It could have been winter, so cold and misty was the plateau. At this height the mist was low cloud that threatened rain. Only the dripping leaves of the few stunted birches witnessed that summer had some to this high, strange, chilling place.

Sharpe had not slept. He had planned the fight he knew he would face once El Matarife discovered that he had not passed his sentinels at the two bridges. In the dawn he had scouted the plateau’s edge, peering through the mist down the tumbled, precipitous slopes of the great hill.

Sharpe had not brought Angel all the way to the flat summit of the great hill. He had left the boy on the track with both rifles and careful, painstaking instructions.

Angel had been worried. ‘It’s a holy place, sehor.’

‘Trust me, Angel, just trust me.’

Sharpe had climbed to the plateau with the two horses, and with the fear that this dreadful, desperate deed that he planned could all be for nothing. He would fight Partisans, he would offend the Church, and ail for a woman who might not have the answers to save his career and solve Hogan’s mystery.

Angel had wished him luck, but the boy had been distressed. ‘We have to fight them, senor?’ He spoke of the Partisans.

‘To defeat France, yes.’ It was a lie, or at the very least Sharpe did not know if it was a truth. Yet Angel, who trusted the English, had believed him.

Now, as the dawn showed the grass wet on the plateau, and as the grey clouds sifted through the small trees, Sharpe galloped towards the convent. He was alone in the high place.

The Convent of the Heavens deserved its name. It was built at the highest point of this steep range of hills, a building that clung alarmingly to the edge of a precipice. It had been built in the days when the Muslims hunted the Christians north, when the prayers of Christians had to be offered in high places that could be defended by Christian swords. The walls of the convent showed no windows. They were grey like the rocks, stained by the rain, a fortress of women. There was only one door in its prison-like walls.

Sharpe knocked and waited. He knocked again, then hammered the door with a stone, making sparks fly from the square-headed iron nails that studded the great planks of wood. He could hear the sound reverberating within the building, but no answer came.

He waited. The mist drifted over the plateau. The two horses, tethered to a great stone, watched him. Their saddles were beaded with moisture.

He kicked the door, cursing, then found a larger stone that he smashed onto the timber, smashed again, until the hollow echoes were like the sound of a battery of field artillery in full fight. There was a click.

In one of the door’s two leaves was a small shutter, protected by a rusted iron grille, and the shutter had slid back. He could see an eye staring at him. He smiled and spoke in his most polite voice. ‘I have come to see La Marquesa de Casares el Grande y Melida Sadaba.’ The eye blinked, the shutter slid shut, then nothing. He waited.

There was silence from the great building. No bolts were shot back on the door, no footsteps or voices sounded from the far side. For a moment he wondered if the eye beyond the shutter had been a dream, so silent was the grey building. It seemed to have slept here for a thousand empty years and his knocking was an offence against eternity.

He found himself an even larger rock, one that he needed to lift with both hands, and he carried it to the door, measured his swing, and thumped it at the place where the two leaves met. He swung it again and again, seeing the right hand leaf jar back a fraction with each blow, and the noise was huge again, echoing from the hallway within, and he wondered what Patrick Harper would think if he knew that his friend was breaking into a convent. Sharpe could almost hear the Ulster voice. ‘God save Ireland.’

The rock swung and crashed, the door jerked back, and he saw an iron bar that was bent but still holding. He hammered it again, cursing with the effort, and despite the chill morning he could feel the sweat on his body and he drove the huge rock with all his strength at the weak spot and the door, at last, shattered back, the iron bar broken, and he could see into the convent.

Miles to the west, at the edge of the great plain, the army marched. Battalion after Battalion of redcoats, battery after battery of guns, all marching eastwards with the cavalry in the van searching for the retreating French.

The Marquess of Wellington, Grandee of Spain with the title of Duque de Ciudad Rodrigo, and Duque da Victoria in Portugal, looked at the northern rain clouds and scowled. ‘Are they coming south?’

I think not, my Lord,’ an aide said.

The General was on horseback. He had set the army in motion and he marched it eastwards. He prayed that rain would not soak the roads and slow him down. The French must not be given time to unite their armies in Spain against him. He looked at the man who rode to his left. ‘Well?’

Major Hogan listed the news of the night, the messages that had come from enemy country. The news was good, so far as if went, though Hogan could not say with certainty whether the fortress at Burgos was prepared for a long siege.

‘Find out! Find out!’ Wellington said. ‘Is that all?’ His tone suggested that he hoped it was.

‘One other thing, my Lord.’ Hogan took a deep breath. ‘It seems that the Marquesa de Casares el Grande has been arrested by the ecclesiastical authorities. We hear she’s in a convent.’

Wellington stared at Hogan as if wondering why he had bothered to tell him such a trivial piece of news. Their horses walked slowly. The General frowned. ‘Sharpe?’ He gave a snort that was half laughter and half scorn. ‘That’s stopped him, eh? The vixen’s gone to ground!’

‘Indeed, my Lord.’

The general looked again at the clouds. The wind, such as it was, came from the east. He frowned again. ‘He wouldn’t be such a god-damned fool as to break into a convent, would he, Hogan?’

Hogan was of the opinion that, for the sake of a woman, Sharpe would do just that, but this did not seem to be the time, to say so. ‘I’m sure not, my Lord. That was not my worry.’

‘What is your worry?’ Wellington’s tone suggested that it had better be substantial to take up his time.

‘The arrest was supposed to be secret, my Lord, but inevitably rumours have spread. It seems that some French cavalry have gone north to look for her.’

Wellington laughed. ‘Let them break into the convent.’

‘Indeed, my Lord.’

‘Rather they were there than facing us, eh? So Bonaparte’s declared war on nuns, has he?’

‘My concern, my Lord, was for Sharpe. If this General Verigny gets his hands oh him.’ Hogan shrugged.

‘My God, he’d better not!’ Wellington’s voice was loud enough to startle some marching soldiers. ‘Sharpe’s got more sense than to be caught, hasn’t he? On the other hand, considering what a god-damned fool he is, maybe not. Still, there’s nothing we can do about it, Hogan.’

‘No, my Lord.’

The General nodded to the Colonel of the Battalion they passed, throwing out a word of praise for his men, then looked again at Hogan. ‘Sharpe had better not break into that god-damned convent, Hogan. I’d rather the bloody frogs caught him!’

‘It seems he’s done for either way, my Lord.’

Wellington scowled. ‘He’s done for anyway, man. You know that, so do I. We just strung him a little hope.’ The subject of Sharpe seemed to irritate Wellington. The General no longer believed that the death of the Marques held a mystery that threatened him, the advance into Spain and the campaign that loomed ahead had dwarfed such a worry into insignificance. He nodded at the Irishman. ‘Keep me informed, Hogan, keep me informed.’

‘Indeed, my Lord.’

Hogan let his horse fall behind. The Marquesa was immured in a convent, and his friend, by that fact, was doomed. A French cavalry regiment had gone hunting in the mountains, and Sharpe had only a boy to protect him. Sharpe was doomed.