“I know.” He believed otherwise.
“Do you?”
She wanted him to say goodbye gracefully, and it was the least he could do. He told her about Gibbons; about the final look before the bayonet took its revenge. She held his arm tight. “I’m sorry, Richard.”
“For Gibbons?”
“No. That you had to do it. It was my fault, I was a fool.”
“No.” It was strange, he thought, how when lovers say goodbye they take all the blame. “It wasn’t your fault. I promised to protect you. I didn’t.”
They walked into a small, sunlit square and stared at a convent which formed one side of the plaza. Fifteen hundred British wounded were in the building, and the army surgeons were working on the first floor. Screams came clearly from the windows and, with them, a grisly flow of severed limbs that piled up beside a tree: an ever growing heap of arms and legs that was guarded by two bored privates whose job was to chase away the hungry dogs from the mangled flesh. Sharpe shivered at the sight and prayed the soldiers’ prayer; that he would be delivered from the surgeons with their serrated blades and blood-stiff aprons.
Josefina had plucked his elbow and they turned away from the convent. “I have a present for you.”
He looked down at her. “I have nothing for you.”
She seemed embarrassed. “You owe Mr Hogan twenty guineas?”
“You’re not giving me money!” He let his anger show.
Josefina shook her head. “I’ve already paid him. Don’t be angry!” He had tried to pull away but she clung on. “There’s nothing you can do about it, Richard. I paid him. You kept pretending you had enough money, but I knew you were borrowing.” She gave him a tiny paper packet and did not look at him because she knew he was upset.
Inside the paper was a ring, made of silver, and on the boss was engraved an eagle. Not a French eagle, holding a thunderbolt, but an eagle all the same. She looked up at him, pleased at his expression. “I bought it in Oropesa. For you.”
Sharpe had not known what to say. He had stammered his thanks and now, sitting with the Generals, he let his fingers feel the silver ring. They had walked back to the house and, waiting outside, there had been a cavalry officer with two spare horses. “Is that him?”
“Yes.”
“And he’s rich?”
She had smiled. “Very. He’s a good man, Richard. You’d like him.”
Sharpe had laughed. “I doubt it.” He wanted to tell her how much he would not like Claud Hardy, with his stupid sounding name and his rich uniform and his thorough-bred horses. The Dragoon had watched them as she looked up at Sharpe.
“I can’t stay with the army, Richard.”So you’re going back to Lisbon?”
She nodded. “We’re not going to Madrid, are we?” He shook his head. “Well, it has to be Lisbon.” She smiled at him. “He has a house in Belem, a big one. I’m sorry.”Don’t be.”
“I can’t follow an army, Richard.” She was pleading for understanding.
“I know. But armies follow you, yes?” It was a clumsy attempt at gallantry, and it had pleased her, but now it was time to part and he wanted her to stay. He did not know what to say. “Josefina? I’m sorry.”
She touched his arm arid there was the gleam of tears in her eyes. She blinked them away and forced herself to sound happy. “One day, Richard, you will fall in love with the right girl? You promise?”
He had not watched her walk to the Dragoon but instead turned away to rejoin the company in the stench of the dead on the battlefield.
“Captains shouldn’t marry.” Crauford thumped the table and Sharpe jumped. “Isn’t that true?”
Sharpe did not reply. He suspected Crauford was right, and he determined, again, to thrust away the memory of Josefina. She was on her way to Lisbon, to the big house, to live with a man who was to join the Lisbon garrison and live a life of dancing and diplomacy. Damn all of it. He drank his wine, reached for the bottle, and forced himself to listen to the conversation which was now as gloomy as his thoughts. They were talking of the fifteen hundred wounded men in the convent who would have to be abandoned to the care of the Spanish. Hill was peering worriedly at Wellesley. “Will Cuesta look after them?”