Бернард Корнуэлл: Sharpe's Havoc

„No, sir.”

„That way.” Hogan pointed eastward. „Four country miles.” He pushed his right boot into its stirrup, then lifted his body to flick out the tails of his blue coat. „With luck you may even rejoin us tomorrow night.”

„What I don’t understand… “ Sharpe began, then paused because the front door of the house had been thrown open and Mrs. Savage, widow and mother of the missing daughter, came into the sunlight. She was a good-looking woman in her forties: dark-haired, tall and slender with a pale face and high arched eyebrows. She hurried down the steps as a cannonball rumbled overhead and then there was a smattering of musket fire alarmingly close, so close that Sharpe climbed the porch steps to stare at the crest of the hill where the Braga road disappeared between a large tavern and a handsome church. A Portuguese six-pounder gun had just deployed by the church and was now firing at the invisible enemy. The bishop’s forces had dug new redoubts on the crest and patched the old medieval wall with hastily erected palisades and earthworks, but the sight of the small gun firing from its makeshift position in the center of the road suggested that those defenses were crumbling fast.

Mrs. Savage sobbed that her baby daughter was lost, then Captain Hogan managed to persuade the widow into the carriage. Two servants laden with bags stuffed with clothes followed their mistress into the vehicle. „You will find Kate?” Mrs. Savage pushed open the door and inquired of Captain Hogan.

„The precious darling will be with you very soon,” Hogan said reassuringly. „Mister Sharpe will see to that,” he added, then used his foot to close the coach door on Mrs. Savage, who was the widow of one of the many British wine merchants who lived and worked in the city of Oporto. She was rich, Sharpe presumed, certainly rich enough to own a fine carriage and the lavish House Beautiful, but she was also foolish for she should have left the city two or three days before, but she had stayed because she had evidently believed the bishop’s assurance that he could repel Marshal Soult’s army. Colonel Christopher, who had once lodged m the strangely named House Beautiful, had appealed to the British forces south of the river to send men to escort Mrs. Savage safely away and Captain Hogan had been the closest officer and Sharpe, with his riflemen, had been protecting Hogan while the engineer mapped northern Portugal, and so Sharpe had come north across the Douro with twenty-four of his men to escort Mrs. Savage and any other threatened British inhabitants of Oporto to safety. Which should have been a simple enough task, except that at dawn the widow Savage had discovered that her daughter had fled from the house.

„What I don’t understand,” Sharpe persevered, „is why she ran away.”

„She’s probably in love,” Hogan explained airily. „Nineteen-year-old girls of respectable families are dangerously susceptible to love because of all the novels they read. See you in two days, Richard, or maybe even tomorrow? Just wait for Colonel Christopher, he’ll be with you directly, and listen.” He bent down from the saddle and lowered his voice so that no one but Sharpe could hear him. „Keep a close eye on the Colonel, Richard. I worry about him, I do.”

„You should worry about me, sir.”

„I do that too, Richard, I do indeed,” Hogan said, then straightened up, waved farewell and spurred his horse after Mrs. Savage’s carriage which had swung out of the front gate and joined the stream of fugitives going toward the Douro.

The sound of the carriage wheels faded. The sun came from behind a cloud just as a French cannonball struck a tree on the hill’s crest and exploded a cloud of reddish blossoms which drifted above the city’s steep slope. Daniel Hagman stared at the airborne blossoms. „Looks like a wedding,” he said and then, glancing up as a musket ball ricocheted off a roof tile, brought a pair of scissors from his pocket. „Finish your hair, sir?”

„Why not, Dan,” Sharpe said. He sat on the porch steps and took off his shako.

Sergeant Harper checked that the sentinels were watching the north. A troop of Portuguese cavalry had appeared on the crest where the single cannon was firing bravely. A rattle of musketry proved that some infantry was still fighting, but more and more troops were retreating past the house and Sharpe knew it could only be a matter of minutes before the city’s defenses collapsed entirely. Hagman began slicing away at Sharpe’s hair. „You don’t like it over the ears, ain’t that right?”

„I like it short, Dan.”

„Short like a good sermon, sir,” Hagman said. „Now keep still, sir, just keep still.” There was a sudden stab of pain as Hagman speared a louse with the scissors’ blade. He spat on the drop of blood that showed on Sharpe’s scalp, then wiped it away. „So the Crapauds will get the city, sir?”

„Looks like it,” Sharpe said.

„And they’ll march on Lisbon next?” Hagman asked, cutting away.

„Long way to Lisbon,” Sharpe said.

„Maybe, sir, but there’s an awful lot of them, sir, and precious few of us.”

„But they say Wellesley’s coming here,” Sharpe said.

„As you keep telling us, sir,” Hagman said, „but is he really a miracle worker?”

„You fought at Copenhagen, Dan,” Sharpe said, „and down the coast here.” He meant the battles at Rolica and Vimeiro. „You could see for yourself.”

„From the skirmish line, sir, all generals are the same,” Hagman said, „and who knows if Sir Arthur’s really coming?” It was, after all, only a rumor that Sir Arthur Wellesley was taking over from General Cradock and not everyone believed it. Many thought the British would withdraw, ought to withdraw, that they should give up the game and let the French have Portugal. „Turn your head to the right,” Hagman said. The scissors clicked busily, not even pausing as a round shot buried itself in the church at the hill’s top. A mist of dust showed beside the whitewashed bell tower down which a crack had suddenly appeared. The Portuguese cavalry had been swallowed by the gun smoke and a trumpet called far away. There was a burst of musketry, then silence. A building must have been burning beyond the crest for there was a great smear of smoke drifting westward. „Why would someone call their home the House Beautiful?” Hagman wondered.

„Didn’t know you could read, Dan,” Sharpe said.

„I can’t, sir, but Isaiah read it to me.”

„Tongue!” Sharpe called. „Why would someone call their home House Beautiful?”

Isaiah Tongue, long and thin and dark and educated, who had joined the army because he was a drunk and thereby lost his respectable job, grinned. „Because he’s a good Protestant, sir.”

„Because he’s a bloody what?”

„It’s from a book by John Bunyan,” Tongue explained, „called Pilgrim’s Progress.”

„I’ve heard of that,” Sharpe said.

„Some folk consider it essential reading,” Tongue said airily, „the story of a soul’s journey from sin to salvation, sir.”

„Just the thing to keep you burning the candles at night,” Sharpe said.

„And the hero, Christian, calls at the House Beautiful, sir”-Tongue ignored Sharpe’s sarcasm-“where he talks with four virgins.”

Hagman laughed. „Let’s get inside now, sir.”

„You’re too old for a virgin, Dan,” Sharpe said.

„Discretion,” Tongue said, „Piety, Prudence and Charity.”

„What about them?” Sharpe asked.

„Those were the names of the virgins, sir,” Tongue said.

„Bloody hell,” Sharpe said.

„Charity’s mine,” Hagman said. „Pull your collar down, sir, that’s the way.” He snipped at the black hair. „He sounds like he was a tedious old man, Mister Savage, if it was him what named the house.” Hagman stooped to maneuver the scissors over Sharpe’s high collar. „So why did the Captain leave us here, sir?” he asked.