Бернард Корнуэлл - Sharpe's Escape

"I thought Americans didn't drink tea, sir."

"The loyal Americans do, Sharpe." Leroy, the son of parents who had fled the rebel victory in the Thirteen Colonies, stole Sharpe's mug. "The rebellious sort feed their tea to the codfish." He drank and looked disgusted. "Don't you use sugar?"

"Never."

Leroy took a sip and grimaced. "It tastes like warm horse piss," he said, but drained the mug nonetheless. "Good morning, lads! Time to shine! Fall in!"

Sergeant Harper had led the new picquet towards the rocks on the small spur where Sergeant Read ordered his men to shoot their guns out into the foggy void. Leroy called that the sound should be ignored. Lieutenant Slingsby, despite having been drunk the night before, now looked as fresh and smart as though he were mounting guard on Windsor Castle. He came from his tent, plucked his red coat straight, adjusted the angle of his saber scabbard, then marched after the picquet. "You should have waited for me, Sergeant!" he called to Harper.

"I told him to go," Sharpe said.

Slingsby swiveled around, his bulging eyes showing surprise at seeing Sharpe. "Morning, Sharpe!" The Lieutenant sounded indecently cheerful. "My word, but that's a rare black eye! You should have put a beefsteak on it last night. Beefsteak!" Slingsby, finding that advice funny, snorted with laughter. "How are you feeling? Better, I trust?"

"Dead," Sharpe said, and turned back to the ridge top where the battalion was forming into line. They would stay there through the dull moments of dawn, through the dangerous time when the enemy might make a surprise attack. Sharpe, standing ahead of the light company, looked down the line and felt an unexpected surge of affection for the battalion. It was nearly six hundred men strong, most from the small villages of southern Essex, but a good few from London and a lot from Ireland, and they were mostly thieves, drunks, murderers and fools, but they had been hammered into soldiers. They knew each other's weaknesses, liked each other's jokes, and reckoned no battalion in God's world was half as good as theirs. They might not be as wild as the Connaught Rangers, who were now moving up to take post to the left of the South Essex, and they were certainly not as fashionable as the Guards battalions farther north, but they were dependable, stubborn, proud and confident. A ripple of laughter went through number four company and Sharpe knew, even without hearing its cause, that Horace Pearee had just made a jest and he knew his men would want the joke passed down. "Silence in the ranks!" he called and wished he had kept silent because of the pain.

A Portuguese unit was formed to the battalion's right and beyond them was a battery of Portuguese six-pounders. Useless guns, Sharpe thought, but he had seen enough nine-pounders on the ridge to know that the cannons could do some slaughter this day. He reckoned the mist was clearing, for he could see the small six-pounders more clearly with every passing minute, and when he turned north and stared at the tops of the trees beyond the monastery's far wall he saw the whiteness thinning and shredding.

They waited the best part of an hour, but no French came. The mist drained from the ridge top, but still filled the valley like a great white river. Colonel Lawford, mounted on Lightning, rode down the battalion's front, touching his hat in answer to the companies' salutes. "We shall do well today," he told each company, "and add luster to our reputation. Do your duty, and let the Frenchmen know they've met better men!" He repeated this encouragement to the light company at the left of the line, ignored the man who asked what luster was, then smiled down at Sharpe. "Come and have breakfast with me, will you, Sharpe?"

"Yes, sir."

"Good man." A bugle sounded from half a mile north and Lawford twisted in his saddle to find Major Forrest. "We can stand down, Major. Half and half, though, I think."

Half the men stayed in line, the others were released to make tea, to eat and relieve themselves, but none was permitted to go beyond the newly made road and so vanish from the battalion's sight. If the French came then the men were expected to be in line within half a minute. Two of the light company wives sat by a fire honing bayonets with sharpening stones and cackling with laughter at a joke told by Rifleman Hagman. Sergeant Read, off duty for the moment, was on one knee, a hand on his musket, praying. Rifleman Harris, who claimed to believe in none of the gods, was making certain that his lucky, rabbit's foot was in his pouch, while Ensign Iliffe was trying to hide behind the Colonel's tent where he was being sick. Sharpe called to him. "Mister Iliffe!"

"Sir." Iliffe, strands of yellowish liquid straggling from his unshaven chin, came nervously to Sharpe, who drew his sword.

"Take that, Mister Iliffe," Sharpe said, pretending not to notice that the Ensign had been vomiting. "Find the Portuguese cavalry smith and have an edge put on it. A proper edge. One I can shave with." He gave the boy two shillings, realizing that his earlier advice, that Iliffe should pay a shilling himself, had been impractical because Iliffe probably did not have a penny to spare. "Go on with you. Bring it back to me as soon as you can."

Robert Knowles, stripped to his waist, was shaving outside Lawford's tent. The skin of his chest and back was milk white while his face was as dark as old wood. "You should grow a mustache, Robert," Sharpe said.

"What a ghastly notion," Knowles said, peering into the mirror that was propped against the water bowl. "I had an uncle with a mustache and he went bankrupt. How are you feeling?"

"Horrible."

Knowles paused, face half lathered, razor poised by his cheek, and stared at Sharpe. "You look horrible. You're to go in, Richard, the Colonel's expecting you."

Sharpe thought of borrowing the razor, but his jaw was still tender where he had been kicked and he reckoned he could go a day without a shave, though at the end of it his chin would be black as powder. He ducked into the tent to find Lawford sitting at a trestle table covered with fine linen and expensive porcelain. "Boiled eggs," the Colonel greeted him warmly. "I do so relish a properly boiled egg. Sit yourself down, Sharpe. The bread's not too hard. How are your wounds?"

"Hardly notice them, sir," Sharpe lied.

"Good man." The Colonel spooned some runny egg into his mouth, then gestured through the canvas towards the east. "Fog's lifting. You think the French will come?"

"Major Hogan seemed sure of it, sir."

"Then we shall do our duty," Lawford said, "and it will be good practice for the battalion, eh? Real targets! That's coffee, very good coffee as well. Do help yourself."

It seemed that Sharpe was to be Lawford's only guest, for there were no plates or silverware for another man. He poured himself coffee, helped himself to an egg and a slice of bread, and ate in silence. He felt uncomfortable. He had known Lawford for over ten years, yet he could think of nothing to say. Some men, like Hogan or Major Forrest, were never short of conversation. Put them down among a group of strangers and they could chatter away like magpies, but Sharpe was always struck dumb except with those he knew really well. The Colonel did not seem to mind the silence. He ate steadily, reading a four-week-old copy of The Times. "Good Lord," he said at one point.

"What's that, sir?"

"Tom Dyton's dead. Poor old chap. Of an advanced age, it says here. He must have been seventy if he was a day!"

"I didn't know him, sir."

"Had land in Surrey. Fine old fellow, married a Calloway, which is always a sensible thing to do. Consols are holding steady, I see." He folded the paper and pushed it across the table. "Like to read it, Sharpe?"

"I would, sir."

"All yours, then."