Sharpe 3-Book Collection 5: Sharpe's Company, Sharpe's Sword, Sharpe's Enemy

by Bernard Cornwell

  ‘Yes, sir.’ A Sergeant of the Fusiliers backed from Sharpe’s anger.

  Sharpe looked at Harper. ‘I could do with some lunch.’

  ‘I’ll take that as an order, sir.’

  ‘No! I was just talking.’

  Harper nevertheless followed Pot-au-Feu towards the Castle kitchens and Sharpe walked up onto the rubble of the eastern wall and smelt the smell of burned flesh. A miserable battle against a miserable enemy, and worse, a battle that need not have been fought. If the watchtower had been taken then the bodies that still littered the wide breach would not need to be here. The thought made him angry and he turned on a Captain of the Fusiliers who was clambering over the blackened stones. ‘Hasn’t anyone thought to bury these men?’

  ‘Sir? Oh. I’ll attend to it, sir. Major Sharpe?’

  ‘Yes.’

  The Captain saluted. ‘Captain Brooker, sir. Grenadier Company.’ Brooker was nervous.

  ‘Well?’

  ‘Colonel Kinney’s dead, sir.’

  ‘Oh, I’m sorry.’ Sharpe truly was. He had liked Kinney in the short time he had known him, and he remembered the Welshman saying what a tragedy it would be if any man was to die on this Christmas Day. ‘I am sorry, Captain.’

  ‘He was a good man, sir. Major Ford’s dead too, sir.’

  ‘Jesus!‘

  ‘Brooker shrugged. ‘In the back, sir. Shot.’

  ‘Unpopular?’

  Brooker nodded miserably. ‘Very, sir.’

  ‘It happens.’ It did too, though no one liked to admit it. Sharpe had once heard a Captain, knowing his unpopularity, appeal to his men before battle to let the enemy kill him. They had granted him his wish.

  Then Sharpe remembered. Ford had been the only Major with the Fusiliers, the second Major being on leave, and that meant Sharpe was senior officer. Except for Farthingdale. ‘Have you seen Sir Augustus?’

  ‘No, sir.’

  ‘Are you senior Captain?’

  Brooker nodded. ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘Then I want one Company back in the Convent, and I want another sent to the watchtower, understand?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘You’ll find Riflemen there as well. And send someone to get those damned fools over here.’ Sharpe pointed to the Rocket Troop who were wandering curiously towards the village.

  ‘The prisoners, sir?’

  ‘In the dungeons, once they’re cleared up. Bring the ones from the Convent here, too. Strip them all.’

  ‘Sir?’

  ‘Strip them. Take their bloody uniforms off. They’ve disgraced them. And naked men find it hard to escape in this weather.’

  Brooker nodded unhappily. ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘And get these men buried! You can use prisoners. They. can stay dressed if they’re working outside. Do you have a surgeon with the Battalion?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘Put him to work in the Convent. Move the wounded there.’ Sharpe turned to look at the first two squads of Frederickson’s Company going over the stones towards the watchtower five hundred yards away. Thank God for Riflemen. ‘Carry on, Captain. Then come and find me. We’re bound to have forgotten something.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  Farthingdale. Where the hell was Farthingdale? Sharpe walked through the scattered stones towards the spot where he had seen the Colonel fall, but there was no red, gold and black uniform among the dead. Nor was Sir Augustus’ big bay horse lying in its own blood. Perhaps the Colonel still lived, in which case he was in command here, but where the hell was he?

  A Lieutenant led another dozen Riflemen over the stones, but there were still some Greenjackets on the ramparts of the keep for a bugle suddenly startled the valley, a bugle blown from the topmost stone of the Castle, a bugle that sounded two quick calls. The first was nine notes long, the second just eight. ‘We have discovered the enemy’. ‘The enemy is cavalry’.

  Sharpe stared at the ramparts. A face leaned out of an embrasure and Sharpe cupped his hands. ‘Where?’

  A hand pointed eastwards.

  ‘What are they?’

  ‘Lancers! French!’

  Another enemy had come to the Gateway of God.

  Chapter 14

  There was one priority in Sharpe’s head, just one, and he ran towards the Convent, arms waving, voice bellowing. ‘Captain Gilliland! Captain Gilliland!’

  He pounded over the road and saw with relief that the horses were still in the traces of the carts. ‘Get them moving! Hurry!’

  ‘Sir?’ Gilliland was running from the Convent’s door.

  ‘Get this troop moving! Hurry! Into the Castle. Push that bloody cart aside, but hurry!’ Sharpe pointed to the ox cart that blocked the main gate of the Castle. Gilliland was still gaping at him. ‘For Christ’s sake, move!’

  Sharpe looked at the artillerymen spread up the valley towards the village. He cupped his hands. ‘Gunners!’

  He chivvied them, snapped at them, turned horses himself, and gradually the sense of urgency communicated itself to the men who had thought Christmas Day a day of rest. ‘Move, you bastards! It’s not a bloody funeral! Whip it up, man! Move!’

  He was not fearing an attack by French cavalry. He guessed that the men on the keep had seen the advance scouts of a French force that had been sent to do what he had done last night; rescue the hostages. Now the three horsemen seen in the dawn made sense; they had been a patrol who had discovered that the work had been done for them, and doubtless the French now hoped to recover their own hostages under a flag of truce, but Sharpe still did not want them to see the strange carts and portable forge of the Rocket Troop. Perhaps he was right, and there would be no fight, or perhaps he was wrong. In which case the rockets, bundled inside their special cases on the long carts, would be the one surprise he could spring in this high valley. ‘Move it!’ Even if the French did see the carts they would have no idea of their purpose, but Sharpe wanted to take no chances. They would know there was something odd at the western end of the valley, and that something would give them caution. Surprise would be diluted.

  Sharpe ran with the leading cart and bellowed at Fusiliers. ‘Clear that gate! Hurry!’

  Frederickson, reliable Frederickson, pushed past the men struggling with the cart. ‘Lancers, sir. Green uniforms, red facings. There’s only a dozen.’

  ‘Green and red?’

  ‘Imperial Guard, I think. Germans.’

  Sharpe looked towards the village, but could see nothing. The valley floor fell beyond Adrados before turning right, turning south, and if he could not see them then they could not see the odd carts that were at last moving behind him into the Castle courtyard. German lancers. Men recruited from the duchies and small kingdoms that had allied themselves to Napoleon. There were far more Germans fighting against the Emperor than for him, but they were alike in one thing; they fought as well as any man on a battlefield. Sharpe looked for Gilliland. ‘Hide your men in the stable, d’you hear me? Hide them!‘

  ‘Yes, sir.’ Gilliland was appalled by the sudden urgency. His war, till now, had been a patient matter of angles and theories; suddenly death was just beyond the horizon.

  ‘Where’s your Company?’ Sharpe turned back to the Rifle Captain.

  ‘On their way, sir.’ Frederickson nodded towards the Riflemen threading the thorn bushes. ‘Ten minutes and they’ll all be there.’

  ‘I’ve ordered a Company of Fusiliers up there as well. I’ll send another. Just make sure of one thing.’

  ‘Sir?’

  ‘Your Commission dates before theirs.’

  Frederickson grinned. ‘Yes, sir.’ Whichever Captain had been promoted to the rank first would be in charge of the watchtower garrison, and Sharpe had no wish for this one-eyed fighter to be under anyone’s command but his own. Frederickson would lie for him.

  ‘And William?’ It was the first time he had used his Christian name.

  ‘Try Bill, sir.’

  ‘Assume we’ll have to fight eventually. That me
ans you’ll be holding that hill.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’ Sweet William went happily away with the promise not just of a fight, but his very own personal fight. Some officers hated responsibility, but the best welcomed it, wanted it, and would take it whether it was offered or not.

  Now there were a dozen things for Sharpe to do. A second Company had to be despatched to the watchtower, Riflemen must be sent to the Convent, ammunition must be taken from Gilliland’s carts and distributed as ready magazines about all the positions. He found Cross’s bugler, then two Ensigns of the Fusiliers, and made them into his own messengers, and all the while fools came to him with problems they could have solved without his help. How was food to be taken to the watchtower? What about the packs left in the Convent? The rope that took water from the well in the keep was broken, and Sharpe snapped, cajoled, decided, and all the time watched the village for the first sight of the enemy horsemen.

  Sergeant Harper, stolid and calm, walked to where Sharpe stood on the rubble of the mined wall and in one hand he carried a hunk of bread topped with meat and in the other a skin of wine. ‘Lunch, sir. Bit late.’

  ‘Have you eaten?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  God, he was hungry! It was cold lamb and the butter on the bread was fresh and he bit into it and it tasted like heaven. A Fusilier Sergeant approached and wanted to know if the Castle gate should be blocked again, and Sharpe said no, but to keep the cart close, and then another man asked if they could bury Kinney in the very mouth of the pass where the grave would look for ever out to the green and brown hills of Portugal, and Sharpe said yes, and still the French cavalry loitered out of sight, Frederickson’s men were at the tower, thank God, and Brooker had two Fusilier Companies following him, and Sharpe watched as a third Company set out for the Convent and he began to relax. A start had been made. The wine was cold and harsh.

  He walked into the Castle courtyard and ordered the low wall pulled down and the stones used to block the stairway beside the stables that led to the western ramparts. He finished the lamb, licking the crumbs and grease from his hand, and then there was an imperious shout from the Castle gateway.

  ‘Sharpe! Major Sharpe!’

  Sir Augustus Farthingdale, Josefina mounted sidesaddle beside him, standing his horse in the archway.

  Sir Augustus bloody Farthingdale, looking for all the world as if he was riding in London’s Hyde Park. The only discrepancy was a clean white bandage that showed beneath his hat on his right temple. He was summoning Sharpe with jerks of his riding crop. ‘Sharpe!’

  Sharpe walked to the low wall. ‘Sir?’

  ‘Sharpe. My lady wife would like to see a rocket fired. Be so good as to arrange it.’

  ‘That won’t be possible, sir.’

  Sir Augustus was not a man who liked to be crossed, and certainly not by an inferior officer in front of the love of his life. ‘I think I gave an order, Mr Sharpe. I expect it to be obeyed.’

  Sharpe put his right foot on the wall and the wineskin hung from the hand resting on the knee. ‘If I demonstrated a rocket for Lady Farthingdale, sir, then I am also demonstrating it to the French troops in the village.’

  Josefina squeaked, looking excited, Sir Augustus stared at Sharpe as though the Rifle officer was mad. ‘The what?’

  ‘French troops, sir. In the village.’ Sharpe looked at the ramparts of the keep and shouted. ‘What d’you see?‘

  A Rifleman, from Cross’s Company, bellowed back. ‘Two squadrons Lancers, sir! Battalion of Infantry in sight now, sir!’

  Infantry now! Sharpe twisted to look at the village, but still no French had pushed through the houses and come in sight. Farthingdale moved his horse forward, the hooves loud on the cobbles. ‘Why the devil wasn’t I told, Sharpe?’

  ‘No one knew where you were, sir.’

  ‘God damn it, man, I was with the doctor!’

  ‘Nothing serious I trust, sir?’

  Josefina smiled at Sharpe. ‘Sir Augustus was hit by a stone, Major. In the explosion.’ And Sir Augustus, Sharpe thought, had insisted on the doctor’s attention when there were eviscerated, screaming men who needed it far more.

  ‘God damn it, Sharpe! Why are they in the village?’

  The question, Sharpe decided, really meant why had the French been allowed to reach the village; to which there was an obvious answer, an answer that even the author of ‘Practical Instructions to the Young Officer in the Art of Warfare with Special Reference to the Engagements now Proceeding in Spain’ should have known. The French were in the village because there were not enough troops to hold watchtower, Castle, and Convent, and still fight the French further east. Sharpe chose to read a different meaning into Sir Augustus’s petulant enquiry. ’I imagine they’ve come for the same reason we came, sir. To rescue their hostages.‘

  ‘Are they going to fight?’ Sir Augustus was not happy to ask the question, but he could not help himself. The author of ‘Practical Instructions’ had taken his material entirely from Despatches and from the other books similar to his own, and he was not used to such close proximity to the enemy.

  Sharpe pulled the plug from the wineskin’s neck. ‘I doubt it, sir. Their women are still with us. I expect we’ll get a flag of truce within the half hour. Might I suggest we advise Madame Dubreton that she will be leaving us soon.’

  ‘Yes.’ Farthingdale was craning over Sharpe’s head looking for a glimpse of the enemy. Nothing was yet in sight. ‘Look after it, Sharpe.’

  Sharpe looked after it, and he also sent Harper with a request to Gilliland for the loan of a saddle horse. He had no intention of letting Sir Augustus do all the talking with the enemy, and Sharpe’s trust in the senior officer was not bolstered when he at last took an interest in Sharpe’s preparations. He watched the soldiers dismantling the low wall and frowned. ‘Why did you order that?’

  ‘Because it’s useless as a defence, sir. And anyway, if it comes to a fight I’d rather they got into the courtyard.’

  Farthingdale was speechless for a moment. ‘Into the courtyard?’

  Sharpe wiped wine from his lips, restoppered the bottle, and smiled. ‘A rat-pit, sir. Once inside they’re trapped.’ He made himself sound more confident than he felt.

  ‘But you said they wouldn’t fight.’

  ‘I don’t suppose they will, sir, but we should prepare against the possibility.’ He told Farthingdale of his other precautions, of the garrison in the watchtower, and kept his voice polite. ‘Is there anything else you’d want done, sir?’

  ‘No, Sharpe, no. Carry on!’

  Bloody Farthingdale. Major General Nairn, with his engaging indiscretion, had told Sharpe that Farthingdale had hopes of high command. ‘Nothing dangerous, mind you, Christ no! One of those fancy rooms in the Horse Guards with chocolate soldiers saluting him. Thinks if he writes the right book then they’ll give him the whole army to smarten up.’ Nairn had looked gloomy. ‘They probably will, too.’

  Patrick Harper appeared from the stables leading two horses. He passed close to Sir Augustus and stopped by Sharpe. ‘Horse, sir.’

  ‘I see two.’

  ‘Thought you might like company.’ Harper’s face was tight with annoyance. Sharpe looked at him curiously.

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘D’you hear what the man’s saying?‘

  ‘No.’

  ‘“My victory.” He’s telling her that he won here, so he is. Telling her that he took the Castle. And did you see her? She didn’t even recognize me! Not so much as the time of day!’

  Sharpe grinned, took the reins, and pushed his left foot into a stirrup. ‘She has a fortune to protect, Patrick. Wait till he’s gone, she’ll say hello.’ He pulled himself up. ‘Wait here.’

  He hid his annoyance from Harper, but he was affronted just the same. If Sharpe ever wrote a book like ‘Practical Instructions’, which he would not, then there would be one piece of advice repeated page after page. Always give credit where it is due, however tempting to take it for yo
urself, for the higher a man rises in the army the more he needs the loyalty and support of his inferiors. It was time, Sharpe decided, to puncture Sir Augustus’ self-esteem. He pulled the horse round, walked it to where Farthingdale was pointing up at the Colours and describing the morning as a very satisfying little fight.

  ‘Sir?’

  ‘Major Sharpe?’

  ‘I thought you should have this, sir. For your report.’ Sharpe held out a scruffy, folded scrap of paper.

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘The butcher’s bill, sir.’

  ‘Ah.’ A hand, gloved in fine leather, twitched the paper away and tucked it into his sabretache.

  ‘Aren’t you going to look at it, sir?’

  ‘I was with the doctor, Sharpe. I’ve seen our wounded.’

  ‘I was thinking of the killed, sir. Colonel Kinney, Major Ford, one Captain, and thirty-seven men, sir. Most of those died in the explosion. Wounded, sir. Forty-eight seriously, another twenty-nine not so serious. I’m sorry, sir. Thirty. I’d forgotten yourself.’

  Josefina giggled. Sir Augustus looked at Sharpe as though the Major had just crawled out of a particularly malodorous sewer. ‘Thank you, Major.’

  ‘And my apologies, sir.’

  ‘Apologies?’

  ‘I haven’t had time to shave.’

  Josefina laughed outright and Sharpe, remembering that she had always liked her men to fight, gave her a look of anger. He was not her man, and he was not fighting for her, and then whatever he might have said was interrupted by a trumpet call, insistent and faraway, the tones of a French cavalry instrument.

  ‘Sir!’ The Rifleman on the keep. ‘Four froggies, sir! One of ’em’s got a white flag, sir. Coming this way!‘