sounded shocked, as though such a thing was an outrage.
“It’s left the bullock train without a guiding hand, Sharpe.”
Christ, Sharpe thought, but he was to be made bullock master!
“Not fair to say they don’t have a guiding hand,” Wallace continued,
‘because they do, but the new fellow don’t have any experience with
bullocks. Torrance, he’s called, and I’m sure he’s a good fellow, but
things are likely to get a bit more sprightly from now on. Going
deeper into enemy territory, see? And there are still lots of their
damned horsemen at large, and Torrance says he needs a deputy officer.
Someone to help him. Thought you might be just the fellow for the job,
Sharpe.”
Wallace smiled as though he was granting Sharpe a huge favour.
“Don’t know anything about bullocks, sir,” Sharpe said doggedly.
“I’m sure you don’t! Who does? And there are dromedaries, and
elephants. A regular menagerie, eh? But the experience, Sharpe, will
do you good. Think of it as another string to your bow.”
Sharpe knew a further protest would do no good, so he nodded.
“Yes, sir,” he said.
“Good! Good! Splendid.” Wallace could not hide his relief.
“It won’t be for long, Sharpe. Scindia’s already suing for peace, and
the Rajah of Berar’s bound to follow. We may not even have to fight at
Gawilghur, if that’s where the rogues do take refuge. So go and help
Torrance, then you can set a course for England, eh? Become a
Greenjacket!”
So Ensign Sharpe had failed. Failed utterly. He had been an officer
for two months and now he was being booted out of a regiment. Sent to
the bullocks and the dromedaries, whatever the hell they were, and
after that to the green-coated dregs of the army. Bloody hell fire, he
thought, bloody hell fire.
The British and their allied cavalry rode all night, and in the dawn
they briefly rested, watered their horses, then hauled themselves into
their saddles and rode again. They rode till their horses were reeling
with tiredness and white with sweat, and only then did they give up the
savage pursuit of the Mahratta fugitives. Their sabre arms were weary,
their blades blunted and their appetites slaked. The night had been a
wild hunt of victory, a slaughter under the moon that had left the
plain reeking with blood, and the sun brought more killing and
wide-winged vultures that flapped down to the feast.
The pursuit ended close to a sudden range of hills that marked the
northern limit of the Deccan Plain. The hills were steep and thickly
wooded, no place for cavalry, and above the hills reared great cliffs,
dizzyingly high cliffs that stretched from the eastern to the western
horizon like the nightmare ramparts of a tribe of giants. In places
there were deep re-entrants cut into the great cliff and some of the
British pursuers, gaping at the vast wall of rock that barred their
path, supposed that the wooded clefts would provide a path up to the
cliff’s summit, though none could see how anyone could reach the
highland if an enemy chose to defend it.
Between two of the deep re-entrants a great promontory of rock jutted
from the cliff face like the prow of a monstrous stone ship. The
summit of the jutting rock was two thousand feet above the horsemen on
the plain, and one of them, scrubbing blood from his sabre blade with a
handful of grass, glanced up at the high peak and saw a tiny puff of
whiteness drifting from its crest. He thought it a small cloud, but
then he heard a faint bang of gunfire, and a second later a round shot
dropped vertically into a nearby patch of millet. His captain pulled
out a telescope and trained it high into the sky. He stared for a long
time, then gave a low whistle.
“What is it, sir?”
“It’s a fortress,” the Captain said. He could just see black stone
walls, shrunken by distance, poised above the grey-white rock.
“It’s hell in the bloody sky,” he said grimly, ‘that’s what it is. It’s
Gawilghur.”
More guns fired from the fortress, but they were so high in the air