SHARPE’S REGIMENT

Sharpe stared at the invitation, and knew that his luck had turned. A moment ago he had been apprehensive, rightly so, about seeing Lord Fenner, for what mere Major could demand answers of a Secretary of State at War? Now, suddenly, the answer had been delivered by this elegant, smiling messenger who had brought an invitation, a command, for Sharpe to go to London and there meet a man who, within the last year, had insisted that Sharpe was promoted, and a man whom even Lord Fenner dared not offend. The Prince of Wales, Prince Regent of England, demanded Major Richard Sharpe’s attendance at court, and Sharpe, if he was clever enough, would let that eminent Royal gentleman demand to know where the Second Battalion had been hidden. Sharpe laughed aloud. He would go over Lord Fenner’s head, and, with Royalty’s help, would march the Colours of his regiment into France.

CHAPTER 2

“There is a yellow line on the carpet. Observe it.’

‘Yes,’ said Major Richard Sharpe.

‘It is there that you stop.’ The chamberlain gave a small, fanciful gesture with his white-gloved fingers as if illustrating how to come to a halt. ‘You bow.’ Another curlicue of the fingers. ‘You answer briefly, addressing His Royal Highness as “Your Royal Highness”. You then bow again.’

Sharpe had been watching people approach the throne for ten tedious minutes. He doubted that, after seeing so many examples, he needed to be given such minute instructions, but the courtier insisted on saying it all again. Every elaborate gesture of the man’s white-gloved hand wafted perfume to Sharpe’s nose.

‘And when you have bowed the second time, Major, you back away. Do it slowly. You may cease the backward motion when you reach the lion’s tail.’ He pointed with his staff at the rampant lion embroidered onto the lavish red carpet. The courtier, with eyes that seemed to be made of ice, looked Sharpe up and down. ‘Some of our military gentlemen, Major Sharpe, become entangled with their swords during the backwards progression. Might I suggest you hold the scabbard away from your body?’

‘Thank you.’

A group of musicians, lavishly dressed in court uniform, with powdered wigs, plucked eyebrows, and intent, busy expressions, played violins, cellos, and flutes. The tunes meant nothing to Sharpe, not one of them a stirring, heart-thumping march that could take a man into battle. These tunes were frivolous and tinkling; mincing, delicate things suitable for a Royal Court. He felt foolish. He was grateful that none of his men could see him now; d’Alembord and Price were safely in Chelmsford, putting some snap into the half-deserted depot, while Harper, though in London, was with Isabella in Southwark.

Above Sharpe was a ceiling painted with supercilious gods who stared down with apparent boredom on the huge room. A great chandelier, its crystal drops breaking the candlelight into a million shards of light, hung at the room’s centre. A fire, an unnecessary luxury this warm night, burned in a vast grate, adding to an already overheated room that stank of women’s powder, sweat, and the cigar smoke that drifted in from the next chamber.

An Admiral was being presented. There was a spatter of light, bored applause from the courtiers who crowded about the dais. The Admiral bowed for a second time, backed away, and Sharpe saw how the man held his slim sword away from his body as he bobbingly reversed over the snarling lion.

‘Lord Pearson, your Royal Highness!’ said the overdressed flunkey who announced the names.

Lord Pearson, attired in court dress, strode confidently forward, bowed, and Sharpe felt his heart beating nervously when he thought that, in a few moments, he would have to follow the man up the long carpet. It was all nonsense, of course, ridiculous nonsense, but he was still nervous. He wished he was not here, he wished he was anywhere but in this stinking, overheated room. He watched Lord Pearson say his few words and thought, with a sense of doom, how impossible it would be to bring up the subject of the missing Battalion in those few, scaring seconds of conversation.

‘It is best,’ the courtier murmured in his ear, ‘to say as little as possible. “Yes, your Royal Highness” or “No, your Royal Highness” are both quite acceptable.’

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