have liked to tell Sharpe to bugger a long way off, but he could not
commit such impolite ness to a fellow officer in front of his men.
“I
never congratulated you,” he forced himself to say.
“No time like the present,” Sharpe said.
Morris blushed.
“Congratulations.”
“Thank you, Charles,” Sharpe said, then turned and looked at the
company. Most grinned at him, but a few men avoided his gaze.
“No Sergeant Hakeswill?” Sharpe asked guilelessly.
“He was captured by the enemy,” Morris said. The Captain was staring
at Sharpe’s coat which was not quite big enough and looked, somehow,
familiar.
Sharpe saw Morris frowning at the jacket.
“You like the coat?” he asked.
“What?” Morris asked, confused by his suspicions and by Sharpe’s easy
manner. Morris himself was wearing an old coat that was disfigured by
brown cloth patches.
“I bought the coat after Assaye,” Sharpe said.
“You weren’t there, were you?”
“No.”
“Nor at Argaum?”
“No,” Morris said, stiffening slightly. He resented the fact that
Sharpe had survived those battles and was now suggesting, however
delicately, that the experience gave him an advantage. The truth was
that it did, but Morris could not admit that any more than he could
admit his jealousy of Sharpe’s reputation.
“So what are our orders today?” Sharpe asked.
Morris could not accustom himself to this confident Sharpe who treated
him as an equal and he was tempted not to answer, but the question was
reasonable and Sharpe was undoubtedly an officer, if merely an
ensign.
“Once we’re through the first wall,” Morris answered unhappily,
“Kenny’s going to attack the left-hand upper breach and he wants us to
seal off the right upper breach.”
“Sounds like a decent morning’s work,” Sharpe said happily, then raised
a hand to Garrard.
“How are you, Tom?”
“Pleased you’re here, sir.”
“Couldn’t let you babies go into a breach without some help,” Sharpe
said, then held out his hand to Sergeant Green.
“Good to see you, Sergeant.”
“Grand to see you too, sir,” Green said, shaking Sharpe’s hand.
“I
heard you’d been commissioned and I hardly dared believe it!”
“You know what they say about scum, Sergeant,” Sharpe said.
“Always floats to the top, eh?” Some of the men laughed, especially
when Sharpe glanced at Morris who had, indeed, expressed that very
opinion not long before. Others scowled, for there were plenty in the
company who resented Sharpe’s good fortune.
One of them, a dark-faced man called Growley, spat.
“You always were a lucky bastard, Sharpie.”
Sharpe seemed to ignore the remark as he stepped through the seated
company and greeted more of his old friends, but when he was behind
Crowley he turned abruptly and pushed out the butt of his slung musket
so that the heavy stock thumped into the private’s head. Crowley let
out a yelp and turned to see Sharpe standing above him.
“The word, Crowley,” Sharpe said menacingly, ‘is “sir”.”
Crowley met Sharpe’s gaze, but could not hold it.
“Yes, sir,” he said meekly.
“I’m sorry I was careless with the musket, Crowley,” Sharpe said.
There was another burst of laughter, making Morris scowl, but he was
quite uncertain of how to deal with Sharpe and so he said nothing.
Watson, a Welsh private who had joined the regiment rather than face an
assize court, jerked a thumb towards the fort.
“They say the breaches are too steep, Mister Sharpe.”
“Nothing to what you Welsh boys climb every day in the mountains,”
Sharpe said. He had borrowed Major Stokes’s telescope shortly after
dawn and stared at the breaches, and he had not much liked what he had
seen, but this was no time to tell the truth.
“We’re going to give the buggers a right bloody thrashing, lads,” he
said instead.
“I’ve fought these Mahrattas twice now and they don’t stand. They look
good, but press home on the bastards and they turn and run like jack
rabbits. Just keep going, boys, keep fighting, and the buggers’ll give
up.”
It was the speech Morris should have made to them, and Sharpe had not
even known he was going to make any kind of speech when he opened his
mouth, but somehow the words had come. And he was glad, for the men