„Wanted comforting!” Sharpe said scathingly. „He was just second in line, wasn’t he?”
„Fifth in line,” Harris said tonelessly, „or so the girl says.”
„Jesus,” Sharpe swore. „Why don’t I just give the bugger a smacking, then we’ll string him up.” He walked back to the house where the civilans were screaming at the Frenchman, who gazed at them with a disdain hat would have been admirable on a battlefield. Vicente was protecting he dragoon and now appealed to Sharpe for help to escort Lieutenant Dlivier to safety.
„He must stand trial,” Vicente insisted.
„He just had a trial,” Sharpe said, „and I found him guilty. So now I’ll thump him and then I’ll hang him.”
Vicente looked nervous, but he did not back down. „We cannot lower ourselves to their level of barbarity,” he claimed.
„I didn’t rape her,” Sharpe said, „so don’t place me with them.”
„We fight for a better world,” Vicente declared.
For a second Sharpe just stared at the young Portuguese officer, scarce believing what he had heard. „What happens if we leave him here, eh?”
„We can’t!” Vicente said, knowing that the villagers would take a far worse revenge than anything Sharpe was proposing.
„And I can’t take prisoners!” Sharpe insisted.
„We can’t kill him”-Vicente was blushing with indignation as he confronted Sharpe and he would not back down-”and we can’t leave him here. It would be murder.”
„Oh, for Christ’s sake,” Sharpe said in exasperation. Lieutenant Olivier did not speak English, but he seemed to understand that his fate was in the balance and he watched Sharpe and Vicente like a hawk. „And who’s going to be the judge and jury?” Sharpe demanded, but Vicente got no opportunity to answer for just then a rifle fired from the western edge of the village and then another sounded and then there was a whole rattle of shots.
The French had come back.
Colonel James Christopher liked wearing the hussar uniform. He decided it suited him and he spent a long time admiring himself in the pier glass in the farmhouse’s largest bedroom, turning left and right, and marveling at the feeling of power conveyed by the uniform. He deduced it came from the long tasseled boots and from the jacket’s high stiff collar that forced a man to stand upright with his head back, and from the fit of the jacket that was so tight that Christopher, who was lean and fit, still had to suck in his belly to fasten the hooks and eyes down its silver-laced front. The uniform made him feel encased in authority, and the elegance of the outfit was enhanced by the fur-edged pelisse that was draped from his left shoulder and by the silver-chained saber scabbard that chinked as he went downstairs and as he paced up and down the terrace where he waited for his guest. He put a sliver of wood into his mouth, obsessively working it between his teeth as he gazed at the distant smear of smoke which showed where buildings burned in the captured city. A handful of fugitives had stopped at the farm to beg for food and Luis had talked with them and then told Christopher that hundreds if not thousands of people had drowned when the pontoon bridge broke. The refugees claimed that the French had wrecked the bridge with cannon fire and Luis, his hatred of the enemy fueled by the false rumor, eyed his master with a surly expression until Christopher had finally lost his patience. „It is only a uniform, Luis! It is not a sign of a changed allegiance!”
„A French uniform,” Luis had complained.
„You wish Portugal to be free of the French?” Christopher snapped. „Then behave respectfully and forget this uniform.”
Now Christopher paced the terrace, picking at his teeth and constantly watching the road that led across the hill. The clock in the farm’s elegant parlor struck three and no sooner had the last chime faded than a large column of cavalry appeared across the far crest. They were dragoons and they came in force to make sure that no partisans or fugitive Portuguese troops gave trouble to the officer who rode to meet Christopher.