She traced with one finger the line of his cheek-bone. ‘It will be better so, don’t you think?’ ‘I think it will be better still if I take precious good care not to be killed, my wife.’ ‘Oh, yes! Much better!’ she agreed, brightening. ‘But it does not seem to me that there will be any battle. When do we march?’
‘This evening.’
‘Well, I think it is going to rain,’ she said.
‘God forbid! I know what your Spanish storms are like.’ He looked up at the sky. ‘All the same, I believe you’re right. We’re in for a regular Tam o’Shanter’s night. Good! That means we shall be engaged tomorrow. It always rains before the Peer’s battles.’ As the afternoon wore on, the sky grew steadily more sullen, some very black clouds rolling up from the west. In the last half-hour of daylight, the landscape looked leaden. As the Light division, bringing up the rear of the army, began to descend the slope of the Aldea Lengua mountain to the river, the fast-gathering darkness closed down on them, and some heavy drops of rain fell. ‘Here it comes!’ said Kincaid.
‘Damn! I wish I had sent you across with the Pioneers!’ Harry said, fastening his boat-cloak round Juana’s neck.
‘Oh, vamos! I am not afraid of rain,’ Juana answered gaily. ‘And I would not leave the brigade, I assure you!’
A sudden gust of wind nearly carried her hat away; by the time the ford at the foot of the hill was reached, the rain was falling in torrents, and the river was already swollen. The flicker of lightning, and some threatening growls of thunder, rolling round the hilltops, frightened Juana’s horse. She could feel him trembling under her, and was obliged to force him into the river. The water, swirling and foaming round his legs, made him snort and jib badly, backing away. The more she tried to urge him forward, the more obstinate he became, carrying her in his terror into the deeper water beyond the ford, and there becoming too frightened to move. West, who was leading Harry’s spare horse, could do very little to help her, beyond shouting advice, and trying to induce her horse to follow his lead. He was beginning to be seriously alarmed, for there were quicksands in the river, when Harry came splashing through the torrent on Old Chap, and, seizing the Portuguese horse’s bridle above the bit, fairly dragged him to the opposite bank. They had scarcely scrambled up it when a deafening dap of thunder so startled the horses that even Old Chap flung up his head, while the Portuguese stood stock-still, shaking, Juana said, in every limb. ‘Why the devil didn’t you wait for me?’ Harry said wrathfully. ‘You might have been drowned, you little fool!’
He could barely distinguish her face in the darkness, but her voice was brimful of mischief. ‘You said I must learn to ford rivers by myself! Muy bien.’
‘I’d like to wring your neck! Do you know what a fright you gave me?’ ‘It is all the fault of this stupid, cowardly horse. I won’t ride him any more. I will have Tiny instead.’
‘We’ll talk about that later. Go on, and get under cover, if you can find any!’ He was obliged to leave her, for he had his duties to attend to, and it was not until an hour or two later that he found her again. Meanwhile, undaunted by the rain which beat remorselessly on her head and shoulders, Juana joined Kincaid, whose brigade was already across the river. He seemed to be in some kind of trouble. He said in a shaken voice: ‘My God, I thought I was blind!’
‘Why? What has happened to you?’
‘Nothing, my dear. That terrific flash so dazzled me I thought I had been struck. I tell you, I couldn’t see a thing, not even the lanterns, for a full ten minutes! Never had such a scare in my life! By Jove, though, what a sight it is!’
The storm, by this time, was at its height. The lightning, which was almost continuous, luridly lit up the whole scene, casting into sharp relief the background of towering hills and woods, and seeming actually to nicker on the points of the long column of bayonets still moving steadily down the mountain-side to the river at its foot. The Light division, keeping close order, passed the river without losing its formation, but a jagged fork of fire, falling amongst some of Le Marchant’s dragoons, already bivouacking on the low ground near Santa Marta, killed several men and beasts, and frightened the picketed horses so much that hundreds of them broke loose from the ropes and galloped off into the surrounding gloom, squealing with panic. The noise of their pounding hooves, as they careered wildly round, the shriller note of their squealing, mingled with the roar and clatter of the thunder, created such an infernal pandemonium that Kincaid was quite astonished to find Juana apparently unperturbed by all the commotion, but laughing, with the rain-drops splashing off the sodden brim of her hat, and running down her neck.
‘My poor dear, you ought to be under cover!”
‘Yes, but I like this better. The rain does not hurt me, and I must stay with the brigade.’ ‘Where’s Harry? Gone off with the QMG to find quarters for Vandeleur?’ ‘He did not tell me, but certainly that is what he must be doing. Enrique never neglects his duty.’
‘Only his wife?’ said Kincaid quizzically.
‘You know better! A decir verdad, he is very angry with me, because this stupid horse would not cross the river. I am going to ride Tiny in future.’
‘Are you, by Jove! Does Harry know?’
‘Yes, for I have told him,’ replied Juana firmly.
7
Vandeleur’s headquarters for that night were fixed in a cottage, which, though very small and poor, had the advantage of possessing a barn in which the horses, and Harry’s greyhounds, could be sheltered from the storm. There was only one room in the cottage besides the kitchen, but Vandeleur would not hear of the Smiths camping out in their little tent. Himself suffering from rheumatism, which had attacked the shoulder that had been wounded at the storming of Ciudad Rodrigo, he could not bring himself to believe that the drenching rain had not given Juana as much as a cold in the head. He wanted to make her drink the glass of brandy and hot water which his ADC brewed for him, and when she made a face over the first sip, and choked, and would not take any more, he shook his head, prophesying an inflammation of the lungs for her, ‘And as for you, Harry, you’ll report yourself sick, and let’s have no more nonsense about it!’ he said.
‘Not I, sir!’ ‘You damned fool of a boy, you can scarcely ride! You’re no use to me with fifteen boils, so don’t flatter yourself you can’t be spared!’
‘Only eleven, General,’ pleaded Harry. ‘Preposterous!’ said Vandeleur testily.
Over the stew which was prepared for their dinner, Juana announced that she had given West orders to put her saddle on Tiny’s back on the following morning. ‘West takes his orders from me,’ said Harry.
‘Seguramente! I said that it was your order.’
‘That’s an attack on your flank, Harry,’ said Vandeleur. ‘Have at him, m’ dear! Roll him up, horse, foot, and guns!’
‘General Vandeleur,’ said Juana, without the flicker of an eyelid, ‘wishes to see me on Tiny.’ ‘Quite right! Can’t bear to see you on that clumsy brute of a Portuguese.’ ‘Have it your own way,’ said Harry. ‘But don’t blame me if you can’t handle Tiny. He’s not an easy horse to ride.’
But Juana showed next morning that she was perfectly able to manage the little Spanish horse. He had been Mameluke-trained, and she made him caracole in front of the troops, showing off like the child she was.
‘You ought to be ashamed of yourself!’ Harry said, but without much conviction. Quite as much as she did, he enjoyed the applause the troops accorded her. To Charlie Beckwith, he said: ‘I do believe there isn’t one of those rascals that wouldn’t lay down his life to defend her. Awful blackguards some of ’em are, too.’
Since there did not seem, at first, to be any prospect of an engagement, he allowed her to remain with the brigade throughout the morning. The Light division, which formed the left wing of the army, was stationed behind a hill, as a reserve force. Nothing much could be seen of the enemy from this, or any other position, Lord Wellington having followed his usual disconcerting custom of drawing up his force on the reverse slopes of the hills that fronted the French. With Salamanca only four miles to the rear, it seemed unbelievable that no engagement would be fought, but the news that the entire baggage-tram had been sent off at dawn towards Ciudad Rodrigo came as an unpleasant surprise to men who had been fretting for days to stop marching, and fight. No one knew exactly what his lordship’s intentions were, but plenty of critics remembered that he had the reputation of being a good commander chiefly in defence.