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Misled by false intelligence, Moore had ordered the army to Salamanca. It turned out that Napoleon had started earlier and moved quicker with three times as many men as reported. Let down by a Spanish army that never appeared, the general had no choice but to return to Corunna.
The 95th rifles had stayed behind as a rearguard at Sahagun a day longer, harassing and confusing the enemy, covering the retreat. When finally they set out to follow along the northern road through the mountains, Sharpe and his chosen men had become separated when the battalion had been attacked by a squadron of French cavalry. Weeks later, when they caught up with a few stragglers at Esla, hoping to find food, fresh clothing and ammunition, they learned that the army's moral had broken; unable to handle reverse of fortune, British soldiery had broken into the wine vaults and rioted drunk through the streets, killing, raping, burning and looting. They had scoured the countryside, plundering every house and now the Spanish would no longer supply food and fodder. Without fodder for the animals to pull the wagons, the commissariat had collapsed entirely.
Sharpe led men who were walking bent against the wind in rags and blankets, some of them bare foot, blood-shod, staggering and stumbling, along a road had turned into a quagmire of mud and slush with the tramping of the thousands of feet before them.
During the last week of fog and bitter cold, they had all seen the ice shrouded bodies of men and women who had simply lain down and died by the road. But where the decline was narrowing, they were passing more closely by the bodies of three, a woman and two children, all dead in a kind of circle around a broken cask. The remainder of the rum it had contained was still pooled by their heads. Intoxication had been followed by a sleep from which they never awoke. Harper was the only man to react. "Sweet mother of Jesus!" Going without food for the last two days, Harper could have had little energy for swearing, but he swore.
Sharpe turned his back to the wind, fumbling for the map in his breast pocket. "Sergeant."
"Sir." Harper was at his back, blocking the wind.
Sharpe held up the map comparing it to the hills around them. The maps they had been given had been accurate as far as the roads went but had given no hint of the terrain. The road turned and vanished but there was the smell of smoke in the wind and a low bell tower was just visible on the ridge.
"See where the road breaks off?"
"I do, sir."
"There's supposed to be a Capuchin monastery at the end of it."
"You're thinking they'll be room at the inn?"
Sharpe laughed. "And perhaps, the good fathers can spare some potatoes and honey." It was imperative that they find food and shelter. The pale sun was still overhead, shining dimly through the clouds, but they needed rest. Some of men were marching asleep and Sharpe was wrestling with his own exhaustion.
There was a monastery but safety turned out to be illusionary. The place had been overrun and plundered within the last day. The church was a still smoldering ruin and the courtyard was a charnel house of bodies left where they had fallen. Mainly Spanish, of course, but there were many in some form of uniform. Sharpe noticed that the dead man whose boot Hagman was measuring his foot against was wearing a blue coat.
"None alive," Harper reported back. "There's a barn and some sheds."
"That will have to do." Sharpe took off his hat and scrubbed a hand through his hair. Get Hagman and Harris. See what can be done about securing the gate. And, Harper, if they find any drink, tell them I said the gates first."
It had been unnecessary to order the men to search for food. There came Isaiah Tongue with a bloody bundle under his arm and a book in his hand in answer to Harper's shout. He held the book for Sharpe's inspection. "Lope de Vega," he said.
Sharpe pointed at the bloody bundle. "What's that?"
"Mule, sir."
The mule meat seasoned with gunpowder and onions became a stew thickened with the few handfuls of flour they found. Two unbroken casks of brandy were discovered in the cellar. The food and drink were shared around the fire. But when it came to sleep, the men took the loft and Sharpe found himself on the floor of the barn with Harper. Things were still uncomfortable between them. At least it was uncomfortable for Sharpe. He was still bruised from their fight in the snow but Harper seemed to find it the most natural thing in the world to share a fire with a man he tried to kill.
Sharpe had taken off one of his boots and was examining the soul. That he still had boots was remarkable. English boots at that. Three of the stragglers who had attached themselves to his group were barefoot but for bloody rags. They said they had passed an ox cart laden with English stores - boots and shoes. The oxen had been knocked up so the cargo had been distributed. At first they had been glad to receive new boots. Before they had walked four miles, though, the bottoms of the boots had dropped off, leaving the leather uppers tied around their ankles.
"Government contractors should be tried in court-martial and flogged," Harper said. "Two hundred lashes for their tricking tricks."
"Ai," Sharpe said. The sole of the left boot had gone flapping and he was trying to mend it with a piece of hemp.
"How long you think before we catch up with the army?"
Sharp shrugged.
"You're a bag full of news," Harper said. "For a jumped up ranker."
"Harper, I am glad you decided not to kill me," Sharpe sighed, "but we are not going to be friends." He took a drink of the brandy in his cup and returned to his task.
Harper wasn't put off. "So, do you have a mother?" he said.
"No. She died when I was three." Sharpe looked up with a challenge in his eyes. "She was a whore."
Harper response was to tilt his head and say, "I have a mother. Back in Ireland. And two sisters. Do you have any sisters?"
"No." Sharpe bit off the hemp.
"That's bad," Harper said, "A man should have women in his life."
"I do," he said.
"A good woman?" Harper said, reaching for his knapsack.
"The best," Sharpe said, remembering Maggie.
As Harper began digging through his pack, up in the loft, Hagman began to play. Sharpe tried to concentrate on mending the boot, but the tune was old and familiar, and remembering Maggie meant remembering warm nights in her bed.
"Merry Christmas," Harper said.
"Christmas?" Sharpe looked up.
"Christmas eve, actually, sir," Harper said. Sharpe stared. Harper was holding out to him a pair of knee boots. They were good boots, French cavalry boots; cavalry boots never get worn out at the heels. "Go on. Take them. I could see right away that they're too delicate for my great sergeant's feet but they might fit an officer's puny little pony hooves."
Sharpe took them. He kicked off the one boot he was still wearing and pulled on them on. They fit. It was a gift beyond price. All he could offer Harper was his thanks and more brandy.
It seemed to be enough. Harper shut up and they sat quietly in now companionable silence, listening to Hagman's pipe until Sharpe realized with a start that he been nodding. "Check the sentries." He stood up, lurching. Had he even remembered to order them posted?
"I'll go with you." Harper stood up, too, and took a brand from the fire.
They needed the brand. It was colder than ever, outside, and dark without the moon. Williams and Pendleton were at the gate house. Jenkins was up in the bell tower, surprisingly sober.
As they arrived back at the barn door, Harper said, "Just a moment, Sir, before we go in," and put the light out in the snow. Sharpe wondered what was coming as he felt Harper's arm around his neck pull him close. Fear had long been a casualty of exhaustion but it didn't occur to him that Harper meant him any harm only that this was an unfamiliar intimacy, finding himself thigh to thigh and chest to chest, with the big Irishman. Tall as Sharpe was, he was usually the one to bend down, but his chin only cleared Harper's collar and his head tucked neatly into Harper's neck.
"I've something else to give you," Harper said and kissed him on the cheek. "There's for your mother."
Harper kissed him again; this time on the mouth. "And there's for that good woman in your life." The kiss was rich with brandy. Harper smelt of sweat and oiled wool, of gunpowder and of wood smoke. All the strength went out of Sharpe's legs. Harper's arm was like iron, though, and didn't let him fall. "And here's a last one for me." The touch on Sharpe's head was a benediction. As sleep wrapped around him like a soft black blanket, he heard, "Asleep it is it? There's a good officer."
12/23/07