Absolute Honour (37 page)

Dead Man’s Horse, he thought, as the town gates drew nearer. Dead Man’s Sword. Dead Man’s Damn Pinching Boots.

He could make out the gate now. And the bloody thing
was
open. Whether that was good or bad he was yet to discover.

At fifty yards, no more, he heard a shout, saw a man jerking up from where he’d been slumped against one of the open gate
doors. As Jack watched, he turned, hands scrabbling at the wood. At twenty yards Jack swung his sword down, leaned forward,
his weight behind the weapon.
The 16th, unlike most Dragoons, favoured the straight blade, thrust home with the weight of the charge.

The man must have felt it approaching. With a shriek he gave up his futile shoving and threw himself to the ground. Jack’s
point passed over him. He was through the gate. He reined in, his horse coming to an immediate halt under the gate tower.
To his left the guard cowered in the dust. To his right was a door. Two men came out of it. One had a musket.

‘Yee-ah!’ cried Jack, spurring his mount forward, pulling back almost instantly on the reins. Lucky came up on his rear legs,
front hooves striking out, forcing both men back. When the hooves came down, Jack lunged, the sword point striking the gun
near its lock, knocking it from the soldier’s arms. Its charge exploded, the noise thunderous in the stillness.

It had taken seconds. With the shrieking man falling backwards, Jack was suddenly aware of another noise, a rumble from the
ground. Jerking the reins yet again, he forced Lucky to the side, just before the third troop charged in.

His orders had been clear and thoroughly explained to the men. So though three Spaniards had begun to run, screaming into
the town, no trooper gave chase. Instead they rallied in the open space behind the gates.

‘Dismount! Handle your carbines!’ Jack’s commands, reinforced by Puxley’s, had the whole troop off in moments, horses linked
and led to the side, the three ranks of the troop acting as divisions. The first two ran to the corner of the nearest house,
where the main street into the town began. The third rank rallied to Jack at the gate.

‘Stokey!’ Jack called, and the fellow ran over fast, enmity swallowed by exhilaration. Jack grabbed his shoulder, turned him
to the gate. ‘Out there, man. Sound the advance.’

As the bugle coughed out its staccato call, Jack led his own rank forward. There was one other entrance to the gate
square, a narrower road, and, as he advanced, Jack could see some Spaniards about a hundred yards away, moving cautiously
along it.

‘Poise your firelocks! Cock your firelocks! Present your firelocks! Hold now, men. Hold!’

The enemy had begun to advance quicker now, a good twenty of them, bearing muskets, officers driving them on with the flats
of their swords. Suddenly they halted, there was a shouted command and a ragged volley made some of his men duck.

‘Steady,’ he called, then, ‘Fire!’

It was a pretty good volley, for cavalrymen, in the near dark. The Spaniards certainly thought so, taking to their heels,
two white-clad bodies kicking on the cobbles behind them.

Jack turned to see the main wave of cavalry, Burgoyne at their head, begin to sweep through the gate.

The Colonel reined in beside him. ‘All to order, Absolute?’

‘Yes, sir. The men are holding the streets here. The Dagoes
were
asleep.’ He grinned. ‘But they’re awake now.’

Burgoyne smiled back. ‘Well, let’s see how they like our lullabies.’ He turned to Hugh Somerville at his side. ‘Major, sixth
troop to secure the gate. And send all spare horses back to Onslow, so he can bring the Grenadiers up smartly.’ He faced forward.
‘According to our hirsute Portuguese friend, the town square is dead ahead and where the main barracks lie. Coming, Absolute?’

Lucky was being held nearby. Swiftly unlinking, Jack mounted in a moment. ‘Gladly, sir.’

He was not quite so glad a few moments later when, on the street they cantered down, shutters were thrown back and ball began
to thrum around them. It seemed that, as in the British Army, men were billeted all over the town. Men who had their muskets
with them.

‘Fourth and fifth troop to dismount by divisions when
fired upon and engage the enemy,’ Burgoyne bellowed. ‘The rest with me.’

There were no niceties of drill, just a harum-scarum half-gallop down the narrow, curving streets, men spilling from horses
when guns were discharged at them, carbines aimed up at shutters, wooden gates in arched doorways battered in to root out
the sniping enemy. Jack pushed on with all the others, now ahead of Burgoyne, now behind him. Occasionally there would be
figures standing beyond a sweeping corner. Powder would flash, bullets pass near or ricochet off walls, and then Jack, like
all the others, would crouch behind his horse’s neck, sword thrust ahead, using the weight of speeding beast and the sharpness
of metal to scatter the enemy. More than once he felt his blade clash with metal, wood, or bone. But there was no time to
note wound or death, the impetus was forward, the nearness of the square indicated by an increasing resistance. And then they
were in it, the open space acting like air sucked in after too long spent under water. The three troops, one hundred and fifty
men, spread out fast, driving those who opposed them into doorways and back down the streets and alleys that radiated outwards.

Jack had become separated from Burgoyne, but Puxley was still to his left and Worsley, whom Jack had not seen since before
the charge, had suddenly appeared on his right. ‘Westward ho!’ yelled the Devonian, sweeping his sword over the Cornishman
and the Welshman, causing Jack to duck. He was about to curse the fool when he noticed something else. Before the biggest
house on the square – three storeys high, with huge oak doors, a red-tiled archway and elegant iron balconies – stood a man
wearing a nightgown, which was not that unusual, and a huge tricorn hat, which was. It was of a similar kind to their Major
Gonzalo’s but had twice the quantity of gold emblems and silver lace. Jack had no
doubt that he was looking at a colonel at the least, a guess confirmed by the man’s apoplectic yelling at all around him.

‘With me, lads,’ Jack cried, kicking Lucky into his stride. The three horses scattered the knot of men around the officer,
bumping some to the ground, the others fleeing to the house’s porch. The General – for that’s what Jack thought him now –
had somehow stood his ground, a younger officer guarding him with a heavy sabre. In a moment, Jack was off his horse; in another,
he’d attacked. The young man’s curved weapon was cumbersome in comparison to Jack’s straight English blade and was dislodged
at the third pass, the officer staggering back. He looked as if he would reach for it again but his commander said something
sharp, something Jack caught but did not understand. On these words, the young Spaniard turned and sprinted into the house.

The General had a sword, too, but he did not level it. Instead he reversed it, held it out to Jack, said something that, to
Jack’s ears, sounded vaguely Italian but he presumed was Spanish.

‘I am not the one to give your sword to, sir,’ Jack said slowly.

The man, his tight-cropped beard as grey as his hair, considered then said, ‘To whom, please?’ The English phrasing was slow
and precise.

‘Him,’ Jack replied. His own commander had suddenly appeared from the throng, leading a party that had subdued the last resistance
upon the porch. ‘Colonel,’ Jack yelled and, in a moment, Burgoyne was there.

‘Absolute. What have we here?’

‘Someone who has something for you, I believe.’

‘General Ignacio de Irunibeni.’ The man bowed stiffly. ‘And your captive, sir.’

The sword was offered again, and this time taken.
‘Lieutenant-Colonel John Burgoyne.’ He bowed, returned the sword. ‘I assume the obligation, General.’ He smiled. ‘Do you think
we could persuade your men to be so obliging?’

‘I can try. But I must warn you, sir, the regiment of Seville has never surrendered,’ the General replied, his accent full
of lisps.

‘Well, I wonder if we can persuade them to this day? For the town is ours, and further sacrifice needless.’

Jack looked beyond this vacuum of politeness to the mayhem beyond. The square had largely been taken but, judging by the explosions
and shouts in the neighbouring streets, Burgoyne’s declaration was premature. He was just about to call Puxley to help him
rally the rest of their troop, when he noticed the officer’s sabre, the one who’d dashed off, upon the ground. As he bent
slowly to it, he realized the General was staring at him, concern in his eyes, calculation, as if he were attempting to gauge
Jack’s mind and precede him to a conclusion. When their gazes held, the Spaniard stepped forward, spoke. ‘I wonder, sir, if
this gallant officer would be my escort.’

‘Absolute? I’m sure he would. Why?’

And suddenly Jack knew. The General was trying to remove him from the board. If war was chess, as Burgoyne had said earlier,
then the Spaniard was still playing a game.

‘Excuse me, sir, I think I know why. Puxley, Worsley, with me.’

The General actually tried to grab his sleeve as he passed but neither that, nor Burgoyne’s shouted question, halted him.
The porch of the house was cleared, men in scarlet coats had already begun to venture cautiously into the hall. But if Jack
was right, this was not time for caution. He took the stairs two at a time, ran onto the first floor landing. The house was
designed around a courtyard, four corridors thus in a square. Running left, Jack realized he had been fortunate
in his guess when he saw two men standing outside a door, both with muskets at port.

He could not hesitate. ‘Charge,’ he cried, as the startled soldiers fired and missed. ‘Take them,’ he yelled, and ran between
the two men – defending themselves with bayonet and gun stock against his companions’ sword thrusts – into the room.

It was as he suspected it would be. The young officer was crouched before the fireplace, desperately trying to fan a small
flame onto a piece of paper in his hand. The pistol however, hastily snatched up by the Spaniard, was more unexpected.

‘Hijo de puta!’
hissed the man, but the room was small and Jack was already running. He was across it just before the barrel levelled. Then
his hand was upon the gun, forcing it up as it flashed. He felt his palm and fingers burn, heard the smash of glass exploding.
He still had his sword in his hand but he was too close to use its point so he used the guard instead, driving it into the
man’s jaw. The Spaniard flew back, lay still upon the floor. Jack bent, snatched the paper from his hand, snuffed the flame
that had caught upon its side. Then, clutching it, he sank onto a chair.

‘What was that all about, sir?’

Jack looked to the young man in the doorway, Puxley behind him, sword resting on the shoulder of one of the Spanish guards.
Jack could see the soles of a pair of boots just poking round the doorframe. He shuddered. ‘Spanish, Worsley.’

‘Sir?’

‘There’s a distinct similarity to Italian.’

‘Is there indeed?’ Worsley gave the sort of humouring laugh one man gives to another who’s succumbed to battle madness.

Jack sighed. He was suddenly too tired to explain. But, as something of a linguist, he was rather pleased to realize that
the first Spanish phrase he had learned was because of time spent in a Roman prison. In Italy, the General would have ordered
his officer to
‘Distruggi il documento.’
In Valencia de Alcántara what he did say was:
‘Destruye el documento.’
But in England his command would have been: ‘Destroy the document.’

Jack threw down the pencil, closed his eyes. The dots, however, continued to crash around behind his lids like billiard balls
on baize. The more he looked the more muddled he became.

He left the paper on the desk, crossed to the open window and looked down onto the town. It had grown quiet in the hour after
midnight. Until then, the soldiers of the 16th had been out upon the streets, celebrating their return to their quarters at
Castelo de Vide with the food they had seized from the defeated Spaniards, washed down with wine they could purchase now in
abundance in exchange for what they’d looted. There was more than wine on offer, however, and that, Jack realized, accounted
for the relative silence. There was a curfew, the troopers back in their billets to rest before the morning’s planned departure.
But they did not have to rest in their billets alone …

He would have liked to be down there, celebrating their victory. Drink a lot of wine and, depending on how much, find a pretty
enough señora to bed down with for the night. It had been a long time since that garden in Bath. Jocasta, ever attached to
Worsley’s arm, would wink at him whenever
he looked; though, to be honest, he wasn’t sure if that were not some condition of her eye.

Damn him! Did not other men manage perfectly well with whores? Were not many of his brother officers down there tonight? He
just never seemed to have found the knack. Too romantic to be practical. Perhaps it was just as well that Burgoyne had ordered
him to work on the only booty he’d taken in Valencia de Alcántara – the paper the young officer had been trying to burn.

‘Why me, sir?’ he’d asked.

Burgoyne had smiled. ‘You are the only one with experience, Absolute. You are Turnville’s man, after all.’

His protest that his talents lay in tracking, disguise and perhaps killing but not in codes had gone unheard. He was the spy
among them, he must have the answers.

Not tonight, Jack thought as he sat, stared again at the dots, letters and numbers in three lines. They had to be words, but
they did not form themselves into anything resembling a readable pattern: