“An admirable thing!” Mister Brown added.
“Most admirable,” Mister Belling agreed energetically, “a battlefield commission! Up from the ranks! Why, it’s a-” he paused, trying to think what it was-“it’s a veritable achievement!”
“But it is not”-Mister Brown spoke delicately, his plump hands opening and closing like a butterfly’s wings-“fungible.”
“Precisely.” Mister Selling’s manner exuded relief that his partner had found the exact word to settle the matter. “It is not fungible, Mister Sharpe.”
No one spoke for a few seconds. A coal hissed, rain spattered on the office window and a carter’s whip cracked in the street, which was filled with the rumble, crash and squeal of wagons and carriages.
“Fungible?” Lieutenant Richard Sharpe asked.
“The commission cannot be exchanged for cash,” Mister Belling explained. “You did not buy it, you cannot sell it. You were given it. What the King gives, you may give back but you cannot sell. It is not”-he paused-“fungible.”
“I was told I could sell it!” Sharpe said angrily.
“You were told wrong,” Mister Brown said.
“Misinformed,” Mister Belling added.
“Grievously so,” Mister Brown said, “alas.”
“The regulations are plain,” Mister Belling went on. “An officer who purchases a commission is free to sell it, but a man awarded a commission is not. I wish it were otherwise.”
“We both do!” Mister Brown said.
“But I was told… ”
“You were told wrong,” Mister Belling snapped, then wished he had not spoken so brusquely for Lieutenant Sharpe started forward in his chair as though he was going to attack the two men.
Sharpe checked himself. He looked from the plump Mister Brown to the scrawny Mister Belling. “So there’s nothing you can do?”
Mister Belling stared at the smoke-browned ceiling for a few seconds as though seeking inspiration, then shook his head. “There is nothing we can do,” he pronounced, “but you might apply to His Majesty’s government for a dispensation. I’ve not heard of such a course ever being followed, but an exception might be made?” He sounded very dubious. “There are senior officers, perchance, who would speak for you?”
Sharpe said nothing. He had saved Sir Arthur Wellesley’s life in India, but he doubted whether the General would help him now. All Sharpe wanted was to sell his commission, take the œ550 and get out of the army. But it seemed he could not sell his rank because he had not bought it.
“Such an appeal would take time,” Mister Brown warned him, “and I would not be sanguine about the outcome, Mister Sharpe. You are asking the government to set a precedent and governments are chary of precedents.”
“Indeed they are,” Belling said, “and so they should be. Though in your case… ?” He smiled, raised his eyebrows, then sat back.
“In my case?” Sharpe asked, puzzled.
“I would not be sanguine,” Mister Brown repeated.
“You’re saying I’m buggered?” Sharpe asked.
“We are saying, Mister Sharpe, that we cannot assist you.” Mister Brown spoke severely for he had been’offended by Sharpe’s language. “Alas.”
Sharpe gazed at the two men. Take them both down, he thought. Two minutes of bloody violence and then strip their pockets bare. The bastards must have money. And he had three shillings and threepence halfpenny in his pouch. That was it. Three shillings and threepence halfpenny.
But it was not Brown or Beijing’s fault that he could not sell his commission. It was the rules. The regulations. The rich could make more money and the poor could go to hell. He stood, and the clatter of his saber scabbard on the chair made Mister Brown wince. Sharpe draped a damp greatcoat round his shoulders, crammed a shako onto his unruly hair and picked up his pack. “Good day,” he said curtly, then ducked out of the door, letting in a gust of unseasonably cold air and rain.
Mister Belling let out a great sigh of relief. “You know who that was, Mister Brown?”
“He announced himself as Lieutenant Sharpe of the 95th Rifles,” Mister Brown said, “and I have no reason to doubt him, do I?”
“The very same officer, Mister Brown, who lived, or should I say cohabited, with the Lady Grace Hale!”
Mister Brown’s eyes widened. “No! I thought she took up with an Ensign!” Mister Belling sighed. “In the Rifles, Mister Brown., there are no ensigns. He is a Second Lieutenant. Lowest of the low!”