Sharpe nodded. There was silence in the room but from the street outside Sharpe could hear the screams and shouts generated by the drunken Spanish soldiers. The girl turned back to him. She had stopped crying. Her voice was very low. “Richard?”
“Yes?”
“Kill them.” She spoke flatly. Hogan half shook his head but Sharpe bent down and kissed her by the ear.
“I will.”
As he straightened up he saw another half smile on the face, and then she forced it into a proper smile that went oddly with the tears. She squeezed his hand. “Will there be a battle tomorrow?”
“Yes.” Sharpe spoke as if the subject could be brushed away, as if it was not of importance.
“Be lucky.”
,I’ll come and see you afterwards.” He smiled at her.
“Yes.” But there was no conviction in her voice. Sharpe turned to Hogan.
“You’ll stay?”
“Till daybreak. I’m not needed till then. But you should go-,
Sharpe nodded. “I know.” He kissed her again, stood up, and put on his rifle and pack. Hogan thought’his face was as cruel as a face could be. The Engineer walked with him to the stairs.
“Be careful, Richard.”
“I will.”
Hogan put a hand on his shoulder to stop him moving. “Remember what you have to lose.”
Sharpe nodded again. “Bring me news when you can.”
Sharpe pushed his way into the street, ignoring the Spaniards, and as he walked towards the north he did not see the tall man in the blue coat with the white facings who watched from a doorway opposite Josefina’s lodgings. The man looked at Sharpe sympathetically, then up at the windows, and settled back into the doorway where he tried to make himself comfortable despite the broken arm with its splints and sling that would keep him from the battle tomorrow. He wondered what was happening on the second floor but he would soon know; Agostino would tell him all in exchange for a piece of gold.
Sharpe hurried up the track that led away from the town between the Portina stream and the Spanish lines. The frightened infantry were being forced back into their positions, but even as he hurried through the trees he could hear the occasional musket shot from the town, the shouting, the coinage of Talavera’s night of fear and rape. The moon had disappeared behind a bank of clouds but the lights of the Spanish fires showed the path and he half ran as he headed north towards the Medellin Hill. To his right the sky was glowing a deep red where the thousands of French fires were reflected in the air. He should have been concerned for the morning; he knew it would be the greatest battle he had ever fought, yet his mind was dominated by the need to find Berry and Gibbons. He came to the Pajar, the tiny hill that marked the end of the Spanish lines and the place where the Portina bent to his right and, from running behind the Spanish troops, the stream now flowed in front of the British position. He saw the shapes of the field guns Wellesley had placed on the small hill, and part of his mind registered how the fire of those guns would sweep protectively in front of the Spanish lines and deflect the massive French attack onto the British lines. But tomorrow was another battle.
The track melted away into the grass. He could see the scattered fires of the British but he had no idea which was the South Essex. They were positioned at the Medellin Hill, he knew that, so he ran by the stream, tripping over tussocks of grass, splashing through patches of marsh, keeping the silvered Portina as his guide to the Medellin. He was alone in the darkness. The British fires were far off to his left, the French even further to the right, the two armies still and quiet. Something was wrong. The old instinct prickled him and he stopped, sank to one knee and searched the darkness ahead. In the night the Medellin Hill looked like a long, low ridge pointing at the French army. It was the key to Wellesley’s left flank; if the French assaulted the hill they could turn and crush the British between the Medellin and Talavera. Yet there were no fires on the ridge. He could see a bright smear of flames at the western end, furthest from the enemy, but on the side facing the town, and on the half of the flat summit nearest the enemy there were no lights. He had thought the South Essex to be bivouacking on the gentle slope that faced him but it was black and empty. He listened. There were the sounds of the night, the noises from the town that had faded to a dull murmur, the wind in the grass, insects, the splashing of the stream, and the far-off sounds of a hundred thousand men crouching by fires waiting for morning. Behind him the small Pajar hill was bright with fires, the guns silhouetted against the white wall of the farmhouse on its crest, but in front it was dark and quiet. He stood up and walked softly on, his instincts alive to a danger he could not define, his mind searching for clues in the darkness and from the murmured sounds of the night. Why had he not been challenged? There should be picquets on the line of the Portina, sentries huddled against the chill wind looking towards the enemy, but no-one had stopped him and asked his business. He kept by the stream until the black loom of the Medellin was above him, then turned left and began to climb the slope. By daylight it looked a gentle slope but as he climbed with his pack and rifle the ground felt steep and each step made the muscles at the back of his legs ache. Tomorrow, he thought, this is precisely where the French columns will come. They will march up this slope, heads down, while the guns crack iron shot into their ranks and the muskets wait in silence at the crest.