Sharpe's Havoc by Bernard Cornwell Page B

how they were to escape them. “What we must do,” the Portuguese Lieutenant said,

“is go east. To Amarante.” He smoothed a patch of bare earth and scratched a crude map with a

splinter of wood. “This is the Douro,” he said, “and here is Porto. We are here”-he tapped the

river very close to the city-”and the nearest bridge is at Amarante.” He made a cross mark

well to the east. “We could be there tomorrow or perhaps the day after.”
    “So can they,” Sharpe said grimly, and he nodded toward the village.
    A gun had just appeared from among the trees where the French had waited so long before

attacking Sharpe’s men. The cannon was drawn by six horses, three of which were ridden by

gunners in their dark-blue uniforms. The gun itself, a twelve-pounder, was attached to its

limber which was a light two-wheeled cart that served as a ready magazine and as an axle for

the heavy gun’s trail. Behind the gun was another team of four horses, these pulling a

coffin-like caisson that carried a spare gun wheel on its stern. The caisson, which was

being ridden by a half-dozen gunners, held the cannon’s ammunition. Even from half a mile

away Sharpe could hear the clink of the chains and thump of the wheels. He watched in silence as

a howitzer came into sight, than a second twelve-pounder, and after that a troop of

hussars.
    “Do you think they’re coming here?” Vicente asked with alarm.
    “No,” Sharpe said. “They’re not interested in fugitives. They’re going to Amarante.”
    “This is not the good road to Amarante. In fact it goes nowhere. They’ll have to strike north

to the main road.”
    “They don’t know that yet,” Sharpe guessed, “they’re taking any road east that they can

find.” Infantry had now appeared from the trees, then another battery of artillery. Sharpe

was watching a small army march eastward and there was only one reason to send so many men

and guns to the east and that was to capture the bridge at Amarante and so protect the French

left flank. “Amarante,” Sharpe said, “that’s where the bastards are going.”
    “Then we can’t,” Vicente said.
    “We can go,” Sharpe said, “we just can’t go on that road. You say there’s a main road?”
    “Up here,” Vicente said, and scratched the earth to show another road to the north of them.

“That is the high road,” Vicente said. “The French are probably on that as well. Do you

really have to go to Amarante?”
    “I’ve got to cross the river,” Sharpe said, “and there’s a bridge there, and there’s a

Portuguese army there, and just because the bloody Frogs are going there doesn’t mean that

they’ll capture the bridge.” And if they did, he thought, then he could go north from Amarante

until he found a crossing place, then follow the Tamega’s far bank south until he reached a

stretch of the Douro unguarded by the French. “So how do we reach Amarante if we don’t go by

road? Can we go across country?”
    Vicente nodded. “We go north to a village here”-he pointed to an empty space on his

map-”and then turn east. The village is on the edge of the hills, the beginning of the-what do

you call it? The wilderness. We used to go there.”
    “We?” Sharpe asked. “The poets and philosophers?”
    “We would walk there,” Vicente said, “spend the night in the tavern and walk back. I doubt

there will be Frenchmen there. It is not on the road to Amarante. Not on any road.”
    “So we go to the village at the edge of the wilderness,” Sharpe said. “What’s it

called?”
    “Vila Real de Zedes,” Vicente said. “It is called that because the vineyards there once

belonged to the King, but that was long ago. Now they are the property of-”
    “Vila Real de what?” Sharpe asked.
    “Zedes,” Vicente said, puzzled by Sharpe’s tone and even more puzzled by the smile on

Sharpe’s face. “You know the place?”
    “I don’t know