Free Flashman in the Peninsula by Robert Brightwell Page B

had overdone it but Downie never suspected a thing. ‘No, of course we can stop Doherty if you’re in pain. I had no idea you had fallen this morning or I would have asked how you were.’ He turned to me, ‘You are a good man, Thomas, to keep an eye on the men’s welfare like that, I should have done better.’
    ‘It was nothing,’ I brushed the praise aside. ‘Now why don’t we ride to the end of the forest ahead of us to see what lies beyond. We can leave the men to set up camp,’ and here I looked meaningfully over my shoulder, ‘as well as forage anything for the pot.’ The men grinned back conspiratorially as I spurred ahead with Downie. In a short while we were winding our way through the forest on the path and I asked about his navigation. ‘Are you sure we are near Alcantara? I have lost my bearings a bit and we haven’t seen the sun for days with this low cloud.’
    ‘Oh yes,’ he looked rather pleased with himself as he added, ‘there are signs you can look out for to help when the sun cannot be seen. For example, moss normally grows on the south side of tree trunks to get the most sunshine, so you can use that as a guide.’ I had never heard this before but looked around and what little moss I could see was scattered on several different sides of the trunks.
    ‘Do you think it would be a good idea to ask for directions tomorrow,’ I asked. ‘Just to confirm what the moss is telling you.’
    ‘I suppose we could,’ he agreed. ‘But I am not sure that I would trust those villagers.’
    It would be a damn sight more reliable than your moss, I thought. You will not be surprised to learn that Downie had got it wrong. A few years later I discovered that moss normally grows on the north side of a tree’s bark. But an old trapper on the Ottawa River in Canada told me that you have to study a hundred trees to get an accurate indication of north as other things such as the direction of rivers and hills also affect the moss.
    We rode back to camp and to Downie’s surprise and my delight a pig was roasting over the fire.
    ‘Trooper Chapman caught a wild pig while out foraging,’ Sergeant Butterworth explained with a straight face to Downie. ‘We can keep the eggs to give us supplies for another day, sir.’
    ‘Yes,’ cried Downie, grinning. ‘And as it is a wild pig we don’t have to pay for it.’
    There is nothing like the smell of roast pork to build up an appetite and it was the first fresh meat we had enjoyed in days. A few hours later and we were settling down for the night, comfortably full, when one of the troopers on guard duty warned that a party from the nearby village was approaching. There were about a dozen of them, ten men armed with scythes, billhooks and a few muskets, a priest and an old woman. A number of our men gathered at the edge of our camp to face them, several having taken the short barrelled carbine muskets from the holsters in their saddles first, in case there was trouble. Most of the villagers stopped a hundred yards down the hill and just the priest and the old woman came on. As I spoke the best Spanish, and to stop Downie discovering where the pig had really come from, I volunteered to go down to greet them.
    ‘What can we do for you?’ I asked them in a friendly tone. The old woman, who had a spectacularly hairy wart on her chin, glanced nervously to the priest.
    ‘We have come to seek payment for the pig,’ he replied calmly, while his eyes darted over my shoulder to look at the troopers standing behind me.
    ‘Did you ask the French for payment when they came this way?’ I asked.
    ‘No señor ,’ the priest smiled. ‘The French did not sneak into the village like your man. They marched in, took what and who they wanted and killed anyone that got in the way. You are riding west, to fight the French I think. We hope you will be different. It is a poor village and we cannot afford to lose a pig without trying for payment.
    ‘Let me have a word with our