SHARPE’S REGIMENT

‘Of course I’ll come! The worst they can do is hang us, isn’t it?’

Sharpe laughed, grateful for the support. He was finding this morning, this day, this march, a trial. Not just because of the foolhardy action he planned, but because he was bitterly regretting his stupid, impulsive proposal of marriage. He had shocked her. He felt a fool. He felt as if he had been given a chance to approach something precious and wonderful, and, with crass clumsiness, he had spoilt it. He tried to convince himself that he was fortunate she had not accepted him on the spot, but instead he felt only regret for his tactlessness.

Jane Gibbons haunted his thoughts to embarrass him, and his enemies haunted them to make him fearful. As soon as Girdwood reached London, the orders would be written for Sharpe’s arrest. Doubtless Fenner would send to Foulness first, then to Chelmsford, and Sharpe watched the road behind his columns as though he expected to see the messengers galloping towards him. His lead over his enemies was slight, and each hour that passed as the unwieldy column trudged along the dusty road, brought failure closer to him.

Sharpe knew he must not show his fears. He found Horatio Havercamp and called him to one side so that the Sergeant walked beside Sharpe’s horse in an interval between Companies. ‘Sir?’

‘How much did you make, Horatio?’

‘Make, sir?’

‘Horatio Havercamp, I started in this army where you did. I know all the bloody tricks and a few even you haven’t bloody learned. How much did you make?’

Havercamp grinned. ‘We got the poor buggers’ wages, sir.’

No wonder, Sharpe thought, the sergeants had been so keen to discover any small fault with a man’s kit that would deserve a deduction from the pay. Those deductions made up the sergeants’ extra income. ‘So how much did you make?’

‘Three pound a week? Varied a bit, of course.’

‘Five pounds a week, maybe?’

‘Say four, sir,’ Havercamp grinned cheerfully. ‘But it was all official like! Above board, sir. Orders.’

Sharpe looked at the sly face. ‘You knew it bloody wasn’t.’

‘Didn’t do any harm, sir, did it? The army needs men; they’ve always paid for crimping, so why not us?’

‘But didn’t you ever wonder what would happen when someone found out?’

The Sergeant still had his look of sly enjoyment. ‘If you was going to arrest us, sir, you’d have done it. You haven’t, which makes me think that you need us. Besides, have you ever seen a better recruiting sergeant than me, sir?’ He grinned at Sharpe and took from his pocket the two golden guineas which, with his marvellous dexterity, he made come and go between his knuckles. ‘It ain’t every sergeant who can say he recruited Major Sharpe, is it?’

Sharpe smiled. ‘Suppose that I think you’d be more useful to me in Spain?’

‘I always heard you were a sensible man, sir. You find recruits here, sir, not there!’

‘But there are no profits in it any more, Sergeant.’

‘No, sir.’ Sergeant Havercamp smiled happily. He knew the profits were still there, not perhaps of the same magnitude, but recruiters had to carry government cash, and if he organised just two fictional jumpers a week then that was two guineas to be split between himself and his corporals. Sergeant Havercamp knew he would do very nicely, even if, as was the usual practice, officers were sent with each party. Horatio knew how to fix an officer’s purse as well as any man’s. ‘Anything else, sir?’

‘One thing. Is there a Mother Havercamp? You know, the one the General chats to over the garden gate?’

Havercamp laughed. ‘Haven’t seen the old maggot in years, sir. Don’t want to, neither.’

Sharpe laughed.

They came to Chelmsford in the middle of the afternoon, flooding the sleepy depot with men, and the problems that had plagued Sharpe before dawn were now magnified a hundred times. It was here that his real work had to begin.

He had been thinking of this moment ever since the idea had come to him across the table from Jane Gibbons. He had tried to anticipate the problems, but even so there were a thousand details he had not thought of, and, outside of d’Alembord, Price, and Harper, he had no capable men to cope with the chaos.

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