Sharpe's Sword

EPILOGUE

Salamanca was honeyed gold in the sunlight. A city built like Rome on hills above a river.

The morning sunlight slanted the shadows long in the Great Plaza. The wounded, two days after the great battle at the Arapiles, still died in the hospital.

Sharpe stood on the Roman Bridge and stared down at the sinuous green weeds. He knew it was foolish to be here, maybe a waste of time, but he waited.

A company of Spanish soldiers was marched across the bridge. The officer grinned at him, waved a cigar. The men looked curiously at the two swords that hung by the grim Rifleman’s side.

A farmer drove cattle past him. Two priests went the other way, arguing violently, and Sharpe paced slowly behind them, stopped at the small fortress arched over the roadway, and walked slowly back.

The clock on the hill struck ten.

A cavalry Sergeant drove a dozen remounts into the river. They drank while he rubbed them down. The edge of the river was very shallow. Children played there, running easily to a small island, and their voices carried up to the bridge.

She might not even come this way, he thought, but she did.

Two liveried servants first, mounted on horseback, then the dark blue coach with its four white horses, and after that another coach that he presumed was for luggage or servants.

He pushed against the stone of the parapet, watched the servants ride past, then the four white horses, and then the barouche, its cover up, was opposite him.

She saw him.

He had to walk a few paces to where the barouche had stopped. He looked up. “I tried to see you.”

“I know.” She was fanning her face.

He felt awkward. The sun was hot on the back of his neck. He could feel sweat trickling below his armpit. “Are you well, Ma’am?”

She smiled. “Yes. I find myself temporarily unpopular in Salamanca.” She shrugged. “Madrid may be more welcoming.”

“You may find our army in Madrid.”

“Then I may go north.”

“A long way?”

She smiled. “A long way.” Her eyes dropped to the two swords, then back to Sharpe’s face. “Did you kill him?”

“In a fair fight.” He was embarrassed again, as he had been at their first meeting. She seemed no different. She was still beautiful, unbearably so, and it seemed impossible that she was an enemy. He shrugged. “Your horse died.”

“Did you kill it?”

“Your brother did.”

She half smiled. “He killed very easily.” Her eyes went back to the sword again, then back to Sharpe. “We were not very fond of each other.” He supposed she meant she and her brother, but he could not be sure she was not talking of himself. She shook her head. “Did you wait for me?”

He nodded. “Yes.”

“Why?”

He shrugged. To tell her he missed her? To tell her that it did not matter that she was French, a spy, released only because she was a Spanish aristocrat and Wellington could not afford the scandal? To tell her that amid all the lies there had been some truth? “To wish you well.”

“And I wish you well.” She mocked him gently. To Sharpe she seemed untouchable, unreachable. “Goodbye, Captain Sharpe.”

“Goodbye, Ma’am.”

She spoke to the coachman, looked back at Sharpe. “Who knows, Richard? Maybe another day.” The coach lurched forward, the last he saw was her golden hair going back into its shadows. He thought to himself that he had nothing of hers to remember her by, only memory which was the worst souvenir.

He felt in his new ammunition pouch and fingered the message that had been delivered that morning from Wellington himself. It thanked him. He supposed that Napoleon would have written similar messages to Leroux and La Marquesa if Sharpe had not taken the notebook from the shattered squares at Garcia Hernandez. After the battle they had found that was the name of the village near to the hill and the valley.

Major Hogan was expansive at lunch. Sharpe was to stay in Hogan’s old lodgings, to be fed well by the landlady, and Hogan drank well before he left. “You’re to stay and recuperate, Richard! General’s orders! We want you fully strong again.”

„Yes, sir.“

“Forrest will wait for you, don’t worry. Your Company’s safe.”

“Any news of a new Colonel?”

Hogan shook his head, belched, and patted his stomach. “Not yet. I think Lawford would like it again, but I don’t know.” He shrugged. “Forrest might get it. I don’t know, Richard.” He pushed a forefinger into Sharpe’s side. “You should be thinking about it.”

“Me! I’m a captain.” Sharpe grinned and bit into cold beef.

Hogan poured more wine. “Think about it! A majority next. Then Lieutenant Colonel. It could happen, Richard. It’s going to be a long bloody war. We just heard the Americans are in now, they may be in Quebec for all we know.“ He sipped his wine. ”Can you afford a Majority?“

“Me!” Sharpe laughed. “They’re two thousand six hundred pounds. Where do you think I can get that kind of money?”

Hogan smiled. “Don’t you usually get what you want, Richard?”

Sharpe shrugged. “I get the rainbows, sir. Never the pots of gold.”

Hogan twisted his glass in his hands. “There was one other thing, Richard, a smallish thing. I’ve been talking to Father Curtis and he did say something odd. He says that notebook was well hidden, truly well hidden, and he can’t imagine how Leroux could have found it.”

“Leroux was a clever man, sir.”

“Aye, maybe. But Curtis was sure it was too well hidden. Only Lord Spears, he says, knew where it was.” His shrewd eyes were on Sharpe.

“Really, sir?” Sharpe poured more wine.

“Does that strike you as odd?”

“Spears is dead, sir. He died well.”

Hogan nodded. “I hear his body was some way from all the others. Some way from the fighting, in fact. Odd?”

Sharpe shook his head. “He could have crawled away, sir.”

“Yes. With a hole in his head. I’m sure you’re right, Richard.” Hogan swirled the wine in his glass. His voice was still neutral. “The only reason I ask is that I do have a responsibility for finding whoever was the spy in our headquarters. I can make myself unpleasant, I suppose, turn over a lot of stones, but you do understand me, I’m sure.”

“I don’t think you need to be unpleasant, sir.”

“Good, good.” Hogan grinned at Sharpe, raised his glass. “Well done, Richard.”

“What for, sir?”

“Nothing, nothing.” Hogan toasted him all the same.

Hogan rode away that afternoon, going eastwards to the army that now marched towards Madrid. Harper left with him, mounted on one of Hogan’s spare horses, and for the second time that day Sharpe found himself on the Roman Bridge. He looked up at Harper. “Good luck.”

“We’ll see you soon, sir?”

“Very soon.” Sharpe touched his stomach. “It hardly hurts.”

“You’ve got to be careful, sir. I mean it killed that Frenchman.”

Sharpe laughed. “He wasn’t careful.”

Hogan bent down and shook Sharpe’s hand. “Take your time, Richard! There won’t be another battle.”

“No, sir.”

Hogan smiled at him. “And how long are you going to wear two swords, eh? You look ridiculous!”

Sharpe grinned and unclasped the Kligenthal. He offered it to Hogan. “You want it?”

“Good Lord, no! It’s yours, Richard. You won it.”

But a man only needs one sword. Harper watched Sharpe, he knew how Sharpe had craved after the Kligenthal, he had seen Sharpe hold the sword last night. The Kligenthal had been forged by a genius, shaped by a master, a weapon of contained beauty. To look at it was to fear it, to see it in the hands of a man who could use it, like Sharpe, was to understand the mind that had made this sword. It seemed to weigh nothing in Sharpe’s hand, so perfectly balanced was the steel, and the Rifleman drew it out now, slowly, so the steel shone like oiled silk in the sun.

The sword at his side, the sword that Harper had given him, was crude and ill-balanced. It was too long for an infantryman, it was clumsy, and it was stamped out with hundreds more in an ill-lit Birmingham factory. Beside the Kligenthal it was raw, cheap, and crude.

Yet Harper had worked the cheap sword as a talisman against Sharpe’s death. Something more than friendship had gone into the blade. It did not matter that it was cheap. The cheap sword had beaten the Kligenthal, the expensive sword, and there was luck in the blade. Dozens of similar swords had simply been left at Garcia Hernandez after the charge, not worth the bother of picking up, and the peasants would fashion them into long knives. Yet Sharpe’s sword was lucky. There was a soldiers’ goddess and her name was Fate and she had liked the sword Harper made for Sharpe. The Kligenthal was stained with the blood of friends, with the torture of flayed priests, and the beautiful sword contained not luck, but evil.

Harper watched as Sharpe drew his arm back, checked for a second, and then threw. The Kligenthal wheeled up into the sunlight, circling, dazzling with quick flashes as the steel caught the light. It seemed to hang for a second at the top of its arc, speared light at the three men, and then fell. It fell towards the Tormes’ deepest part, still turning, and then the sun left it so the steel was grey and then it struck the sheen of the water, broke it, and was gone.

Harper cleared his throat. “You’ll frighten the fishes.”

“That’s more than you ever did.”

Harper laughed. “I caught some.”

The goodbyes were said again, the hooves sounded on the bridge’s stones, and Sharpe walked slowly back to the town. He did not want this leave to be long. He wanted to be back with the South Essex, in the skirmish line where he belonged, but he would wait a week and eat his food and rest as he had been ordered.

He pushed open the door of the small courtyard of the house that was his new address, registered with the Town Major, and he stopped. She looked up. “I thought you were dead.”

“I thought you were lost.” He had been right. Memory was the worst souvenir. Memory told him she had long dark hair, a face like a hawk, a body that was slim and muscled from the days of riding the high border hills. Memory forgot the movement of a face, the life of a person.

Teresa put the cat on the ground, smiled at her husband, and came towards him. “I’m sorry. I was far north. What happened?”

„I’ll tell you later.“ He kissed her, held her, kissed her again. There was guilt inside him.

She looked up at him, puzzled. “Are you all right?”

“Yes.” He smiled. “Where’s Antonia?”

“Inside.” She jerked her head towards the kitchen where Hogan’s ‘motherly old soul’ was singing. Teresa shrugged. “She’s found someone else who wants to look after her. I suppose I shouldn’t have brought her, but I thought she ought to be near her father’s grave.”

“Not yet.” They both laughed because they were embarrassed.

The sword scraped on the ground and he took it off, laid it on the table, then hugged her again. “I’m sorry.”

“What for?”

“Worrying you.”

“Did you think this marriage would be calm?” She smiled.

“No.” He kissed her again, and this time he let his relief pour out of him, and she held him tight so that the wound hurt, but it did not matter. Love mattered, but that was so hard to learn, and he kissed her again and again till she drew away.

She smiled up at him, happiness in her eyes. “Hello, Richard.”

“Hello, wife.”

“I’m glad you’re not dead.”

“So’m I.”

She laughed, then looked at the sword. “New?”

“Yes.”

“What happened to the old one?”

“It wore out.” Not that it mattered. From now on this old sword, with its dull scabbard, would be his sword and Fate’s weapon; Sharpe’s sword.