Sharpe's Escape (32 page)

"I'm to do all that?" the
fourrier
asked in amazement, his voice muffled because he was eating a piece of cheese.

"I shall talk to the Marshal," Poquelin said grandly, then scowled. "Are you eating?"

"Got a sore tooth, sir," the man mumbled. "All swollen up, sir. Doctor says he wants to pull it. Permission to go and have tooth pulled, sir."

"Refused," Poquelin said. He was tempted to draw his sword and beat the man for insolence, but he had never drawn the weapon and was afraid that if he tried then he would discover that the blade had rusted to the scabbard's throat. He contented himself with striking the man with his hand. "We must set an example," he snapped. "If the army is hungry, we are hungry. We don't eat the army's food. You are a fool. What are you?"

"A fool, sir," the
fourrier
dutifully replied, but at least he was no longer quite such a hungry fool.

"Take a dozen men and search for carts. Anything with wheels," Poquelin ordered, confident that Marshal Masséna would approve of his idea to use Portuguese civilians as draught animals. The army was expected to march south in a day or two, and the rumor was that the British and Portuguese would make a last stand in the hills north of Lisbon, so Poquelin only needed to make a new depot some forty or fifty miles to the south. He had some transport, of course, enough to carry perhaps a quarter of the food, and those existing mules and wagons could come back for more, which meant the warehouse needed to be protected while its precious contents were laboriously moved closer to Lisbon. Poquelin hurried back to the warehouse door and looked for the dragoon Colonel who was guarding the street. "Dumesnil!"

Colonel Dumesnil, like all French soldiers, despised the commissary. He turned his horse with insolent slowness, rode to Poquelin so that he towered above him, then let his drawn sword drop so that it vaguely threatened the small man. "You want me?"

"You have checked that there are no other doors to the warehouse?"

"Of course I haven't," Dumesnil said sarcastically.

"No one must get in, you understand? No one! The army is saved, Colonel, saved!"

"
Alléluia
," Dumesnil said dryly.

"I shall inform Marshal Masséna that you are responsible for the safety of these supplies," Poquelin said pompously.

Dumesnil leaned from the saddle. "Marshal Masséna himself gave me my orders, little man," he said, "and I obey my orders. I don't need more from you."

"You need more men," Poquelin said, worried because the two squads of dragoons, barring the street on either side of the warehouse doors, were already holding back crowds of hungry soldiers. "Why are those men here?" he demanded petulantly.

"Because rumor says there's food in there," Dumesnil flicked his sword towards the warehouse, "and because they're hungry. But for Christ's sake stop fretting! I have enough men. You do your job, Poquelin, and stop telling me how to do mine."

Poquelin, content that he had done his duty by stressing to Dumesnil how important the food was, went to find Colonel Barreto who was waiting with Major Ferreira and the alarming Ferragus beside the warehouse doors. "It is all good," Poquelin told Barreto. "There is even more than you told us!"

Barreto translated for Ferragus who, in turn, asked a question. "The gentleman," Barreto said to Poquelin, his sarcasm obvious, "wishes to know when he will be paid."

"Now," Poquelin said, though it was not in his power to issue payment. Yet he wanted to convey the good news to Masséna, and the Marshal would surely pay when he heard that the army had more than enough food to see it to Lisbon. That was all that was needed. Just to reach Lisbon, for even the British could not empty that great city of all its supplies. A treasure trove waited in Lisbon and now the Emperor's Army of Portugal had been given the means to reach it.

The dragoons moved aside to let Poquelin and his companions through. Then the horsemen closed up again. Scores of hungry infantrymen had heard about the food and they were shouting that it should be distributed now, but Colonel Dumesnil was quite ready to kill them if they attempted to help themselves. He sat, hard-faced, unmoving, his long sword drawn, a soldier with orders, which meant the food was in secure hands and the Army of Portugal was safe.

SHARPE AND HARPER made the return run to the roof where Vicente and Sarah waited. Vicente was bent over in apparent pain, while Sarah, her black silk dress gleaming with spots of fresh blood, looked pale. "What happened?" Sharpe asked.

In reply she showed Sharpe the bloodstained knife blade. "I did get the bullet out," she said in a small voice.

"Well done."

"And lots of cloth scraps," she added more confidently.

"Even better," Sharpe said.

Vicente leaned back against the tiles. He was barechested and a new bandage, torn from his shirt, was crudely wrapped about his shoulder. Blood had oozed through the cloth.

"Hurts, eh?" Sharpe asked.

"It hurts," Vicente said dryly.

"It was difficult," Sarah said, "but he didn't make a noise."

"That's because he's a soldier," Sharpe said. "Can you move your arm?" he asked Vicente.

"I think so."

"Try," Sharpe said. Vicente looked appalled, then understood the sense in the order and, flinching with pain, managed to raise his left arm, which suggested the shoulder joint was not mangled. "You're going to be right as rain, Jorge," Sharpe said, "so long as we keep that wound clean." He glanced at Harper. "Maggots?"

"Not now, sir," Harper said, "only if the wound goes bad."

"Maggots?" Vicente asked faintly. "Did you say maggots?"

"Nothing better, sir," Harper said enthusiastically. "Best thing for a dirty wound. Put the little buggers in, they clean it up, leave the good flesh, and you're good as new." He patted his haversack. "I always carry a half-dozen. Much better than going to a surgeon because all those bastards ever want to do is cut you up."

"I hate surgeons," Sharpe said.

"He hates lawyers," Vicente said to Sarah, "and now he hates surgeons. Is there anyone he likes?"

"Women," Sharpe said, "I do like women." He was looking over the city, listening to screams and shots, and he knew from the noise that French discipline had crumbled. Coimbra was in chaos, given over to lust, hate and fire. Three plumes of smoke were already boiling from the narrow streets to obscure the clear morning sky and he suspected more would soon join them. "They're firing houses," he said, "and we've got work to do." He bent down and scooped up some pigeon dung that he pushed into the barrels of Harper's volley gun. He used the stickiest he could find, carefully placing a small amount into each muzzle. "Ram it down, Pat," he said. The dung would act as wadding to hold the balls in place when the barrels were tipped downwards, and what he planned would mean pointing the gun straight down. "Do many of the houses here have student quarters?" he asked Vicente.

"A lot, yes."

"Like this one?" He gestured at the roof beside them. "With rooms stretching through the attic?"

"It's very common," Vicente said, "they are called
repúblicas
, some are whole houses, others are just parts of houses. Each one has its own government. Every member has a vote, and when I was here they…"

"It's all right, Jorge, tell me later," Sharpe said. "I just hope the houses opposite the warehouse are a
república
." He should have looked when he was there, but he had not thought of it. "And what we need now," he went on, "are uniforms."

"Uniforms?" Vicente asked.

"Frog uniforms, Jorge. Then we can join the carnival. How are you feeling?"

"Weak."

"You can rest here for a few minutes," Sharpe said, "while Pat and I get some new clothes."

Sharpe and Harper edged back down the gutter and climbed through the open window into the deserted attic. "My ribs bloody hurt," Sharpe complained as he straightened up.

"Did you wrap them?" Harper asked. "Never get better unless you wrap them up."

"Didn't want to see the angel of death," Sharpe grumbled. The angel of death was the battalion doctor, a Scotsman whose ministrations were known as the last rites.

"I'll wrap the buggers for you," Harper said, "when we've a minute." He went to the doorway and listened to voices below. Sharpe followed him down the stairs, which they took slowly, careful not to make too much noise. A girl began screaming on the next floor. She stopped suddenly as if she had been hit, then started again. Harper reached the landing and moved towards the door where the screaming came from.

"No blood," Sharpe whispered to him. A uniform jacket sheeted with new blood would make them too distinctive. Men's voices came from the lower floor, but they were taking no interest in the girl above. "Make it fast," Sharpe said, edging past the Irishman, "and brutal as you like."

Sharpe pushed the door open and kept moving, seeing three men in the room. Two were holding the girl on the floor while the third, a big man who had stripped off his jacket and lowered his breeches to his ankles, was just getting down on his knees when Sharpe's rifle butt took him in the base of his skull. It was a vicious blow, hard enough to throw the man forward onto the girl's naked belly. Sharpe reckoned the man had to be out of the fight, drew the rifle back and hit the left-hand man on the jaw and he heard the bone crack and saw the whole jaw twist awry. He sensed the third man going down to Harper's blow and finished off the man with the broken jaw by another slam of the brass-sheathed butt to the side of his skull. By the feel of the blow he had fractured the man's skull, then he was gripped around the legs by the first man who had somehow survived the initial assault. The man, hampered by his lowered breeches, clawed at Sharpe's groin, unbalancing him, then the heavy butt of the volley gun slammed into the back of his skull and he slid down, groaning. Harper gave him a last tap as a keepsake.

The girl, stripped naked, stared up in horror and was about to scream again as Harper snatched up her clothes, but then he put his finger to his lips. She held her breath, gazing up at him, and Harper smiled at her, then gave her the clothes. "Get dressed, sweetheart," he said.

"
Inglês
?" she asked, pulling the torn dress over her head.

Harper looked horrified. "I'm Irish, darling," he said.

"For God's sake, lover boy," Sharpe said, "get the hell up the stairs and fetch the other two down."

"Yes, sir," Harper said and went to the door. The girl, seeing him go, gave a small cry of alarm. The Irishman looked back at her, winked at her, and the girl snatched up the rest of her clothes and followed him, leaving Sharpe with the three men. The big man, who had taken such a beating, showed signs of recovery, lifting his head and scrabbling on the floor with a calloused hand, so Sharpe drew the man's own bayonet and slid it up between his ribs. There was very little blood. The man gave a heave, opened his eyes once to look at Sharpe, then there was a rattling noise in his throat and his head dropped. He lay still.

The other two men, both very young, were unconscious. Sharpe reckoned the one whose jaw he had broken and dislocated would probably die from the blow on the skull. He was white-faced and blood was trickling from his ear, and he gave no sign of consciousness as Sharpe stripped off his clothes. The second, whom Harper had hit, groaned as he was stripped, and Sharpe thumped him into silence. Then he peeled off his own jacket and pulled on a blue one. It fitted him well enough. It buttoned to one side of the broad white facing that blazoned the front and which ended at his waist, though a pair of tails hung down behind. The tails had white turnbacks decorated with pairs of red flaming grenades, which meant the jacket's true owner was from a grenadier company. The high stiff collar was red and the shoulders had brief red epaulettes. He pulled on the soldier's white crossbelt that was fastened at the left shoulder by the epaulette's strap, and from which hung the bayonet. He decided against taking the man's white trousers. He already wore the overalls of a French cavalry officer, and though the mix of coat and overalls was unusual, few soldiers were uniformed properly after they had been on campaign for a few weeks. He strapped his own sword belt beneath the coat tails and knew that was a risk, for no ordinary soldier would carry a sword, but he assumed men would think he had plundered the weapon. He hung his rifle on his shoulder, knowing that to any casual glance the weapon resembled a musket. He emptied the man's oxhide pack and put in his own jacket and shako, then pulled on the soldier's shako, a confection of red and black blazoned on the front with a brass plate showing an eagle above the number 19, making Sharpe a new recruit to the 19th Infantry of the Line. The cartridge box, which hung beneath the bayonet at the end of the crossbelt, had a brass badge of a grenade mounted on its lid.

Harper came back and looked startled for a second at the sight of Sharpe in enemy blue, then he grinned. "Suits you, sir." Vicente and the two girls followed. Sharpe saw that the Portuguese girl was young, perhaps fifteen, with bright eyes and long dark hair. She saw the trace of blood on the shirt of the man who had been about to rape her, then spat on him and, before anyone could stop her, she snatched up a bayonet and stabbed the neck of one of the other two, making blood spurt high up the wall. Vicente opened his mouth to protest, then fell silent. Eighteen months before, when Sharpe had first met him, Vicente's legal mind had balked at such summary punishment of rapists. Now he said nothing as the girl spat on the man she had killed, then went to the second, who was lying on his back and breathing with a hoarse sound from his broken jaw. She stood over him, poising the bayonet above his twisted mouth.

"I never did like rapists," Sharpe said mildly.

"Scum," Harper agreed, "pure bloody scum."

Sarah watched, not wanting to watch, but unable to take her eyes off the bayonet that the girl held two-handed. The girl paused, reveling in the moment, then stabbed down. "Get yourselves dressed," Sharpe told Vicente and Harper. The dying man gurgled behind him and his heels briefly drummed against the floor. "Ask her name," Sharpe told Sarah.