After the sobbing, the noise of boots on stone, came shouted orders, and the Company marched out with fixed bayonets on shouldered guns, and in the lead was the Captain holding a rifle sling looped round the neck of Teresa Moreno. The Partisans growled, looked at the father, at El Catolico, but dared not move. Teresa was crying, her face half hidden by her hands, but every man could see the white bandage, torn from the bottom of her dress, and they could see the bright blood which stained the cloth. Sharpe was holding a gleaming, saw-backed bayonet at her head and if she stumbled he pulled at the sling round her throat. Kearsey felt a terrible shame as he watched the Rifle Officer shield himself from El Catolico’s guns with the girl’s body, and as the Company, in a silence that seemed as if it could explode at any instant in a dreadful violence, marched past the poised horsemen, Cesar Moreno gazed at the blood-soaked bandage, at the spots of blood on his daughter’s dress, and he promised himself the luxury of this English Captain’s death. Kearsey touched his arm.
‘I’m sorry.’
‘It does not matter. I will catch them and kill them.’ Cesar Moreno watched the faces of the Company and he thought they looked shocked, as if their Captain had dragged them into new depths of horror. ‘I will kill him.’
Kearsey nodded. ‘I’m sorry.’
Moreno looked at him. ‘It was not your doing, Major.’ He nodded at where the Light Company were beginning their crossing, the lightly loaded men forming a human dam to help the gold-carriers to cross. ‘Go in peace.’
Sharpe crossed last, holding the girl and feeling the long weeds snatch at his legs and try to drag him under. The water level was low but the current still strong, and it was awkward with one arm round Teresa’s neck, but they made it and were pulled on to the far bank by Patrick Harper, who nodded back over the river.
‘Felt sorry for her father, sir.’
‘He’ll find out she wasn’t touched.’
‘Aye, that’s true. The Major’s coming.’
‘Let him.’
They set off across the grassland, in the heat of the morning, their boots leaving a wide swath through the pale stalks and with the Partisans never far behind. Harper walked with Sharpe and Teresa and he looked over the girl’s head at his Captain.
‘How’s the arm, sir?’
‘It’s fine.’ Sharpe had cut open his left forearm for the blood with which to soak Teresa’s bandage.
Harper nodded ahead, to the Company. ‘Should have cut open Private Batten. It’s all he’s good for.’
Sharpe grinned. The thought had occurred to him, but he had rejected it as petty. ‘I’ll survive. You’d better tell the lads that the girl’s not harmed. Quietly.’
‘I’ll do that.’
Harper went ahead. The men were silent, shocked, because Sharpe had let them believe he was working the great blade on the girl. If they had known the truth they would have marched past El Catolico with grinning faces, suppressed glee, and the whole thing would have been lost. Sharpe looked at the Partisans, to the side and behind, and then at Teresa.
‘You must keep pretending.’
She nodded, looked up at him. ‘You keep your promise?’
‘I promise. We have a bargain.’
It was a good one, too, he decided, and he admired Teresa for its terms. At least, now, he knew why she was on his side, and there was only one regret: he knew they would not be together long, that the bargain called for them to be far apart, but the war would be long and, who knew, perhaps he would meet her again.
At midday the Company climbed a steep ridge that ran directly west, towards their goal, and Sharpe led the way up its steep, razor-stoned flank with a sense of relief. The Partisans could not take their horses up the slope and their figures grew smaller and smaller as the Company laboured upwards. The men carrying the gold needed frequent rests, lying and panting beneath the sun, but each hour took them nearer the Coa, and for a time Sharpe dared to hope that they had shaken off El Catolico and his men. The spine of the ridge was a bare, rocky place and littered with small bones left by wolves and vultures. Sharpe had the feeling of walking in a place where no man ever trod, a place that was commanded by the beasts, and all round them the hills crouched in the searing, aching sun, and nothing moved except for the Company crawling along the high crest, and Sharpe felt as if the world had ended and they had been forgotten. Ahead he could see the hazed hills that led to the river, to safety, and he forced the Company on. Patrick Harper, carrying two packs of gold, nodded at the western hills to their front.