that stretch of country. “But if
you send a small force there,” Christopher went on, “you will find a token unit of British
riflemen. There are only a score of them, but they have some Portuguese troops and some
rebels with them. Say a hundred men altogether? They’re yours, but in return I ask one
thing.”

“Which is?”

“Spare the Quinta. It belongs to my wife’s family.”

A grumble of thunder sounded to the north and the cypresses were outlined by a flash of
sheet lightning. “Vila Real de Zedes?” Vuillard asked.

“A village not far from the Amarante road,” Christopher said, “and I wish I could give you
something more, but I offer what I can as an earnest of my sincerity. The troops there will
give you no trouble. They’re led by a British lieutenant and he didn’t strike me as
particularly resourceful. The man must be thirty if he’s a day and he’s still a lieutenant
so he can’t be up to much.”

Another crackle of thunder made Vuillard look anxiously to the northern sky. “We must
get back to quarters before the rain comes,” he said, but then paused. “It doesn’t worry you
that you betray your country?”

“I betray nothing,” Christopher said, and then, for a change, he spoke truthfully. “If
France’s conquests, General, are ruled only by Frenchmen then Europe will regard you as
nothing but adventurers and exploiters, but if you share your power, if every nation in
Europe contributes to the government of every other nation, then we will have moved into
the promised world of reason and peace. Isn’t that what your Emperor wants? A European
system, those were his words, a European system, a European code of laws, a European
judiciary and one nation alone in Europe, Europeans. How can I betray my own
continent?”

Vuillard grimaced. “Our Emperor talks a lot, Englishman. He’s a Corsican and he has
wild dreams. Is that what you are? A dreamer?”

“I am a realist,” Christopher said. He had used his knowledge of the mutiny to
ingratiate himself with the French, and now he would secure their trust by offering a
handful of British soldiers as a sacrifice.

So Sharpe and his men must die, so that Europe’s glorious future could arrive.

The loss of the telescope hurt Sharpe. He told himself it was a bauble, a useful frill, but
it still hurt. It marked an achievement, not just the rescue of Sir Arthur Wellesley, but the
promotion to commissioned rank afterward. Sometimes, when he scarcely dared believe that
he was a King’s officer, he would look at the telescope and think how far he had traveled
from the orphanage in Brewhouse Lane and at other times, though he was reluctant to admit
it to himself, he enjoyed refusing to explain the plaque on the telescope’s barrel. Yet he
knew other men knew. They looked at him, understood he had once fought like a demon under
the Indian sun and were awed.

Now bloody Christopher had the glass.

“You’ll get it back, sir,” Harper tried to console him.

“I bloody will, too. I hear that Williamson got into a fight in the village last night?”

“Not much of a fight, sir. I pulled him off.”

“Who was he milling?”

“One of Lopes’s men, sir. As evil a bastard as Williamson.”

“Should I punish him?”

“God, no, sir. I looked after it.”

But Sharpe nevertheless declared the village out of bounds, which he knew would not be
popular with his men. Harper spoke for them, pointing out that there were some pretty girls
in Vila Real de Zedes. “There’s one wee slip of a thing there, sir,” he said, “that would bring
tears to your eyes. The lads only want to walk down there of an evening to say hello.”

“And to leave some babies behind.”

“That too,” Harper agreed.

“And the girls can’t walk up here?” Sharpe asked. “I hear some do.”

“Some do, sir, I’m told, that’s true.”

“Including one wee slip of a thing that has red hair and can bring tears to your eyes?”

Harper watched a buzzard quartering the broom-clad slopes of the hill on which the fort
was being made. “Some of us like to go to church in the village, sir,” he said, studiously
not talking about the red-headed girl whose name was Maria.

Sharpe smiled. “So how many Catholics have we got?”

“There’s me, sir, and Donnelly and Carter and McNeill. Oh, and Slattery, of course. The
rest of you are all going to hell.”

“Slattery!” Sharpe said. “Fergus isn’t a Christian.”

“I never said he was, sir, but he goes to mass.”

Sharpe could not help laughing. “So I’ll let the Catholics go to mass,” he said.

Harper grinned. “That means they’ll all be Catholic by Sunday.”

“This is the army,” Sharpe said, “so anyone wanting to convert has to get my permission.
But you can take the other four to mass and you bring them back by midday, and if I find any of
the other lads down there I’ll hold you responsible.”