The lancers ducked their spired helmets as they clattered through the tunnel of the city’s Bangalore Gate and so led the fugitives into the stinking tangle of crowded streets. The spears forged the lancers’ path, driving civilians aside and forcing wagons and handcarts into hasty retreats up any convenient alley. Even the sacred cows that wandered freely inside the city were forced aside, though the lancers did it gently, not wanting to offend the sensibilities of the Hindus. They passed the mosque, then turned down a street lined with shops, their open fronts thickly hung with cloth, silk, silver jewellery, vegetables, shoes and hides. In one alley Law-ford caught a glimpse of bloodsoaked men butchering two camels and the sight almost made him gag. A naked child hurled a bloody camel’s tail at the two white men, and soon a horde of tattered, chanting children were dodging through the lancers’ horses to mock the prisoners and pelt them with animal dung. Sharpe cursed them, Lawford hunched low as he walked, and the children only ran away when two European soldiers, both dressed in bluejackets, chased them away. ‘Prisonniers?’ one of the two men called cheerfully.
‘Non, monsieur,’ Lawford answered in his best schoolboy French. ‘Nous sommes deserteurs.’
‘C’est bonl’ The man tossed Lawford a mango. ‘Lafemme aussi?’
‘Lafemme est notre prisonniere.’ Lawford tried a little wit and
was rewarded with a laugh and a farewell shout of bonne chance.
‘You speak French?’ Sharpe asked.
‘A little,’ Lawford claimed modestly. ‘Really only a little.’
‘Bloody amazing,’ Sharpe said and Lawford was obscurely pleased that he had at last succeeded in impressing his companion. ‘Bet not many private soldiers speak Frog,’ Sharpe dashed Lawford’s pleasure, ‘so don’t show yourself as being too good at it. Stick to bloody English.’
‘I didn’t think of that,’ Lawford said ruefully. He looked at the mango as though he had never seen such a piece of fruit before, and it was plain that his hunger was tempting him to bite into the sweet flesh, but then his manners prevailed and he gallantly insisted that Mary eat the fruit instead.
The lancers turned into a delicately sculpted archway where two sentries stood guard. Once inside the archway the cavalrymen slid down from their saddles and, lances in hand, led their horses down a narrow passage between two high brick walls. Sharpe, Mary and Lawford were more or less abandoned just inside the gateway where the two sentries ignored them, but did chase away the more curious townsfolk who had gathered to stare at the Europeans. Sharpe sat on a mounting block and tried to ignore the pain in his back. Then the lancer officer returned and shouted at them to follow him. He led them through another arch, then under an arcade where flowers twined round pillars, and so to a guardroom. The officer said something to Mary, then locked the door. ‘He says we’re to wait,’ Mary said. She still had the mango, and though the lancers had stripped Sharpe and Lawford of their coats and packs and had searched the two men for coins and hidden weapons, they had not searched Mary and she took a small folding penknife from an inside pocket of her skirt and cut the fruit into three portions. Law-ford ate his share, then wiped juice from his chin. ‘Did you ever get that picklock, Sharpe?’ he asked, saw Sharpe’s furious glare, and coloured. ‘Dick,’ he corrected himself.
‘Had it all along,’ Sharpe said. ‘Mary’s got it. And she’s got the guinea.’ He grinned despite his pain.
‘You mean you lied to General Baird?’ Lawford asked sternly.
“Course I bloody lied!’ Sharpe snarled. ‘What kind of a fool admits to having a picklock?’
For a moment Lawford looked as though he would reprove Sharpe for dishonesty, but the Lieutenant controlled the urge. He merely shook his head in mute disapproval, then sat with his back against the bare brick wall. The floor was made of small green tiles on which Sharpe lay on his belly. In minutes he was asleep. Mary sat beside him, sometimes stroking his hair and Lawford found himself embarrassed by her display of affection. He felt he ought to talk with Mary, but found he had nothing to say and so decided it was better not to speak in case he woke Sharpe. He waited. Somewhere deep in the palace a fountain splashed. Once there was a great clatter of hooves as cavalrymen led their horses out from the inner stables, but most of the time it was quiet in the room. It was also blessedly cool.