Orders for Sharpe to attend the headquarters the following morning waited at his lodgings. Orders and a bottle of brandy, donated by Nairn, with a scrawled letter saying that if Sharpe had got back on time then he would need the contents of this bottle. Sir Augustus had not even offered him a glass of water, let alone a glass of wine, and Sharpe shared the bottle with Lieutenant Harry Price and let vent to his feelings about velvet-clad civilians who thought they were Colonels. Price smiled happily. ‘That’s my ambition, sir. A velvet coat, a young wife full of juice, and all the heroes like you saluting me.’
‘May it happen for you, Harry.’
‘May all the dreams come true, sir.’ Price had been sewing a patch onto his red jacket. Like most of the South Essex he wore a red coat; only Sharpe and his few Riflemen who had survived the Retreat to Corunna and then been formed into the South Essex’s Light Company kept their prided Green coats. Green coats! Of course! Green bloody coats!
‘What is it, sir?’ Price was holding the bottle upside down, hoping for a miracle.
‘Nothing, Harry, nothing. Just an idea.’
‘Then God help someone, sir.’
Sharpe held the idea, and with it a second thought, and took them both to the headquarters in the morning. It had clouded in the night, light cold rain falling for most of the morning, and the table in the hallway outside the room where Nairn waited was heaped with coats, cloaks, scabbards and damp hats. Sharpe added his own to the pile, propped the rifle against the wall where an orderly promised to keep watch over it.
Nairn, Farthingdale, Sharpe and one unknown Lieutenant Colonel made up the meeting. Nairn, for once, had eschewed his dressing gown and wore the dark green facings and gold lace of one of the Highland Regiments. Sir Augustus was resplendent in the red, black and gold of the Princess Royal’s Dragoons, his cavalry spurs tearing at the carpet. The Lieutenant Colonel was a Fusilier, his red coat faced in white, and he nodded warmly at Sharpe. Nairn made the introductions. ‘Lieutenant Colonel Kinney. Major Sharpe.’
‘Your servant, Sharpe, and it’s an honour.’ Kinney was big, broad faced, with a ready smile. Nairn looked at him and smiled.
‘Kinney’s a Welshman, Sharpe, so don’t trust him further than you can throw a cat.’
Kinney laughed. ‘He’s been like that ever since my lads rescued his Regiment at Barossa.’
Sir Augustus coughed pointedly in protest at the Celtic badinage, and Nairn glanced at him from beneath his huge eyebrows.
‘Of course, Sir Augustus, of course. Sharpe! Your story, man?’
Sharpe told it all and was only interrupted once. Nairn looked at him incredulously. ‘Took her bodice off! Threw her at you?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘And you did it up again?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Extraordinary! Go on!’
When Sharpe had finished, Nairn had a sheet of paper covered with notes. A fire crackled in the hearth. The rain was soft on the window. Somewhere in the town a Sergeant Major screamed at his men to form column of fours on the centre files. The Major General leaned back. ‘This Frenchman, Sharpe. Dubreton. What’s he going to do?’
‘He’d like to mount a rescue, sir.’
‘Will he?’
‘They have twice as far to go as us, sir.’ The French and British were wintering well apart.
Nairn grunted. ‘We must do it first. A rescue, then smoke those scum out of their holes.’ He tapped a piece of paper. ‘That’s what the Peer wants, that’s what we’ll give him. What would you need to rescue the women, Sharpe?’
‘Sir!’ Sir Augustus leaned forward. ‘I was hoping I might be entrusted with the rescue.’
Nairn looked at Sir Augustus and stretched the silence out till it was painful. Then. ‘That’s noble of you, Sir Augustus, very creditable. Still, Sharpe’s been there, let Sharpe give us his ideas first, eh?’
It was time for the first of the two ideas, a slim idea in the light of morning, but he would try it. ‘We can rescue them, sir, as long as we know where they are. If we do, sir, then I only see one way. We must travel by night so we can approach unseen, lay up all day as close as we can, and attack the next night. It would have to be done by Riflemen, sir.’
‘Riflemen!’ Nairn bridled, Kinney smiled. ‘Why do you think only Riflemen! D’you think no one else can fight in this army?’
‘Because I saw many uniforms there, sir, but I didn’t see one Rifleman. On that night anyone not in a green uniform is an enemy.’
Nairn grunted. ‘But you didn’t see all of his men.’
‘No, sir.’ Sharpe was placatory, yet all of them knew that less men deserted from the Rifles than from other Regiments. Nairn glanced at Sir Augustus’ red, black and gold. ‘Riflemen, then. What else?’
There was one other thing, but it would all be in vain unless Sharpe knew in which building the hostages were kept. He said as much and Nairn smiled slowly, mischievously. ‘But we do know.’
‘We do?’ Sharpe was surprised, remembered to add, ‘sir?’
‘We do, we do.’ Nairn grinned at them.
Kinney waited. Sir Augustus looked annoyed. ‘Perhaps you’d care to enlighten us, sir?’
‘My duty and my pleasure, Sir Augustus.’ Nairn closed his eyes, leaned far back, and raised his right hand dramatically. His voice was declamatory. ‘Line after line my gushing eyes o’erflow, Led through a something-something woe: Now warm in love!’ He had raised his voice to a triumphant shout on the word ‘love’, now he lowered it conspiratorially, his eyes opening. ‘… Now with’ring in my bloom, Lost in a convent’s solitary gloom!’
Nairn grinned impishly. ‘Alexander Pope. From Heloise and Abelard. A sad tale of a young man gelded in his prime. That’s what comes of too much love. So! They’re in the Convent. She’s a clever lassie, that Frenchman’s wife.’
Kinney leaned forward. ‘How many Riflemen?’
‘Two Companies, sir?’
Kinney nodded. ‘Can they hold the Convent overnight?’
Sharpe nodded back. ‘Yes, sir.’
‘So you’d need relief in the morning, yes?’
‘Yes, sir.’
Kinney looked at Nairn. ‘It’s as we discussed, sir. One small group to go in and secure the ladies, and a Battalion to come up in the morning to punish the men. There’s one thing worries me, though.’
Nairn raised an eyebrow. ‘Go on.’
‘They may be deserters, but I think we can assume they are not fools. If you go in at night.’ He was looking at Sharpe, Sir Augustus’ request utterly forgotten or ignored. ‘If you go in, Major, don’t you think they’ll be expecting something of the sort? There’ll be sentries, there’ll be a picquet line. It’s a risk, Sharpe, and though I don’t mind a risk, you might find that they have enough time to take their vengeance on the ladies.’
Sir Augustus nodded, seeming to have changed his mind about the desirability of any rescue. ‘I agree with Kinney.’
Nairn looked at Sharpe. ‘Well, Major?’
‘I had thought of that, sir.’ He smiled. This was the second idea, the better idea. ‘I thought of going in on Sowan’s Night.’
Nairn grinned. Automatically he corrected Sharpe. ‘Sowan’s Nicht! I like it, man! I like it! Sowan’s Nicht! The bastards will all be flat on their backs with the drink!’