Bernard Cornwell - Sharpe’s Prey - The Expedition to Copenhagen, 1807

Baird looked at him in disgust. ‘To do what?’

‘I’ll find work,’ Sharpe said. Maybe he would go to Ebenezer Fairley, the merchant who had shown him friendship on the voyage home from India, or perhaps he would thieve. That was how he had started in life. ‘I’ll get by,’ he said belligerently.

Sir David Baird cut the cheese which crumbled under his knife. ‘There are three kinds of soldier, Sharpe,’ he said. ‘There are the damned useless ones, and God knows there’s an endless supply of those. Then there are the good solid lads who get the job done, but would piss in their breeches if you didn’t show them how their buttons worked. And then there’s you and me. Soldiers’ soldiers, that’s who we are.’

Sharpe looked sceptical. ‘A soldier’s soldier?’ he asked.

‘We’re the men who clean up after the parade, Sharpe. The carriages and kings go by, the bands play, the cavalry prances past like bloody fairies, and what’s left is a mess of dung and litter. We clean it up. The politicians get the world into tangles, then ask their armies to make things right. We do their dirty work, Sharpe, and we’re good at it. Very good. You might not be the best officer in King George’s army, but you’re a bloody fine soldier. And you like the life, don’t tell me you don’t.’

‘Being a quartermaster?’ Sharpe sneered.

‘Aye, that too. Someone has to do it, and as often as not they give it to a man up from the ranks.’ He glared at Sharpe and then, unexpectedly, grinned. ‘So you’ve fallen out with Colonel Beckwith too, have you?’

‘I reckon so, sir, yes.’

‘How?’

Sharpe considered the question and decided it could not be answered truthfully. He could not say he did not fit into the mess, it was too vague, too self-pitying, so he answered with a half-truth. ‘They’ve marched off, sir, and left me to clean up the barracks. I’ve fought more battles than any of them, seen more enemies and killed more men than all of them put together, but that don’t count. They don’t want me, sir, so I’m getting out.’

‘Don’t be such a bloody fool,’ Baird growled. ‘In a year or two, Sharpe, there’s going to be enough war for every man jack in this army. So far all we’ve been doing is pissing around the edge of the French, but sooner or later we’re going to have to tackle the bastards head on. We’ll need all the officers we can get then, and you’ll have your chance. You might be a quartermaster now, but ten years from now you’ll be leading a battalion, so just be patient.’

‘I’m not sure Colonel Beckwith will want me back, sir. I’m not supposed to be in London. I’m supposed to be at Shorncliffe.’

‘Beckwith will do what I tell him,’ Baird growled, ‘and I’ll tell him to kiss your bum if you do this job for me.’

Sharpe liked Baird. Most soldiers liked Baird. He might be a general, but he was as tough as any man in the ranks. He could outswear the sergeants, outmarch the Rifles and outfight any man in green or scarlet. He was a fighter, not a bureaucrat. He had risen high enough in the army, but there were rumours that he had enemies higher still, men who disliked his bluntness. ‘What kind of job, sir?’ Sharpe asked.

‘One where you might die, Sharpe,’ Baird said with relish. He drained his glass of port and poured another. ‘We’re sending a guardsman to Copenhagen. Our interest in Copenhagen is supposed to be secret, but I dare say every French agent in London already knows it. This fellow is going there tomorrow and I want someone to keep him alive. He’s not a real soldier, Sharpe, but an aide to the Duke of York. Not one of those’ – he saw Sharpe glancing at the table of theatre-goers – ‘but the same sort of creature. He’s a courtier, Sharpe, not a soldier. You won’t find a better man for standing sentinel over the royal piss pot, but you wouldn’t want to follow him into a breach, not if you wanted to win.’

‘He’s going tomorrow?’ Sharpe asked.

‘Aye, I know, short notice. We had another man ready to hold his hand, but he was the fellow who was murdered two days ago. So the Duke of York tells me to find a replacement. I thought of you, but didn’t know where you were, then God sent me to the theatre and I find you guzzling ale afterwards. Well done, God. And you won’t mind slitting a few Frog throats?’

‘No, sir.’

‘Our bloody guardsman says he doesn’t need a protector. Says there’s no danger, but what does he know? And his master, the Duke, insists he takes a companion, someone who knows how to fight and, by God, Sharpe, you know how to fight. Almost as well as me!’

‘Almost, sir,’ Sharpe agreed.

‘So you’re under orders, Sharpe.’ The General gripped the port bottle by the neck and pushed back his chair. ‘Are you sleeping here?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘So am I, and I’ve got a carriage coming at seven o’clock to take us to Harwich.’ Baird stood, then paused. ‘It’s a strange thing, Sharpe, but if you do your job properly you’ll stop a war. Odd thing for a soldier to do, don’t you think? Where’s our advancement if we can’t fight? But all the same I doubt we’ll be beating our swords into ploughshares any time soon, not unless the Frogs suddenly see sense. So till tomorrow, young man.’ Baird gave Sharpe a brusque nod and went back to his companions, while Sharpe, with a start of surprise, realized he had not been told why the guardsman was being sent to Copenhagen, nor been asked whether he was willing to go with him. Baird, it appeared, had taken his assent for granted, and Baird, Sharpe reckoned, was right, for, like it or not, he was a soldier.

The General was in a foul mood at seven o’clock next morning. His aide, a Captain Gordon, mimed the cause of Baird’s ill temper by tipping an imaginary bottle to his lips, thus cautioning Sharpe to tact. Sharpe kept silent, settling on the carriage’s front seat, while Baird grumbled that London stank, the weather was wretched and the coach seats lumpy. The vehicle lurched as the inn servants strapped the General’s luggage on the roof, then there was a further delay as a final passenger appeared and insisted that his own luggage be secured alongside Baird’s. The newcomer was a civilian who looked about thirty years old. He was very thin and had a frail, birdlike face on which, astonishingly, a black velvet beauty patch was glued. He wore a silver coat edged with white lace and carried a gold-topped stick from which a silk handkerchief hung. His hair, black as gunpowder, had been smoothed with a perfumed oil and tied with a silver ribbon. He climbed into the coach and, without a word, sat opposite Sharpe. ‘You’re late, my lord,’ Baird snapped.

The young man raised a gloved hand, fluttered his fingers as if to suggest Baird was being extremely tiresome and then closed his eyes. Baird, denied sport with his lordship, frowned at Sharpe instead. ‘There’s still blood on the coat, Sharpe.’

‘Sorry, sir. Tried to wash it out.’ The carriage jerked forward.

‘Can’t have you going to Denmark in a bloody coat, man.’

‘One supposes, Sir David,’ Captain Gordon cut in smoothly, ‘that Lieutenant Sharpe will not be wearing uniform in Denmark. The object is secrecy.’

‘Object, my arse,’ the General said helpfully. ‘He’s my nephew,’ he informed Sharpe, referring to Captain Gordon, ‘and talks like a bloody lawyer.’

Gordon smiled. ‘Do you have civilian clothes, Sharpe?’

‘I do, sir.’ Sharpe indicated his pack.

‘I suggest you don them once you’re aboard your ship,’ Gordon said.

‘“I suggest you don them.”’ Baird mimicked his nephew’s voice. ‘Bloody hellfire. Doesn’t this bloody carriage move at all?’

‘Traffic, Sir David,’ Gordon said emolliently. ‘Essex vegetables for the Saturday market.’