Sharpe 3-Book Collection 5: Sharpe's Company, Sharpe's Sword, Sharpe's Enemy (81 page)

There was joy in this moment, such joy, the joy of nineteen years hatred come to this place, this hour, this helplessness of a man who had spent his life tormenting the weak and working evil. Obadiah Hakeswill, a prisoner, the yellow face twitching on its elongated neck, the bright blue eyes still darting about the courtyard as if hoping for some escape. Sharpe walked slowly forward, and still the eyes looked for a way out of this place, but then the eyes snapped to Sharpe because there was the sound of a sword scraping from a scabbard.

Sharpe smiled. ‘Private Hakeswill. You lost your Sergeantcy, did you know?’ The head twitched, the eyes blinked, and Sharpe waited till Hakeswill was still. ‘Shun!’

Automatically, a lifetime of soldiering behind him, Hakeswill slammed upright, hands at his side, and at the same instant, catching the fire of the sinking sun, the long sword went to his throat. The blade was held at Sharpe’s full arm’s length, its tip barely quivering at Hakeswill’s adam’s apple. Silence.

Men in the courtyard sensed the anger from the two men. Fusiliers and Riflemen stopped, turned, and watched the sword.

Only Farthingdale moved. He stepped forward, his eyes horribly caught by the level, unmoving sword, and he feared the sudden rush of bright blood in the sunset. ‘What are you doing, Sharpe?’

Sharpe spoke softly, each word clear and slow. ‘I was thinking of skinning the bastard alive, sir.’ His eyes stayed on Hakeswill.

Farthingdale looked at Sharpe and the setting sun lit the left side of the scarred face, a face implacable and frightening, and Farthingdale felt the fear. He feared cold-blooded death, and he feared that one word from him might provoke it. His protest, when it came, sounded feeble even to his own ears. ‘The man must be tried, Sharpe, by a Court-Martial. You can’t kill him!’

Sharpe smiled, still looking at Hakeswill. ‘I said I’d skin him alive, not dead. Do you hear that, Obadiah? I can’t kill you.’ He suddenly raised his voice. ‘This is the man who can’t be killed! You’ve all heard of him, well here he is! Obadiah Hakeswill. And soon you’ll see a miracle. You’ll see him dead! But not here, not now! In front of a firing squad.’

The great blade stayed where it was. The French Dragoons, who had spent too many aching hours strengthening their sword arms by doing just what Sharpe was doing, appreciated the strength of a man who could hold a heavy cavalry sword at full stretch for so long, and keep it so still.

Hakeswill coughed. He sensed death‘retreating from him and he looked at Farthingdale. ’Permission to speak, sir?‘ Farthingdale nodded and Hakeswill screwed his face into a smile. The red light of sun and fire was reflected onto his yellow skin by the sword. ’Welcome a Court-Martial, sir, welcome it. You gentlemen are fair, sir, I know that, sir.‘ He was at his most obsequious.

Farthingdale was at his most patronizing. Here, at last, was a soldier who understood how to address his superiors. ‘You shall have a fair trial, I promise you that.’

‘Thank you, sir. Thank you.’ Hakeswill would have knuckled his forehead except that the sword still terrified him.

‘Mr Sharpe! Put him with the other prisoners!’ Farthingdale felt he had defused the situation, was in command again.

‘I will, sir, I will.’ Sharpe still looked at Hakeswill, his eyes had not moved since the sword was drawn. ‘What uniform is that, Private?’

‘Uniform, sir?’ Hakeswill pretended that he had never noticed the rank of his uniform. ‘Oh this, sir! I found it, sir, found it.’

‘You’re a Colonel, are you?’

‘No, sir. Course not, sir.’ Hakeswill looked at Sir Augustus and gave him the full benefit of his rotting grin. ‘I was forced to wear it, sir, forced! After they forced me to join them, sir!’

‘You’re a bleeding disgrace to that uniform, aren’t you?’

The blue eyes came back to Sharpe. ‘Yes, sir, ifyou say so, sir.’

‘I do, Obadiah, I do.’ Sharpe smiled again. ‘Take it off.’

Dubreton smiled and tossed a translation over his shoulder. Bigeard and the Dragoons grinned, settled forward on the pommels of their saddles.

‘Sir?’ Hakeswill appealed to Farthingdale, but the sword tip was pressed against his throat.

‘Strip, you bastard!’

‘Sharpe!’ That damned syllable.

‘Strip! You poxed bastard! Strip!’

The sword blade flickered, left and right, starting blood from the skin over Hakeswill’s adam’s apple, and the gross, lumpen man tore at the red officer’s sash, pulled at his belts, at the empty scabbard, and then scrambled out of the red jacket and dropped it on the cobbles.

‘Now trousers and boots, Private.’

Farthingdale protested. ‘Sharpe! Lady Farthingdale is watching! I insist this stops!’

Hakeswill’s eyes looked towards the balcony and Sharpe knew that by standing at the very end of the platform Josefina could see into the courtyard. Sharpe kept the sword steady. ‘If Lady Farthingdale doesn’t like the view, sir, I suggest she goes inside. In the meantime, sir, this man has disgraced his uniform, his country, and his Regiment. For the moment I can only take one of those things away from him. Strip!’

Hakeswill sat, pulled off the boots, then stood to remove the white trousers. He shivered slightly, dressed only in the long white shirt that was buttoned from neck to knees. The sun had dipped beneath the western ramparts.

‘I said strip.’

‘Sharpe!’

Sharpe hated this yellow-skinned, lank-haired, twitching man who had tried to kill his daughter, to rape his wife, this man who had once flogged Sharpe so that the ribs showed through the torn flesh, this man who had murdered Robert Knowles. Sharpe wanted to kill him here and now, in this courtyard with this blade, but he had long ago sworn that justice would be seen to kill the man who could not be killed. A firing party would do that thing, and then Sharpe could write the letter he had long wanted to write to Knowles’ parents and tell them their son’s murderer had met his end.

Hakeswill looked up at Josefina, back to Sharpe, then stepped back two paces as if he could escape the sword. Bigeard lashed out with his foot, throwing him forward, and Hakeswill looked at Sir Augustus. ‘Sir?’

The sword arm moved at last. Up, down, across, and the shirt was torn, blood seeping from the shallow cuts. ‘Strip!’

The hands tore at the shirt, ripping it, bursting buttons free, and Hakeswill stood there, the tatters of pride at his feet, and on his face a hatred that was strong as life itself.

Sharpe hooked the shirt towards him, wiped the tip of the blade, then rammed it into the scabbard. He stepped back. ‘Lieutenant Price!’

‘Sir?’

‘Four men to put Private Hakeswill into the dungeon! I want him tied up there!’

‘Yes, sir!’

The courtyard seemed to relax. Only Hakeswill, misshapen and naked, was tense with anger and hate. Riflemen pulled him away, the same Riflemen he had stripped of their greenjackets before the assault on Badajoz.

Dubreton gathered his reins. ‘I think, perhaps, you should have killed him.’

‘Perhaps, sir.’

Dubreton smiled. ‘On the other hand we have not killed Pot-au-Feu. He’s hard at work preparing your dinner.’

‘I look forward to it, sir.’

‘You should! You should! French cooks, Major Sharpe, have secrets. You, I’m sure, have none.’ He glanced at the stables, smiled, then raised a hand to Sir Augustus before turning his horse.
‘Au revoir!’

The sparks were brighter as the French accelerated through the gateway of the Castle. Sharpe looked at the stables. Six men, all in artillery uniform, stood gaping in the doorway. He swore at them, had a Sergeant take their names, and hoped that Dubreton had drawn no conclusions other than that Sharpe was hiding some guns. Tomorrow would reveal all.

It was nightfall, Christmas Day, in the Castle of the Virgin.

German voices, singing carols, faded behind them as they rode horses slowly towards the village. Eight officers and Josefina were dining with the French.

The torches that illuminated the village street flamed inside soft haloes. There was a night mist. Sir Augustus was in a playful mood, a heavy playfulness, perhaps because Josefina was looking as sultry and beautiful as artifice could make her. He looked across her at Sharpe. ‘Perhaps they’ll serve you frog’s legs, Sharpe!
^?

‘One can only hope, sir.’

There would be a hard frost tonight. To the south and overhead the stars were visible through the fine mist, Christmas stars, but the northern sky was dark, spreading south, and Sharpe could smell bad weather in the air. Pray God it would not be snow. He did not relish struggling from the Gateway of God, guarding the British, Portuguese and Spanish prisoners who were crammed into the Castle’s dungeon, struggling with them and Gilliland’s carts down the snow covered pass. Then, he thought, they might not be leaving in the morning. It depended on the French and their plans.

Dubreton waited for them at the door of the inn. It was a large building,‘far too large for such a tiny village, yet once it had served as a house for travelling men who crossed the Sierra and wanted to avoid the tolls of the southern road. The war had dulled trade, but still the building looked inviting and warm. A tricolour hung from an upstairs window, lit by two straw and resin torches, while unarmed soldiers came forward to take the horses. Farthingdale left the introductions to Sharpe. Four Captains, including Brooker and Cross, and two Lieutenants including Harry Price.

Once inside, Dubreton conducted Josefina to the room where the Frenchwomen prepared themselves. Sharpe heard delighted voices greeting their former companion in misfortune, and then he smiled as he saw the trouble that had been taken for the meal.

All the inn’s tables had been pushed together, making one great table covered in white cloths, and tall candles showed more than two dozen place settings. Forks, as Hagman had feared, gleamed silver beneath the flames. Wine bottles stood open on a sideboard, ranks of them, a whole Battalion of wine, while bread, hard crusted, waited in baskets on the table. A fire burned in the hearth, its warmth already reaching to the inn’s main door.

An orderly took Sharpe’s greatcoat, another brought a great bowl from which steam arose and Dubreton ladled out glasses of punch. A dozen French officers waited in the room, their smiles welcoming, their eyes curious to see their enemy so close. Dubreton waited till the orderly had passed the punch around. ‘I wish you gentlemen a happy Christmas!’

‘A happy Christmas!’

There was a smell from the inn’s kitchens that could have been a foretaste of paradise.

Farthingdale raised his glass. ‘To a gallant enemy!’ He repeated it in French.

‘To a gallant enemy!’

Sharpe drank and his eye was caught by a French officer who, unlike the others, was not dressed as either an infantry-man, a Lancer, or a Dragoon. His uniform was plain blue, very dark, without a single badge of rank or unit mark. He wore spectacles, wire bound, and his face showed the ravages of childhood smallpox. The eyes, small and dark like the man himself, caught Sharpe’s and there was none of the friendliness that the other officers showed.

Dubreton returned Sir Augustus’ compliment and then announced that dinner would be another half hour yet, that the orderlies would keep their glasses charged, and that his officers had been chosen for their English, mostly bad, but please would they consider themselves welcome. Farthingdale made a small response and then chivvied the British officers towards the waiting French. Sharpe, hating small talk, moved to a shadowed corner of the room and was astonished that the small dark man in his blue, plain uniform headed for him. ‘Major Sharpe?’

‘Yes.’

‘More punch?’

‘No, thank you.’

‘You prefer wine?’ The voice was harsh, the tone mocking.

‘Yes.’

The Frenchman, whose English accent was almost too perfect, snapped his fingers and Sharpe was startled by the alacrity with which an orderly responded to the summons. This man was feared. When the orderly was gone the Frenchman looked up at the Rifleman. ‘Your promotion is recent, yes?’

‘I don’t have the honour of your name.’

A quick smile, instantly gone. ‘Ducos. Major Ducos, at your service.’

‘And why should my promotion be recent, Major?’

The smile came again, a secret smile as if Ducos harboured knowledge and revelled in it. ‘Because in the summer you were a Captain. Let me see, now. At Salamanca? Yes. Then at Garcia Hernandez where you killed Leroux. A pity that, he was a good man. Your name didn’t come to my ears at Burgos, but I suspect you were recovering from the wound Leroux gave you.’

‘Anything else?’ The man had been absolutely right in everything, annoyingly right. Sharpe noticed the buzz of conversation growing in the rest of the room, the beginning of laughter, and he noticed too that all the French had given this small man a wide berth. Dubreton looked over, caught Sharpe’s eye, and the French Colonel gave a tiny, almost apologetic shrug.

‘There’s more, Major.’ Ducos waited for the orderly to give Sharpe his wine. ‘Have you seen your wife in the last few weeks?’

‘I’m sure you know the answer to that.’

Ducos smiled, taking it as a compliment. ‘I hear La Aguja is in Casatejada, and in no danger from us, I assure you.’

‘She rarely is.’

The insult went past Ducos as if it had never been uttered. The spectacles flashed circles of candle-light at Sharpe. ‘Are you surprised I know so much about you, Sharpe?’

‘Fame is always surprising, Ducos, and very gratifying.’ Sharpe sounded wonderfully pompous to himself, but this small, sardonic Major was annoying him.

Ducos laughed. ‘Enjoy it while you can, Sharpe. It won’t last. Fame bought on a battlefield can only be sustained on a battlefield, and usually that brings death. I doubt you’ll see the war’s end.’

Sharpe raised his glass. ‘Thank you.’

Ducos shrugged. ‘You’re all fools, you heroes. Like him.’ He jerked his head towards Dubreton. ‘You think the trumpet will never stop.’ He sipped his glass, taking very little. ‘I know about you because we have a mutual friend.’

‘I find that unlikely.’