He touched the horse’s flanks, splashed through the ford and began to climb the gradual slope beyond. Dogs barked in the farmyard, and Nosey howled in reply till Sharpe snapped at him to be quiet. The familiar homely stink of a dungheap wafted across the highway. Sharpe rode slowly, as though hurrying might spoil the calm of this perfect summer’s evening. The road was unhedged, running between wide strips of rank grass in which wood garlic, foxgloves, columbine and yellow archangel grew. Elder and blackthorn bushes offered patches of shade. A rabbit thumped the verge in alarm at the horsemans’ approach, then scurried into the rye stalks. The evening was fragrant, warm and rich, lit by the great wash of gold light that flooded through the cloud chasms in the western skies.
Off to Sharpe’s left, about a mile away, he could see the roofs of two more farmhouses, while to his right the wood gave way to rolling cornfields intersected by a farm track that twisted between the crops. Nothing untoward moved in the landscape. Had he come to the wrong crossroads? He had a sudden fear that this was not the Charleroi to Brussels road. He took out his map, which indeed suggested that he was riding on the main Brussels highway, but maps were notoriously inaccurate. He looked for a milestone, but none was in sight. He stopped again and listened, but could hear neither musketry nor the sounds of marching men. Had he imagined the enemy this morning? Or the musketry this afternoon? But Rebecque had heard the musketry too. So where were the French? Had they been swallowed into the warm fields?
The road bent slightly to the right. The rye was growing so tall that Sharpe could not see what lay around the bend. He loosened his rifle in its holster and called Nosey to heel. Simon Doggett, riding alongside Sharpe with the spare horse, seemed to share the
Rifleman’s nervousness. Both men were instinctively curbing their horses.
They edged round the road’s bend. Ahead now was a road junction shaded by two big chestnut trees. The highway bent to the left, while a smaller track went off to the right. Far beyond the junction, and half-obscured by the tall rye, was a village. The map tallied with what Sharpe saWj so the village had to be Frasnes.
“We’ll go as far as the village,” Sharpe said.
“Yes, sir.”
The sound of their voices broke the nervous spell and both men dug in their heels to make their horses trot. Sharpe had to duck under a low chestnut branch as he turned the next corner to see, five hundred yards ahead of him, the wide village street.
He stopped again. The street seemed empty. He pulled out the battered sea captain’s telescope that he had bought in Caen to replace the expensive glass that he had lost after Toulouse. He trained the awkward heavy instrument on the village’s single street.
Three men sat outside what must be the village inn. A woman in thick black skirts led a donkey laden with hay. Two children ran towards the church. The image of the church wavered, Sharpe checked the glass’s tremor, then froze. “Jesus Christ!”
“Sir?” Doggett asked in alarm.
“We’ve got the bastards!” Sharpe’s voice was filled with satisfaction.
The French had not disappeared, and he had not imagined them. They were in Frasnes. At the far end of the village street, just coming into sight and foreshortened by distance and the ancient lens, was a battalion of French infantry. They must have been singing for, though Sharpe could hear nothing, he could see their mouths opening and closing in unison. This battalion wore darker blue coats than most French infantry and had very dark blue trousers. “They’re a battalion of Voltigeurs,” Sharpe told Doggett. “Light infantry. Skirmishers. So where the hell are their Dragoons?” He panned the telescope left and right, but no horsemen showed in the evening sunlight.
Doggett had taken out his own glass and was staring at the French. They were the first enemy troops he had ever seen and the sight of them had made him go pale. He could hear the beat of his bloodstream echoing fast in his ears. He had often imagined seeing the enemy for the first time, but it was strange how very commonplace and yet how exciting this baptism was. “How many of them are there?” he asked.