“Do you like the Prince?” Paulette asked him.

That was a sensitive question. “Do you?” Sharpe countered.

“He’s a drunk.” Paulette did not bother with tact, but just let her scorn flow. “And when he’s not drunk he squeezes his spots. Plip plop, plip plop! Ugh! I have to do his back for him.” She looked to see whether her words had offended Sharpe, and was evidently reassured. “You know he was going to marry an English princess?”

“I know.”

“She couldn’t stand him. So now he says he will marry a Russian princess! Ha! That’s all he’s good for, a Russian. They rub butter on their skins, did you know that? All over, to keep warm. They must smell.” She sipped her ale, then frowned as her mind skittered back over the conversation. “Your wife in England. She does not mind that you have another lady?”

“She has another man.”

The evident convenience of the arrangement pleased Paulette. “So everything is all right?”

“No.” He smiled. “They stole my money. One day I shall go back and take it from them.”

She stared at him with large serious eyes. “Will you kill the man?”

“Yes.” He said it very simply, which made it all the more believable.

“I wish a man would kill for me,” Paulette sighed, then stared in alarm because Sharpe had suddenly raised a hand in warning. “What is it?”

“Sh!” He stood and went in his stockinged feet to the open stabieyard door. Far off, like a crackling of burning thorns, he thought he heard musketry. He could not be certain, for the sound was fading and tenuous in the small warm breeze. “Do you hear anything?” he asked the girl.

“No.”

“There it is! Listen!” He heard the noise again, this time it sounded like a piece of canvas ripping. Somewhere, and not so very far off, there was a musket fight. Sharpe looked up at the weathercock on the stable roof and saw the wind had backed southerly. He ran to the kitchen door which opened into the main part of the house. “Rebecque!”

“I hear it!” The Baron was already standing at the open front door. “How far off?”

“God knows.” Sharpe stood beside Rebecque. The small wind kicked up dust devils in the street. “Five miles?” Sharpe hazarded. “Six?”

The noise faded to nothing, then any chance of hearing it again was drowned in the clatter of hooves. Sharpe looked down the high street, half expecting to see French Dragoons galloping into the small village, but it was only the Prince of Orange who had abandoned his carriage and taken a horse from one of his escort. That escort streamed behind him down the street, together with the aide who had fetched the Prince back.

“What news, Rebecque?” The Prince dropped from the saddle and ran into the house.

“Only what we sent you.” Rebecque followed the Prince into the map room.

“Charleroi, eh?” The Prince chewed at a fingernail as he stared at the map. “We’ve heard nothing from Dornberg?”

“No, sir. But if you listen carefully, you can hear fighting to the south.”

“Mons?” The Prince sounded alarmed.

“No one knows, sir.”

“Then find out!” the Prince snapped. “I want a report from Dornberg. You can send it after me.”

“After you?” Rebecque frowned. “But where are you going, sir?”

“Brussels, of course! Someone has to make sure Wellington has heard this news.” He looked at Sharpe. “I particularly wanted you in attendance tonight.”

Sharpe suppressed an urge to kick His Royal Highness in the royal arse. “Indeed, sir,” he said instead.

“And I insist you wear Dutch uniform. Why aren’t you in Dutch uniform now?”

“I shall change, sir.” Sharpe, despite the Prince’s frequent insistence, had yet to buy himself a Dutch uniform.

Rebecque, sensing that the Prince still intended to dance despite the news of a French invasion, cleared his throat. “Surely there’ll be no ball in Brussels tonight, sir?”

“It hasn’t been cancelled yet,” the Prince said petulantly, then turned back with specific instructions for Sharpe. “I want you in evening dress uniform. That means gold lace, two epaulettes with gold bullion on each and blue cushions. And a dress sword, Sharpe, instead of that butcher’s blade.” The Prince smiled, as if to soften his sartorial orders, then gestured at one of his Dutch aides. “Gome on, Winckler, there’s nothing more to do here.” He strode from the room, leaving Rebecque thin-lipped and silent.

The sound of the hooves faded in the warm air. Rebecque listened again for the sound of musketry, but heard nothing, so instead tapped the map with an ebony ruler. “His Royal Highness is quite right, Sharpe, you should be wearing Dutch uniform.”

“I keep meaning to buy one.”

Rebecque smiled. “I can lend you something suitable for tonight.”

“Bugger tonight.” Sharpe twisted the map round so that it faced him; ‘Do you want me to go to Mons?“

“I’ve already sent Harry.” Rebecque went to the open window and stared into’the heat haze. “Perhaps nothing is happening in Mons.” He spoke softly, almost to himself. “Perhaps we’re all wrong about Mons. Perhaps Napoleon is just swinging open the front doors and ignoring the back gate.”

“Sir?”

“It’s a double-leafed front door, Sharpe, that’s what it is!” Rebecque spoke with a sudden urgency as he strode back to the table and tapped the map. “The Prussians are the left-hand door and we’re the right, and when the French push in the middle, Sharpe, the two leaves will hinge apart. Is that what Bonaparte’s doing to us?”

Sharpe stared down at the map. From the Prince’s headquarters a road ran eastwards through Nivelles to meet the Charleroi highway at an unnamed crossroads. If that crossroads was lost, then Napoleon would have successfully swung the two doors apart. The British and Dutch had been worrying about Mons, but now‘ Sharpe took a scrap of charcoal and scrawled a thick ring round the crossroads. “That’s the lock on your doors, Rebecque. Who are our closest troops?”

“Saxe-Weimar’s brigade.” Rebecque had already seen the importance of the crossroads. He strode to the door and shouted for clerks.

“I’ll go there,” Sharpe offered.

Rebecque nodded acceptance of the offer. “But for God’s sake send me prompt news, Sharpe. I don’t want to be left in the dark.”

“If the French have taken that damned crossroads, we’ll all be in the dark. Permanently. I’m borrowing one of the Prince’s horses. Mine’s blown.”

“Take two. And take Lieutenant Doggett with you. He can carry your messages.”

“Does that crossroads have a name?” That was an important question, for any messages Sharpe sent had to be accurate.

Rebecque searched the table to find one of the larger scale maps that the Royal Engineers had drawn and distributed to all the army headquarters. “It’s called Quatre Bras.”

“Four arms?”

“That’s what it says here, Quatre Bras. Four Arms. Just what you need for opening double doors, eh?”

Sharpe did not respond to the small jest. Instead he shouted for Lieutenant Doggett, then went to the kitchen where he sat and tugged on his boots. He yelled through the open stableyard door for three horses to be saddled, two for himself and one for Lieutenant Doggett. “And untie my dog!”

The orders for Prince Bernhard of Saxe-Weimar, sealed with Rebecque’s copy of the Prince of Orange’s personal seal, came ten minutes later. Rebecque brought the orders himself and handed them up to Sharpe who was already mounted. “Remember you’re supposed to be dancing tonight,” Rebecque smiled at Sharpe.

Paulette had come into the stableyard and was leaning against a sun-warmed wall. She smiled at Sharpe as he twisted the Prince’s horse towards the archway. “Go carefully, Englishman,” she called.

The courtyard was filling with horses as staff officers, all alerted by the distant musketry, arrived from the various brigade headquarters to seek information and orders. Sharpe blew the Prince’s whore a kiss, then rode to find a crossroads.