Sharpe's Fury Part 20

"By yourself?"

"Gonzalo brought me."

"Gonzalo?"

"The man who died."

"The man who was going to sell the letters?"

She nodded.

"And you've been working with Gonzalo ever since?"

She nodded again. "In Madrid, Seville, and now here."

"The same game?"

"Game?"

"Pretend to be well-born, get letters, sell them back?"

She smiled. "We made a lot of money, Captain Sharpe. More than you could ever dream of."

"I don't need to dream, darling. I once stole the jewels of an Indian king."

"So you're rich?" she asked, eyes brightening.

"Lost it all."

"Careless, Captain Sharpe."

"So what will you do without Gonzalo?"

She frowned. "I don't know."

"Stay with Henry? Be his mistress?"

"He's very kind to me," Caterina said, "but I don't think he'd take me back to London. And he will go back eventually, won't he?"

"He'll go back," Sharpe confirmed.

"So I'll have to find someone else," she said, "but not you."

"Not me?"

"Someone rich," she said with a smile.

"And you have to stay away from Father Salvador Montseny," Sharpe said.

She gave another shudder. "He is really a killer? A priest?"

"He's as nasty as they come, darling. And he wants your letters. He'll kill you to get them."

"But you want my letters too."

"I do."

"And Pumps says you're a killer."

"I am."

She seemed to consider her dilemma for a moment, then nodded at the bath. "It's time to get clean," she said.

"You want me back in that room?" Sharpe asked.

"Of course not. That bath's for you. You stink. Get undressed, Captain Sharpe, and I'll wash your back."

Sharpe was a good soldier. He obeyed.

"I LIKE LIKE Henry Wellesley," Sharpe said. Henry Wellesley," Sharpe said.

"So do I," Caterina said, "but he is"-she paused, thinking-"earnest."

"Earnest?"

"Sad. His wife hurt him. Pumps says she was not beautiful."

"You can't trust everything Pumps says."

"But I think he is right. Some women are not beautiful yet they drive men mad. She has driven Henry sad. Are you going to sleep?"

"No," Sharpe said. The bed was the most comfortable he had experienced. A feather mattress, silk sheets, big pillows, and Caterina. "I have to go."

"Your uniform isn't dry." She had insisted on washing his uniform in the used bath water and it was now propped on two chairs before the fire.

"We have to go," Sharpe corrected himself.

"We?"

"Montseny wants to find you. And to get the letters he'll hurt you."

She thought about that. "When Gonzalo died," she said, "I came here because I was frightened. And because this is safe."

"You think Pumps will protect you?"

"No one would dare come in here. It's the emba.s.sy!"

"Montseny will dare," Sharpe said. "There's no guard on Lord Pumphrey's front door, is there? And if the servants see a priest they'll trust him. Montseny can get in here easily. I did."

"But if I go with you," she said, "how do I live?"

"Same as everyone else."

"I am not everyone else," she said indignantly, "and didn't you tell me you were sailing back to Lisbon?"

"I am, but you'll be safer in the Isla de Leon. Lots of British soldiers to defend you. Or you can come back to Lisbon with me." She rewarded that suggestion with a smile and silence. "I know," Sharpe went on, "I'm not rich enough. So why did you lie to Henry?"

"Lie to him?" She opened her eyes wide and innocent.

"When you came here, darling, you told him you had no letters. You told him you'd lost the ones Gonzalo didn't have. You lied."

"I thought perhaps if things went wrong," she began, then shrugged.

"You'd still have something to sell?"

"Is that bad?"

"Of course it's bad," Sharpe said sternly, "but it's b.l.o.o.d.y sensible. So how much do you want for them?"

"Your uniform is scorching," she said. She climbed out of bed and went to turn the jacket and overalls around. Sharpe watched her. A beauty. She would drive men mad, he thought. She came back to the bed and slid in beside him again.

"So how much?" he asked her.

"Gonzalo said he would make me four hundred dollars."

"He was cheating you," Sharpe said.

"I don't think so. Pumps said he couldn't get more than seven hundred."

It took Sharpe a moment to understand what she was saying. "Lord Pumphrey said that?"

She nodded very seriously. "He said he could hide the money in the accounts. He would say it was for bribes, but he could only hide seven hundred."

"And he'd give you that for the letters?"

She nodded again. "He said he would get seven hundred dollars, keep two, and give me five. But he had to wait till the other letters were found. Mine, he said, weren't valuable till they were the only letters left."

"b.l.o.o.d.y h.e.l.l," Sharpe said.

"You're shocked." Caterina was amused.

"I thought he was honest."

"Pumps! Honest?" She laughed. "He tells me his secrets. He shouldn't, but he wants to know my secrets. He wants to know what Henry says about him so I make him tell me things first. Not that Henry tells me any secrets! So I tell Pumps what he wants to hear. He told me a secret about you."

"I've got no secrets with Lord Pumphrey," Sharpe said indignantly.

"He has one about you," she said. "A girl in Copenhagen? Called Ingrid?"

"Astrid."

"Astrid, that's the name. Pumps had her killed," Caterina said.

Sharpe stared at her. "He what?" he asked after a while.

"Astrid and her father. Pumps had their throats cut. He's very proud of it. He made me promise not to tell anyone."

"He killed Astrid?"

"He said she and her father knew too many secrets that the French would want to know, and he couldn't trust them to keep quiet, so he told them to go to England and they wouldn't so he had them killed."

It had been four years since Sharpe had been in Copenhagen with the invading British army. He had wanted to stay in Denmark, leave the army, and settle with Astrid, but her father had forbidden the marriage and she was an obedient girl. So Sharpe had abandoned the dream and sailed back to England. "Her father used to send information to Britain," Sharpe said, "but he got upset with us when we captured Copenhagen."

"Pumps says he knew a lot of secrets."

"He did."

"He doesn't know any now," Caterina said callously, "nor does Astrid."

"The b.a.s.t.a.r.d," Sharpe said, thinking of Lord Pumphrey, "the b.l.o.o.d.y b.a.s.t.a.r.d."

"You mustn't hurt him!" Caterina said earnestly. "I like Pumps."

"You tell Pumps the price for the letters is a thousand guineas."

"A thousand guineas!"

"In gold," Sharpe said. "You tell him that, and tell him he can deliver the money to you in the Isla de Leon."

"Why there?"

"Because I'll be there," Sharpe said, "and so will you. And as long as I'm there you'll be safe from that murderous priest."

"You want me to leave here?" she asked.

"You've got the letters," Sharpe said, "so it's time you made money on them. And if you stay here someone else will make the money. And like as not they'll kill you to get the letters. So you tell Pumps you want a thousand guineas, and that if you don't get it you'll tell me about Astrid."

"You were in love with her?"

"Yes," Sharpe said.

"That's nice."

"Tell Lord Pumphrey that if he wants to live he should pay you a thousand guineas. Ask for two thousand and maybe you'll get it."