Cornwell, Bernard 01 Sharpe’s Tiger-Serigapatam-Apr-May 1799

More straw stirred in the first cell on the left, close by where Sharpe and Lawford were standing. ‘Look who it isn’t!’ Hakeswill had come to the bars. ‘Sharpie!’

‘Be quiet, Sergeant,’ Lawford snapped.

‘Yes, sir, Mister Lieutenant Lawford, sir, quiet it is, sir.’ Hakeswill clung to the bars of his cage, staring wide-eyed at the two newcomers. His face twitched. ‘Quiet as the grave, sir, but no one talks to me down here. He won’t.’ He nodded towards the cell opposite that the guard was now unlocking. ‘Likes it quiet, he does,’ Hakeswill went on. ‘Like a bleeding church. Says his prayers too. Always quiet it is here, except when the darkies are having a shout at each other. Dirty bastards they are. Smell the sewage, can you? One giant jakes!’ Hakeswill’s face twisted in rictus and, in the gloom of the shadowed cells, his eyes seemed to glitter with an unholy delight. ‘Been missing company, I have.’

‘Bastard,’ Sharpe muttered.

‘Quiet! Both of you,’ Lawford insisted and then, with his innate politeness, the Lieutenant nodded thanks to the guard who had finally opened the cell directly opposite Hakeswill’s lair. ‘Come on, Sharpe,’ Lawford said, then stepped fastidiously into the filthy straw. The cell was eight foot deep and ten foot long and a little over the height of a man. The sewage smell was rank, but no worse than in the courtyard above. The barred door clashed shut behind them and the key was turned.

‘Willie,’ a tired voice said from the shadows of the cell, ‘how very good of you to visit me.’ Sharpe, his eyes accustoming themselves to the dimness of the dungeons, saw that Colonel McCandless had been crouching in one corner, half shrouded by straw. The Colonel now stood to greet them, but he was weak for he tottered as he stood, though he shook off Law-ford’s attempt to help him. ‘A fever,’ he explained. ‘It comes and it goes. I’ve had it for years. I suspect the only thing that will cure it will be some soft Scottish rain, but that seems an ever more unlikely prospect. It is good to see you, Willie.’

‘You too, sir. You’ve met Private Sharpe, I think.’

McCandless gave Sharpe a grim look. ‘I have a question for you, young man.’

‘It wasn’t gunpowder, sir,’ Sharpe said, remembering his first confrontation with the Colonel and thus anticipating the question. ‘It tasted wrong, sir. Wasn’t salty.’

‘Aye, it didn’t look like powder,’ the Scotsman said. ‘It was blowing in the wind like flour, but that wasn’t my question, Private. My question, Private, is what would you have done if it had been gunpowder?’

‘I’d have shot you, sir,’ Sharpe said, ‘begging your pardon, sir.’

‘Sharpe!’ Lawford remonstrated.

‘Quite right, man,’ McCandless said. ‘The wretched fellow was testing you, wasn’t he? He was giving you a recruitment test, and you couldn’t fail it. I’m glad it wasn’t powder, but I don’t mind saying you had me worried for a brief while. Do you mind if I sit, Willie? I’m not in my usual good health.’ He sank back into his straw from where he frowned up at Sharpe. ‘Nor are you, Private. Are you in pain?’

‘Bastards cracked a rib, sir, and I’m bleeding a bit. Do you mind if I sit?’ Sharpe gingerly sat against the side bars of the cell and carefully lifted away the coat that had been draped over his back. ‘Bit of fresh air will heal it, sir,’ he said to Lawford who was insisting on examining the newly opened

wounds, though there was nothing he could do to help them mend.

‘You won’t get fresh air here,’ McCandless said. ‘You smell the sewage?’

‘You can’t miss that smell, Uncle,’ Lawford said.

‘It’s the new inner wall,’ McCandless explained. ‘When they built it they cut the city drains, so now the night soil can’t reach the river and the sewage puddles just east of here. Some of it seeps away through the Water Gate, but not enough. One learns to pray for a west wind.’ He smiled grimly. ‘Among other things.’

McCandless wanted news, not only of what had brought Lawford and Sharpe into Seringapatam, but of the siege’s progress and he groaned when he heard where the British had placed their works. ‘So Harris is coming from the west?’

Pages: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100 101 102 103 104 105 106 107 108 109 110 111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119 120 121 122 123 124 125 126 127 128 129 130 131 132 133 134 135 136 137 138 139 140 141 142 143 144 145 146 147 148 149 150 151 152 153 154 155 156 157 158 159 160 161

Leave a Reply 0

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *