Where the defences would have been alerted. Now the fear had time to surge back, and it was made worse because Sharpe saw how the French had pulled down the houses nearest the old wall so that the guards behind the barricades would have a clear field of fire.
Shots came from the Frenchmen in the church behind. A bullet fluttered overhead, another skipped between the Riflemen to smash into a broken wall ahead. Sharpe imagined the muskets and carbines sliding over the city’s barricades. He imagined a French officer ordering the troops to wait until the enemy was close. Now was the moment of death. Now, if there were cannon in the defences, the great barrels would gout their spreading canisters. Riflemen would be flensed alive, their bellies ripped out, their guts spread ten yards along a cold road.
No such shots came, and Sharpe realized that the city’s defenders must be confused by the shots from the church. To a man on the main defence line it must seem as if the approaching Riflemen were the remnants of the guard-house’s garrison being pursued by the musketry of a distant enemy. He shouted the magic word as loud as he could, hoping it would reinforce the mistaken identity. ‘„Ami! Ami!“
Sharpe could see the main defences now. A high-sided farm-waggon had been pushed across the nearest street entrance to make a temporary barricade which, by day, could be hauled aside to let the cavalry patrols enter or leave the city. It was illuminated by a fire which also showed the shapes of men climbing onto the waggon bed. Sharpe could see them fixing their bayonets. He could also see a narrow gap to the left of the waggon where the harness pole formed the only obstacle.
A question was shouted from the waggons, and Sharpe had no answer beyond the single word, ‘Ami!“ He was panting with the uphill run, but managed to snarl an order to his men. ”Don’t bunch! Spread!“
Then, from the church behind him, a bugle sounded.
It must have been an agreed signal, but one which had been delayed by the death of the picquet’s officer and Sergeant. It was the alarm; shrill and desperate, and it provoked an instant volley from the waggon.
The muskets banged, but the defenders had fired too soon and, like so many troops firing downhill, too high. The realization gave Sharpe a sudden burst of hope. He was shouting a war cry now, nothing coherent, just a scream of murderous rage that would carry him to the very edge of the enemy’s position. Harper was beside him, feet pounding, and the Riflemen were spreading across the road so that they did not make a bunched target for the French soldiers who scrambled onto the waggon to take the places of the men who had fired.
”Tirez/” An enemy officer’s sword slashed down.
The musket flames leaped three feet clear of the French muzzles, smoke pumped to hide the cart, and a Rifleman was jerked back as though a rope had yanked him off his feet.
Sharpe had gone to the left of the road where he stumbled on the rubble from the dismantled houses. He saw a Rifleman stop to take aim and he shouted at him to keep running. There could be no pause now, none, for if this attack lost its momentum, the enemy would merely swat it away. Sharpe clenched himself for the awful moment when the gap must be faced.
He leapt for the gap, screaming his challenge that was meant to strike fear into whoever waited for him. Three Frenchmen were there, lunging with bayonets, and Sharpe’s sword clanged from the blades to bite into a musket stock. He stumbled on the waggon pole, then was thumped aside . as Sergeant Harper crashed through the narrow gap. Other Riflemen were clawing at the cart’s side, trying to climb it. A Frenchman stabbed down with a bayonet, but was hurled back by a rifle bullet. More rifles fired. A Frenchman aimed at Sharpe but, in his nervousness, he had forgotten to prime his musket. The flint sparked on an empty pan, the man screamed, then Sharpe had found his footing and drove forward with the sword. Harper was twisting his sword-bayonet from an enemy’s ribs. More Riflemen were crowding through the gap, chopping and slashing, while others came over the waggon to drive the Frenchmen back. The defenders had been too few, and had waited too long before the bugle had turned their uncertainty into action. Now they died or fled.