"You don't understand, " he said stubbornly. "I could snatch a thousand French eagles and I'm still the bugger who came up from the ranks. I'm still an upstart. They can smell me a hundred yards off, and they're just waiting, Teresa, just waiting for me to make a mistake. One mistake!

That's all it takes."

"Write a request now, " she said patiently, "and as soon as the first Frenchman shows, I will ride to Salamanca. As soon as we hear the first gunshot in the hills, I will ride. So then you will not have to hold for long, Richard."

He thought about it, and knew she was right, and so he went down to the mess and lit a candle and then woke Ensign Hickey because the Ensign had gone to a proper school and would know what words to use, and then Sharpe penned the words in his clumsy handwriting. 'I have reason to believe, he wrote, 'that a French column is approaching this fort which I have the honour to command. My command being perilously small in numbers, I request reinforcements as quickly as may be possible. Richard Sharpe, Capt'.

"Shouldn't I date it?" he asked, "put a time on it?"

"I will convince them you were in a hurry, " Teresa said.

Hickey, shy to be seen in front of Teresa in his undershirt, pulled a blanket over his bare legs. "Are the French really coming, sir?" He asked Sharpe.

"I reckon so. Why? Does that worry you?"

Hickey thought about it for a heartbeat, then nodded. "Yes, sir, it does,»

"It's why you joined the army, isn't it?"

"I joined the army, sir, because my father wanted me to."

"He wanted you dead?"

"I pray not, sir."

"I was an Ensign once, Hickey, " Sharpe said, "and I learned one lesson about being an Ensign."

"And what lesson was that, sir?"

"That ensigns are expendable, Hickey, expendable. Now go to sleep."

Sharpe and Teresa climbed back to the parapet. "You were cruel, Richard, " she said.