‘Left, sir.’
‘Well, he can still fire a rifle. Splendid! And when we run out of ammunition we can throw snowballs!’ He grinned at the Sergeant. ‘Come the four corners of the world in arms, Sergeant, and we will shock them.’
‘A chance would be a fine thing, sir.’
‘It will come, Sergeant, it will come!’
To the north of the village, well away from the Rifle sharpshooters on the watchtower hill, two batteries of French guns unlimbered. The horses were taken away, the ready ammunition piled by the guns, and the snow settled on the bulbous roundshot piles and on the serge bags of powder. The artillerymen were strong and confident. The infantry had failed, and now the General was sensibly calling in the artillery. Not just the artillery, the French artillery, Napoleon’s own weapon. Every gunner in France was proud that the Emperor was an artilleryman. A Sergeant swept the snow off the wreathed ‘N’ on a gun’s breech and squinted along the barrel at the Convent. Soon, my lovely, he thought, soon. He patted the gun as though the brass, iron and timber monster were a favoured child.
Sharpe crossed to the Convent during the truce, his boots leaving fresh prints on the snow, and he stopped at the gates to look at the foreshortened barrels of the guns, guns that looked straight at him. He went inside, past the hornbeam which was decorated anew with a delicate tracery of snow, and it seemed impossible that only yesterday morning he had watched the German Riflemen decorate the bare branches.
He spoke to the officers, surprising them with his words, and he made them repeat his orders and then walk him through their positions so he knew they had understood. The Fusilier officers seemed relieved by his words. ‘We will not defend the Convent, gentlemen.’
‘Something up your sleeve, sir?’ Harry Price grinned.
‘No, Harry.’
Sharpe went downstairs and found Harper. ‘Patrick?’
‘Sir?’The big grin.
‘All well?’
‘Aye. So what’s happening?’ Sharpe told him and the broad Irish face nodded. ‘The lads will be glad to be back with you, so they will, sir.’
‘I’ll be glad to have them back. Tell them.’
‘They know that. How’s my friend Private Hakeswill?’
‘Rotting in the dungeon.’
‘I heard so.’ Harper grinned. ‘That’s good.’
‘Did you spike the gun?’
296
‘Aye, they’ll not fire that in a hurry.’ Harper had driven a nail into the touchhole, then filed the cut nail smooth with the breech. The whole touch-hole would have to be drilled out, then replaced with an iron wedge block, in which a new touch-hole was bored, that was inserted from the inside of the barrel and shaped so that each subsequent firing of the gun would drive it further home. Harper scratched his temple. ‘You reckon it will be tonight, sir?’
‘Dusk?’
‘Aye.’
‘Good luck.’
‘The Irish don’t need luck, sir.’
‘Just the English off their backs, yes?’ Sharpe laughed.
Harper grinned. ‘You see how promotion brings sense to you, sir?’
Sharpe walked back across the valley, the snow falling thicker now, only a few tussocks of grass visible above the clean whiteness. He thought it would be the Convent that the French would attack, though it was possible that the siting of the guns was an attempt to mislead him, but he did not think so. The French wanted the Convent so they could put their big guns behind the protection of its wall and hammer at the Castle’s northern ramparts. Then they would try for the watchtower so their guns could plunge fire into the courtyard, and most of all he feared the howitzers that would lob their shells high in the clouds before they fell among the defenders. Tomorrow.
The snow crunched under his boots, settled on his face, touched the old ramparts with a white shading which was curiously beautiful. The snow had covered the dark stains on the grass. He wondered how long they could hold this position. The weather could only delay any relief, and now they were down to just four hundred rockets. Gilliland had not been able to bring more because of the necessity of bringing the Fusiliers’ supplies, but somehow Sharpe did not think the rockets would be used much more in the Gateway of God. He had one idea for them, an idea of desperation, but they had served their purpose, as had the quick-fuses which he had taken from Gilliland for another purpose. The fuses were for firing batches of rockets, and Gilliland had been unhappy at losing them, but their time would come.