„More,” Dulong grunted.
„So how do you get rid of them?”
Dulong gazed at the bridge through a telescope. The beams were both about a meter wide, more than enough, though the rain would doubtless make them slippery. He raised the glass to see that the Portuguese had dug trenches from which they could fire directly along the beams. But the night would be dark, he thought, and the moon clouded. „I would take a hundred volunteers,” he said, „fifty for each beam, and go at midnight.” The rain was getting worse and the dusk was cold. The Portuguese muskets, Dulong knew, would be soaked and the men behind them chilled to the bone. „A hundred men,” he promised the Marshal, „and the bridge is yours.”
Soult nodded. „If you succeed, Major,” he said, „then send me word. But if you fail? I do not want to hear.” He turned and walked away.
Dulong went back to the 31st Leger and he called for volunteers and was not surprised when the whole regiment stepped forward, so he chose a dozen good sergeants and let them pick the rest and he warned them that the fight would be messy, cold and wet. „We will use the bayonet,” he said, „because the muskets won’t fire in this weather and, besides, once you have fired one shot you will not have time to reload.” He thought about reminding them that they owed him a display of bravery after their reluctance to advance into the rifle fire on the watchtower hill at Vila Real de Zedes, then decided they all knew that anyway and so held his tongue.
The French lit no fires. They grumbled, but Marshal Soult insisted. Across the river the ordenanga believed they were safe and so they made a fire in one of the cottages high above the bridge where their commanders could keep warm. The cottage had one small window and just enough flame light escaped through the unshuttered glass to reflect off the wet cross beams that spanned the river. The feeble reflections shimmered in the rain, but they served as a guide for Dulong’s volunteers.
They went at midnight. Two columns, fifty men in each, and Dulong told them they must run across the bridge and he led the right-hand column, his saber drawn, and the only sounds were the river hissing beneath, the wind shrieking in the rocks, the pounding of their feet and a brief scream as one man slipped and fell into the Cavado. Then Dulong was climbing the slope and found the first trench empty and he guessed the ordenanga had taken shelter in the small hovels that lay just beyond the second trench and the fools had not even left a sentry by the bridge. Even a dog would have served to warn them of a French attack, but men and dogs alike were sheltering from the weather. „Sergeant!” the Major hissed. „The houses! Clean them out!”
The Portuguese were still asleep when the Frenchmen came. They arrived with bayonets and no mercy. The first two houses fell swiftly, their occupants killed scarcely before they were awake, but their screams alerted the rest of the ordenanqa who ran into the darkness to be met by the best-trained infantry in the French army. The bayonets did their work and the cries of the victims completed the victory because the survivors, confused and terrified by the terrible sounds in the dark night, fled. By a quarter past midnight Dulong was warming himself by the fire that had lit his way to victory.
Marshal Soult took the medal of the Legion d’Honneur from his own coat and pinned it to the turnback of Major Dulong’s frayed jacket. Then, with tears in his eyes, the Marshal kissed the Major on both cheeks. Because the miracle had happened and the first bridge belonged to the French.
Kate wrapped herself in a damp saddle blanket then stood beside her tired horse and watched dully as French infantry cut down pine trees, slashed off their branches, then carried the trimmed trunks to the bridge. More timber was fetched from the small cottages and the ridge beams were just long enough to span the bridge’s roadway, but it all took time, for the rough timbers had to be lashed together if the soldiers, horses and mules were to cross in safety. The soldiers who were not working huddled together against the rain and wind. It felt like winter suddenly. Musket shots sounded far away and Kate knew it was the country people come to shoot at the hated invaders.
A cantiniere, one of the tough women who sold the soldiers coffee, tea, needles, thread and dozens of other small comforts, took pity on Kate and brought her a tin mug of lukewarm coffee laced with brandy. „If they take much longer”-she nodded at the soldiers rebuilding the bridge’s roadway-”we’ll all be on our backs with an English dragoon on top. So at least we’ll get something out of this campaign!” She laughed and went back to her two mules which were laden with her wares. Kate sipped the coffee. She had never been so cold, wet or miserable. And she knew she only had herself to blame.
Williamson stared at the coffee and Kate, unsettled by his gaze, moved to the far side of her horse. She disliked Williamson, disliked the hungry look in his eyes and feared the threat in his naked desire of her.
Were all men animals? Christopher, for all his elegant civility by day, liked to inflict pain at night, but then Kate remembered the single soft kiss that Sharpe had given her and she felt the tears come to her eyes. And Lieutenant Vicente, she thought, was a gentle man. Christopher liked to say how there were two sides in the world, just as there were black pieces and white pieces on a chessboard, and Kate knew she had chosen the wrong side. Worse, she did not know how she was to find her way back to the right one.
Christopher strode back down the stalled column. „Is that coffee?” he asked cheerfully. „Good, I need something warming.” He took the mug from her, drained it, then tossed it away. „Another few minutes, my dear,” he said, „and we’ll be on our way. One more bridge after this, then we’ll be over the hills and far away in Spain. You’ll have a proper bed again, eh? And a bath. How are you feeling?”
„Cold.”
„Hard to believe it’s May, eh? Worse than England. Still, don’t they say rain’s good for the complexion? You’ll be prettier than ever, my dearest.” He paused as some muskets sounded from the west. The noise rattled loud for a few seconds, echoing back and forth between the defile’s steep sides, then faded. „Chasing off bandits,” Christopher said. „It’s too soon for the pursuit to catch us up.”
„I pray they do catch us,” Kate said.
„Don’t be ridiculous, my dear. Besides, we’ve got a brigade of good infantry and a pair of cavalry regiments as rearguard.”
„We?” Kate asked indignantly. „I’m English!”
Christopher gave her a long-suffering smile. „As am I, dearest, but what we want above all is peace. Peace! And perhaps this retreat will be just the thing to persuade the French to leave Portugal alone. That’s what I’m working on. Peace.”
There was a pistol bolstered in Christopher’s saddle just behind Kate and she was tempted to pull the weapon free, thrust it into his belly and pull the trigger, but she had never fired a gun, did not know if the long-barrelled pistol was loaded, and besides, what would happen to her if Christopher were not here? Williamson would maul her. she thnnaht and for some reason she remembered the letter she had succeeded in leaving for Lieutenant Sharpe, putting it on the House Beautiful’s mantel without Christopher seeing what she was doing. She thought now what a stupid letter it was. What was she trying to tell Sharpe? And why him? What did she expect him to do?
She stared up the far hill. There were men on the high crest line and Christopher turned to see what she was looking at. „More of the scum,” he said.
„Patriots,” Kate insisted.
„Peasants with rusted muskets,” Christopher said acidly, „who torture their prisoners and have no idea, none, what principles are at stake in this war. They are the forces of old Europe,” he insisted, „superstitious and ignorant. The enemies of progress.” He grimaced, then unbuckled one of his saddlebags to make sure that his black-fronted red uniform jacket was inside. If the French were forced to surrender then that coat was his passport. He would take to the hills and if any partisans accosted him he would persuade them he was an Englishman escaping from the French.