The case was finally stowed away, Braithwaite came down the ladder, pocketed the sheet of paper, collected his lantern and started back toward the larger ladder that lay alongside the mizzenmast and led to the closed hatch. He did not see Sharpe. He thought he was alone in the hold until a hand suddenly grasped his collar. “Hello, Oxford man,” Sharpe said.
“Jesus!” Braithwaite swore and shuddered. Sharpe took the lantern from the secretary’s nerveless hand and placed it on top of a cask, then spun Braithwaite around and pushed him hard so that he fell onto the deck.
“I had an interesting conversation with her ladyship the other day,” Sharpe said. “It seems you’re blackmailing her.”
“You’re being ridiculous, Sharpe, ridiculous.” Braithwaite thrust himself backward until he could go no further, then sat with his back against the water casks where he brushed at the dirt on his trousers and coat.
“Do they teach blackmail at Oxford?” Sharpe asked. “I thought they only taught you useless things like Latin and Greek, but I’m wrong, am I? They give lectures in blackmail and housebreaking, maybe? Pocket-slitting on the side, perhaps?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“You know what I’m talking about, Braithwaite,” Sharpe said. He picked up the lantern and walked slowly toward the terrified secretary. “You’re blackmailing Lady Grace. You want her jewels, don’t you, and maybe more? You’d like her in your bed, wouldn’t you? You’d like to go where I’ve been, Braithwaite.”
Braithwaite’s eyes widened. He was scared, but he was not so witless as to miss the significance of Sharpe’s words. Sharpe had admitted the adultery, and that meant Braithwaite was about to die, for Sharpe could not afford to let him live and tell the tale. “I just came to fetch a memorandum, Sharpe,” the secretary babbled in apparent panic, “that’s all. I came to fetch this paper. Just a memorandum, Sharpe, for Lord William’s report. Let me show you,” and he put a hand in his pocket to fetch the paper and brought out, not a memorandum, but a small pistol. It was the kind of gun designed to be carried in a purse or pocket for use against cutthroats or highwaymen and Braithwaite, his hand shaking, dragged back the flint. “I’ve carried this ever since you threatened me, Sharpe.” His voice was suddenly more confident as he leveled the pistol.
Sharpe dropped the lantern.
It hit the deck, there was a shudder of light, then the smash of glass and utter darkness. Sharpe twisted aside, half expecting to hear the pistol crack, but Braithwaite had retained enough nerve to hold his fire.
“You’ve got one shot, Oxford man,” Sharpe said. “One shot, then it’s my turn.”
Silence, except for the clatter of the pumps and the noise of the masts and the scratching of rats’ feet in the bilge.
“I’m used to this,” Sharpe said. “I’ve crawled in the darkness before, Braithwaite, and killed men. Cut their gizzards. I did it outside Gawilghur on a dark night. Cut two men’s throats, Braithwaite, slit them back to the spine.” He was crouching behind a cask so that if Braithwaite did fire then the secretary would merely inflict a wound on a barrel of salt beef. Sharpe kept his body behind the cask and reached out with his left hand, scraping his nails on the plank deck. “I slit their gizzards, Oxford man.”
“We can come to an agreement, Sharpe,” Braithwaite said nervously. He had not moved since the hold went dark. Sharpe knew that, for he would have heard. He reckoned Braithwaite was waiting until he went close and then he would fire. Just like ship-to-ship fighting. Let the bugger get close, then fire.
“What kind of agreement, Oxford man?” Sharpe asked, then scratched the deck again, making little noises that would be magnified by the secretary’s fear. He found a shard of broken lantern glass and scraped it on the wood.
“You and I should be friends, Sharpe,” Braithwaite said. “You and I? We ain’t like them. My father is a parson. He doesn’t make much. Three hundred a year? That may sound like a competence to you, but it’s nothing, Sharpe, nothing. Yet people like William Hale are born to fortunes. They abuse us, Sharpe, they grind us down. They think we’re dirt.”