Hogan took out his snuff box. “Do you think they’ll fight?”

“God knows.” The year before, Sharpe knew, a Spanish army had forced the surrender of twenty thousand Frenchmen, so there was no doubting that the Spaniards could fight if their leadership and organisation were equal to their ambitions. But, to Sharpe, the evidence of the Regimienta suggested that their immediate allies had neither the organisation nor the leaders to do anything except, perhaps, make bombastic speeches.

At half past ten, five hours late, the Battalion finally shrugged on its packs and followed the Santa Maria across the old bridge. Sharpe and Hogan travelled ahead of the South Essex and immediately behind a far from warlike Spanish rearguard. A bunch of mules was being coaxed along, loaded high with luxuries to keep the Spanish officers comfortable in the field, while, in the middle of the beasts, rode the priest who continually turned and smiled nervously with blackened teeth at the heathens on his tail. Strangest of all were three white-dressed young women who rode thoroughbred horses and carried fringed parasols. They giggled constantly, turned and peeped at the Riflemen, and looked incongruously like three brides on horseback. What a way, Sharpe thought, to go to war.

By midday the column had covered a mere five miles and had come to a complete stop. Trumpets sounded at the head of the Regimienta, officers galloped in urgent clouds of dust up and down the ranks, and the soldiers simply dropped their weapons and packs and sat down in the road. Anyone with any kind of rank started to argue, the priest, stuck among the mules, screamed hysterically at a mounted officer, while the three women wilted visibly and fanned themselves with their white-gloved hands. Christian Gibbons walked his horse to the head of the British column and sat staring at the three women. Sharpe looked up at him.

“The middle one is the prettiest.”

“Thank you.” Gibbons spoke with a heavy irony. “That’s civil of you, Sharpe.” He was about to urge his horse forward when Sharpe put a hand on the bridle.

“Spanish officers, I hear, are very fond of duelling.”

“Ah.” Gibbons stared icily down on Sharpe. “You may have a point.” He wheeled his horse back down the road.

Hogan was shouting at the priest, in Spanish, trying to discover why they had stopped. The priest smiled his blackened smile and raised his eyes to heaven as if to say it was all God’s will and there was nothing to be done about it.

“Damn this!” Hogan looked round urgently. “Damn! Don’t they know how much time we’ve lost? Where’s the Colonel?”

Simmerson was not far behind. He and Forrest arrived with a clatter of hooves. “What the devil’s happening?”

“I don’t know, sir. Spanish have sat down.”

Simmerson licked his lips. “Don’t they know we’re in a hurry?” No-one spoke. The Colonel looked round the officers as though one of them might suggest an answer. “Come on, then. We’ll see what it’s about. Hogan, will you translate?”

Sharpe fell his men out as the mounted officers rode up the column, and the Riflemen sat beside the road with their packs beside them. The Spanish appeared to be asleep. The sun was high and the road surface reflected a searing heat. Sharpe touched the muzzle of his rifle by mistake and flinched from the hot metal. Sweat trickled down his neck, and the glare of the sun, reflected from the metal ornaments of the Spanish infantry, was dazzling. There were still fifteen miles to go. The three women rode their horses slowly towards the head of the Regimienta, one of them turned and waved coquettishly to the Riflemen and Harper blew her a kiss, and when they had gone the dust drifted gently onto the thin grass of the verge.

Fifteen minutes of silence passed before Simmerson, Forrest and Hogan pounded back from their meeting with the Spanish Colonel. Sir Henry was not pleased. “Damn them! They’ve stopped for the day!”

Sharpe looked questioningly at Hogan. The Engineer nodded. “It’s true. There’s an inn up there, and the officers have settled in.”

“Damn! Damn! Damn!” Simmerson was pounding the pommel of his saddle. “What are we to do?”

The mounted officers glanced at each other. Simmerson was the man who had to make the decision and none of them answered his question, but there was only one thing to do. Sharpe looked at Harper.

“Form up, Sergeant.”

Harper bellowed orders. The Spanish muleteers, their rest disturbed, looked curiously as the Riflemen pulled on their packs and formed ranks.

“Bayonets, Sergeant.”

The order was given and the long, brass-handled sword-bayonets rasped from the scabbards. Each blade was twenty-three inches long, each sharp and brilliant in the sun. Simmerson looked nervously at the weapons. “What the devil are you doing, Sharpe?”

“Only one thing to do, sir.”

Simmerson looked left and right at Forrest and Hogan, but they offered him no help. “Are you proposing we should simply carry on, Sharpe?”

It’s what you should have proposed, thought Sharpe, but instead he nodded. “Isn’t that what you intended, sir?”

Simmerson was not sure. Wellesley had impressed on him the need for speed, but there was also the duty not to offend a touchy ally. But what if the bridge should already be occupied by the French? He looked at the Riflemen, grim in their dark uniforms, and then at the Spanish who lolled in the roadway smoking cigarettes. “Very well.”

“Sir.” Sharpe turned away to Harper. “Four ranks, Sergeant.”

Harper took a deep breath. “Company! Double files to the right!”

There were times when Sharpe’s men, for all their tattered uniforms, knew how to startle a Militia Colonel. With a snap and a precision that would have done credit to the Guards, the even-numbered files stepped backwards; the whole company, without another word of command, turned to the right and instead of two ranks there were now four facing towards the Spanish. Harper had paused for a second while the movement was carried out. “Quick march!”

They marched. Their boots crashed onto the road scattering mules and muleteers before them. The priest took one look, kicked his heels, and the donkey bolted into the field.

“Come on, you bastards!” Harper shouted. “March as if you mean it!”

They did. They pushed their tempo up to the Light Infantry quick march and stamped with their boots so that the dust flew up. Behind them the South Essex were formed and following, before them the Regimienta split apart into the fields, the officers running from the white-walled inn and screaming at the Riflemen. Sharpe ignored them. The Spanish Colonel, a vision of golden lace, appeared at the inn doorway to see his Regiment in tatters. The men had scattered into the fields and the British were on their way to the bridge. The Colonel was without his boots and in his hand he held a glass of wine. As they drew level with the inn Sharpe turned to his men.

“Company! To the right! Salute!”

He drew the long blade, held it in the ceremonial salute, and his men grinned as they presented their arms towards the Colonel. There was little he could do. He wanted to protest but honour was honour, and the salute should be returned. The Spaniard was in a quandary. In one hand, the wine, and in the other a long cigar. Sharpe watched the debate on the Spanish Colonel’s face as he looked from one hand to the other, trying to decide which to abandon, but in the end the Colonel of the Santa Maria stood to attention in his stockings and held the wine glass and cigar at a dutifully ceremonious angle.

“Eyes front!”

Hogan laughed out loud. “Well done, Sharpe!” He looked at his watch. “We’ll make the bridge before nightfall. Let’s hope the French don’t.”

Let’s hope the French don’t make it at all, thought Sharpe. Defeating an ally was one thing but his doubts about the ability of the South Essex to face the French were as real as ever. He looked at the white, dusty road stretching over the featureless plain and in a fleeting, horrid moment wondered whether he would return. He pushed the thought away and gripped the stock of his rifle. With his other hand he unconsciously felt the lump over his breastbone. Harper saw the gesture. Sharpe thought it was a secret that round his neck he had a leather bag in which he kept his worldly wealth, but all his men knew it was there, and Sergeant Harper knew that when