“I didn’t want the stripes when I was first offered them,” Sharpe said awkwardly.
Harper shrugged as if to show that Sharpe’s odd admission was of no interest to him.
“I didn’t want to become an officer’s guard dog,” Sharpe went on. “My friends were in the ranks, my enemies were Sergeants and officers.”
That must have touched a sympathetic chord for the
Irishman gave a half-grudging and half-amused grimace.
Sharpe stooped and picked up some pebbles. He flicked one at the white rock and watched it ricochet down the hill. “When we rejoin Battalion they’ll probably put me back in the stores and you can go back to the ranks.” Sharpe said it as a sop to the Irishman’s pride, as a half-promise that Harper would not be forced to keep the white stripes, but he could not keep the resentment from his voice. “Does that satisfy you?”
“Yes, sir.” Harper’s agreement sounded neither heartfelt nor bitter, merely the acknowledgement of a wary truce.
“You don’t have to like me,” Sharpe said, “but just remember I was fighting battles when this Battalion was still being formed. When you were growing up, I was carrying a musket. And I’m still alive. And I haven’t stayed alive by being fair, but by being good. And if we’re going to survive this shambles, Harper, we’ve all got to be good.”
“We are good. Major Vivar said so.” Harper spoke defensively.
“We’re half-good,” Sharpe spoke with a sudden intensity, “but we’re going to be the bloody best. We’re going to be the cocks of the dirtiest dunghill in Europe. We’re going to make the French shiver to think of us. We’re going to be good!”
Harper’s eyes were unreadable; as cold and hard as the stones of the hillside, but there was a stirring of interest in his voice now. “And you need me to do it?”
“Yes, I do. Not to be a bloody lapdog. Your job is to fight for the men. Not like Williams, who wanted you all to like him, but by making them good. That way we all stand a chance of going home when this war’s over. You want to see Ireland again, don’t you?”
“Aye, I do.”
“Well, you won’t see it again if you fight against your own side as well as the bloody French.”
Harper blew out a great breath, almost in exasperation. It was plain he had accepted the stripes, however reluctantly, because Vivar had pressed them on him. Now, with equal reluctance, he was being half-persuaded by Sharpe. “A good few of us will never see home,” he said guardedly, “not if we go to this cathedral for the Major.”
“You think we shouldn’t go?” Sharpe asked with genuine curiosity.
Harper considered. He was not weighing what answer he should give, for his mind was already made up, but rather what tone he should use. He could be surly, thus ensuring that Sharpe knew of his continuing hostility, or he could match Sharpe’s conciliatory manner. He chose neither, but rather spoke in a flat and dutiful voice. “I think we should go, sir.”
“To see a saint on a white horse?”
Again the Irishman teetered between his choices. He stared at the stark horizon, then shrugged as he chose his new course. “It never does to question a miracle, sir. You just take the guts and belly out of it and you’re left with nothing at all.”
Sharpe heard the acquiescence, and knew his price was being paid. Harper would co-operate, but Sharpe wanted that co-operation to be willing. He wanted their fragile truce to become more than an agreement of convenience. “You’re a good Catholic?” he asked, wondering just what sort of a man his new Sergeant was.
“I’m not so devout as the Major, sir. Not many are, are they?” Harper paused. He was making his peace with Sharpe, but there would be no formal declaration of hostility’s end, nor any regrets about the past, but rather a new beginning that must find its halting start on this cold hillside. Both men were too proud for apology, so apologies must be forgotten. “Religion’s for the women, so it is,” Harper went on, “but I make my nod to the Church when I must, and I hope God’s not looking when I don’t want Him to see what I’m doing. But I believe, aye.”