Bernard Cornwell – 1807 09 Sharpe’s Prey

Sharpe followed just as Hopper fired his seven-barreled gun inside the room. An enemy’s bullet whipped past Sharpe’s head as he went through the door. He slid on the polished floorboards, crouching as he moved and turning the rifle down the length of the room that was an elegant study with portraits, bookshelves, a desk and a sofa. A man was flopping by the desk, jerking in pain from one of Hopper’s bullets. Another man was by the shuttered window with Clouter’s boarding axe buried in his neck. “There’s a live one behind the desk,” Hopper said.

Sharpe gave his empty volley gun to Hopper. “Reload it,” he said, then he stalked toward the desk. He heard the scrape of a ramrod in a barrel and so knew his enemy was effectively unarmed. He took three more quick steps and saw a man crouching with a half-loaded pistol. Sharpe had hoped to find Lavisser, but the man was no one he recognized. The man looked up and shook his head. “Non, monsieur, non!”

Sharpe fired. The bullet took the man in the skull, fountaining blood across the desk and onto the dying man at Sharpe’s feet.

There was a fourth man in the room. He was naked and tied to a sofa in an alcove, but he was alive, though Sharpe almost gagged when he saw him. He was alive by a miracle, for Ole Skovgaard had been half blinded and tortured and he seemed oblivious of the fight that had filled the room with choking powder smoke.

Clouter, bloodied boarding axe in one big hand, crossed to the sofa and swore softly. Sharpe grimaced at the sight of the empty eye socket, the bloodied mouth and the raw fingertips where the nails had been pulled before the fingers’ bones had been broken. He put down his rifle, took out his clasp knife and sliced the ropes that secured Skovgaard. “Can you hear me?” he asked. “Can you hear me?”

Skovgaard raised a tentative hand. “Lieutenant?” He could hardly speak, for his bloody mouth was toothless.

“We’re taking you home,” Sharpe said, “taking you home.”

Hopper fired a pistol down the stairwell and Clouter went to help him. Skovgaard pointed feebly at the desk and Sharpe crossed to it and saw a pile of papers spattered with the blood of the man he had just shot. There were names on the sheets, names and names, a list of the correspondents that London wanted protected. Hans Bischoff in Bremen, Josef Gruber in Hanover, Carl Friederich of Konigsberg. There were Russian names, Prussian names, seven pages of names and Sharpe snatched the papers up and thrust them into a pocket. Clouter fired down the stairs. Hopper had reloaded one of the seven-barreled guns and now shouldered Clouter aside, but it seemed no one was threatening for he held his fire.

There were velvet curtains hanging inside the closed shutters. Sharpe seized one and tugged hard, ripping it from its hoops. He wrapped the naked Skovgaard in the red velvet, then lifted him. Skovgaard moaned in pain. “You’re going home,” Sharpe said. Smoke was coming up the stairwell. “Who’s down there?” Sharpe asked Clouter.

“Two men. Maybe three.”

“We’ve got to go down,” Sharpe said, “and out of the front door.” He had not seen Lavisser or Barker.

Hopper was loading the second seven-barreled gun. He had given the first to Clouter. Sharpe could hear the flames downstairs. Bombs were detonating to the west. A maid, eyes wide with terror, ran down the stairs. She seemed not to notice the men in the study door, but just vanished round the half landing. There was a shot from the hallway and the maid screamed. “Jesus Christ,” Sharpe swore.

Hopper had four of the barrels loaded and decided they were enough. “Do we go?”

“Go,” Sharpe said.

Clouter and Hopper went first, then Sharpe carried Skovgaard after them. The two seamen jumped to the half landing and both fired their guns straight down into the smoke that filled the hallway. Sharpe went more slowly, trying to ignore Skovgaard’s soft moans. The maid was lying beside the banisters, blood streaking her gown. Another body lay beside a table in the hall while flames were flickering at the door which led down to the kitchen. The front door was open and Clouter led the way out. Sharpe shouted a warning that Lavisser’s men might be waiting in the street, but the only folk there were neighbors who believed the fire and smoke had been caused by British bombs. One of the woman looked alarmed at the sight of the two huge men who burst from the door with their guns, then a murmur of sympathy sounded when the crowd saw Skovgaard in Sharpe’s arms.

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