He drank more wine, just to prove that he could do it, and then, when he was solemnly thinking he ought to work out a detail or two of the decisions he had made, his head went back onto the bed, the bottle dropped, and he slept the sleep of the drunk.
CHAPTER 17
Morning came like a sad groan. He was still tangled in blankets beside the bed. The dawn light was depressing.
He swore and closed his eyes.
Someone was using a sledgehammer within the castle, the blows were ringing through his skull.
`Oh God.’
He opened his eyes again. A bottle of wine lay close to him on the floor, the wine trapped by the bottle’s neck dark with sediment. He groaned again.
He leaned his head on the bed and stared up at the whitewashed ceiling. The hammering seemed to be coming from the very walls of the room. He could not believe it was possible to feel this ill. His eyes felt as if they were trying to burst from his head, his mouth was fouler than the cell Ducos had first put him in, his stomach was sour and his bowels were water. `Oh God.’
He heard the bolts on his door shoot back, but did not turn round. `Bonjour, m’sieul’ It was the cheerful young guard.
Sharpe turned slowly, his neck hurting. `Jesus.’
The guard laughed. ‘Won, m’sieu. Cest moi.’ He put the bowl on the table and mimed shaving. `Oui, m’sieu?’
`Oui.’
Sharpe stood up. He staggered on aching legs, and wished he had stayed on the floor. He held a hand up to the guard. `A minute! Wait!’ He went to the wooden screen, held it, and vomited. `Jesus!’
`Afsieu?’
`All right! All right! What time is it?’
`Afsieu?’
Sharpe tried to remember the word. He snapped the fingers of his left hand. `L’keure?’
`Ah! C’est six figures, m’sieu.’
`Cease?’
The soldier held up six fingers, Sharpe nodded, then spat through the window.
The young guard seemed happy to shave the English officer. He did it skilfully, chatting incomprehensibly and cheerfully as he lathered and scraped and washed and towelled. It occurred to Sharpe that he could elbow the boy in the belly, take his musket, shoot the man outside, and be in the courtyard within ten seconds. There had to be a damned horse there and, with luck, he could be through the gates and away before the guards knew what was happening.
On the other hand he did not feel up to morning mayhem, and it seemed distinctly churlish to attack a cheerful man who was shaving him with such skill. Besides, he needed breakfast. He needed it badly.
The boy patted Sharpe’s face dry and smiled. `Bonjourl’ He backed out of the door with the bowl and towel, came back a moment later for the musket he had left beside Sharpe. He waved farewell and shut the door, not bothering to bolt it.
The hammering still echoed in the room. He went to the window and.saw, where the `sentries paced their monotonous beats on the ramparts, that the guns which had defied Wellington last year were being destroyed. Their trunnions, the great knobs that held the barrels to the carriages, were being sawn through. When the hacksaws were halfway through, a man would give a great blow with a sledgehammer to shear the bronze clean. The blows rang dolorously through the courtyard. To make sure that the guns were far beyond repair they were being spiked as well, then heaved over the ramparts to fall onto the precipitous rocks below. The noise was shattering. He groaned. `Oh God!’
Sharpe lay on the bed. He would never drink again, never. On the other hand, of course, the hair of the dog that bit you was the only specific against rabies. Half the British army went to their rest drunk and could only face the next day by drinking the night’s dregs. He opened one eye and stared gloomily at an unopened bottle of champagne on the table.
He fetched it, frowned at it, then shrugged. He jammed it between his legs, and twisted the cork with his left hand. It popped boomingly. The sheer effort of pulling the cork seemed to have left him weaker then a kitten. The champagne foamed onto his overalls.