Бернард Корнуэлл - Sharpe's Escape

"I'm not sure," Major Forrest came across to Lawford, "that we can reach the farm now, sir."

Lawford did not answer. The implication of Forrest's remark was that the attempt to rescue the light company should be abandoned. The way south, back to the fort on the hill, was clear enough and, if the South Essex moved back towards the heights, they would survive. The French would see it as a victory, but at least the battalion would live. The light company would be lost, and that was a pity, but better to lose one company than all ten.

"The fire is definitely slacking," Forrest said, and he was not talking of the incessant musketry of the voltigeurs, but of the action at the farm.

Lawford twisted in the saddle and saw that the farmhouse was virtually free of powder smoke. He could see a group of Frenchmen crouched behind a shed or barn, which told him the farmhouse itself had not fallen, but Forrest was right. There was less firing there and that suggested the light company's resistance was being abraded. "Poor fellows," Lawford said. He thought for a second of trying to reach the farm by cutting across the floods and the marshland, but a riderless horse, one of those whose saddles had been emptied by the South Essex square, was floundering in the swamp and, from its struggles, it was plain that any attempt to cross the waterlogged ground would be inviting trouble. The horse heaved itself onto a firmer patch and stood there, shivering and frightened. Lawford felt a flicker of fear himself and knew he must make a decision. "The wounded will have to be carried," he said to Forrest. "Detail men from the rear rank."

"We're going back?" Forrest asked.

"I fear so, Joseph. I fear so," Lawford said, and just then a voltigeurs bullet struck Lightning in the right eye and the horse reared, screaming, and Lawford kicked his boots from the saddle and threw himself to the left as Lightning twisted in the sky, hooves flailing. Lawford fell heavily, but managed to scramble clear as the big horse collapsed. Lightning tried to get up again, but only succeeded in kicking the ground and Lawford's servant ran to the beast with the Colonel's big horse pistol. Then he hesitated, for Lightning was thrashing. "Do it, man!" the Colonel called. "Do it!" The horse's eyes were white, its bloodied head was beating against the ground and the servant could not aim the pistol, but Major Leroy snatched the gun, rammed his boot onto the horse's head and then fired into Lightning's forehead. The horse gave a last great spasm, then was still. Lawford swore. Leroy threw the pistol back to the servant and, his boots glistening with the horse's blood, went back to the western face of the square.

"Give the orders, Major," Lawford said to Forrest. He felt close to tears. The horse had been magnificent. He ordered his servant to unbuckle the girth and remove the saddle, and he watched as those wounded who could not crawl or limp were lifted from the ground and then the South Essex began to retreat. It would be a painfully slow withdrawal. The square had to stay together if the horsemen were not to charge, and it could only edge its way cautiously, shuffling rather than marching. The French, seeing it move south, gave an ironic cheer, and pressed closer. They wanted to finish the redcoats and go back to their side of the valley with a fine haul of prisoners, captured weapons and, best of all, the two precious colors. Lawford looked up at the two flags, both now punctured with bullet strikes, and he wondered if he should strip them from the poles and burn the heavy silk, then dismissed that thought as panic. He would get back to the hills and Picton would be angry, and doubtless there would be mockery from other battalions, but the South Essex would survive. That was what mattered.

The route back to the hills was clear of all enemy now because the right-hand battalion of cazadores had moved closer to the South Essex. The French had been repulsed by the Portuguese, defeated by their rifles, and instead had concentrated on the vulnerable redcoats, and now the Portuguese battalion moved to its right and its rifles were working on the men assailing Lawford, and that cleared the way south, but the cavalry drifted that way and the Portuguese formed square again. The cavalry, harassed by the endless shells, moved back towards the center of the valley, but the Portuguese rifles still kept the way home clear for the South Essex. In another two or three hundred yards, Lawford thought, he would be close to the hill and the French would give up and retreat, except that they would console themselves by capturing the farm. Lawford glanced at the buildings, saw no smoke coming from the roof or windows and reckoned it was all too late. "We tried," he said to Forrest, "at least we tried."

And failed, Forrest thought, but said nothing. The northern-most files of the square divided to edge about Lightning's corpse, then closed up again. The voltigeurs, wary of the Portuguese rifles, were concentrating on that northern flank again and the half-company volleys were constant as the redcoats tried to drive the pestilential skirmishers away. The muskets flamed and the smoke thickened and the square shuffled south. And the light company was alone.

Sharpe ducked, just evading a blow of Ferragus's right fist, and instead caught a left on his shoulder, which was like being hit by a musket ball. It almost knocked him over, and the following punch from Ferragus's right hand, which was supposed to half crush Sharpe's skull, only succeeded in glancing off the top of his head and knocking off his shako, but it still rocked Sharpe who instinctively rammed the butt of his rifle towards Ferragus and caught the big man on his left knee. The pain of that blow stopped Ferragus, and the second blow of the rifle caught him on his right fist which was still injured from the stone blow Sharpe had given him at the monastery. Ferragus flinched from the pain and two redcoats tried to haul him down but he shook them off like a bear shrugging off dogs, although they had slowed him for a second, giving Sharpe a chance to stand. He tossed the rifle to Harper. "Let him be," Sharpe said to the redcoats, "let him be." He unbuckled his sword belt and threw the weapon to Bullen. "Keep a watch out of the windows, Mister Bullen!"

"Yes, sir."

"A good watch! Make sure the men are looking out there, not in here."

"Let me murder him, sir," Harper suggested.

"Let's not be unfair to Mister Ferreira, Pat," Sharpe said. "He couldn't cope with you. And the last time he tried to deal with me he had to have help. Just you and me, eh?" Sharpe smiled at Ferragus who was flexing his right hand. Sarah was behind the big man and she cocked the musket, grimacing with the force needed to drag back the doghead. The sound of the ratchet made Ferragus glance behind and Sharpe stepped forward and drove his right knuckles into Ferragus's left eye. He felt something give there, the big head jerked back and Sharpe was out of range by the time he had recovered. "I know you'd like to kill him," Sharpe said to Sarah, "but it's not very ladylike. Leave him to me." He went forward again, aimed a blow at Ferragus's closing left eye and stepped back before he delivered it, moving to his left, making sure Ferragus followed him, and pausing just a heartbeat too long because Ferragus, faster than Sharpe expected, delivered a straight left. It did not travel far, it did not even look particularly powerful, but it struck Sharpe in his bandaged ribs and was like a cannonball's strike, and if he had not already decided to step back he would have been floored by the blow, but his legs were already moving as the pain seared up his ribs. He flicked out his own left hand, aiming again at the swollen eye, but Ferragus swatted it aside, released his left hand again, but Sharpe was safely back now.

Ferragus could see nothing from his left eye, and the pain of it was a flaring red agony in his skull, but he knew he had hurt Sharpe and knew if he could get close he could do more than just hurt the rifleman, who was now stepping back between the wounded redcoats and the big hearth. Ferragus hurried, reckoning to take Sharpe's best blows and then get close enough to murder the English bastard, but Slingsby, drunk as a judge and sitting in the hearth, stuck out his right leg and Ferragus tripped on it and Sharpe was back in his face, the left fist again pulping Ferragus's damaged eye and ramming the heel of his right hand into Ferragus's nose. Something broke there and Ferragus, swatting at Slingsby with his left hand, threw out his right to stop Sharpe, but Sharpe had stepped back again. "Let him be, Mister Slingsby," Sharpe said. "Are your men watching out the windows, Mister Bullen?"