“Whatever he does,” Sharpe said, “he’s still in danger. The French want his list of names.”
“Aksel looks after him,” Astrid said.
“Then he’s in far more danger than he realizes,” Sharpe said.
Astrid smiled at that. “You don’t like Aksel?”
“No. Do you?”
“No,” Astrid confessed, “but this morning my father suggested I marry him.”
“Why?”
She shrugged. She was silent for a few seconds, flinching as a succession of big shells cracked apart in the citadel. Each explosion flashed livid light on the smoke and threw shadows from the gravestones. Sharpe could hear the scraps of shattered casing striking on the citadel’s walls or whistling overhead to rattle on the roofs of Nyboden’s small houses. “It’s the warehouse,” Astrid said at last. “If my father dies then I will inherit and he does not think a woman can run the business.”
“Of course you can run it,” Sharpe said.
“And he would like to know that the business is safe before he dies,” she went on as though Sharpe had not spoken. “So he wants me to marry Aksel.”
“Marry someone else,” Sharpe said.
“It has not been so long since Nils died,” Astrid said, “and I have not wanted anyone. Except Nils.” She still had her arm in his elbow, though they were not walking anymore, but instead were standing under a tree as though its branches would shelter them from the bombs that whistled overhead. “It would be beautiful,” Astrid went on, “if it were not so sad.” She was talking of the northern sky which was lit by the intermittent flashes of mortars aboard the bomb ships. Each discharge flooded the night like crimson summer lightning and the flaring displays flickered one after another, filling the sky. “It is like the winter lights,” she said.
“So will you marry Aksel?”
“I want Father to be happy,” she said. “He has not been happy for a long while.”
“A man who loves his business more than his daughter,” Sharpe said, “doesn’t deserve to be happy.”
“He has worked hard,” Astrid said as though that explained everything.
“And it will all be for nothing if he stays here,” Sharpe warned her, “because the French will come after him.”
“What else can he do?” Astrid asked.
“Move to Britain,” Sharpe said. “His old friends in the Foreign Office want that.”
“They do?”
“So they tell me.”
Astrid shook her head. “After this? No, he will not go to Britain. He is a loyal Dane.”
“And you?”
“Me?”
“You must have relatives in Britain?”
Astrid nodded. “My mother’s sister lives in Hampshire. I visited a long time ago. It was very nice, I thought.”
“Then go to Hampshire,” Sharpe said. A piece of shell tore through the branches above them. Birds were singing, disturbed from their sleep by the noise.
“And what would I do in Hampshire?” Astrid asked.
“This,” Sharpe said, and kissed her. For a heartbeat she seemed to resist, then he realized it was merely her surprise, for then she put her arms about him and returned the kiss with an astonishing ferocity. They kissed again, then she put her head on his shoulder and said nothing, but just clung to him for a long while. Six more bombs fell. The flames were now showing above the citadel’s walls, then a shell struck a second ready magazine and Astrid shuddered in Sharpe’s arms as the whole city physically trembled.
“I could not go to England,” Astrid said softly, “not while Father lives.” She pulled herself back so she could look up into his eyes. “You could come here?”
“It’s a good place,” Sharpe said. What was left of it.
“You would be welcome,” she said. Her face, serious-eyed, was lit by the flames. “You really would be welcome.”
“Not by Aksel,” Sharpe said with a smile.
“No, not by Aksel.” She smiled back. “I should go home,” she said, but did not move. “Would you really stay here?”
“I will,” Sharpe said.
She frowned. “I don’t know you, though, do I?”
He kissed her again, tenderly this time. “You know me,” he told her.
“We must trust the heart, yes?”
“Trust the heart,” Sharpe said and she smiled, then laughed. She pulled him away from the tree.