Sharpe's Waterloo (13 page)

The Countess jabbed her walking cane in the direction of a girl with bright gold ringlets and eyes as radiant as sapphires. The girl was undeniably beautiful, and clearly knew it for she was wearing no petticoat and a diaphanous dress of pale gold that did little to hide her body. ‘She might as well be stark naked!' the Countess said.

‘It's the fashion.' Lucille felt very drab.

‘When I was a girl it took twelve yards of cloth just to make an underskirt for a ball gown. Now they simply unfold some cheesecloth and throw it over their shoulders!' Hardly that even, for most of the womens' shoulders were bared, just as most bosoms were almost naked. ‘And see how they walk! Just like men.' In the Countess's childhood, before the Revolution, and before Belgium had been liberated from Austrian rule by the French, women had been taught to glide along a floor, their feet hidden by wide skirts and their slippers barely leaving the polished boards. The effect was graceful, suggesting effortless motion, while now the girls seemed not to care. The Countess shook her head with disgust. ‘You can tell they're Protestants! No manners, no grace, no breeding.'

Lucille diverted the old lady by showing her the supper room which, like the ballroom, had been draped with the Belgian colours of black, gold and scarlet. Beneath the silk hangings the long tables were covered in white linen and were thick with silver and fine china.

‘They'll lose all the spoons tonight!' the Countess said with undisguised satisfaction, then turned as applause greeted the stately polonaise which had progressed from the far side of the house, advanced through the entrance hall and now entered the ballroom to open the dancing formally. Lucille and the Countess sat by the supper room entrance. The uniformed officers and their ladies stepped delicately in the dancing line, they bowed and curtseyed. The music rang sweetly. A child, allowed to stay up and watch the ball's beginning, stared wide-eyed from a balcony, while the Countess tapped her stick on the parquet floor in time to the music.

After the polonaise, the first waltz brightened the room with its jaunty rhythm. The windows were black with night, but sheeted with the reflections of a thousand candles sparkling on ten thousand jewels. Champagne and laughter ruled the room, while the dancers whirled in glittering joy.

Lucille watched the pretty girl in the diaphanous golden dress who danced with a tall and handsome officer in British cavalry uniform. Lucille noted how the girl refused all partners but that one man and she felt a surge of sympathy because she knew the girl must be in love, just as she herself was in love. Lucille thought the girl and the cavalry officer made a very fine couple, but she wished the girl would smile rather than hold her face in such a cold and supercilious expression.

Then Lucille forgot the girl as the ballroom was swamped by a sudden and prolonged applause, which forced the orchestra to pause.

The Duke of Wellington had appeared with his staff. He stood in the ballroom entrance and acknowledged the applause with a small bow. He was not a tall man, but something about his confidence and reputation gave him an impressive stature. He was dressed in the scarlet and gold of a British field marshal with a tactful Netherlands decoration worn on an orange sash.

Lucille, politely applauding with the rest of the room, wondered whether this man truly was the greatest soldier of his time. Many, including Sharpe, insisted that he was. No one, not even the Emperor, had fought so many battles, and no other General had won all the battles he had ever fought, though the Duke, as every person in the ballroom was aware, had never fought the Emperor. In Vienna, where the Duke had travelled as Britain's ambassador to the Congress, society had greeted him with outrageous flattery, calling him
‘le vainqueur du vainqueur du monde',
but Lucille guessed that Bonaparte might have other ideas of the Duke's military stature.

Now the conqueror of the world's conqueror gestured to stop the applause. ‘He has a good leg,' the Dowager Countess confided in Lucille.

‘He's a handsome man,' Lucille agreed.

‘And he's not in a corset. You can tell that by the way they bow. My husband never wore a corset, not like some here tonight.' The Countess cast a scathing eye at the dancers who were beginning yet another waltz, then looked back to the Duke. ‘He's a young man.'

‘Forty-six,' Lucille told her, ‘the same age as the Emperor.'

‘Generals are getting younger. I'm sure the soldiers don't like it. How can a man have confidence in a stripling?'

The Countess fell into a disapproving silence as a young and handsome British officer offered Lucille a low and evidently uncorseted bow. ‘My dear Lucille!' Captain Peter d'Alembord was resplendent in scarlet coat and white breeches.

‘Captain!' Lucille responded with a genuine pleasure. ‘How nice to see a friendly face.'

‘My Colonel received an invitation, didn't know what to do with such a thing, so gave it to me. I can't believe you've persuaded Sharpe to attend, or have you turned him into a dancing man?'

‘He's supposed to be accompanying the Prince.' Lucille named d'Alembord to the Dowager Countess of Mauberges who gave the officer a very suspicious examination.

‘Your name is French!' the Countess accused him.

‘My family were Huguenots, my lady, and therefore unwanted in
la belle France.'
D‘Alembord's contemptuous scorn for France made the Countess bridle, but he had already turned back to Lucille. ‘You'll do me the honour of dancing?'

Lucille would. D‘Alembord was an old friend who had dined frequently with Sharpe and Lucille since they had come to the Netherlands. Both men had served in the Prince of Wales's Own Volunteers where d'Alembord had succeeded Sharpe to the command of the first battalion's light company. That battalion was now bivouacked in a village to the west of Brussels where d‘Alembord had heard no news of any skirmishes on the frontier. Instead his day had been spent indulging the Colonel's passion for cricket. ‘I think he plans to kill us all with boredom,' d'Alembord told Lucille as they took the floor.

‘Poor Peter.'

‘Not at all, I am the most fortunate of men. Except for Sharpe, of course.'

Lucille smiled at the dutiful but pleasing compliment. ‘Of course. And how is Anne?'

‘Very well. She writes to tell me that her father has found a house that will be suitable for us. Not too large, but with adequate stabling and a few acres of grazing.'

‘I'm glad for you.'

D‘Alembord smiled. ‘I'm rather glad for me, too.'

‘So stay alive to enjoy it, Peter!'

‘Don't even tempt fate to suggest I won't.' D'Alembord was newly engaged, and filled with a touching happiness at the prospect of his marriage. Lucille rather envied him, wishing that she could marry Sharpe. That admission made her smile to herself. Who would ever have believed that Lucille, Vicomtesse de Seleglise and widow of Colonel Xavier Castineau, would be mother to a half-English bastard?

She turned lithely to the music and saw that the blue-eyed girl in the golden dress was watching her very coldly. Was it the dowdy grey dress that had earned the girl's scorn? Lucille suddenly felt very shabby and uncomfortable. She turned her back to the girl.

‘Good God!' D‘Alembord, who was a very good dancer, suddenly faltered. His eyes were fixed on someone or something at the room's edge and Lucille, turning to see what had caught his astonished attention, saw the golden girl returning d'Alembord's gaze with what seemed to be pure poison.

‘Who is she?' Lucille asked.

D‘Alembord had quite given up any attempt to dance. Instead he offered Lucille his arm and walked her off the floor. ‘Don't you know?'

Lucille stopped, turned to look at the girl once more then, intuitively, she knew the answer and looked for confirmation into d‘Alembord's worried face. ‘That's Richard's wife?' She could not hide her astonishment.

‘God only knows what she's doing here! And with her damned lover!' D‘Alembord steered Lucille firmly away from Jane and Lord John Rossendale. ‘Richard will kill him!'

Lucille could not resist turning one more time. ‘She's very beautiful,' she said sadly, then she lost sight of Jane as the Duke of Wellington's party moved across the ballroom floor.

The Duke was offering bland reassurance about the scanty news of the day's skirmishes. Brussels was full of rumours about a French attack, rumours that the Duke was scarcely able to correct or deny. He knew there had been fighting about Charleroi, and he had heard of some skirmishes being fought in the villages south of the Prince of Orange's headquarters, but whether the French had invaded in force, or whether there was an attack coming in the direction of Mons, the Duke still did not know. Some of his staff had urged that he abandon the Duchess's ball, but such an act, he knew, would only have offered encouragement to the Emperor's many supporters in Brussels and could even have prompted the wholesale desertion of Belgian troops. The Duke had to appear confident of victory or else every waverer in his army would run to be with the Emperor and the winning side.

‘Is Orange here?' the Duke asked an aide.

‘No, sir.'

‘Let's hope he brings news. My dear Lady Mary, how very good to see you.' He bowed over her hand, then dismissed her fears of an imminent French invasion. Gently disengaging himself he walked on and saw Lord John Rossendale waiting to present himself and, with him, a young, pretty and under-dressed girl who somehow looked familiar.

‘Who in God's name brought Rossendale here?' the Duke angrily asked an aide.

‘He's been appointed to Uxbridge's staff, sir.'

‘Damn Harry. Haven't we enough bloody fools in the cavalry already?' Harry Paget, Earl of Uxbridge and commander of the British cavalry, was second in command to the Duke. Uxbridge had eloped with the wife of the Duke's younger brother, which did not precisely endear him to the Duke. ‘Is Harry here?' the Duke now asked.

‘No, Your Grace.'

‘He's sent Rossendale as deputy adulterer instead, eh?' The Duke's jest was grim, then his face froze into a chill smile as Rossendale ushered Jane forward.

‘Your Grace.' Lord John bowed. ‘May I name Miss Jane Gibbons for you?' He deliberately used Jane's maiden name.

‘Miss Gibbons.' The Duke found himself staring down her powdered cleavage as she curtseyed. ‘Have we not met, Miss Gibbons?'

‘Briefly, Your Grace. In southern France.'

He had her now. Good God! Wellington stiffened, remembering the details of the gossip. This was Sharpe's wife! What in hell's name did Rossendale think he was doing? The Duke, realizing that the introduction had been made in order to give the adulterous liaison the appearance of his approval, icily turned away without another word. It was not the adultery that offended him, but the stupidity of Lord John Rossendale risking a duel with Sharpe.

The Duke turned abruptly back, intending to inform his lordship that he did not permit duelling among his officers, but Rossendale and Jane had been swallowed up in the crowd.

The Duke forced a smile and airily denied to a lady that he had any fear of an imminent French attack. ‘It takes longer to push an army up a road than you might think. It's not like herding cows, madam. We'll have good warning when Bonaparte marches, I do assure you.'

Another burst of applause announced the arrival of the Prince of Orange, who had come with a handful of staff officers. The Young Frog waved happily to the dancers and, ignoring his hostess, made straight for the Duke. ‘I knew you wouldn't cancel the ball.'

‘Should I have done?' the Duke asked tartly.

‘There have been rumours,' the Prince said airily, ‘nothing but rumours. Isn't this splendid?' He stared eagerly about the room in search of the prettiest faces, but instead caught sight of Lieutenant Harry Webster, one of his own British aides, who was hurrying across the dance floor. Webster offered the Prince a perfunctory bow, then offered him a despatch.

Most of the ballroom saw the despatch being given, and could tell from Webster's dust-stained boots that he must have ridden hard to bring the paper to Brussels, but the Prince merely thrust the despatch into a pocket of his coat and went back to his scrutiny of the younger women. Webster's face showed alarm. The Duke, catching the expression, smiled thinly at the Prince. ‘Might I know the contents of the despatch, Your Highness?'

‘If you wish. Of course.' The Prince carelessly handed over the sealed paper, then sent one of his Dutch aides to enquire about the identity of the girl in the diaphanous gold dress.

The Duke tore the despatch open. Rebecque, in Braine-le-Comte, had news both from the Prussians and from Dornberg in Mons. The French had advanced north from Charleroi, but had turned eastwards to attack Blücher and had halted for the night at a village called Fleurus. General Dornberg reported no activity at all on the roads leading to Mons. His cavalry patrols had ridden ten miles into France and had met no enemy troops.

The Prince, his eyes more bulbous than ever, had seized Webster's arm. ‘You see that girl? Do you know her?'

‘Lieutenant Webster,' the Duke's voice was as cold as a sword in winter, ‘four horses instantly to the Prince of Orange's carriage. Your Highness will return immediately to your headquarters.'

The Prince blinked in surprise at his Commander-in-Chief, then offered a small laugh. ‘Surely it can wait till - '

‘Instantly, sir!' The Duke did not raise his voice, but there was something quite terrifying in his tone. ‘Your corps will concentrate on Nivelles now. Go, sir, go!'