The other carriage stopped. She heard the shout of the coachman and she presumed the soldiers wanted to search it. She smiled: no one dared search her carriage.
Then the door opened, she turned, one hand clutching her cloak to her neck, to see a priest climbing into her carriage. `Who are you?’
She had a pistol beneath the cushions. She pushed her right hand towards it.
The man took off his broad hat. The shielded lantern within her carriage showed a huge, strong face with eyes harder than stone. `You are La Marquesa de Casares el Grande y Melida Sadaba?’
`I am.’ Her voice was like ice. `You?’
`Father Hacha.’
She could see men outside the coach, their shapes dim in the moonlit street. She looked back at the priest and saw that his clothes were finer than those she would have expected on an ordinary parish priest. She sensed this man’s force, his strength, and his hostility. It was a pity, she thought, that such a man should give up his life to God. `What do you want?’
`I have news for you.’
She shrugged. `Go on.’
The Inquisitor sat on the seat opposite her. He seemed to fill the small carriage with his huge presence. His voice was deeper even than Pierre Ducos`. `Your husband is dead.’
She stared at him. She said nothing. At each ear hung a diamond cluster. Her cloak, though the night was not cold, was edged with white fur. At her throat, where her left hand held the fur collar, were more diamonds.
`Did you not hear me?’
`I heard you.’ She smiled. `You want to be rewarded for bringing me the news? The coachman will give you a coin.’
The Inquisitor’s face showed nothing. `Adultery is a sin, woman.’
`And impudence is bad manners. Leave me, priest.’
He pointed a strong, dark hand at her. `You are an adulterer.’
She rapped on the window and shouted at the coachman to drive on. The carriage did not move and she angrily jerked the strap from its hook so that the window crashed down. `I said go on!’
The Spanish soldiers, uncomfortable but obedient, surrounded the carriage. With them were men in long, dark habits. She fumbled in the cushions for the pistol, but the strong hand of the Inquisitor reached for her wrist and pulled it clear. `You are an adulterer, woman.’
She pulled away from him, but his grip was firm. She called for her servants, but the Inquisitor just smiled. `Your servants will obey their God, as you never did. You are an adulterer, and your husband and your lover are dead.’
`My lover?’
`The Englishman.’
She had thought he meant General Verigny, now she knew he meant Richard Sharpe. She felt a pang at the news, knowing that her letter had caused his death, but her own troubles were too immediate for the pang to last. `Let me go!’
`You are under arrest, woman.’
`Don’t be impertinent!’
`You are Spanish by marriage and in the jurisdiction of this diocese.’ He pulled her, making her call out in pain, but no one moved to help her.
He dragged her from the carriage and pushed her into the second coach where two women, both with lined, hard faces that were edged with white linen hoods, waited for her. She screamed at her servants for help, but they were surrounded by soldiers with muskets and monks with staves, and then the door of the coach slammed and it jerked under way. The Inquisitor sat opposite her. When she screamed again he leaned over and struck her into silence.
The Marquesa’s coachman was ordered back to the town. The Spanish Major, who had been ordered to obey the summons of the Ecclesiastical court, wondered where the Golden Whore was going. He had been told not to ask, not to care, just to obey. He listened to the dark coach rattle into the night, then shouted at his men to return to their posts.
General Verigny watched from the tower, waiting for the carriage lanterns to appear on the white road. He waited as the moon sank beneath the mountains. He waited until the clocks struck two and then he knew she was not coming. He thought of sending some of his men towards Burgos to see if her carriage had run into trouble, but decided that she was probably flirting with another man instead. He cursed, wondered whether anyone would ever tame the bitch, and went to bed.