Chapter 7
Colonel Blake's quarters were already crowded and smoky by the time Sharpe joined the company; the candles that burned brightly in wall sconces and in candelabra on the table lending the dining room a festive air at the expense of a breathable atmosphere.
Unsurprisingly, the combined forces of Estella and Josefina were proving a magnetic attraction for every man in the room; Colonel Blake's gaze in particular being drawn to the pearly expanse of Josefina's bosom as if to true North.
Sharpe's hopes of slipping in unseen were immediately scotched by Captain Whiting whose cheery greeting, bawled from across the room, alerted Colonel Blake to his arrival.
"Major Sharpe! Back on your feet again, I see!" the Colonel exclaimed delightedly. "Estella and Josefina were devastated to hear of your injury. Asked after you every day." At the mention of their names, the girls turned their soft eyes on Sharpe and murmured expressions of sympathy in charming broken English.
Whatever the deprivations being suffered by the camp in general, they had clearly stopped short of the Portuguese beauties. Their dresses of embroidered silk were dazzling in the candlelight and Sharpe found himself as captivated as his brother officers by their glowing skin and shining hair.
He bent over each white hand in turn, thanking them for their concern and assuring them that he was now quite recovered, thanks to Doctor Burnett. Ah, yes, they twittered. The daughter of Doctor Baxter. Such… They hesitated and conferred in whispers before deciding that the word they sought was 'dedication.' Sharpe smiled and nodded his agreement.
It seemed that being deprived of equestrian pursuits had allowed Estella and Josefina more time to perfect their elaborate coiffures. Both had achieved a complicated arrangement of loops and braids that put Sharpe in mind of the corn dollies seen long ago, hanging above the door of a country tavern; but in his eyes, though artfully done, they could not match the simplicity of Helen's no-nonsense chignon. The Doctor's hair would be quite long, he thought, with perhaps a slight curl, when unpinned.
Captain Whiting interrupted Sharpe's wool-gathering by nudging his elbow with a glass of wine. "Still the same disgusting vintage as before, old man, but get enough of it down your neck and I'm sure you'll find Colonel Blake most entertaining," the Captain offered, with a broad wink in Estella's direction.
Sharpe accepted the brimming glass while scanning the assembly for any sign of Helen. He turned back to find Major Hewlin paying court to Estella and Josefina in fluent Portuguese; his obviously extravagant compliments causing much fluttering of fans and eyelashes. Hewlin expressed his admiration for their dewy complexions while noting Sharpe's distracted manner with interest.
When everyone was sufficiently fortified with alcohol to withstand the culinary delights in store for them, Colonel Blake led the charge toward the table. Sharpe's own men had provided much of the game on offer this evening. It was unlikely that much in the way of wildlife remained at large after Hagman returned from his hunting trips.
Sharpe exchanged pleasantries with his fellow diners, but during the lulls in conversation, his gaze drifted toward the door. Once or twice he found himself the target of Hewlin's watchful expression. Irritated by the other's supercilious air, Sharpe fixed his attention on his plate, tackling a portion of roast pheasant with more determination than enthusiasm.
Hewlin was first to notice Helen's arrival. She was standing by the door, one hand still resting on the latch, looking sombre in a dress of dark blue silk. Instantly, he slid out of his seat and escorted her to the vacant chair beside his own. Colonel Blake tore his gaze from Estella's décolletage and squinted the length of the table. "Doctor Burnett! Coaxed from your tower at last! Major Hewlin, look after the lady, will you?" Hewlin bowed. "With pleasure, Colonel."
Helen glanced at Sharpe and responded politely but distantly to Hewlin's barrage of compliments and enquires as he arranged serving dishes and cutlery and then poured a glass of wine for her. Frowning, Helen reached across the table and moved aside a candelabrum.
"That's better. It's a charming decoration, but more obstacle than ornament. I would sooner talk to my opposite neighbour than the silverware. I trust you are well, Major Sharpe?" Helen asked, a warm smile softening her formal tone. Sharpe inclined his head and returned her smile. "Yes, thank you, ma'am."
Behind the brightness of the candles, Hewlin's face lay in shadow. Sharpe watched as the Major leant back in his seat to regard him speculatively. Hewlin merely smiled in response to his scrutiny, and raised his glass in salute. "Your very good health, Major Sharpe… Doctor Burnett."
As the meal progressed, Sharpe noticed that Helen's gaze drifted frequently toward Colonel Blake and his pretty satellites. Josefina in particular was responding to her admirers' relentless flattery with expansive gestures that drew attention to her white arms and dainty hands. The stones in her many rings flashed as she leant across the table to tap Captain Whiting playfully with her fan.
Helen glanced down at her lap. Sharpe assumed she was comparing her own work-roughened hands with Josefina's pale tapering fingers. He longed to offer some reassuring comment, but, as expected, it was Hewlin, far better schooled in the art of small talk, who distracted Helen from her self-critical study. "This is an enchanting piece, and characteristically Indian in design, am I right?"
Hewlin had reached out to touch the delicate silver comb that secured Helen's hair at the nape of her neck. Startled, Helen touched the comb herself, as if only now reminded of it. "It was a gift from my husband."
"Exquisite," Hewlin murmured. Sharpe bristled, convinced that the Major's remark was directed toward Helen herself rather than the ornament. "I recall there being dozens of silversmiths' workshops along the Ashoka Road. James must have been spoilt for choice." Hewlin mused. He turned his gaze on Sharpe. "I daresay you bought a few trinkets yourself, Major Sharpe, during your time in Mysore." He frowned. "Or perhaps not. You were but a humble sergeant back then."
Sharpe was about to inform him that as a 'humble sergeant' he had had precious stones belonging to the Tippoo Sultan sewn into the lining of his uniform, and could have bought up the silversmiths' entire stock had he so wished. But he bit back the retort and wondered instead how Major Hewlin knew so much about his past. He glanced at Helen and thought she seemed distressed by Hewlin's clumsy familiarity.
Sharpe turned at a sudden flurry of activity from the other end of the table. Estella and Josefina had risen and were insisting that the party continue without them. For his part, Colonel Blake was insisting on bidding them both an extremely fond farewell. Sharpe noted too that Captain Whiting's adieus to Estella were a shade more enthusiastic than was perhaps wise.
Taking her cue from the girls, Helen pushed back her chair and reached for the shawl that lay draped across its back. "Well, I shall leave you two gentlemen to your port and cigars." She smiled thinly at Hewlin, then more generously for Sharpe's benefit. Both men stood.
Sharpe half-expected Helen to offer her hand as Estella and Josefina had done, but she merely pulled her shawl more closely about her shoulders and tucked her hands out of sight.
"May I escort you to your quarters, ma'am?" Sharpe enquired and was irritated to hear Hewlin echoing his offer. Flustered, Helen looked between the two men, but then regained her composure and shook her head. "Thank you, no. I have some matters to attend to in the infirmary. I shall be quite all right, I assure you," she continued firmly, silencing Hewlin's protest.
Sharpe walked Helen to the door and held it open for her. "You are certain?" Helen smiled at his concern. "Yes, thank you." She looked past him to where Hewlin stood beside the table, watching. Touching a hand to Sharpe's shoulder, she raised her voice a fraction. "Should your injury require further attention, Major Sharpe, you know where to find me."
Sharpe nodded, smiling.
He remained by the door until Helen's dark clothing merged with the slate-blue shadows in the courtyard. Reluctantly, he took his seat at the table, watching as a decanter was passed around, and wondering how soon he could decently make his escape.
Sharpe paused at the top of a flight of stone steps. The corridor to his left ended after ten yards or so in a blank wall, while the way to his right stretched on for more than twice that length, before finally disappearing into darkness. Iron brackets high on the wall contained rush torches that burned brightly, streamers of yellow flame licking at the rough stonework.
He turned to the right and began to walk along the uneven flags, passing from light into dark, the scrape of his boot heels echoing loudly in the silence. Sharpe knew he must be on the topmost floor of the Castillo by now. But where was he to go from here? The corridor seemed to be without doors or windows.
He stopped, certain that he had lost his way. Peering ahead into the gloom he was finally able to make out the dim outline of a spiral staircase which wound upward to yet another floor. As Sharpe moved closer he saw that the lower steps were bathed pale gold. Placing one foot on the bottom step, he leaned in and looked up around the curving stair. A faint glow showed from somewhere above.
Sharpe hesitated, but the light remained steady, neither retreating nor advancing. He began to climb, taking the shallow treads three at a time, and discovered its source; a stub of candle in a brass holder, tucked against the outer edge of the stair. In three strides he found a second candle, then a third.
A sixth and last candle marked the top of the staircase and the beginning of a narrow hallway. Sharpe bent and picked up the candle. The tiny flame was barely enough to lift the darkness, but a sliver of moonlight striking across the floor guided him toward a door that stood ajar at the end of the passage.
The door was made of some dark wood, heavy with elaborate ironmongery. Sharpe pushed it gently and it swung open silently on well-oiled hinges. He remained standing in the hallway, looking into the room beyond. Through a large window, deep-set in a stone embrasure, pale light from a full moon spilled across the faded reds and golds of a Turkey carpet.
The room seemed empty and silent at first, but just as Sharpe was about to step inside, he heard the faint rustle of silk, and saw Helen, heading purposefully toward the window. With head bent and hands clasped beneath her chin, she was pacing back and forth, unaware of his presence.
Sharpe watched as Helen turned abruptly on reaching the window and strode back toward the middle of the room again, her gaze still fixed on the floor. He knew he should speak, cross the threshold, but something held him back.
Helen had arrived at the window again and was standing silhouetted against the night sky. She leant forward, hands outstretched and pressed her palms hard against the glass. Sharpe found he was holding his breath. For a moment, both watcher and watched were still, frozen in time. Sharpe exhaled slowly, quietly, but it was enough to break the spell.
Startled, Helen spun around to face him. Sharpe left the candle on a chair by the door and crossed the room swiftly to take both of her hands in his before she could draw breath. He pressed his lips to the palm of her right hand, finding it chilled from contact with the glass.
"Don't! Please!" Sharpe looked up in surprise as Helen snatched the hand back. Though he had barely brushed the skin, he noticed that she was nursing her clenched fist as if branded by his touch.
"My hands are dirty." Helen said weakly, her fluttering gesture toward the windowsill implying the grime of centuries rather than its actual light film of dust.
Sharpe realized that he had mistaken Helen's brusqueness for impatience, a spark from the firebrand that was Doctor Burnett, but the woman who stood before him now was just Helen; nervous and uncertain. Whatever confidence she possessed when lighting the way to this turret room had deserted her.
Helen swallowed hard and glanced aside as if seeking escape. Sharpe took a step backward as she suddenly gathered up her skirts and rushed across the room toward an ornately carved cabinet that served as a washstand.
For all his faults, Colonel Blake believed strongly that ladies, even those who pursued unsuitable professions, should be provided with 'all the comforts of home' and had consequently ordered the room filled with numerous cumbersome items of furniture, come upon in some forgotten corner of the Castillo.
A large rectangular mirror framed in gold hung on the wall behind the washstand; candles burned in sconces on either side. Sharpe saw Helen glance at his reflection in the glass as she struggled to lift a heavy jug, spilling as much water over the polished surface of the cabinet as into the basin.
Helen snatched up a sliver of soap and began to scrub furiously at her hands, staring into the candle flame and biting her lip. Sharpe remained by the window for a moment longer and then crossed the room silently. Helen tensed, holding herself stiffly as he reached around and closed his hands over hers.
Sharpe felt Helen breathe out hesitantly as he slid his fingers between hers, and began to knead her palm, his thumb describing lazy circles in the thin lather. He glanced up and smiled at Helen's reflection, noticing as he did so that she was following the movement in the mirror with some detachment as if the reflected image of their entwined hands were a thing apart.
"You're laughing at me," Helen whispered, half-turning toward him.
Sharpe shook his head. "No, I'm not."
Helen gasped as bent to trace the curve of her cheek with his lips, and then curl his tongue around her earlobe.
"Richard…"
"Shh…"
Sharpe tugged at the lace collar of her dress with wet fingers and pressed his lips to her neck and shoulder. Helen turned in his embrace. In an instant, Sharpe's mouth fastened on hers, his kiss long and deep.
Helen finally pulled away, flushed and breathless. Sharpe looked down, half-smiling to see her hands bunched into fists, braced against his chest. He waited, his own hands tight around her waist.
They both watched as Helen's fingers uncurled slowly, as if willed by another, to move upward and brush the collar of his shirt. Sharpe felt her place a hesitant finger in the hollow at the base of his throat, her touch so light as to seem merely a warmth. Helen concentrated her attention wholly on tracing the ridge of his collarbone, a small smile curving her lip, as if the rapid pulse under her fingertip was her own private discovery. Sharpe remained still, spellbound by this halting, wordless exploration.
Helen glanced up suddenly and held Sharpe's gaze for a long moment and then wound her arms around his neck, reaching up to kiss him with an intensity that surprised them both. Sharpe tightened his embrace and gently bent her body back as their tongues wove together.
Helen clung to him fiercely, crying out when he broke the kiss to press his lips to her breast, his hands moving down around her body to half-lift her against the cabinet.
Sharpe felt as if he were watching himself from a distance, seeing Helen pushing his jacket from his shoulders; he, struggling to unfasten the rows of tiny buttons on her dress. Surely he didn't mean to… here, now? He raised his head and looked into Helen's eyes, seeing his wild imagining reflected there.
Slowly Sharpe released her, letting slip the fabric of her skirt that he had bunched in his fists. He stepped away, breathing hard, an apology on the tip of his tongue. He shook his head to clear it, his hands dropping to his sides.
Helen watched as he reached behind her to take down one of the candles. Gentle again now, his mouth grazing her cheek, Sharpe looked around the room. Helen nodded toward a curtained doorway.
Sharpe opened his eyes, vaguely aware of having been woken by… something. He came to slowly to find himself lying on his stomach, on a bed in an unfamiliar room.
He felt a warm hand glide along his shoulder and then move down to trace the lattice of scars across his spine, the fingers spreading, lingering, pressing gently, as if to commit the ragged contours to memory. Sharpe smiled, recalling the candles on the staircase, the turret room – and Helen. He relaxed under the soothing touch, only a slight movement, but the hand withdrew instantly.
"I'm sorry. I thought you were asleep," Helen whispered.
Sharpe heard her swallow painfully. The hand returned to the small of his back. "When was this?" she asked. Despite the catch in her voice, Sharpe detected an echo of the Doctor Burnett who had tended him when he was brought to the infirmary after the fight in Benavento; her calm assessment of his injuries an anchor within the haze of his delirium.
"A long time ago," he replied, gazing unseeing into the shadows, an image forming in his mind's eye of the village square in India where his punishment had been meted out; his flogging the result of a trap set by Sergeant Hakeswill. There was no need to tell Helen how it had felt to reach that plateau of burning pain, and endure it, as blood dripped onto the dusty ground under the relentless lash which laid his flesh open to the bone.
Sharpe turned onto his back. The moon had set hours ago, the dark contours of the furniture looming as deeper shadows in the darkness. Helen leant over him, a moving shadow in the grey light from a window set high in the wall. Fingertips brushed his shoulder. "I'm afraid you will have a scar here."
"Company for the others," Sharpe replied with a shrug. "Your stitches were very neat," he added in case she thought him ungrateful.
"Aunt Elizabeth made sure I practiced my needlework every day," Helen said. "Though I can't imagine what she'd say if she saw the use I put it to now."
Sharpe smiled as Helen settled herself on the pillow beside his head. She brushed a damp strand of hair from his forehead and then bent to kiss him lightly. "I could keep you here, you know. Tell everyone that you'd been spirited away by Dona Elena."
"You shouldn't listen to O'Dwyer's tales," Sharpe said with mock severity. "The man's a rogue."
"It takes one to know one," Helen said laughing. She began to trace a meandering path across his chest and stomach with a fingertip.
"Doctor Burnett! I'm not fully recovered," Sharpe murmured, capturing her hand.
Helen trailed the tip of her tongue across his skin in the wake of her finger. "Oh yes you are."
The breath caught in his throat. "I meant from my injury."
"So did I." Her shadow dipped again and Sharpe relaxed his grip.
Helen's hand drifted lower.
Sharpe woke for a second time to find the room filled with the pale light of dawn. He frowned as a woodland scene in muted blues and greens swam before his eyes before finally resolving itself into a faded tapestry featuring a hunting party; an elegantly dressed gathering on horseback, falcons perched on gloved hands, moving among long-legged hounds, the whole bordered by swags of leaves and berries.
He turned his head and found that Helen's side of the bed was empty, the sheets cool. He sat up and looked around for his uniform. Last night, he recalled with a smile, an impatient Helen, had flung his jacket aside as they stumbled toward the bed, but now the familiar dark green garment was draped across the back of a chair at its foot; his shirt and trousers neatly folded on the seat. A gauze curtain lifted in the slight breeze from an open doorway. Sharpe rolled over and slid out of bed.
Dressed in a light cotton wrap, Helen was standing at the far end of a narrow walkway. Sharpe pulled his shirt over his head, and then leant against the doorframe, watching as she stretched cat-like and caught up her hair in both hands, winding the strands lazily around her fingers.
Sharpe crept up behind her and slid his hands around her waist. Helen smiled as he bent to kiss her. "I thought I'd let you sleep," she said. "I imagine you've seen the sunrise more times than you care to remember."
Her guess was correct. Reveille had often sounded at one o'clock during the summer campaigns in Spain, which made for a very short night's sleep. Helen gestured toward the horizon. "'Red sky in the morning, shepherd's warning.' Isn't that what they say?"
Sharpe followed her gaze to see, not the rosy-fingered dawn of Jackson's memory, but the dull fire of blood orange lying across the eastern sky. Helen shivered, pressing closer. "Summer is over."
Sharpe lifted his head. "You think so?" True, the breeze was cool, but it was still early morning. The temperature was bound to rise later in the day. He looked out at the surrounding countryside, the rolling hills, carpeted with dense forest, in which any number of enemy soldiers might hide.
There would be drills, of course and target practice. The men had to be kept in a state of readiness, but this long period of waiting and watching frayed the nerves of even veteran fighters. Worse still, he was no nearer to discovering the identity of the spy in their ranks. He dropped his gaze to the courtyard far below. Reveille sounded, the thin notes from a bugle swallowed up by the blanketing stonework. Men stirred and stretched, yawning as they stumbled toward cooking fires.
"Richard?"
Sharpe tore his attention from the gradually awakening camp. Helen had turned in his embrace. He kissed her absently. "Sorry. What were you saying?"
Helen sighed. "I said I'd be needing more fuel for the fires in the infirmary. That room can become quite icy for no apparent reason. It's a wonder you and Major Hewlin didn't die from cold."
"Hewlin was there?" Sharpe said, suddenly alert.
"Yes. He insisted that you shouldn't be separated. He was as keen to keep an eye on you as your Sergeant Harper. I was forever tripping over one or the other of them." Helen replied, smiling at the memory.
Sharpe's gaze drifted back toward the courtyard. "I must go. We'll be leaving in an hour."
Helen nodded. Although he still held her tightly, he was clearly eager to be down there with his men. She could picture him, moving among the men of the 95th, sharing a joke, and accepting a mug of strong black tea from his Sergeant. There would be advice and reassurance for the newer recruits, and grim discussion with the older men who had seen it all before.
Sharpe stared out at the distant mountains. "The French are out there somewhere, and we have to find them." He stepped away from Helen and turned toward the doorway.
"Why?"
Sharpe looked back. "Because the French are the enemy."
He drew the curtain aside.
"War is the enemy," Helen said behind him.
Sharpe paused on the threshold, and then ducked inside. The fabric slid through his fingers and fell back into place.