Mrs. Savage sobbed that her baby daughter was lost, then Captain Hogan managed to persuade the widow into the carriage. Two servants laden with bags stuffed with clothes followed their mistress into the vehicle. „You will find Kate?” Mrs. Savage pushed open the door and inquired of Captain Hogan.
„The precious darling will be with you very soon,” Hogan said reassuringly. „Mister Sharpe will see to that,” he added, then used his foot to close the coach door on Mrs. Savage, who was the widow of one of the many British wine merchants who lived and worked in the city of Oporto. She was rich, Sharpe presumed, certainly rich enough to own a fine carriage and the lavish House Beautiful, but she was also foolish for she should have left the city two or three days before, but she had stayed because she had evidently believed the bishop’s assurance that he could repel Marshal Soult’s army. Colonel Christopher, who had once lodged m the strangely named House Beautiful, had appealed to the British forces south of the river to send men to escort Mrs. Savage safely away and Captain Hogan had been the closest officer and Sharpe, with his riflemen, had been protecting Hogan while the engineer mapped northern Portugal, and so Sharpe had come north across the Douro with twenty-four of his men to escort Mrs. Savage and any other threatened British inhabitants of Oporto to safety. Which should have been a simple enough task, except that at dawn the widow Savage had discovered that her daughter had fled from the house.
„What I don’t understand,” Sharpe persevered, „is why she ran away.”
„She’s probably in love,” Hogan explained airily. „Nineteen-year-old girls of respectable families are dangerously susceptible to love because of all the novels they read. See you in two days, Richard, or maybe even tomorrow? Just wait for Colonel Christopher, he’ll be with you directly, and listen.” He bent down from the saddle and lowered his voice so that no one but Sharpe could hear him. „Keep a close eye on the Colonel, Richard. I worry about him, I do.”
„You should worry about me, sir.”
„I do that too, Richard, I do indeed,” Hogan said, then straightened up, waved farewell and spurred his horse after Mrs. Savage’s carriage which had swung out of the front gate and joined the stream of fugitives going toward the Douro.
The sound of the carriage wheels faded. The sun came from behind a cloud just as a French cannonball struck a tree on the hill’s crest and exploded a cloud of reddish blossoms which drifted above the city’s steep slope. Daniel Hagman stared at the airborne blossoms. „Looks like a wedding,” he said and then, glancing up as a musket ball ricocheted off a roof tile, brought a pair of scissors from his pocket. „Finish your hair, sir?”
„Why not, Dan,” Sharpe said. He sat on the porch steps and took off his shako.
Sergeant Harper checked that the sentinels were watching the north. A troop of Portuguese cavalry had appeared on the crest where the single cannon was firing bravely. A rattle of musketry proved that some infantry was still fighting, but more and more troops were retreating past the house and Sharpe knew it could only be a matter of minutes before the city’s defenses collapsed entirely. Hagman began slicing away at Sharpe’s hair. „You don’t like it over the ears, ain’t that right?”
„I like it short, Dan.”
„Short like a good sermon, sir,” Hagman said. „Now keep still, sir, just keep still.” There was a sudden stab of pain as Hagman speared a louse with the scissors’ blade. He spat on the drop of blood that showed on Sharpe’s scalp, then wiped it away. „So the Crapauds will get the city, sir?”
„Looks like it,” Sharpe said.
„And they’ll march on Lisbon next?” Hagman asked, cutting away.
„Long way to Lisbon,” Sharpe said.
„Maybe, sir, but there’s an awful lot of them, sir, and precious few of us.”
„But they say Wellesley’s coming here,” Sharpe said.
„As you keep telling us, sir,” Hagman said, „but is he really a miracle worker?”
„You fought at Copenhagen, Dan,” Sharpe said, „and down the coast here.” He meant the battles at Rolica and Vimeiro. „You could see for yourself.”