“It was just a notion.” Louisa, chastened, stared at the bats which flickered past the ramparts in the night.
Tt was kind of you to want to help.“
“I do want to help.”
“Just by being here, you help.” Sharpe tried to sound gallant. The sentry turned at the rampart’s end and paced slowly back towards them. Sharpe sensed that the girl would retire to her room at any moment and, though he risked further embarrassment, he could not bear to let the moment pass without reinforcing his thin hopes. “Did I offend you earlier?” he asked clumsily.
“Don’t think such a thing. I am flattered.” Louisa stared at the lights in the deep valley.
“I can’t believe that we’re going to run away from Spain.” If that was Louisa’s objection to accepting him, then Sharpe would scotch it, not because he knew that the Lisbon garrison would stay in place, but because he could not accept that the British intervention had been defeated. “We’re going to stay. The Lisbon garrison will be reinforced, and we’ll attack again!” He paused, then plunged closer to the heart of the matter. “And there are officers’ wives with the army. Some live in Lisbon, some stay a day or so behind the army, but it isn’t unusual.”
“Mr Sharpe.” Louisa laid a gloved hand on his sleeve. “Give me time. I know you’d tell me that I should seize the moment, but I don’t know if that moment is now.”
“I’m sorry.”
“There is nothing to regret.” She gathered her cloak about her. “Will you let me retire? I am quite wearied by sewing.”
“Goodnight, miss.”
No man, Sharpe thought, felt as foolish as a man rejected, yet he persuaded himself that he had not been rejected, rather that she had promised an answer after Santiago de Compostela was taken. It was his impatience which demanded an answer sooner. It was an impatience that would obsess him, and drive him onto a city from which he would return, triumphant or defeated, to receive the answer he craved.
The next day was a Sunday. Mass was celebrated in the fort’s courtyard, and afterwards a group of horsemen arrived from the north. They were fierce-looking men, festooned with weapons, who treated Vivar with a wary courtesy. Later he told Sharpe that the men were rateros, highwaymen, who for the moment had turned their violence against the common enemy.
The rateros brought news of a French messenger, captured with his escort four days before, who had carried a coded despatch. The despatch was lost, but the gist of the message had been extracted from the French officer before he died. The Emperor was impatient. Soult had waited too long. Portugal must fall and the British, if they still lingered in Lisbon, must be expelled before February was done. Marshal Ney was to stay in the north and clear away all hostile forces from the mountains. So, even if Vivar waited till Soult was gone, there would still be French troops in Santiago de Compostela.
But if Vivar attacked now, while Soult was still twelve leagues to the north, and while the precious fodder was still stored in the city, then a double blow could be struck: the supplies could be destroyed, and the gonfalon unfurled.
Vivar thanked the horsemen, then went to the fortress chapel where, for an hour, he prayed alone.
When he emerged, he found Sharpe. “We march tomorrow.”
“Not today?” If haste was so desperately needed, why wait the extra twenty-four hours?
But Vivar was adamant. “Tomorrow. We march tomorrow morning.”
The next dawn, before he had shaved, and before he had even swallowed a mug of the hot bitter tea which the Riflemen loved so much, Sharpe discovered why Vivar had waited that extra day. The Spaniard was trying to deceive the French with another false trail, to which end, the previous night, he had sent Louisa from the fortress. Her room was empty, her bed lay cold, and she was gone.
CHAPTER 13
“Why?” Sharpe’s question was both a challenge and a protest.
“She wanted to help,” Vivar said blithely. “She was eager to help, and I saw no reason why she should not. Besides, Miss Parker has eaten my food and drunk my wine for days, so why should she not repay that hospitality?”