EPILOGUE

Sharpe was in the room where it had all started last year. Last year. That seemed strange, but 1813 was already ten days old, Teresa's death two weeks in the past, the spring would come and with it would come a new campaign.

The fire burned in the same hearth by which Sharpe had learned with such joy of his promotion. There was no joy now.

Wellington looked at Hogan as if for help, but the Major shrugged. The General put levity into his voice. 'I'll have to keep those damned rockets, Sharpe. You saw to that.'

Sharpe looked up from the fire. 'Yes, my Lord.' He supposed he had seen to that. After their success at Adrados they could hardly be sent back to England. 'I'm sorry, my Lord.'

'We'll fit them in somewhere.' Wellington paused. 'As we'll fit you in somewhere, Major.' He gave one of his rare smiles. 'You took a lot on yourself, Sharpe. A whole Battalion under your command!'

Sharpe nodded. 'Sir Augustus complained I took too much on myself, my Lord.'

Wellington grunted. 'Good thing you did. What was the matter with the man? Lily-livered?' His voice was suddenly harsh.

Sharpe shrugged, then decided the truth was better than politeness. 'Yes, sir.'

'How did it feel to fight a Battalion? Good?'

'At times, sir.'

'Like being a General, eh? Perhaps you'll find that out, Sharpe.'

'I doubt it, sir.'

Wellington's piercing blue eyes watched him. The General stood in muddied boots in front of the fire, the skirts of his riding coat lifted by clasped hands. 'The glory gets tarnished, yes?'

'Yes, sir.'

'Some people never learn that. They think I enjoy this, but its a job, Sharpe, that's all, a job. Like being a street-sweeper or a slaughterman. Someone has to do it or the filth will overwhelm us.' He seemed embarrassed to have said so much.

'Yes, my Lord.'

Wellington waved a hand towards the door. 'I'll send for you, Major Sharpe. We must find you employment. A Major who fights my battles must be given employment!'

Sharpe moved to the door, Hogan with him, shepherding him protectively, but the General stopped them. 'Sharpe?'

'My Lord?'

This time Wellington really did seem embarrassed. He glanced at the armchair, then back to Sharpe. 'Would it seem amiss, Sharpe, if I say that all things pass?'

'No, my Lord. Thank you.'

Major Michael Hogan, as old a friend as almost any in the army, walked with Sharpe through Frenada's streets. 'You're sure of this, Richard?'Yes, I'm sure.'

They walked in silence for a minute and Hogan hated the heaviness in his friend, the seemingly inconsolable and private grief that festered inside. `I'll meet you afterwards.'

'Afterwards?'

'Afterwards.' Hogan spoke decisively. This evening he planned to make Sharpe drunk. He planned to force the grief out into the open and he would do it as the Irish knew how to do it, with a wake. It was overdue, but he and Harper had agreed to it, had forced agreement on Sharpe, and the Rifle Captain, Frederickson, would come too. Hogan had liked Frederickson instantly, had been amused at the man's complaint that no one would fight him, and had been pleased to see Frederickson's modest disclaimer when he had read the words of Sharpe's report. A wake, a decent, drunken, laughing wake, Hogan had ordered Harry Price to attend and he would force Sharpe to drink, to talk, to remember Teresa, and in the morning the grief would already be turning into healthy regret. 'Afterwards, Richard.' Hogan stepped across a deep rut in a cross-roads. 'You heard that Sir Augustus has requested home leave?'

'I heard.'

'And `Lady Farthingdale' is back in Lisbon?'

'Yes. I heard.'Josefina had written Sharpe a bitter letter, a letter that complained he had broken his word by revealing his knowledge to Sir Augustus, a letter that reeked of her lost future fortune. It had ended by saying a friendship was over and Sharpe had torn the letter into shreds and put the shreds on the fire, and then remembered how Teresa had seen him flirting with Josefina and he had cried because of the hurt he might have given to his wife. His wife.

She was buried in Casatejada, in the stone crypt in the tiny chapel where her family was buried. Antonia would grow up speaking Spanish, knowing neither mother nor father, and Sharpe would ride to see her soon, to look at his daughter who would grow up not knowing him.

Sometimes he woke in the night and he was happy for a moment until he remembered Teresa was dead. Then the happiness went.

Sometimes he saw long black hair on a slim woman in the street and his heart leaped inside, joy welled up uncontrollable, and then the shroud of knowledge would sink again. She was dead.

The South Essex had marched north to Frenada and they were drawn up in a hollow square, one side left open, and in the open side was a hornbeam tree. Not a sapling like the one the Germans had decorated for Christmas, but a full grown tree and in front of the tree was an open grave and beside the grave was an empty box.

When the corpse was put in the box they would make the whole Battalion march past and the order would be given. 'Eyes left!' Every man must look on the punishment for desertion.

The provosts brought him, and the firing squad watched as he was tied to the hornbeam, but Sharpe did not watch. It was late afternoon and he stared at the snow which was on the hilltops around Frenada and he waited until a provost officer reported to him. 'We're ready, sir.'

It was a cloudless sky, a winter's day of sharp clarity, a day when a deserter would die.

He did not want to die. He had cheated death before and he pulled at the bonds, his head twitching, and the spittle frothed at his lips as he swore and jerked, snatched at the ropes and threw himself from side to side so that the fourteen muskets of the firing party went from side to side.

'Fire!'

Fourteen muskets slammed into fourteen shoulders and Hakeswill was twitched against the trunk, blood spattering the shirt he wore, yet still he lived. He slumped down, a cough rasping in his throat, and then he was cackling in triumph, the madness on him because he knew he had cheated death again, and he jerked, twisted, and the blood spotted his trousers, the earth, and the blue eyes in the yellow face came up to watch the Rifle officer walk slowly towards him. 'You can't kill me! You can't kill me! You can't kill me!'

It was supposed to be done with a pistol, but Sharpe pulled back the flint of his Rifle and he knew that the curse would be gone when the flint snapped forward. Hakeswill was hanging in the ropes, the face turned up, the voice screaming and spitting blood and spittle.

The Rifle barrel came slowly up.

'You can't kill me!' And this time the voice collapsed into sobs, sobs that were child-like because Obadiah knew that he was lying. 'You can't kill me.'

The bullet killed him. It twitched his head for the very last time, killing him instantly, killing the man who could not be killed. Sharpe had dreamed of this moment for nigh on twenty years, but there was none of the pleasure he had expected.

Behind him, unseen, the evening star was showing pale against a winter sky. A small wind stirred the hornbeam twigs.

Two bodies marked this winter. The one whose hair had been spread on the snows of the Gateway of God, and now this one. Obadiah Hakeswill, being lifted into his coffin, dead. Sharpe's enemy.