the salute. It had been more than three weeks since his demotion, yet it still hurt. The Battalion, embarrassed, called him ‘sir’ or ‘Mr Sharpe’. Only Hakeswill twisted the knife. Sharpe pointed to the mess on the ground. ‘That’s it. Sort it out.’
‘Sir!’ Hakeswill turned to the working party from the Light Company. ‘You heard the Lieutenant! Sort it out and get a bloody move on! The Captain wants us back.’
Hagman, the old Rifleman, the best shot in the Company, who had served with Sharpe for seven years, gave his old Captain a sad smile. ‘Nasty day, sir.’
Sharpe nodded. The rain had stopped, but it looked as if it would start again soon. ‘How are things, Dan?’
The Rifleman grinned, shrugged, and looked round to see if Hakeswill was listening. ‘Bloody terrible, sir.’
‘Hagman!’ Hakeswill bellowed. ‘Just because you’re bloody old doesn’t mean you can’t work. Get your bloody self here, fast!’ The Sergeant grinned at Sharpe. ‘Sorry, Lieutenant, sir. Can’t stop to chat, can we? Work to do.’ The teeth ground together, the blue eyes blinked rapidly. ‘How’s your lady, sir. Well? I was hoping to renew the acquaintance. In Baddy-joss is she?’ He cackled and turned away, back to the working party that was rescuing the fallen shovels from the broken-axled cart.
Sharpe ignored the gibes because to react was to give Hakeswill the satisfaction of having unsettled him, and he looked away from the cart and stared over the grey, swollen river. Badajoz. Just four miles away; a city built on a corner of land formed by the River Guadiana and the Rivillas stream. The city was dominated by the sprawling castle high on the rock hill which stood where the stream flowed into the river. The army had marched from Elvas that morning and now they waited as the Engineers put the last touches to the pontoon bridge that would take the British to the southern bank on which Badajoz stood. Each tin pontoon, strengthened by wooden braces, weighed two tons, and the clumsy, oblong boats, dragged here by oxen, had been floated in a line across the Guadiana. They were all moored now, anchored against the rain-heightened river, and across their top surfaces the Engineers had laid massive thirteen-inch cables. The water foamed dirty between the tin boats as, on top of the cables, planks were slapped into place with a speed that spoke of the frequent practice the Engineers had made in crossing Spain’s rivers. Almost before the last planks were in place the first carts were crossing and men shovelled sand and earth on to the planks to make a crude roadway.
‘Forward!’ The first troops began to cross, unmounted men of the newly arrived Heavy Cavalry Brigade leading their horses. The animals were nervous on the thrumming bridge, but they crossed, and Badajoz was about to be ringed with troops.
On the far bank the cavalry mounted, sorted themselves into squadrons, and, as the first infantry began to cross, the horsemen put spurs to their mounts and trotted towards the city. There was little they could do against the massive walls; they were a demonstration, a flaunting of intent, and a discouragement to the handful of French cavalry inside Badajoz who might be tempted to ride against the bridgehead.
It began to rain, pitting the swirling, dark water, and soaking the already damp troops as they crossed the river and turned left towards the city. Once there was a cheer from the infantry as a cannon’s shot was heard from Badajoz. A squadron of the Heavy Cavalry had ridden too close to the walls, a French gun had fired, and the British riders galloped ignominiously out of range. The cheer was ironic. The infantry might die soon at the hands of the guns, but it was still good to see the fancy cavalry taught a lesson. No cavalryman would have to go into Badajoz’s breaches.
The South Essex had become pack mules. The Engineers had over a hundred carts waiting to cross the river and two had snapped their axles. The South Essex would have to carry the loads across the water. Windham reined in beside Sharpe. ‘All ready, Mr Sharpe?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Keep the baggage close when we cross!’
‘Yes, sir.’ No, sir, three bags full, sir. ‘Sir?’
‘Mr Sharpe?’ Windham was eager to be away.
‘Have you forwarded my request, sir?’
‘No, Mr Sharpe, much too early. My compliments!’ The Colonel touched the tassel on his bicorne and wheeled his horse away.
Sharpe hitched his sword up, useless to him for counting spades and pick-axes, and trudged over the mud towards the Battalion’s baggage. Each company kept a mule that carried the books, the endless paperwork that went with a Captaincy, a few paltry supplies and, quite illegally, some officers’ baggage as well. Other mules carried the Battalion supplies; the spare arms chest, uniforms, more paperwork, and the surgeon’s grim load. Mixed with the mules were the officers’ servants, leading spare horses and packhorses, and, mingled among them all, the children. They shrieked and played round the animals’ legs, watched by their mothers who crouched beneath makeshift shelters waiting for the order to march. By regulation there should be just sixty wives with the Battalion, but inevitably, after three years at war, the South Essex had collected far more. There were nearer three hundred women marching with the Battalion, the same number of children, and they were a mixture of English, Irish, Scottish, Welsh, Spanish and Portuguese; there was even a Frenchwoman, left behind in the fighting at Fuentes de Oñoro, who had chosen to stay with her captors and had married a Sergeant in Sterritt’s Company. Some were whores, following the army’s meagre pennies, some were proper wives with papers to prove it, while some called themselves wives and did not need the ceremony. All were tough. Many had married twice or three times in the war, having lost their husbands to a French bullet or a Spanish fever.
The previous morning Windham had cancelled the wives’ parade. In barracks the parade made some sense; it kept a Colonel in touch with the families and gave a good officer a chance to detect brutality, but the women of the South Essex did not like the parade, were not used to it, and had showed their discontent. The very first time that Sharpe had lined them for Windham’s inspection Private Clayton’s wife, a pretty girl, had been suckling her baby. The Colonel had stopped, glanced down, and frowned at her. ‘This is hardly the time, woman!’
She had grinned, lifted her breasts towards him. ‘When ’e’s ’ungry, ’e’s ’ungry, just like ’is father.’ There was a chorus of laughter from the wives, jeers from the men, and Windham had strode away. Jessica would have known what to do, but not he.
Now, as Sharpe approached the rain-swept baggage, the women grinned at him from beneath their blankets. Lily Grimes, a tiny woman of irrepressible cheerfulness, and a voice with the piercing quality of a well-honed bayonet, gave him a mock salute. ‘Given up parading us, Cap’n?’ The women always called him Captain.
‘That’s right, Lily.’
She sniffed. ‘He’s mad.’
‘Who?’
‘Bloody Colonel. What did he want us to parade for, anyway?’
Sharpe grinned. ‘He worries about you, Lily. He likes to keep an eye on you.’
She shook her head. ‘He wants to look at Sally Clayton’s tits more like.’ She laughed and peered up at Sharpe. ‘You didn’t look away either, Cap’n. I watched you.’
‘I was just wishing it had been you, Lily.’
She shrieked with laughter. ‘Any time, Cap’n, you just ask.’
Sharpe laughed, walked away from her. He admired the wives, and he liked them. They endured all the discomforts of the campaign; the nights under pouring rain, the hard rations, the long marches, yet they never gave up. They watched their men go into battle and afterwards they searched the field for a corpse or a wounded husband, and all the while they brought up their children and looked after their men. Sharpe had seen Lily carrying two of her children up a hard road, her husband’s musket, and the family’s few belongings as well. They were tough.
And they were not ladies; three years in the Peninsula had made sure of that. Some dressed in old uniforms, most were garbed in voluminous, filthy skirts with tattered shawls and scarves