“I’ll have Orrock incline right to give your sepoys room,” he promised Wallace, ‘and I’m putting your own regiment on Orrock’s right flank.” Wallace, because he was commanding the brigade, would not lead his own Highlanders who would be under the command of his deputy, Major Swinton. Colonel McCandless had joined his friend Wallace, and Wellesley greeted him.
“I see your man holds their left, McCandless.”
“So I’ve seen, sir.”
“But I don’t wish to tangle with him early on. He’s hard by the village and they’ve made it a stronghold, so we’ll take the right of their line, then swing north and pin the rest against the Juah. You’ll get your chance, McCandless, get your chance.”
I’m depending on it, sir,” McCandless answered. The Colonel nodded a mute greeting to Sharpe, who then had to follow Wellesley to the ranks of the 74th.
“You’ll oblige me, Swinton,” Wellesley said, ‘by doubling your fellows to the right and taking station beyond Colonel Orrock’s picquets. You’re to form the new right flank. I’ve told Colonel Orrock to move somewhat to his right, so you’ll have a good way to go to make your new position. You understand?”
“Perfectly, sir,” Swinton said.
“Orrock will incline right and we double round behind him to form the new flank and sepoys replace us here.”
“Good man!” Wellesley said, then rode on to Colonel Orrock. Sharpe guessed that the General had ordered the 74th to move outside Orrock because he did not trust the nervous Colonel to hold the right flank.
Orrock’s contingent of half companies was a small but potent force, but it lacked the cohesion of the men’s parent battalions.
“You’re to lead them right wards Wellesley told the red-faced Colonel, ‘but not too far. You comprehend? Not too far right! Because you’ll find a defended village on your front right flank and it’s a brute. I don’t want any of our men near it until we’ve sent the enemy infantry packing.”
“I go right?” Orrock asked.
“You incline right,” Wellesley said, ‘then straighten up. Two hundred paces should do it. Incline right, Orrock, give the line two hundred paces more width, then straighten and march straight for the enemy.
Swinton will be bringing his men onto your right flank. Don’t wait for him, let him catch you, and don’t hesitate when we attack. Just go straight in with the bayonet.”
Orrock jutted his head, scratched his chin and blinked.
“I go right wards
“Then straight ahead,” Wellesley said patiently.
“Yes, sir,” Orrock said, then jerked nervously as one of his small six-pounder cannon, which had been deployed fifty yards in front of his line, fired.
“What the devil?” Wellesley asked, turning to look at the small gun that had leaped back five or six yards. He could not see what the gun had fired at, for the smoke of the discharge made a thick cloud in front of the muzzle, but a second later an enemy round shot screamed through the smoke, twitching it, to bounce between two of Orrock’s half companies. Wellesley cantered to his left to see that the enemy guns had opened fire. For the moment they were merely sending ranging shots, but soon the guns would be pouring their metal at the red ranks.
The General cantered back southwards. It was close to mid afternoon now and the sun was burning the world white. The air was humid, hard to breathe, and every man in the British line was sweating. The enemy round shot bounced on the ground in front of them, and one shot ricocheted up to churn a file of sepoys into blood and bone. The sound of the enemy cannon was harsh, banging over the warm ground in successive punches that came closer and closer together as more guns joined the cannonade. The British guns replied, and the smoke of their discharges betrayed their positions, and the enemy gunners levered their pieces to aim at the British cannon which, hugely outnumbered, were having by far the worst of the exchange. Sharpe saw the earth around one six-pounder struck again and again by enemy round shot, each strike kicking up a barrow-load of soil, and then the small gun seemed to disintegrate as a heavy ball struck it plumb on the front of its carriage.