Sharpe's Triumph: Richard Sharpe and the Battle of Assaye, September 1803

by Bernard Cornwell

  “No, sir.”

  “An Irishman, Sergeant, and not even a soldier! George was an illiterate seaman out of the gutters of Dublin, and before he drank himself to death, poor man, he’d become the Begum Somroo’s general. I think he was her lover, too, but that ain’t any distinction with that particular lady, but before he died George needed a whole herd of elephants to haul his gold about. And why? Because the Indian princes, Sergeant, need our skills. Equip yourself with a good European and you win your wars. I captured seventy-two guns at the battle of Malpura and I demanded the weight of one of those guns in pure gold as my reward. I got it, too. In ten years you could be as rich as you want, rich as Benoît de Boigne. You must have heard of him?”

  “No, sir.”

  “He was a Savoyard, Sergeant, and in just four years he made a hundred thousand pounds and then he went off home and married a seventeen-year-old girl fresh from her father’s castle. In only four years! From being a captain in Savoy’s army to being governor of half Scindia’s territory. There’s a fortune to be made here and rank and birth don’t come into it. Only ability counts. Nothing but ability.” Pohlmann paused, his eyes on Sharpe. “I’ll make you a lieutenant tomorrow, Sergeant, and you can fight in my compoo, and if you’re any damn good then you’ll be a captain by month’s end.” Sharpe looked at the Hanoverian, but said nothing. Pohlmann smiled. “What are your chances of getting a commission in the British army?”

  Sharpe grinned. “No chance, sir.”

  “So? I offer you rank, wealth and as many bibbis as you can handle.”

  “Is that why Mister Dodd deserted, sir?”

  Pohlmann smiled. “Major Dodd deserted, Sharpe, because he faces execution for murder, and because he’s sensible, and because he wants my job. Not that he’ll admit to that.” The Hanoverian twisted in the howdah. “Major Dodd!” he shouted.

  The Major urged his awkward horse to the elephant’s side and looked up into the howdah. “Sir?”

  “Sergeant Sharpe wants to know why you joined us.”

  Dodd gave Sharpe a suspicious look, but then shrugged. “I ran because there’s no future in the Company,” he said. “I was a lieutenant for twenty-two years, Sergeant, twenty-two years! It don’t matter to the Company how good a soldier you are, you have to wait your turn, and all the while I watched wealthy young fools buying themselves majorities in the King’s ranks and I had to bow and scrape to the useless bastards. Yes, sir, no, sir, three bloody bags full, sir, and can I carry your bags, sir, and wipe your arse, sir.” Dodd had been getting angrier and angrier as he spoke, but now made an effort to control himself. “I couldn’t join the King’s army, Sergeant, because my father runs a grist mill in Suffolk and there ain’t no money to buy a King’s commission. That meant I was only fit for the Company, and King’s officers treat Company men like dirt. I can outfight twenty of the bastards, but ability don’t count in the Company. Keep your nose clean, wait your turn, then die for the shareholders when the Court of Directors tells you.” He was becoming angry again. “That’s why,” he finished curtly.

  “And you, Sergeant?” Pohlmann asked. “What opportunities will the army offer you?”

  “Don’t know, sir.”

  “You do know,” Pohlmann said, “you do know.” The elephant had stopped and the Hanoverian now pointed ahead and Sharpe saw that they had come to the edge of a wood, and a half-mile away was a great city with walls like those the Scots had climbed at Ahmednuggur. The city walls were bright with flags, while its embrasures glinted with the reflection of sunlight from gun barrels. “That’s Aurungabad,” Pohlmann said, “and everyone inside those walls is pissing themselves in fear that I’m about to start a siege.”

  “But you’re not?”

  “I’m looking for Wellesley,” Pohlmann said, “and you know why? Because I’ve never lost a battle, Sharpe, and I’m going to add a British major-general’s sword to my trophies. Then I’ll build myself a palace, a bloody great marble palace, and I’ll line the halls with British guns and hang British colors to shield my bedroom from the sun and I’ll bounce my bibbis on a mattress stuffed with the hair of British horses.” Pohlmann luxuriated in that dream for a while and then, with a last glance at the city, ordered the mahout to turn the elephant about. “When is McCandless leaving?” he asked Sharpe.

  “Tonight, sir.”

  “After dark?”

  “Around midnight, sir, I think.”

  “That gives you plenty of time to think, Sergeant. To think of your future. To contemplate what the red coat offers you, and what I offer you. And when you have thought about those things, come to me.”

  “I’m thinking on it, sir,” Sharpe said, “I’m thinking on it.” And he was.

  CHAPTER•6

  Colonel McCandless excused himself from Pohlmann’s supper, but did not forbid Sharpe to attend. “But don’t get drunk,” he warned the Sergeant, “and be at my tent at midnight. I want to be back at the River Godavery by dawn.”

  “Yes, sir,” Sharpe said dutifully, then went to Pohlmann’s tent where most of the compoo’s officers had gathered. Dodd was there, and so were a half-dozen wives of Pohlmann’s European officers and among them was Simone Joubert, though there was no sign of her husband. “He is in charge of the army picquets tonight,” Simone explained when Sharpe asked her, “and Colonel Pohlmann invited me to eat.”

  “He invited me to join his army,” Sharpe told her.

  “He did?” Her eyes widened as she stared up from her chair. “And will you?”

  “It would mean I’d be close to you, Ma’am,” Sharpe said, “and that’s an inducement.”

  Simone half smiled at the clumsy gallantry. “I think you would not be a good soldier if you changed your loyalty for a woman, Sergeant.”

  “He says I’ll be an officer,” Sharpe said.

  “And is that what you want?”

  Sharpe squatted on his heels so that he could be closer to her. The other European wives saw him crouch and pursed their mouths with a disapproval born of envy, but Sharpe was oblivious of their gaze. “I think I’d like to be an officer, yes. And I can think of one very good reason to be an officer in this army.”

  Simone blushed. “I am a married woman, Sergeant. You know that.”

  “But even married women need friends,” Sharpe said, and just then a large hand took unceremonious hold of his clubbed hair and hauled him to his feet.

  Sharpe turned belligerently on whoever had manhandled him, then saw that it was a smiling Major Dodd. “Can’t have you stooping to women, Sharpe,” Dodd said before offering an ungainly bow to Simone. “Good evening, Madame.”

  “Major,” Simone acknowledged him coldly.

  “You will forgive me, Madame, if I steal Sergeant Sharpe from you?” Dodd asked. “I want a word with him. Come on, Sharpe.” He plucked Sharpe’s arm, guiding him across the tent. The Major was very slightly drunk and evidently intent on becoming more drunk for he snatched a whole jug of arrack from a servant, then scooped up two beakers from a table. “Fancy Madame Joubert, do you?” he asked Sharpe.

  “I like her well enough, sir.”

  “She’s spoken for, Sergeant. Remember that if you join us, she’s spoken for.”

  “You mean she’s married, sir?”

  “Married?” Dodd laughed, then poured the arrack and gave one beaker to Sharpe. “How many European officers can you see here? And how many European women? And how many of them are young and pretty like Madame Joubert? Work it out, lad. And you’re not jumping the queue.” Dodd smiled as he spoke, evidently meaning his tone to be jocular. “But you are joining us, aren’t you?”

  “I’m thinking about it, sir.”

  “You’ll be in my regiment, Sharpe,” Dodd said. “I need European officers. I’ve only got Joubert and he’s no damn use, so I’ve spoken with Pohlmann and he says you can join my Cobras. I’ll give you three companies of your own to look after, and God help you if they’re not kept in prime condition. I like to look after the men
, because come battle they look after you, but God help any officer who lets me down.” He paused to drink half his arrack and pour some more. “I’ll work you hard, Sharpe, I’ll work you damned hard, but there’ll be plenty of gold washing around this army once we’ve thrashed Boy Wellesley. Money’s your reward, lad, money.”

  “Is that why you’re here, sir?”

  “It’s why we’re all here, you fool. All except Joubert, who was posted here by his government and is too damned timid to help himself to Scindia’s gold. So report to me in the morning. We’re marching north tomorrow night, which means you’ll have one day to learn my ropes and after that you’re Mister Sharpe, gentleman. Come to me tomorrow morning, Sharpe, at dawn, and get rid of that damned red coat.” He poked Sharpe’s chest hard. “I see a red coat,” he went on, “and I want to start killing.” He grinned, showing yellow teeth.

  “Is that what happened at Chasalgaon, sir?” Sharpe asked.

  Dodd’s grin vanished. “Why the hell do you ask that?” he growled.

  Sharpe had asked because he had been remembering the massacre, and wondering if he could ever serve under a man who had ordered such a killing, but he said none of that. He shrugged instead. “I heard tales, sir, but no one ever tells us anything proper. You know that, sir, so I just wondered what happened there.”

  Dodd considered that answer for a moment, then shrugged. “I didn’t take prisoners, Sharpe, that’s what happened. Killed the bastards to the last man.”

  And to the last boy, Sharpe thought, remembering Davi Lal. He remained impassive, not letting a hint of memory or hate show. “Why not take prisoners, sir?”

  “Because it’s war!” Dodd said vehemently. “When men fight me, Sergeant, I want them to fear me, because that way the battle’s half won before it’s started. It ain’t kind, I’m sure, but who ever said war was kind? And in this war, Sergeant”—he waved his hand towards the officers clustering about Colonel Pohlmann—“it’s dog eat dog. We’re all in competition, and you know who’ll win? The most ruthless, that’s who. So what did I do at Chasalgaon? I made sure of a reputation, Sharpe. Made a name for myself. That’s the first rule of war, Sergeant. Make the bastards fear you. And you know what the second rule is?”

  “Don’t ask questions, sir?”

  Dodd grinned. “No, lad, the second rule is never to reinforce failure, and the third, lad, is to look after your men. You know why I had that goldsmith thrashed? You’ve heard of that, haven’t you? I’ll tell you. It wasn’t because he’d cheated me, which he did, but because he cheated some of my men. So I looked after them and let them give him a solid kicking, and the bastard died. Which he deserved to do, rich fat bastard that he was.” The Major turned and scowled at the servants bringing dishes from Pohlmann’s cook tent. “And they’re just as bad here, Sharpe. Look at all that food! Enough to feed two regiments there, Sharpe, and the men are going hungry. No proper supply system, see? It costs money, that’s why. You don’t get issued food in this army, you go out and steal it.” He plainly disapproved. “I’ve told Pohlmann, I have. Lay on a commissary, I said, but he won’t, because it costs money. Scindia hoards food in his fortresses, but he won’t issue it, not unless he’s paid, and Pohlmann won’t give up a penny of profit, so no food ever comes. It just rots in the warehouses while we have to keep moving, because after a week we’ve stripped one set of fields bare and have to go on to the next. It’s no bloody way to run an army.”

  “Maybe one day you’ll change the system, sir,” Sharpe said.

  “I will!” Dodd said vigorously. “I bloody will! And if you’ve any sense, lad, you’ll be here helping me. You learn one thing as a miller’s son, Sergeant, and that’s not just how to grind corn, but that a fool and his money are easily parted. And Scindia’s a fool, but given a chance I’ll make the bugger into the Emperor of India.” He turned as a servant beat a gong with a muffled stick. “Time for our vittles.”

  It was a strangely subdued supper, though Pohlmann did his best to amuse his company. Sharpe had tried to maneuver himself into a seat beside Simone, but Dodd and a Swedish captain beat him to it and Sharpe found himself next to a small Swiss doctor who spent the whole meal quizzing Sharpe about the religious arrangements in British regiments. “Your chaplains are godly men, yes?”

  “Drunken bastards, sir, most of them.”

  “Surely not!”

  “I hauled two of them out of a whorehouse not a month ago, sir. They didn’t want to pay, see?”

  “You are not telling me the truth!”

  “God’s honor, sir. The Reverend Mister Cooper was one of them, and it’s a rare Sunday that he’s sober. He preached a Christmas sermon at Easter, he was that puzzled.”

  Most of the guests left early, Dodd among them, though a few diehards stayed on to give the Colonel a game of cards. Pohlmann grinned at Sharpe. “You wager, Sharpe?”

  “I’m not rich enough, sir.”

  Pohlmann shook his head in mock exasperation at the answer. “I will make you rich, Sharpe. You believe me?”

  “I do, sir.”

  “So you’ve made up your mind? You’re joining me?”

  “I still want to think a bit, sir.”

  Pohlmann shrugged. “You have nothing to think about. You either become a rich man or you die for King George.”

  Sharpe left the remaining officers at their cards and walked away into the encampment. He really was thinking, or trying to think, and he sought a quiet place, but a crowd of soldiers were wagering on dog fights, and their cheers, as well as the yelps and snarls of the dogs, carried far through the darkness. Sharpe settled on an empty stretch of ground close to the picketed camels that carried Pohlmann’s supply of rockets, and there he lay and stared up at the stars through the mist of smoke. A million stars. He had always thought there was an answer to all life’s mysteries in the stars, yet whenever he stared at them the answer slipped out of his grasp. He had been whipped in the foundling home for staring at a clear night’s sky through the workshop skylight. “You ain’t here to gawp at the dark, boy,” the overseer had snapped, “you’re here to labor,” and the whip had slashed down across his shoulders and he had dutifully looked down at the great tarry lump of hemp rope that had to be picked apart. The old ropes had been twisted and tightened and tarred into vast knots bigger than Sharpe himself, and they had been used as fenders on the London docks, but when the grinding and thumping of the big ships had almost worn the old fenders through they were sent to the foundling home to be picked apart so that the strands could be sold as furniture, stuffing or to be mixed into wall plaster. “Got to learn a trade, boy,” the master had told him again and again, and so Sharpe had learned a trade, but it was not hemp-picking. He learned the killing trade. Load a musket, ram a musket, fire a musket. And he had not done much of it, not yet, but he liked doing it. He remembered Malavelly, remembered firing the volley at the approaching enemy, and he remembered the sheer exultation as all his unhappiness and anger had been concentrated into his musket’s barrel and been gouted out in one explosive rush of flame, smoke and lead.

  He did not think of himself as unhappy. Not now. The army had been good to him in these last years, but there was still something wrong in his soul. What that was, he did not know, because Sharpe did not reckon he was any good at thinking. He was good at action, for whenever there was a problem to be solved Sergeant Sharpe could usually find the solution, but he was not much use at simply thinking. But he had to think now, and he stared at the smoke-dimmed stars in the hope that they would help him, but all they did was go on shining. Lieutenant Sharpe, he thought, and was surprised to realize that he saw nothing very odd in that idea. It was ridiculous, of course. Richard Sharpe, an officer? But somehow he could not shake the idea loose. It was a laughable idea, he tried to convince himself; at least in the British army it was, but not here. Not in Pohlmann’s army, and Pohlmann had once been a sergeant. “Bloody hell,” he said aloud, and a camel belched in answer.

  The cheers of t
he spectators greeted the death of a dog, and, nearer, a soldier was playing one of the strange Indian instruments, plucking its long strings to make a sad, plangent music. In the British camp, Sharpe thought, they would be singing, but no one was singing here. They were too hungry, though hunger did not stop a man from fighting. It had never stopped Sharpe. So these hungry men could fight, and they needed officers, and all he had to do was stand up, brush the dirt away and stroll across to Pohlmann’s tent and become Lieutenant Sharpe. Mister Sharpe. And he would do a good job. He knew that. Better than Morris, better than most of the army’s junior officers. He was a good sergeant, a bloody good sergeant, and he enjoyed being a sergeant. He got respect, not just because of the stripes on his red sleeves, and not just because he had been the man who blew the mine at Seringapatam, but because he was good and tough. He wasn’t frightened of making a decision, and that was the key to it, he reckoned. And he enjoyed making decisions, and he enjoyed the respect that decisiveness brought him, and he realized he had been seeking respect all his life. Christ, he thought, but would it not be a joy to walk back into the foundling home with braid on his coat, gold on his shoulders and a sword at his side? That was the respect he wanted, from the bastards in Brewhouse Lane who had said he would never amount to anything and who had whipped him bloody because he was a bastard off the streets. By Christ, he thought, but going back there would make life perfect! Brewhouse Lane, him in a braided coat and a sword, and with Simone on his arm and a dead king’s jewels about her neck, and them all touching their hats and bobbing like ducks in a pond. Perfect, he thought, just perfect, and as he indulged himself in that dream an angry shout came from the tents close to Pohlmann’s marquee and an instant later a gun sounded.

  There was a moment’s pause after the gunshot, as if its violence had checked a drunken fight, then Sharpe heard men laughing and the sound of hoofbeats. He was standing now, staring towards the big marquee. The horses went by quite close to him, then the noise of their hooves receded into the dark. “Come back!” a man shouted in English, and Sharpe recognized McCandless’s voice.