Sharpe, like Lord Pumphrey, looked up to see the ambassador leaning out of a window of the embassy’s watchtower, a modest five-story structure at the edge of the stable yard. “Up here,” Henry Wellesley called again, “and you, Mister Sharpe! Come on!” He sounded excited.
Sharpe emerged onto the roofed platform to see that Brigadier Moon was lord of the tower. He had a chair and a footstool, and beside the chair was a telescope, while on a small table was a bottle of rum and beneath it a chamber pot. This tower had been equipped with windows to protect the upper platform from the weather, and it was plain that Moon had adopted the aerie. He had got to his feet now and, resting on his crutches, was looking eastward with the ambassador. “The ships!” Henry Wellesley greeted Sharpe and Lord Pumphrey.
A whole host of small ships was scurrying through white-capped waves into the vast harbor of the Bay of Cádiz. They were odd-looking craft to Sharpe’s eyes. They were single-masted and had one gigantic sail each. The sails were wedge-shaped, sharp at the front and massive at the stern. “Feluccas,” the ambassador said, “not a word to attempt when drunk.”
“Felucky to get here before the storm broke,” the brigadier commented, earning a smile from Henry Wellesley.
The French mortars were trying to sink the feluccas but having no success. The sound of the guns was muted by the rain and wind. Sharpe could see the blossom of smoke from inside Fort Matagorda and Fort San José each time a mortar fired, but he could not see where the shells plummeted for the water was already too turbulent. The feluccas thrashed onward, heading for the southern end of the bay where the rest of the shipping was safely out of mortar range. They were pursued by dark squalls and seething rain as the storm spread southward. A lightning bolt cracked far away on the northern coast. “So the Spaniards kept their word!” Henry Wellesley said exultantly. “Those ships have come here all the way from the Balearics! A couple of days to provision them, then the army can embark.” He was a man who looked as though his troubles were coming to an end. If the combined British and Spanish army could destroy the French siege works and drive Victor’s forces away from Cádiz, then his political enemies would be neutered. The Cortes and the Spanish capital might even move back to a recaptured Seville and there would be the rare taste of victory in the air. “The plan,” Henry Wellesley said to Sharpe, “is for Lapeña and Sir Thomas to rendezvous with troops from Gibraltar, then march north, take Victor in the rear, hammer him, and drive his troops out of Andalusia.”
“It’s supposed to be a secret,” the brigadier grumbled.
“Some secret,” Lord Pumphrey said sourly. “A priest just told me all about it.”
The ambassador looked alarmed. “A priest?”
“Who seemed quite certain that Marshal Victor is entirely apprised of our plans to assault his lines.”
“Of course he’s bloody apprised of them,” the brigadier said. “Victor might have started his career as a trumpeter, but the man can count ships, can’t he? Why else is the fleet gathering?” He turned back to watch the feluccas that were now out of range of the mortars that had fallen silent.
“I think, Your Excellency, that we should confer,” Lord Pumphrey said. “I have a proposal for you.”
The ambassador glanced at the brigadier who was studiously watching the ships. “A useful proposal?”
“Most encouraging, Your Excellency.”
“Of course,” Henry Wellesley said and headed for the stairs.
“Come, Sharpe,” Lord Pumphrey said imperiously, but as Sharpe followed His Lordship the brigadier snapped his fingers.
“Stay here, Sharpe,” Moon ordered.
“I’ll follow you,” Sharpe told Pumphrey. “Sir?” he asked the brigadier when Wellesley and Pumphrey were gone.
“What the devil are you doing here?”
“I’m helping the ambassador, sir.”
“Helping the ambassador, sir,” Moon mimicked Sharpe. “Is that why you stayed? You were supposed to ship back to Lisbon.”
“Weren’t you supposed to as well, sir?” Sharpe asked.
“Broken bones heal better on land,” the brigadier said. “That’s what the doctor told me. Stands to reason when you think about it. All that lurching about on ship? Doesn’t help a bone knit, does it?” He grunted as he lowered himself into his chair. “I like it up here. You see things.” He tapped the telescope.
“Women, sir?” Sharpe asked. He could think of no other reason why a man with a broken leg would struggle to the top of a watchtower, and the tower did give Moon views of dozens of windows.
“Mind your tongue, Sharpe,” Moon said, “and tell me why you’re still here.”
“Because the ambassador asked me to stay, sir, to help him.”
“Did you learn your impudence in the ranks, Sharpe? Or were you born with it?”
“Being a sergeant helped, sir.”
“Being a sergeant?”
“You have to deal with officers, sir. Day in, day out.”
“And you have no high opinion of officers?”
Sharpe did not answer. Instead he gazed at the feluccas that were rounding into the wind and dropping anchors. The bay was a turmoil of whitecaps and small angry waves. “If you’ll excuse me, sir?”
“Is it anything to do with that woman?” Moon demanded.
“What woman, sir?” Sharpe turned back from the stairs.
“I can read a newspaper, Sharpe,” Moon said. “What are you and that bloody little molly cooking up?”
“Molly, sir?”
“Pumphrey, you idiot. Or hadn’t you noticed?” The question was a sneer.
“I’d noticed, sir.”
“Because if you’re too fond of him,” the brigadier said nastily,
“you’ve got a rival.” Moon was delighted by the indignation on Sharpe’s face. “I keep my eyes open, Sharpe. I’m a soldier. Best to keep your eyes open. You know who visits the molly’s house?” he gestured through the window. The embassy was composed of a series of houses, gathered around two courtyards and a garden, and the brigadier pointed to a house in the smaller yard. “The ambassador, Sharpe, that’s who! Sneaks into the molly’s house. What do you think of that, then?”
“I think Lord Pumphrey is an adviser to the ambassador, sir.”
“Advice that must be given at night?”
“I wouldn’t know, sir,” Sharpe said, “and if you’ll excuse me?”
“Excused,” Moon sneered, and Sharpe clattered down the tower stairs, going to the ambassador’s study where he found Henry Wellesley staring into the garden where the rain crashed down. Lord Pumphrey was by the fire, warming his behind. “Captain Sharpe is of the opinion that Father Montseny was lying,” Pumphrey told Wellesley as Sharpe entered.
“Are you, Sharpe?” Wellesley asked without turning.
“Don’t trust him, sir.”
“A man of the cloth?”
“We don’t even know he’s a real priest,” Sharpe said, “and I saw him at the newspaper.”
“Whatever he is,” Lord Pumphrey said tartly, “we have to deal with him.”
“Eighteen hundred guineas,” the ambassador said, sitting at his desk, “good God.” He was so appalled that he did not see the look Sharpe shot at Lord Pumphrey.
Pumphrey, his peculation inadvertently revealed by the ambassador, looked innocent. “I would suggest, Your Excellency, that the Spaniards saw the ships arriving before we did. They conclude that our expedition will sail in the next day or two. That means battle within a fortnight and they are entirely confident of victory. And if the forces defending Cádiz are destroyed, then the letters become irrelevant. They would like to profit from them before that happens and thus the acceptance of my offer.”
“Eighteen hundred guineas, though,” Henry Wellesley said.
“Not your guineas,” Pumphrey said.
“Good God, Pumps, the letters are mine!”
“Our opponents, Your Excellency, by publishing one letter, have made the correspondence into
instruments of diplomacy. We are therefore justified in using His Majesty’s funds to render them ineffectual.” Lord Pumphrey made a pretty gesture with his right hand. “I shall lose the money, sir, in the accounts. Not difficult.”
“Not difficult!” Henry Wellesley retorted.
“Subventions to the guerrilleros,” Lord Pumphrey said smoothly, “purchase of information from agents, bribes to the deputies of the Cortes. We expend hundreds, thousands of guineas on such recipients and the Treasury has never glimpsed a receipt yet. It’s not difficult at all, Your Excellency.”
“Montseny will take the money,” Sharpe said stubbornly, “and keep the letters.”
Both men ignored him. “He insists you make the exchange personally?” the ambassador asked Lord Pumphrey.
“I suspect it is his way of assuring me that violence is not contemplated,” Lord Pumphrey said. “No one would dare murder one of His Majesty’s diplomats. It would cause too much of a ruction.”
“They killed Plummer,” Sharpe said.
“Plummer was not a diplomat,” Lord Pumphrey said sharply.
The ambassador looked at Sharpe. “Can you steal the letters, Sharpe?”
“No, sir. I can probably destroy them, sir, but they’re too well guarded to steal.”
“Destroy them,” the ambassador said. “I assume that means violence?”
“Yes, sir.”
“I do not, I cannot, countenance acts that might aggravate our relationship with the Spanish,” Henry Wellesley said. He rubbed his face with both hands. “Will they keep their word, Pumps? No more letters published?”
“I imagine the admiral is content with the damage done by the first, my lord, and is eager for gold. I think he will keep his word.” Pumphrey frowned as Sharpe made a noise of disgust.
“Then so be it,” Henry Wellesley said. “Buy them back, buy them back, and I apologize for causing this trouble.”
“The trouble, Your Excellency,” Lord Pumphrey said, “will soon be done.” He looked down at the ambassador’s chess game. “We have come, I think,” he said, “to the end of the matter. Captain Sharpe? I assume you will accompany me?”
“I’ll be there,” Sharpe said grimly.
“Then let us gather gold,” Lord Pumphrey said lightly, “and be done with it.”
THE NOTE came well after dark. Sharpe was waiting with his men in an empty stall of the embassy stables. His five men were all in cheap civilian clothes and looked subtly different. Hagman, who was thin anyway, looked like a beggar. Perkins resembled an unappealing street rat, one of the London boys who swept horse shit out of the way of pedestrians in hope of a coin. Slattery appeared menacing, a footpad who could turn violent at the slightest show of resistance. Harris looked like a man down on his luck, perhaps a drunken schoolmaster turned onto the streets, while Harper was like a countryman come to town, big and placid and out of place in his shabby broadcloth coat. “Sergeant Harper comes with me,” Sharpe told them, “and the rest of you wait here. Don’t get drunk! I might need you later tonight.” He suspected this night’s adventure would go sour. Lord Pumphrey might be optimistic about the outcome, but Sharpe wanted to be ready for the worst, and the riflemen were his reinforcements.
“If we’re not to get drunk, sir,” Harris asked, “why the brandy?”
Sharpe had brought four bottles of brandy from the ambassador’s own supply and now he uncorked the bottles and poured their contents into a stable bucket. Then he added a jug full of lamp oil. “Mix all that up,” he told Harris, “then put it back in the bottles.”
“You’re setting a fire, sir?”
“I don’t know what the hell we’re doing. Maybe we’re doing nothing. But stay sober, wait, and we’ll see what happens.”
Sharpe had thought about taking all his men, but the priest had been insistent that Pumphrey only bring two companions, and if His Lordship arrived with more, then probably nothing would happen. There was a chance, Sharpe allowed, that Montseny was dealing honestly, and so Sharpe would give the priest that small chance in hope that the letters would be handed over. He doubted it. He cleaned the two sea-service pistols he had taken from the embassy’s small arsenal, oiled their locks, then loaded them.
The clocks in the embassy struck eleven before Lord Pumphrey came to the stables. His Lordship was in a black cloak and carried a leather bag. “It’s the cathedral, Sharpe,” Lord Pumphrey said. “The crypt again. After midnight.”
“Bloody hell,” Sharpe said. He splashed water on his face and buckled his sword belt. “Are you armed?” he asked Pumphrey, and His Lordship opened his cloak to show a pair of dueling pistols stuck in his belt. “Good,” Sharpe said, “because the bastards are planning murder. Is it still raining?”
“No, sir,” Hagman answered. “Windy, though.”
“Pat, volley gun and rifle?”
“And a pistol, sir,” Harper said.
“And these,” Sharpe said. He crossed to the wall where the French haversack hung and took out four of the smoke balls. He was remembering the engineer lieutenant describing how the balls could be nasty in tight places. “Anyone got a tinderbox?”
Harris had one. He gave it to Harper. “Maybe we should all come, sir?” Slattery suggested.
“They’re expecting three of us,” Sharpe said, looking at Pumphrey who nodded in confirmation, “so if they see more than three they’ll probably vanish. They’re going to do that anyway once they’ve got what’s in that bag.” He nodded at the leather valise that Lord Pumphrey carried. “Is that heavy?”
Pumphrey shook his head. “Thirty pounds,” he guessed, hefting the bag.
“Heavy enough. Are we ready?”
The cobbled streets were wet, gleaming in the intermittent light of torches burning in archways or at street corners. The wind gusted cold, plucking at their cloaks. “You know what they’re going to do?” Sharpe said to Pumphrey. “They’ll have us hand over the gold, then they’ll make themselves scarce. Probably fire a couple of shots to keep our heads down. You’ll get no letters.”
“You are extremely cynical,” Pumphrey said. “The letters are of ever-lessening use to them. If they print more, then the Regency will close them down.”
“They will print more,” Sharpe said.
“They would rather have this,” Lord Pumphrey said, raising the bag.
“What they’d rather have,” Sharpe said, “is the letters and the gold. They probably don’t want to kill you, considering that you’re a diplomat, but you’re worth fifteen hundred guineas to them. So they’ll kill if they have to.”
Pumphrey led them west toward the sea. The wind was brisker and the night filled with the booming, slapping sound of the canvas covering the unfinished parts of the cathedral’s roof. Sharpe could see the cathedral now, its vast gray wall flickering with patches of light thrown by torches in the nearby streets. “We’re early,” Lord Pumphrey said, sounding nervous.
“They’ll already be here,” Sharpe said.
“Maybe not.”
“They’ll be here. Waiting for us. And don’t you owe me something?”
“Owe you?” Pumphrey asked.
“A thank you,” Sharpe said. “How much is in the bag, my lord?” he asked when he saw Lord Pumphrey’s puzzlement. “Eighteen hundred or fifteen?”
Lord Pumphrey glanced at Harper, as if to suggest Sharpe should not talk about such matters in front of a sergeant. “Fifteen, of course,” Pumphrey said, his voice low, “and thank you for saying nothing in front of His Excellency.”
“Doesn’t mean I won’t tell him tomorrow,” Sharpe said.
“My work requires expenses, Sharpe, expenses. You probably have expenses too?”
“Don’t count me in, my lord.”
“I merely do,” Lord Pumphrey said with fragile dignity, “what everyone else does.”
“So in your world everyone lies, and everyone’s corrupt?”
“It is called the diplomatic service.”
“Then thank God I’m
just a thief and a murderer.”
The wind buffeted them as they left the last small street and climbed the steps to the cathedral’s doors. Pumphrey went to the left-hand one that squealed on its hinges as he pushed it open. Harper, following Sharpe inside, made the sign of the cross and gave a brief genuflection.
Pillars stretched toward the crossing where small lights glimmered. More candles burned in the side chapels, all of the flames flickering in the wind that found its way into the vast space. Sharpe led the way down the nave, rifle in hand. He could see no one. A broom lay discarded against one pillar.
“If trouble starts,” Sharpe said, “lie flat.”
“Not just run away?” Lord Pumphrey asked flippantly.
“They’re behind us already,” Sharpe said. He had heard footsteps and now, glancing back, saw two men in the shadows of the nave’s end. Then he heard the scratch and bang of bolts being shot home. They were locked in now.
“Dear God,” Lord Pumphrey said.
“Pray he’s on our side, my lord. There are two men behind us, Pat, guarding the door.”
“I’ve seen them, sir.”
They reached the crossing where the transept met the nave. More candles burned on the temporary high altar. Scaffolding climbed the four huge pillars, vanishing in the lofty darkness of the unfinished dome. Pumphrey had gone to the crypt steps, but Sharpe checked him. “Wait, my lord,” he said, and he went to the door in the temporary wall built where the sanctuary would one day stand. The door was locked. There were no bolts on the inner side, no padlock and no keyhole, which meant it was secured on the outer side and Sharpe cursed. He had made a mistake. He had assumed the door would be bolted from the inside, but when he had explored the cathedral with Lord Pumphrey he had not checked, which meant his retreat was cut off. “What is it?” Lord Pumphrey asked.
“We need another way out,” Sharpe said. He stared up into the tangled shadows of the scaffolding that surrounded the crossing. He remembered seeing windows up there. “When we come out,” he said, “it’s up the ladders.”