“He’s safe.”
“Where?”
Spears shrugged. “He’s in a monastery today. Bowing and scraping.”
“You didn’t sell him?”
Spears laughed, and the sound was harsh and bubbling because of the blood in his throat. He swallowed and grimaced. “I didn’t need to. Leroux had already found out.”
As Hogan had suspected. “Sweet God.” Sharpe stared at the field after battle. He had once feared for La Marquesa’s body beneath Leroux’s torture, now he flinched from the thought of the elderly priest racked on a blood soaked table. “But you said he’s safe?”
Curtis was safe, but he was an old man. Old men worry, Spears said, about dying before their work is done, and so Curtis had written the names and addresses of all his correspondents in a small, leather book. It was disguised as one of his notebooks of astronomical observations, filled with star charts and Latin names, but the codes could be broken.
Leroux had bided his time. He had planned to take Curtis when the British had gone, but then came news of a great British victory, and he had demanded that Spears fetch the priest. Spears’ voice was small now. “I couldn’t do that. So I fetched him the book instead.”
Leroux no longer needed El Mirador. With the book in his hands he could find all the correspondents who wrote faithfully from throughout Europe and he could take them one by one, kill them, and Britain would be blind. Sharpe shook his head in disbelief. “Why didn’t you just lie? Why did you have to give them the book? They didn’t know about it!”
“I thought they’d reward me.” Lord Spears was pathetic.
“Reward you! More blood money?”
“No.” Blood was dark on his cheek. “I wanted her body just once. Just once.” He made a choking sound that could have been a laugh or a sob. “I didn’t get it. Leroux gave me back my parole instead. He returned me my honour.” The bitterness was rank in his voice.
The dark bulk of the Greater Arapile was topped by two small fires. It blocked Sharpe’s view of the lights of Salamanca. “Where’s Leroux now?”
“He’s riding for Paris.”
“Which way?”
“He’s going to Alba de Tormes.”
Sharpe looked at Spears, dying on the ground. “You didn’t tell him the Spanish were there?”
“He didn’t seem to care.”
Sharpe swore softly. He must go. He swore again, louder, because he liked Spears and he hated this sudden weakness, this collapse of a man, this sale of honour. “You sold all our agents for one parole?”
No. There had been money, too, Spears said, but the money was to be paid when Leroux reached Paris and it would go to Dorothy in England. A dowry, Spears’ last treacherous gift, and he pleaded with Sharpe, told Sharpe he could not understand; family was all, and Sharpe stood up. “I’m going.”
Spears lay on the ground, defeated, broken. “One last promise?”
“What?”
“If you find him she won’t get the money.”
“No.”
“Then keep my honour for her.” The voice was husky, close to breaking. “Tell her I was a hero.”
Sharpe lifted the sword, put the point in the scabbard, and drove it home. “I’ll tell her you died a hero. Your wounds in front.”
Spears rolled onto his side because it was easier to void the blood. “And one thing more.”
“I’m in a hurry.” Sharpe had to find Hogan. He would rouse Harper first, because the Sergeant would want to join this final hunt, this last chance against their enemy. Leroux had killed Windham, killed McDonald, he had come close to killing Sharpe, he had tortured Spanish priests, and he had taken the honour of Lord Spears. Sharpe had been given one more chance in the wreckage after the battle.
“I’m in a hurry, too.” Spears waved a feeble hand towards the battlefield. “I don’t want those bloody looters to kill me, Richard. Do that much for me.” He blinked. “It hurts, Richard, it hurts.”
Sharpe remembered Connelley. Die well, lad, die well. “You want me to kill you?”
“The last office of a friend?” It was a plea.
Sharpe picked up Spears’ pistol, cocked it, and crouched beside the supine cavalryman. “Are you sure?”
“It hurts. Tell her I died well.”
Sharpe had liked this man. He remembered the chicken being tossed like a howitzer shell at the ball, he remembered the great shout in the big Plaza on the morning after the first night on the mirador. This man had made Sharpe laugh, had shared wine with him, and now he was a miserable, broken man who had given his honour first to Leroux, and now to Sharpe. „I’ll tell her you died well. I’ll tell her you were a hero. I’ll make you into Sir Lancelot.“ Spears smiled. His eyes were on Sharpe. The Rifleman brought the pistol close to Spears’ neck. „I’ll tell her to build a new church big enough for the bloody plaque.” Spears smiled wider and the bullet went beneath his chin, up through the skull, and erupted at the top of his head. It was the kind of wound that a hero, on horseback, might fetch. He died instantly, smiling, and Sharpe’s greatcoat was spattered by the wound. He pulled it out, then threw it down, hating it. He turned and hurled the pistol into the trees, heard it crash through branches and twigs, and then there was silence. He looked down on Spears and cursed himself that he had ever become involved. Spears had talked ofthejoy that war could bring, theirresponsibility of unshackled youth, but there was little joy in this secret war.
He bent down and picked up his greatcoat, shook it out, and walked to the horses. He mounted his own, led Spears’ by the reins, and went down the bank. He paused at its foot, looked back, and the body was a dark shadow against the grass. He told himself that the tears in the corners of his eyes were just irritation from the smoke of battle; something any man could expect.
Revenge was at Alba de Tormes, his heels scraped the horse’s flanks, and the Cathedral clock, above the Palacio Casares, struck twelve.
CHAPTER 25
Alba de Tormes was a town on a hill to the east of the River Tormes. The hill was crowned with an ancient castle and covered with jumbled roofs that led down to the magnificent convent where the body of St. Teresa of Avila was revered by pilgrims. Beside the convent was the bridge.
The French needed the bridge to take their shattered army to the relative safety of the eastern bank and away from the pursuit that they knew would come with sabres in the dawn, but Wellington had denied them the bridge. Weeks before, when his army first came to Salamanca, he had put a Spanish garrison into the Castle and into the defence works at the bridge’s eastern end. The Spanish guns could rake the length of the bridge, rattle its stones with canister, and so the French were trapped in the great river bend.
From Alba de Tormes the river flowed nine miles north and then, in a great curve, it turned westwards and flowed for ten miles before its waters passed beneath the arches of Salamanca’s Roman bridge. Within that great bend the French fled eastward through the night. Hundreds crossed by the ford, but most went towards the town that had the only bridge they could use. The French guns, baggage, pay-chest, wounded, all went to Alba de Tormes and to the bridge that was guarded by the guns of the Spanish.
Except the Spanish were not there. They had fled three days before; fled without sight of an enemy. They knew the French were coming south, feared a British defeat, and so the Spanish garrison packed its baggage and marched south.
They deserted their post. The bridge was left open to the French and, all night, Marmont’s men went eastward. A great victory had been devalued. The stragglers of the defeated army were collected on the eastern bank, formed into ranks, and marched away. A rearguard, that had not fought the previous day, barred the eastward road a little beyond the town and its empty bridge.