Sharpe dutifully stroked the cat, which purred happily. Meanwhile he looked around the room. The shuttered window to the small front garden was behind him, the two walls either side were filled with bookcases, while the far wall, beyond Collignon’s chair, was made of doors, presumably opening into another room, which would create one long chamber the length of the house. Fox was in a chair next to Sharpe and was talking fast to their host, who nodded frequently but said little. Sharpe gathered that Collignon had offered a list of names which Fox now wanted, but it was evident that the Frenchman was reluctant to yield the list. ‘You know who these people are?’ Fox demanded sharply.
‘Maybe some of them. It is difficult to be certain.’
‘Why difficult?’
‘La Fraternité is secret, monsieur.’
‘But you know some,’ Fox pressed, ‘who are they?’
‘Soldiers.’
‘I want the names!’
‘Monsieur,’ Collignon frowned, ‘I must be certain. I cannot betray men unless I am sure of their guilt.’
‘We can establish their guilt,’ Fox insisted.
‘By using him?’ Collignon nodded towards Sharpe. ‘He looks formidable.’ He seemed to assume that Sharpe spoke no French, an assumption Sharpe was happy to encourage.
‘By questioning them,’ Fox said.
Collignon, Sharpe noticed, was getting ever more nervous as Fox pushed him. His hands kept gripping and regripping the arms of his chair, his eyes darted from Fox to Sharpe, back to Fox, then around the room. He seemed relieved to welcome the maid when she returned carrying a large dark bottle and three glasses on a silver tray. ‘It is not the best wine,’ Collignon said, ‘but alas, good wine is difficult to find right now.’ The maid gave each man a glass of the wine, then put the half emptied bottle on a small table to Sharpe’s right. ‘Monsieur,’ she said to Sharpe, and he nodded thanks.
‘You drink wine, Colonel?’ Collignon asked in English as the girl left.
‘I do, monsieur.’
‘Perhaps I should have offered you brandy.’ Collignon grimaced at the taste of the wine. ‘This wine is expensive, but …’ he shrugged, leaving the rest unsaid.
‘It’s barely drinkable swill,’ Fox finished for him, then opened his pouch and laid ten golden English guineas along the arm of his chair. He placed each coin slowly, deliberately, and Sharpe saw the greed in Collignon’s eyes. ‘We pay, Monsieur Collignon,’ Fox said, ‘but there will be no future payments unless you give me what you offered before I was arrested.’
‘And you are free now!’ Collignon wrenched his eyes from the gold. ‘How did that happen?’
‘The British army freed me, then sent me here to find you. To obtain what you promised, to obtain what you were paid to provide.’
‘It is delicate,’ Collignon said, ‘you do not understand.’
‘Colonel Sharpe is not delicate,’ Fox said menacingly.
Sharpe looked surprised at the mention of his name, but Collignon appeared terrified. ‘Non, non,’ he said, holding his hands out as if to ward off trouble. ‘I will supply what you want, Monsieur Fox.’
‘Names,’ Fox said, ‘I want names! You told me you had the names, so give them to me!’
‘I made a list,’ Collignon said uncertainly.
‘Then give it me!’
‘I will fetch it for you,’ Collignon said, then stood and went to the wide doors which evidently divided the long room. ‘Just a moment,’ he said.
He opened the two centre doors and Sharpe saw two men in the darkness beyond. He also saw the barrel of a musket reflect the small lamplight and he pushed hard with his feet to throw the armchair backwards. A musket fired, the ball thumping into the chair’s thick upholstery. The cat was hissing, clawing at Sharpe’s right hand, and he hurled the beast over the fallen chair towards the far doors, then reached into his pocket for the pistol. He heard a shout of alarm, presumably caused by Josephine’s sharp claws, then he was crouched behind the thick rampart of the chair’s horsehair and leather. He held the pistol in his left hand and snatched the bottle of wine from the table. He planned to hurl it too, but before he could draw his arm back a moustached face appeared above the fallen chair and a pistol was pointed at his head. ‘You will stand, monsieur,’ the man said in French.
‘Stand, Sharpe,’ Fox muttered. He had taken shelter beside his own armchair, crouching awkwardly, but now unfolded his huge height, his hands outspread to show he had no weapon.
Sharpe also stood and swung the bottle as he did. It crashed into the moustached man’s head hard enough to shatter and the broken glass scored deep bloody cuts across his face. The man howled, dropped his pistol, and swivelled away. Another man levelled a musket at Sharpe, who dropped behind the chair again, took the pistol into his right hand and edged fast about the fallen chair’s right-hand side. He levelled the barrel and fired. The musket fired at the same moment, its smoke filling the room, but Sharpe saw the man stagger back, evidently struck by the bullet.
And at that same moment the window behind him shattered and the shutters bulged inwards until their metal locking bars snapped out of their iron brackets and they burst open to reveal a massive Irishman holding a seven-barrel gun. ‘Through there, Pat!’ Sharpe pointed at the open doors. ‘We want the fellow alive!’ He tossed down his empty pistol and picked up the one dropped by the man whose face he had savaged with glass. He went to the doors, conscious he was in a well-lit room facing men in darkness who could see him while he could not see them. He heard a man panting deeply and suspected that was the man he had shot, but Sharpe wanted Collignon, who had fled. He threw the remaining doors back and saw only the panting man, who had collapsed into another chair. Sharpe snatched up the man’s musket and slammed the butt into his skull.
‘Ouch,’ Harper said.
‘The fellow we want has grey hair and a beard,’ Sharpe said. A door was open and he went through into a hallway. Light came from a room to his right and he ran there to find the maid Charlotte in a kitchen. She screamed when she saw Sharpe.
‘Quiet, girl,’ Sharpe said. ‘Where is Monsieur Collignon?’
Charlotte shivered in fear, but pointed to a door. ‘There, monsieur.’
Sharpe opened the door to see steps going down into a cellar. ‘Monsieur Collignon!’ he called.
Silence.
‘I’ve killed or wounded your two companions. You want me to come down and do the same to you?’ Sharpe called.
The answer was a pistol shot that thumped into the wooden stair beneath Sharpe’s feet. ‘I have more guns!’ Collignon called.
Sharpe looked at Charlotte, who nodded. ‘He keeps his guns down there, monsieur,’ she whispered.
‘How many?’
‘A lot, monsieur!’
The cat Josephine, none the worse for being used as a missile, stalked into the kitchen. ‘Give her some cream,’ Sharpe told the maid, ‘she deserves it.’
Charlotte crossed to a cupboard. Sharpe heard the rattle of a ramrod in a barrel coming from the cellar. He was thinking to hurl himself down the stairs, then turn and shoot before Collignon could react, but if the man did have three or four loaded pistols then such an attack was foolhardy.
Charlotte had taken down a jug draped with a beaded muslin cover and Sharpe saw bottles in the cupboard. ‘What’s that?’
‘Brandy, monsieur.’
‘God save Ireland!’ Harper said. ‘Enough for a battalion!’
‘Put a couple aside, Pat,’ Sharpe said, ‘and bring me the rest.’