And that, Sharpe reckoned, was a good sign. The Portuguese evidently had pride, and troops with pride would fight well given another chance, though not all the Portuguese troops showed such spirit. The men from the ordenanqa kept running, but that was hardly surprising. The ordenanqa was an enthusiastic but unskilled army of volunteers raised to defend the homeland and the battle-hardened French troops were tearing them to shreds.

Meanwhile Miss Savage was still missing.

Captain Hogan appeared on the front porch of the House Beautiful. He carefully closed the door behind him and then looked up to heaven and swore fluently and impressively. Sharpe buttoned his breeches and his two dozen riflemen inspected their weapons as though they had never seen such things before. Captain Hogan added a few more carefully chosen words, then spat as a French round shot trundled overhead. „What it is, Richard,” he said when the cannon shot had passed, „is a shambles. A bloody, goddamned miserable poxed bollocks of an agglomerated halfwitted shambles.” The round shot landed somewhere in the lower town and precipitated the splintering crash of a collapsing roof. Captain Hogan took out his snuffbox and inhaled a mighty pinch.

„Bless you,” Sergeant Harper said.

Captain Hogan sneezed and Harper smiled.

„Her name,” Hogan said, ignoring Harper, „is Catherine or, rather, Kate. Kate Savage, nineteen years old and in need, my God, how she is in need, of a thrashing! A hiding! A damned good smacking, that’s what she needs, Richard. A copper-sheathed, goddamned bloody good walloping.”

„So where the hell is she?” Sharpe asked.

„Her mother thinks she might have gone to Vila Real de Zedes,” Captain Hogan said, „wherever in God’s holy hell that might be. But the family has an estate there. A place where they go to escape the summer heat.” He rolled his eyes in exasperation.