All those details Sharpe noticed later, as the interview progressed, but his very first impression as he went through the door and shuffled awkwardly into line was the shock of familiarity. This was the most famous face in the world, a face repeated on a million pictures, a million etchings, a million plates, a million coins. This was a face so familiar to Sharpe that it was truly astonishing to see it in reality. He involuntarily gasped, causing Harper to push him onward. The Emperor, recognizing Sharpe's reaction, seemed to smile.

Sharpe's second impression was of the Emperor's eyes. They seemed full of amusement as though Bonaparte, alone of all the men in the room, understood that a jest was being played. The eyes belied the rest of Bonaparte's face, which was plump and oddly petulant. That petulance surprised Sharpe, as did the Emperor's hair which alone was unlike his portraits. It was as fine and wispy as a child's. There was something feminine and unsettling about that silky hair and Sharpe perversely wished that Bonaparte would cover it with the cocked hat he carried under his arm.

"You are welcome, gentlemen," the Emperor greeted the Spanish officers, which pleasantry was translated into Spanish by a bored-looking aide. The greeting prompted a chorus of polite responses from all but the disdainful Ardiles.

The Emperor, when all sixteen visitors had found somewhere to stand, sat in a delicate gilt chair. The room was evidently a drawing room, and was full of pretty furniture, but it was also as damp as the hallway and billiard room outside. The skirting boards, beneath the water-stained wallpaper, were disfigured by tin plates that had been nailed over rat holes and, in the silence that followed the Emperor's greeting, Sharpe could hear the dry scratching of rats' feet in the cavities behind the tin patched wall. The house was evidently infested as badly as any ship.