The Fusilier Colours were taken from their leather cases, unfurled, and the flags were carried between the polished halberds of the Sergeants whose job was to protect them. Each halberd was a giant axe, the steel burnished to shine like silver, and the sight of the standards amidst the glittering blades would move any soldier. The panoply of war. Sir Augustus, in front of the Colours, removed his hat, waved it, and the two half-Battalion columns broke into the quick march.
Sharpe cupped his hands. ‘Fire! Fire!’ It did not matter that there were few targets. What mattered now was to send the Rifle bullets singing about the defenders’ ears, discouraging them, making them fearful even before the two columns burst over the rubble of the shattered wall. Cross’s bugler came stumbling and panting back from his errand and Sharpe made him sound the advance and took the line forward twenty yards before he sounded the halt. ‘Fire! Let them know we’re here!’
The rubble of the eastern wall beckoned the two columns forward. It could be easily climbed, its breast-high stones were fallen into a gentle ramp on which Sharpe could see his mens’ rifle bullets kicking up spurts of whitish dust. He imagined the two columns of the Fusiliers flowing over the wall into the courtyard, their anger fired by Kinney’s death, so why, why in God’s name, had Pot-au-Feu invited this attack?
The rifles were drowned by a double explosion from the watchtower hill and Sharpe turned to see the jets of burgeoning smoke mark the position of the two guns in the earthworks beneath the tower. The roundshot rumbled, struck the ground short of the columns and bounced over their heads. The Fusiliers jeered and their officers shouted for silence. Bayonets were bright in the ranks.
Sergeants shouted dressing at the men, ordered their marching, and some of the red jackets with white facings were clean and bright, showing that new recruits were fighting on this Christmas morning. The guns fired again.
The barrels were hotter, or else the elevating screws had been touched a fraction, and this time the first bounce of the balls was in the nearer column and Sharpe saw the files wiped sideways, blood splashing behind, and one man pitched forward, musket dropping, and then crawled from the column and collapsed.
‘Close up! Close up!’
‘Faster!’ Farthingdale waved the hat.
Perhaps he was still right, Sharpe thought. The guns could do little damage in the time it would take for the columns to reach the Castle. They might kill a dozen men, wound as many again, but that would not stop the attack. He looked at the Castle. Musket smoke spouted from almost every embrasure, his Riflemen had targets now, and no bullets struck the slope of the broken wall. He ordered the skirmish line another ten paces forward.
No bullets striking the rubble. He looked again. Nor was there musket smoke above the wall. His men had switched their fire to the men who fired at the attack, and no men fired from the wall which meant it was undefended. Undefended! No men were there, and then Sharpe cursed and began a stumbling run over the uneven ground towards the columns that were close to his skirmish line.
A cannon fired from the watchtower, high this time, so the ball struck between the columns and bounced up and over. The Sergeants called the marching time, their mouths huge, and the officers rode or walked beside their companies with swords drawn. The second gun fired, smashing the nearer column again, plucking men out of the ranks so that the men behind stepped over the carnage and closed files, and still the columns came on. The gun echo died in the valley. The Rifles cracked ahead, muskets spattered from the ramparts, and the leading men of the columns were in the lingering smoke of the skirmish lines first position.
Sharpe pushed unceremoniously through the ranks of the nearer column. He waved at Sir Augustus, proud on his nervous horse. ‘Sir! Sir!’
Farthingdale’s sabre was drawn. His cloak was peeled back to show the red, black and gold of his uniform. He had purchased his way to a Colonelcy, never having fought, always being the political soldier in the palaces and parliaments of power. ‘Sir!’