Читать книгу Sharpe 3-Book Collection 1: Sharpe’s Tiger, Sharpe’s Triumph, Sharpe’s Fortress - Bernard Cornwell - Страница 18

‘Sharpe! Sharpe!’ It was Colonel Gudin who, at nightfall, burst into the barracks room. ‘Come, quick! As you are, hurry!’

‘What about me, sir?’ Lawford asked. The Lieutenant had been idly reading his Bible as he lay on his cot.

‘Come on, Sharpe!’ Gudin did not wait to answer Lawford, but just ran across the barracks’ courtyard and out into the street which separated the European soldiers’ quarters from the Hindu temple. ‘Quick, Sharpe!’ the Frenchman called back as he hurried past a pile of mud bricks that were stacked at the street corner. Sharpe, dressed in tiger-striped tunic and boots, but with no hat, crossbelt, pouches or musket, ran after the Colonel. He leapt over a half-naked man who was sitting cross-legged beside the temple wall, shoved a cow out of his way, then turned the corner and hurried after Gudin towards the Mysore Gate. Lawford had paused to tug on his boots and by the time he reached the street beside the temple, Sharpe had already vanished.

‘Can you ride a horse?’ Gudin shouted at Sharpe when the two men reached the gate.

‘I did a couple of times,’ Sharpe said, not bothering to explain that the beasts had been unsaddled draught horses that had ambled docilely around the inn yard.

‘Get on that one!’ Gudin said, pointing to a small excited mare that was being held by an Indian infantryman along with Gudin’s own horse. ‘She belongs to Captain Romet, so for God’s sake take care,’ Gudin shouted as he swung himself up into the saddle. Captain Romet was one of Gudin’s two deputies, but as both the junior French officers spent most of their lives in the city’s most expensive brothel, Sharpe had yet to meet either of them. He climbed gingerly onto the mare’s back, then kicked back his heels and clung desperately to the horse’s mane as she followed Gudin’s gelding into the gateway. ‘The British are attacking a wood just north of Sultanpetah,’ the Colonel explained as he pushed his horse through the crowded archway.

Sharpe could hear the distant fight. Muskets snapped and shells exploded dully to flicker red bursts of light far to the city’s west. It was very nearly night in the city. The first house lamps had long been lit and flaming torches smoked in the archway of the Mysore Gate through which a stream of men was hurrying. Some were infantry, others carried rockets. Gudin bellowed at them for passage, used his gelding to force the slower rocketmen aside, and then, once through the gate, he sawed on his reins to turn westwards.

Sharpe followed, more intent on staying on the mare than watching the excitement that seethed around him. A narrow bridge led across the South Cauvery just outside the gate and Gudin shouted at its guards to clear the roadway. Rocketmen shrank back against the balustrades as Sharpe and Gudin hurried between the bridge’s small forts and then over the shallow, shrunken river. Once on the far bank they galloped hard across a stretch of muddy grass, then splashed through another small branch of the river. Sharpe clung to the mare’s neck as she lurched up out of the stream. Rockets were flaring in the sky ahead which still glowed from the last rays of the invisible sun.

‘Your old friends are trying to clear the tope,’ Gudin explained, pointing at the thick wood that showed black against the eastern skyline. He had slowed down, for now they were crossing more uneven ground and the Colonel did not want to break a horse’s leg by being too reckless. ‘I want you to confuse them.’

‘Me, sir?’ Sharpe slipped half out of the saddle, gripped the pommel desperately and somehow dragged himself upright. He could hear the snapping crack of muskets, and see the small muzzle flames flickering all across the land ahead. It seemed to him like a major attack, especially when a British field gun fired in the distance and its muzzle flame lit the twilight like sheet lightning.

‘Shout orders at them, Sharpe,’ Gudin said, when the report of the gun had rolled past them. ‘Confuse them!’

‘Lawford would have done better, sir,’ Sharpe said. ‘He’s got a voice like an officer.’

‘Then you’ll have to sound like a sergeant,’ Gudin said, ‘and if you do it right, Sharpe, I’ll make you up to corporal.’

‘Thank you, sir.’

Gudin had slowed his horse to a walk as they neared the wood. It was too dark to trot now and there was a danger they could lose their way. To Sharpe’s north, where the field gun had fired, the musketry was regular, suggesting that the British soldiers or sepoys were steadily taking their objectives, but in the wood in front, there seemed to be nothing but confusion. Muskets crackled irregularly, rockets streaked fire amongst the branches and smoke boiled from small brush fires. Sharpe could hear men shouting, either in fear or triumph. ‘I wouldn’t mind a gun, sir,’ he said to Gudin.

‘You don’t need one. We’re not here to fight, just to mix them up. That’s why I came back to get you. Dismount here.’ The Colonel tied both horses’ reins to an abandoned handcart that must have been used to bring more rockets forward. The two men were a hundred yards short of the tope now and Sharpe could hear officers shouting orders. It was hard to tell who was giving the orders, for the Tippoo’s army used English words of command, but as Sharpe and Gudin hurried closer to the fight Sharpe could tell that it was Indian voices that shouted the commands to fire, to advance and to kill. Whatever British or Indian troops were trying to capture the wood were evidently in trouble, and it had been Gudin’s inspiration to snatch the first Englishman he could find in the barracks and use him to sow even more confusion among the attackers. Gudin drew a pistol. ‘Sergeant Rothiere!’ he called.

‘Mon Colonel!’ The big Sergeant, who had first used Captain Romet’s horse to reach the fight, materialized out of the gloom. He gave Sharpe a suspicious glowering look, then cocked his musket.

‘Let’s enjoy ourselves,’ Gudin said in English.

‘Aye, sir,’ Sharpe said and wondered what the hell he should do now. In the dark, he reckoned, there should be no trouble in slipping away from the Colonel and Rothiere and joining the beleaguered attackers, but how would that leave Lieutenant Lawford? The trick of it, Sharpe decided, was not to make it look as though he was deliberately trying to get back to the British, but rather to make it seem as though he was captured accidentally. That still might make things very awkward for Lawford, but Sharpe knew that his overriding duty was to carry McCandless’s warning to General Harris, just as he knew that he might never get another opportunity as good as this one that Gudin had dropped so unexpectedly into his lap.

Gudin paused at the edge of the tope. Rocketmen were enthusiastically blasting their weapons through the trees where the missiles were being deflected off branches to tumble erratically through the leaves. Muskets sounded deep inside the wood. Wounded men lay at the trees’ edge, and somewhere not far off a dying man alternately screamed and panted. ‘So far,’ Gudin said, ‘we seem to be beating them. Let’s go forward.’

Sharpe followed the two Frenchmen. Off to his right there was a sudden blast of gunfire and the sound of bayonets clashing, and Gudin swerved towards the sound, but the fight was over before they ever reached it. The Tippoo’s men had encountered a small group of redcoats and had killed one and chased the others deeper into the wood. Gudin saw the redcoat’s body in the fast-dying flame light of an exhausted rocket and knelt beside the man. The Colonel took out a tinderbox, struck a spark, blew the charred linen in the box alight, then held the tiny flame down beside the redcoat’s chest. The man was not quite dead, but he was unconscious, blood was bubbling slow in his throat and his eyes were closed. ‘Recognize the uniform?’ Gudin asked Sharpe. The tinderbox’s flickering glow revealed that the redcoat’s turnbacks and facings were scarlet piped with white.

‘Bloody hell,’ Sharpe said. ‘Excuse me, sir,’ he added, then he gently moved Gudin’s hand up to the dying man’s face. Blood had poured out of the man’s mouth to soak his powdered hair, but Sharpe recognized him all the same. It was Jed Mallinson who usually paraded in the rearmost rank of Sharpe’s file. ‘I know the uniform and the man, sir,’ Sharpe told Gudin. ‘It’s the 33rd, my old battalion. West Riding, Yorkshire.’

‘Good.’ Gudin snapped the tinderbox shut, extinguishing the small flame. ‘And you don’t mind confusing them?’

‘That’s why I’m here, sir,’ Sharpe said with a suitable bloodthirstiness.

‘I think the British army lost a good man in you, Sharpe,’ Gudin said, standing and guiding Sharpe deeper into the trees. ‘If you don’t want to stay in India you might think of coming home with me.’

‘To France, sir?’

Gudin smiled at Sharpe’s surprised tone. ‘It isn’t the devil’s country, Sharpe; indeed I suspect it’s the most blessed place on God’s earth, and in the French army a good man can be very easily raised to officer rank.’

‘Me, sir? An officer?’ Sharpe laughed. ‘Like making a mule into a racehorse.’

‘You underestimate yourself.’ Gudin paused. There were feet trampling to the right, and a sudden blast of musketry off to the left. The musketry attracted an excited rush of the Tippoo’s infantry who blundered through the trees. Sergeant Rothière bellowed at them in a mix of French and Kanarese, and his sudden authority calmed the men who gathered around Colonel Gudin. Gudin smiled wolfishly. ‘Let’s see if we can mislead some of your old comrades, Sharpe. Shout at them to come this way.’

‘Forward!’ Sharpe obediently bellowed into the dark trees. ‘Forward!’ He paused, listening for an answer. ‘33rd! To me! To me!’

No one responded. ‘Try a name,’ Gudin suggested.

Sharpe invented an officer’s name. ‘Captain Fellows! This way!’ He called it a dozen times, but there was no response. ‘Hakeswill!’ he finally shouted. ‘Sergeant Hakeswill!’

Then, from maybe thirty paces away, the hated voice called back, ‘Who’s that?’ The Sergeant sounded suspicious.

‘Come here, man!’ Sharpe snapped.

Hakeswill ignored the order, but the fact that a man had replied at all cheered Gudin who had quietly formed the stray unit of the Tippoo’s infantry into a line that waited to kill whoever came in response to Sharpe’s hailing. Chaos reigned ahead. Rockets banged into branches, musket flames flared in the drifting smoke, while bullets thumped into trees or crackled through the thick leaves. A bloodthirsty cheer sounded a long way off, but whether it was Indian or British troops who cheered, Sharpe could not tell.

One thing was plain to Sharpe. The 33rd was in trouble. Poor Jed Mallinson should never have been abandoned to die, and that sad death, along with the scattered sounds of firing, suggested that the Tippoo’s men had succeeded in splitting the attacking force and was now picking it off piece by piece. It was now or never, Sharpe reckoned. He had to get away from Gudin and somehow rejoin his battalion. ‘I need to get closer, sir,’ he told the Colonel and, without waiting for Gudin’s consent, he ran deeper into the trees. ‘Sergeant Hakeswill!’ he shouted as he ran. ‘To me, now! Now! Come on, you miserable bastard! Move your bloody self! Come on!’ He could hear Gudin following him, so Sharpe fell silent and, suddenly deep in shadow, dodged off to his right.

‘Sharpe!’ Gudin hissed, but Sharpe was well away from the Colonel now and he reckoned he had done it without looking like a deserter.

‘Sergeant Hakeswill!’ Sharpe bellowed, then ran on again. There was a danger that by shouting he would keep Gudin on his heels, but it was a greater danger to let the Frenchman think that he was deliberately trying to rejoin the British, for then Lawford might suffer, and so Sharpe ran the risk as he worked his way still farther into the dense trees. ‘Hakeswill! To me! To me!’ He pushed through thick foliage, tripped over a bush, picked himself up and ran on into a clearing. ‘Hakeswill!’ he shouted.

A rocket crashed into a branch high above Sharpe and slashed straight down into the clearing ahead of him. Once on the ground the missile circled furiously like a mad dog chasing its own tail and the brilliant light of the exhaust lit the trees all around. Sharpe flinched away from the lash of the fiery tail and almost ran straight into Sergeant Hakeswill who had suddenly appeared from the bushes to his left.

‘Sharpie!’ Hakeswill shouted. ‘You bastard!’ He slashed wildly at Sharpe with his bloody halberd. Morris, hearing Hakeswill’s name shouted, had ordered the Sergeant to find whoever was summoning him and Hakeswill had unwillingly obeyed. Now, suddenly, Hakeswill was alone with Sharpe and the Sergeant slammed the spear forward again. ‘Traitorous little bastard!’ Hakeswill said.

‘For Christ’s sake, drop it!’ Sharpe shouted, retreating before the quick lunges of the spear head.

‘Running off to the enemy, Sharpie?’ Hakeswill said. ‘I should take you in, shouldn’t I? It’ll be another court martial and a firing party this time. But I won’t risk that. I’m going to put your gizzards on a skewer, Sharpie, and send you back to your maker. And wearing a frock, too?’ The Sergeant stabbed again, and Sharpe leapt back once more, but then the dying rocket fizzed across the clearing and its long bamboo stick tangled Sharpe’s legs. He fell backwards and Hakeswill gave a shout of triumph as he sprang towards him with the halberd poised ready to lunge downwards.

Sharpe felt the rocket’s iron tube under his right hand, gripped it and threw it up at Hakeswill’s face. The rocket’s gunpowder fuel was almost gone, but there was just enough left to spurt one last sudden flame that licked across Hakeswill’s blue-eyed face. The Sergeant screamed, dropped the halberd and clapped his hands to his eyes. To his surprise he discovered he could still see and that his face was not badly burned, but in his panic he had stumbled past Sharpe and so now he turned back and, as he did so, he dragged a pistol out of his belt.

Just then a squad of redcoats burst into the clearing. The burning carcass of the rocket showed that they were men from the 33rd’s Grenadier Company who were as lost as every other redcoat on this night of chaos. One of the grenadiers saw Sharpe who, in his tiger-striped tunic, was scrambling to his feet. The grenadier raised his gun. ‘Leave the bastard!’ Hakeswill screamed. ‘He’s mine!’

Then a volley of musketry flamed from the trees and half of the grenadiers spun round or were hurled backwards. Blood hissed in the fiery remnants of the rocket as a company of tiger-striped troops burst out of the trees. Colonel Gudin and Sergeant Rothière led them. Hakeswill turned to run at the sight of the enemy, but one of the Tippoo’s men lunged forward with a bayonet-tipped musket and succeeded in driving the Sergeant down to the ground where he first twisted frantically aside, then screamed for mercy. Gudin ran past the fallen Hakeswill. ‘Well done, Sharpe,’ Gudin called. ‘Well done! Stop that! Stop that!’ These last orders were to the Tippoo’s men who had enthusiastically begun to bayonet the surviving grenadiers. ‘We take prisoners!’ Gudin roared. ‘Prisoners!’ Rothière knocked a bayonet aside to stop the soldier from slaughtering Hakeswill.

Sharpe was cursing. He had so nearly got clean away! If Hakeswill had not attacked him he might have run another fifty yards through the trees, discarded the tiger-striped tunic and discovered some of his old friends. Instead he had become a hero to Gudin who believed that Sharpe had lured all the grenadiers into the clearing where the twelve who had survived the enthusiastic attack were now prisoners along with the twitching and cursing Hakeswill.

‘You took a terrible risk, Corporal!’ Gudin said, coming back to Sharpe and sheathing his sword. ‘You could have been shot by your old friends. But it worked, eh? And now you are a corporal!’

‘Aye, sir. It worked,’ Sharpe said, though he took no pleasure in it. It had all gone so disastrously wrong, indeed the whole night had gone disastrously wrong for the British. The Tippoo’s men were now clearing the tope yard by yard, and chasing British survivors back across the aqueduct. They pursued the beaten fugitives with jeers, volleys of musket fire and salvoes of rockets. Thirteen prisoners had been taken, all by Sharpe and Gudin, and those unfortunate men were herded back towards the city while the redcoat dead were looted for weapons and valuables.

‘I’ll make sure the Tippoo hears of your bravery, Sharpe,’ Gudin said as he retrieved his horse. ‘He’s a brave man himself and he admires it in others. I don’t doubt he’ll want to reward you!’

‘Thank you, sir,’ Sharpe said, though without enthusiasm.

‘You’re not wounded, are you?’ Gudin asked anxiously, struck by the forlorn tone of Sharpe’s voice.

‘Burned my hand, sir,’ Sharpe said. He had not realized it when he snatched up the rocket tube to fend off Hakeswill, but the metal cylinder had scorched his hand, though not badly. ‘Nothing much,’ he added. ‘I’ll live.’

‘Of course you’ll live,’ Gudin said, then laughed delightedly. ‘Gave them a beating, didn’t we?’

‘Trounced ’em proper, sir.’

‘And we’ll trounce them again, Sharpe, when they attack the city. They don’t know what’s waiting for them!’

‘What is waiting for them, sir?’ Sharpe asked.

‘You’ll see. You’ll see,’ Gudin said, then hauled himself up into his saddle. Sergeant Rothière wanted to stay in the tope to retrieve British muskets, so the Colonel insisted that Sharpe ride the second horse back to the city with the disconsolate prisoners who were under the guard of a gleeful company of the Tippoo’s troops.

Hakeswill looked up at Sharpe and spat. ‘Bloody traitor!’

‘Ignore him,’ Gudin said.

‘Snake!’ Hakeswill hissed. ‘Piece of no-good shit, that’s what you are, Sharpie. Jesus Christ!’ This last imprecation was because one of the escorting soldiers had hit the back of Hakeswill’s head with a musket barrel. ‘Black bastard,’ Hakeswill muttered.

‘I’d like to kick his bloody teeth in, sir,’ Sharpe said to Gudin. ‘In fact, if you’ve no objection, sir, I’ll take the bastard into the dark and finish him off.’

Gudin sighed. ‘I do object,’ the Colonel said mildly, ‘because it’s rather important we treat prisoners well, Sharpe. I sometimes fear the Tippoo doesn’t understand the courtesies of war, but so far I’ve managed to persuade him that if we treat our prisoners properly then our enemies will treat theirs properly in return.’

‘I’d still like to kick the bastard’s teeth in, sir.’

‘I assure you the Tippoo might do that without any help from you,’ Gudin said grimly.

Sharpe and the Colonel spurred ahead of the prisoners to cross the bridge back to the city where they dismounted at the Mysore Gate. Sharpe handed the mare’s reins to Gudin who thanked him yet again and tossed him a whole golden haideri as a reward. ‘Go and get drunk, Sharpe,’ the Colonel said, ‘you deserve it.’

‘Thank you, sir.’

‘And believe me, I’ll tell the Tippoo. He admires bravery!’

Lieutenant Lawford was among the curious crowd who waited just inside the gate. ‘What happened?’ he asked Sharpe.

‘I buggered up,’ Sharpe said bitterly. ‘I bloody well buggered it up. Come on, let’s spend some money. Get drunk.’

‘No, wait.’ Lawford had seen the redcoats coming through the flame light of the gate torches and he pulled away from Sharpe to watch as the thirteen prisoners were pushed at bayonet point into the city. The crowd began jeering.

‘Come away!’ Sharpe insisted and he tugged at Lawford’s elbow.

Lawford shook off the tug and stared at the prisoners, unable to hide his chagrin at the sight of British soldiers being herded into captivity. Then he recognized Hakeswill who, at the same instant, stared into the Lieutenant’s face, and Sharpe saw Hakeswill’s look of utter astonishment. For a second the world seemed to pause in its turning. Lawford appeared unable to move, while Hakeswill was gaping with disbelief and seemed about to shout his recognition. Sharpe was reaching to snatch a musket from one of the Tippoo’s infantrymen, but then Hakeswill turned deliberately away and composed his features as though sending a silent message that he would not remark on Lawford’s presence. The twelve grenadier prisoners were still a few yards behind and Lawford, suddenly realizing that yet more men of his battalion might recognize him, at last turned away. He pulled Sharpe with him. Sharpe protested. ‘I want to kill Hakeswill!’

‘Come on!’ Lawford hurried down an alley. The Lieutenant had gone pale. He stopped beside the arched doorway of a small temple that was surmounted by a carving of a cow resting beneath a parasol. Little flames sputtered inside the sanctuary. ‘Will he say anything?’ Lawford asked.

‘That bastard?’ Sharpe said. ‘Anything’s possible.’

‘Surely not. He wouldn’t betray us,’ Lawford said, then shuddered. ‘What happened, for God’s sake?’

Sharpe told him of the night’s events and how close he had come to making a clean break back to the British lines. ‘It were bloody Hakeswill that stopped me,’ he complained.

‘He could have misunderstood you,’ Lawford said.

‘Not him.’

‘But what happens if he does betray us?’ Lawford asked.

‘Then we join your uncle in the bloody cells,’ Sharpe said gloomily. ‘You should have let me shoot the bastard back at the gate.’

‘Don’t be a fool!’ Lawford snapped. ‘You’re still in the army, Sharpe. So am I.’ He suddenly shook his head. ‘God Almighty!’ he swore. ‘We need to find Ravi Shekhar.’

‘Why?’

‘Because if we can’t get the news out, then maybe he can!’ Lawford said angrily. His anger was at himself. He had been so beguiled by exploring the existence of a common soldier that he had forgotten his duty, and that dereliction now filled him with guilt. ‘We have to find him, Sharpe!’

‘How? We can’t ask in the streets for him!’

‘Then find Mrs Bickerstaff,’ Lawford said urgently. ‘Find her, Sharpe!’ He lowered his voice. ‘And that’s an order.’

‘I outrank you,’ Sharpe said.

Lawford turned on him furiously. ‘What did you say?’

‘I’m a corporal now, Private.’ Sharpe grinned.

‘This is not a joke, Sharpe!’ Lawford snapped. There was a sudden authority in his voice. ‘We’re not here to enjoy ourselves. We’re here to do a job.’

‘We’ve done it bloody well so far,’ Sharpe said defensively.

‘No, we haven’t,’ Lawford said firmly. ‘Because we haven’t got the news out, have we? And until we do that, Sharpe, we’ve achieved nothing. Absolutely nothing. So talk to your woman and tell her what we know and get her to find Shekhar. That’s an order, Private Sharpe. So do it!’ Lawford abruptly turned and stalked away.

Sharpe felt the comforting weight of the haideri in his tunic pocket. He thought about following Lawford, then decided to hell with it. Tonight he could afford the best and life was too short to pass up that sort of chance. He decided he would go back to the brothel. He had liked the place, a house filled with curtains, rugs and shaded oil lamps where two giggling girls had given Lawford and Sharpe baths before letting them go up the stairs to the bedrooms. A haideri would buy a whole night in one of those rooms, perhaps with Lali, the tall girl who had left Lieutenant Lawford exhausted and guilt-ridden.

So he went to spend his gold.

The 33rd marched unhappily back to the encampment. The wounded were carried or limped back and one man cried out every time he put his left foot down, but otherwise the battalion was silent. They had been whipped, and the distant jeers of the Tippoo’s men rubbed salt into their wounds. A last few rockets pursued them, their flames streaking wildly askew across the stars.

The Grenadier and Light Companies had taken the casualties. Men were missing and Wellesley knew that some of those missing were dead and he feared that others were prisoners or else still lying wounded among the dark trees. The remaining eight companies of the battalion had marched to support the flank companies, but in the dark they had crossed the aqueduct too far to the south and, while Wellesley had tried to find his beleaguered flank companies, Major Shee had stolidly marched straight through the tope and out across the aqueduct on the far side without encountering the enemy or firing a shot. The two sepoy battalions could easily have turned the night’s disaster into a victory, but they had received no orders, though one of the battalions, fearing disaster, had fired a panicked volley that had killed their own commanding officer while, a half-mile to their front, the 33rd had floundered about in unsoldierlike chaos.

It was that lack of professionalism that galled Wellesley. He had failed. The northern stretch of the aqueduct had been efficiently captured by other battalions, but the 33rd had blundered. Wellesley had blundered, and he knew it. General Harris was sympathetic enough when the young Colonel reported his failure; Harris murmured about the uncertainty of night attacks and how everything could be put right in the morning, but Wellesley still felt the failure keenly. He knew only too well that experienced soldiers like Baird despised him, believing that his promotion to second-in-command was due solely to the fact that his elder brother was Governor-General of the British regions in India, and Wellesley’s shame had been made worse because Major General Baird had been waiting with Harris when Wellesley arrived to report his failure and the tall Scotsman seemed to smirk as Wellesley confessed to the night’s disasters. ‘Difficult things, night attacks,’ Harris said yet again while Baird said nothing and Wellesley smarted under the Scotsman’s telling silence.

‘We’ll clear the tope in the morning,’ Harris tried to console Wellesley.

‘My men will do it,’ Wellesley promised quickly.

‘No, no. They won’t be rested,’ Harris said. ‘Better if we use fresh troops.’

‘My fellows will be quite ready.’ Baird spoke for the first time. He smiled at Wellesley. ‘The Scotch Brigade, I mean.’

‘I request permission to command the attack, sir,’ Wellesley said very stiffly, ignoring Baird. ‘Whatever troops you use, sir, I’ll still be duty officer.’

‘I’m sure, I’m sure,’ Harris said vaguely, neither granting nor denying Wellesley’s request. ‘You must get some sleep,’ he said to the young Colonel, ‘so let me wish you a restful night.’ He waited till Wellesley was gone, then shook his head mutely.

‘A whippersnapper,’ Baird said loudly enough for the retreating Colonel to hear him, ‘with his nursery maid’s apron strings still trapped in his sword belt.’

‘He’s very efficient,’ Harris said mildly.

‘My mother was efficient, God rest her soul,’ Baird retorted vigorously, ‘but you wouldn’t want her running a damned battle. I tell you, Harris, if you let him lead the assault on the city you’ll be asking for trouble. Give the job to me, man, give it to me. I’ve got a score to settle with the Tippoo.’

‘So you have,’ Harris agreed, ‘so you have.’

‘And let me take the damned tope in the morning. God, man, I could do it with a corporal’s guard!’

‘Wellesley will still be officer of the day tomorrow morning, Baird,’ Harris said, then pulled off his wig as a sign that he wanted to go to bed. One side of his scalp was curiously flattened where he had been wounded at Bunker Hill. He scratched at the old injury, then yawned. ‘I’ll bid you good night.’

‘You know how to spell Wellesley’s name for the despatch, Harris?’ Baird asked. ‘Three L’s!’

‘Good night,’ Harris said firmly.

At dawn the Scotch Brigade and two Indian battalions paraded east of the encampment, while a battery of four twelve-pounder guns unlimbered to their south. As soon as the sun was up the four guns began throwing shells into the tope. The missiles left filmy smoke traces in the air from their burning fuses, then plunged into the trees where their explosions were muffled by the thick foliage. One shell fell short and a great gout of water spurted up from the aqueduct. Birds wheeled above the smoking tope, squawking their protests at the violence that had once again disturbed their nests.

Major General Baird waited in front of the Scotch Brigade. He itched to take his countrymen forward, but Harris insisted it was Wellesley’s privilege. ‘He’s officer of the day till noon,’ Harris said.

‘He ain’t up,’ Baird said. ‘He’s sleeping it off. If you wait for him to wake up it’ll be past noon anyway. Just let me go, sir.’

‘Give him five minutes,’ Harris insisted. ‘I sent an aide to wake him.’

Baird had intercepted the aide to make certain Wellesley did not wake in time, but just before the five minutes expired the young Colonel came racing across the ground on his white horse. He looked dishevelled, like a man who had made too hasty a toilet. ‘My sincerest apologies, sir,’ he greeted Harris.

‘You’re ready, Wellesley?’

‘Indeed, sir.’

‘Then you know what to do,’ Harris said curtly.

‘Look after my Scots boys!’ Baird called to Wellesley, and received, as he expected, no answer.

The Scots colours were unfurled, the drummer boys sounded the advance, the pipers began their fierce music and the brigade marched into the rising sun. The sepoys followed. Rockets streaked up from the tope, but the missiles were no more accurate in the morning than they had been at night. The four brass field guns fired shell after shell, only stopping when the Scotsmen reached the aqueduct. Harris and Baird watched as the brigade attacked in a four-deep line that climbed the nearer embankment, dropped out of sight into the aqueduct, briefly reappeared on the farther embankment, then finally disappeared into the trees beyond. For a few moments there was the disciplined sound of musket volleys, then silence. The sepoys followed the Scots, spreading left and right to attack the fringes of the battered woodland. Harris waited, then a galloper came from the northern stretch of the aqueduct, which had been captured during the night, to report that the land between the tope and the city was thick with enemy fugitives running back to Seringapatam. That news was proof that the tope was at last taken and that the whole aqueduct was now in allied hands. ‘Time for breakfast,’ Harris said happily. ‘You’ll join me, Baird?’

‘I’ll hear the butcher’s bill first, sir, if you don’t mind,’ Baird answered, but there was no butcher’s bill, for none of the Scots or Indian troops had died. The Tippoo’s men had abandoned the tope once the artillery shells began to fall among the trees and they left behind only the plundered British dead of the previous night. Lieutenant Fitzgerald was among them, and he was buried with honours. Killed by an enemy bayonet, the report said.

And now, with the approach ground west of the city in Harris’s hands, the siege proper could begin.

It did not prove difficult to find Mary. Sharpe merely asked Gudin and, after the night’s events in the tope, the Colonel was eager to give Sharpe whatever he wanted. The loss of the tope the following dawn had in no way diminished the Frenchman’s delight at the night-time victory, nor the optimism inside the city, for no one had seriously expected the tope to resist for more than a few minutes and the previous night’s victory, with its catch of prisoners and its tales of British defeat, had convinced the Tippoo’s forces that they would prove more than a match for the enemy armies.

‘Your woman, Sharpe?’ Gudin teased. ‘You become a corporal and all you want is your woman back?’

‘I just want to see her, sir.’

‘She’s in Appah Rao’s household. I’ll have a word with the General, but first you’re to go to the palace at midday.’

‘Me, sir?’ Sharpe felt an instant pang of alarm, fearing that Hakeswill had betrayed him.

‘To get an award, Sharpe,’ Gudin reassured him. ‘But don’t worry, I’ll be there to steal most of your glory.’

‘Yes, sir.’ Sharpe grinned. He liked Gudin, and he could not help contrasting the kind and easy-going Frenchman with his own Colonel who always appeared to treat common soldiers as if they were a nuisance that had to be endured. Of course Wellesley was sheltered from his ranks by his officers and sergeants, while Gudin had such a small battalion that in truth he was more like a captain than a colonel. Gudin did have the assistance of a Swiss adjutant and the occasional help of the two French captains when they were not drinking in the city’s best brothel, but the battalion had no lieutenants or ensigns, and only three sergeants, which meant that the rank and file had an unprecedented access to their Colonel. Gudin liked it that way for he had little else to occupy him. Officially he was France’s adviser to the Tippoo, but the Tippoo rarely sought anyone’s advice. Gudin confessed as much as he walked with Sharpe to the palace at midday. ‘Knows it all, does he, sir?’ Sharpe asked.

‘He’s a good soldier, Sharpe. Very good. What he really wants is a French army, not a French adviser.’

‘What does he want a French army for, sir?’

‘To beat you British out of India.’

‘But then he’d just be stuck with you French instead,’ Sharpe pointed out.

‘But he likes the French, Sharpe. You find that strange?’

‘I find everything in India strange, sir. Haven’t had a proper meal since I got here.’

Gudin laughed. ‘And a proper meal is what?’

‘Bit of beef, sir, with some potatoes and a gravy thick enough to choke a rat.’

Gudin shuddered. ‘La cuisine anglaise!’

‘Sir?’

‘Never mind, Sharpe, never mind.’

A half-dozen men waited to be presented to the Tippoo, all of them soldiers who had somehow distinguished themselves in the defence of the tope the previous night. There was also one prisoner, a Hindu soldier who had been seen to run away when the attackers had first crossed the aqueduct. All of them, coward and heroes alike, waited in the courtyard where Sharpe and Lawford had been tested by the Tippoo, though today five of the six tigers had been taken away, leaving only a big old docile male. Gudin crossed to the beast and tickled its chin, then scratched it between the ears. ‘This one’s tame as a cat, Sharpe.’

‘I’ll let you stroke it, sir. Wild horses wouldn’t get me near a beast like that.’

The tiger liked being scratched. It closed its yellow eyes and for a few seconds Sharpe could almost persuade himself the big beast was purring, then it yawned hugely, displaying a massive mouth with old worn teeth, and when it had yawned it stretched out its long forepaws and, from its furry pads, two sets of long, hooked claws emerged. ‘That’s how it kills,’ Gudin said, gesturing at the claws as he backed away. ‘Holds you down with its teeth, then slits your belly open with the claws. Not this one, though. He’s just an old soft pet. Fleabitten too.’ Gudin picked a flea off his hand, then turned as a doorway to the courtyard was opened and a procession of palace attendants filed into the sunlight. It was led by two robed men who carried staffs tipped with silver tiger heads. They served as chamberlains, mustering the heroes into line and pushing the coward to one side, and behind them came two extraordinary men.

Sharpe gaped at them. They were both huge; tall and muscled like prizefighters. Their dark skin, naked to their waists, was oiled to a glistening shine, while their long black hair had been twisted round and round their heads and then tied with white ribbons. They had bristling black beards and wide moustaches that had been stiffened into points with wax. ‘Jettis,’ Gudin whispered to Sharpe.

‘Jettis? What are they, sir?’

‘Strongmen,’ Gudin said, ‘and executioners.’ The soldier who had fled from the attacking British dropped to his knees and shouted an appeal to the chamberlains. They ignored him.

Sharpe stood at the left-hand end of the line of heroes, who straightened proudly when the Tippoo himself entered the courtyard. He was escorted by six more servants, four of whom held a tiger-striped canopy above his head. The silken canopy was supported by poles with tiger finials and had a fringe of pearl drops. The Tippoo was in a green robe hung with more pearls and with his tiger-hilted sword hanging in its jewelled scabbard from a yellow silk sash. His broad turban was also green and wrapped about with more pearls, while in a plume at its crown there glittered a ruby so huge that Sharpe at first assumed it must be made of glass for surely no precious stone could be that massive, except perhaps for the big yellow-white diamond that formed the pommel of a dagger that the Tippoo wore in his yellow sash.

The Tippoo glanced at the quivering soldier, then nodded at the jettis.

‘This is not pleasant, Sharpe,’ Colonel Gudin warned softly from just behind Sharpe.

One of the jettis seized the terrified prisoner and dragged him upright, then half carried and half led him so that he stood directly in front of the Tippoo. There the jetti forced the man to make a half-turn, then pushed him down to his knees, knelt behind him and wrapped his arms around the prisoner’s arms and torso so that he could not move. The condemned man called piteously to the Tippoo who ignored the plea as the second jetti stood in front of the prisoner. The Tippoo nodded and the standing jetti placed his big hands on either side of the doomed man’s head. The man screamed, then the scream was cut off as the jetti tightened his grip.

‘God almighty!’ Sharpe said in wonderment as he watched the man’s head being wrung like a chicken. He had never seen such a thing, nor dreamed it was even possible. Behind him Colonel Gudin made a small noise of disapproval, but Sharpe had been impressed. It was a quicker death than being flogged, and quicker too than most hangings where the prisoners were left to dangle and dance as the rope choked them. The Tippoo applauded the jetti’s display, rewarded him, then ordered the dead man to be dragged away.

Then, one by one, the night’s heroes were led up to the tiger-striped canopy and to the short plump man who stood in its shade. Each soldier knelt as he was named, and each time the Tippoo leaned down and used both hands to lift the man up before talking to him and presenting the hero with a large medallion. The medallions looked as if they were gold, but Sharpe guessed they had to be made of polished brass, for surely no one would give away that much gold! Each of the men kissed the gift, then shuffled backwards to his place in the line.

At last it was Sharpe’s turn. ‘You know what to do,’ Gudin said encouragingly.

Sharpe did. He disliked going on his knees to any man, let alone this plump little monarch who was his country’s enemy, but there was no future in unnecessary defiance and so he obediently went down on one knee. The yellow-white stone in the dagger’s hilt glinted at him, and Sharpe could have sworn it was a real diamond. A huge diamond. Then the Tippoo smiled, leaned forward and raised Sharpe by putting his hands under his armpits. He was surprisingly strong.

Gudin had come forward with Sharpe and now spoke to the Tippoo’s interpreter in French, and the interpreter translated into Persian, which left Sharpe none the wiser. So far as he was concerned the events of the previous night had been a shambles, but it was evident that Gudin was telling a tale of high heroics for the Tippoo kept giving Sharpe appreciative glances. Sharpe stared back in fascination. The Tippoo had grey eyes, a dark skin and a finely trimmed black moustache. At a distance he looked plump, even soft, but closer there was a grimness to his face which persuaded Sharpe that Colonel Gudin had been right when he claimed that this man was a fine soldier. Sharpe towered over the Tippoo so much that if he looked straight ahead he found himself gazing at the huge stone in the Tippoo’s plume. It did not look like glass. It looked like one giant ruby, the size of a piece of grapeshot. It was held in a delicate gold clasp, and had to be worth a bloody fortune. Sharpe remembered his promise to give Mary a proper ruby on the day he married her, and he almost grinned at the thought of stealing the Tippoo’s stone. Then he forgot the stone as the Tippoo asked some questions, but Sharpe was not required to answer for Colonel Gudin did all his speaking for him. Once the questions were answered the Tippoo looked up into Sharpe’s eyes and spoke directly to him. ‘He says,’ Gudin translated the interpreter’s words, ‘that you have proved yourself a worthy soldier of Mysore. He is proud to have you in his forces, and he looks forward to the day when, with the infidel beaten back from the city, you can become a full and proper member of his army.’

‘Does that mean I’ll have to be circumvented, sir?’ Sharpe asked.

‘It means you are extraordinarily grateful to His Majesty, as I shall now tell him,’ Gudin said and duly did so, and when that statement had been translated, the Tippoo smiled and turned to an attendant, took the last of the medallions from its silk-lined basket, and reached up to put it round Sharpe’s neck. Sharpe stooped to make it easier, and blushed as the Tippoo’s face came close. He could smell a pungent perfume on the monarch, then Sharpe stepped back and, just like the other soldiers, he lifted the medallion to his lips. He almost swore as he did so, for the thing was not made of brass at all, but of heavy gold.

‘Back away,’ Gudin muttered.

Sharpe bowed to the Tippoo and backed clumsily to his place in the line. The Tippoo spoke again, though this time no one bothered to translate for Sharpe, and then the small ceremony was over and the Tippoo turned and went back into his palace.

‘You are now officially a hero of Mysore,’ Gudin said drily, ‘one of the Tippoo’s beloved tigers.’

‘Don’t deserve to be, sir,’ Sharpe said, peering at the medallion. One side was patterned with an intricate design, while the other showed a tiger’s face, though the face seemed to be cunningly constructed from the whorls of an intricate script. ‘Does it say something, sir?’ he asked Gudin.

‘It says, Sharpe, “Assad Allah al-ghalib”, which is Arabic and it means “The Lion of God is victorious.”’

‘Lion, not tiger?’

‘It’s a verse from the Koran, Sharpe, the Muslim Bible, and I suspect the holy book does not mention tigers. It can’t, otherwise I’m sure the Tippoo would use the quotation.’

‘Funny, isn’t it?’ Sharpe said, peering at the heavy gold medallion.

‘What is?’

‘The British beast is the lion, sir.’ Sharpe chuckled, then hefted the gold in his hand. ‘Is he a rich bugger, the Tippoo?’

‘As rich as can be,’ Gudin said drily.

‘And those are real stones? That ruby in his hat and the diamond in his dagger?’

‘Both worth a king’s ransom, Sharpe, but be careful. The diamond is called the Moonstone and is supposed to bring ill luck to anyone who steals it.’

‘I wasn’t thinking of thieving it, sir,’ Sharpe said, though he had been thinking exactly that. ‘But what about this?’ He lifted the heavy medallion again. ‘Do I get to keep it?’

‘Of course you do. Though I might say you only received it because I somewhat exaggerated your exploits.’

Sharpe unlooped the medallion. ‘You can have it, sir.’ He pushed the heavy gold towards the Frenchman. ‘Really, sir! Go on.’

Gudin backed away and held up his hands in horror. ‘If the Tippoo discovered you had given it away, Sharpe, he would never forgive you! Never! That’s a badge of honour. You must wear it always.’ The Colonel pulled out a Breguet watch and clicked open its lid. ‘I have duties, Sharpe, and that reminds me. Your woman will be waiting for you in the small temple beside Appah Rao’s house. You know where that is?’

‘No, sir.’

‘Go to the north side of the big Hindu temple,’ the Colonel said, ‘and keep walking. You will come almost to the city wall. Turn left there and you will see the temple on your left. It has one of those cows over the gate.’

‘Why do they put cows over the gates, sir?’

‘For the same reason we put images of a tortured man in our churches. Religion. You ask too many questions, Sharpe.’ The Colonel smiled. ‘Your woman will meet you there, but remember, Corporal, guard duty at sundown!’ With those words Gudin strode away and Sharpe, with one final glance at the somnolent tiger, followed.

It was not hard to find the small temple that lay opposite an old gateway that led through the western defences. It was these walls that McCandless had warned against, but Sharpe, staring at them from the temple entrance, could see nothing strange about them. A long ramp ran up to the firestep and a pair of soldiers were struggling to push a handcart loaded with rockets to the ramparts where a dozen great guns stood unattended in their embrasures, but he could see nothing sinister, no trap to destroy an army. One of the Tippoo’s sun-blazoned flags flew on a tall staff above the gatehouse itself, flanked by two smaller green flags that showed a silver device. The wind lifted one of the flags and Sharpe saw it was the same calligraphic tiger head that was engraved on his medal. He grinned. That was something to show Mary.

He went into the temple, but Mary had not yet arrived. Sharpe found a patch of shade in a niche to one side of the open courtyard from where he watched a stark-naked man with a white stripe painted across his bald pate who was sitting cross-legged in front of an idol that had a man’s body, a monkey’s head and was painted red, green and yellow. Another god, this one with seven cobra heads, stood in a niche that was littered with fading flowers. The cross-legged man did not move, Sharpe could swear he did not even blink, not even when two other worshippers came to the temple. One was a tall slim woman in a pale-green sari with a small diamond glinting in the side of her nose. Her companion was a tall man dressed in the Tippoo’s tiger-striped tunic with a musket slung on one shoulder and a silver-hilted sword hanging at his side. He was a fine-looking man, a fitting companion for the elegant woman who crossed to a third idol, this one a seated goddess with four sets of arms. The woman touched her joined hands to her forehead, bowed low, then reached forward and rang a tiny handbell to attract the goddess’s attention. It was only then that Sharpe recognized her. ‘Mary!’ he called, and she turned in alarm to see Sharpe standing in the deep shadows at the side of the shrine. The look of terror on Mary’s face checked Sharpe. The tall young soldier had put a hand on the hilt of his sword. ‘Mary,’ Sharpe called again, ‘lass.’

‘Brother!’ Mary called aloud, and then, almost in a panic, she repeated the word. ‘Brother!’

Sharpe grinned, disguising his confusion. Then he saw there were tears in Mary’s eyes and he frowned. ‘Are you all right, lass?’

‘I’m very well,’ she said deliberately, and then, in an even more stilted voice, ‘Brother.’

Sharpe glanced at the Indian soldier and saw that the man had a fiercely protective look. ‘Is that the General?’ he asked Mary.

‘No. It’s Kunwar Singh,’ Mary said, and she turned and gestured towards the soldier and Sharpe saw a look of tenderness on her face, and all at once he understood what was happening.

‘Does he speak English?’ Sharpe asked, and then, with a grin, ‘sister?’

Mary threw him a look of pure relief. ‘Some,’ she said. ‘How are you? How’s your back?’

‘Mending all right, it is. That Indian doctor does magic, he does. I still feel it now and then, but not like it was. No, I’m doing all right. I even won a medal, look!’ He held the gold towards Mary. ‘But I need to talk to you privately,’ he added as she leaned close to peer at the medallion. ‘It’s urgent, love,’ he hissed.

Mary fingered the gold, then looked up at Sharpe. ‘I’m sorry, Richard,’ she whispered.

‘There’s nothing to be sorry for, lass,’ Sharpe said, and he spoke truthfully, for ever since he had seen Mary in her sari he had sensed that she was not for him. She looked too sophisticated, too elegant, and the wives of common soldiers were usually neither. ‘You and him, eh?’ he asked, glancing at the lean and handsome Kunwar Singh.

Mary gave a tiny nod.

‘Good for you!’ Sharpe called to the Indian and gave him a smile. ‘Good girl, my sister!’

‘Half-sister,’ Mary hissed.

‘Make up your bloody mind, lass.’

‘And I’ve taken an Indian name,’ she said. ‘Aruna.’

‘Sounds good. Aruna.’ Sharpe smiled. ‘I like it.’

‘It was my mother’s name,’ Mary explained, then fell into an awkward silence. She glanced at the man with the white stripe on his head, then tentatively touched Sharpe’s elbow and so led him back into the shaded niche where he had been waiting. A ledge ran round the niche and Mary sat on it, facing Sharpe with her hands held modestly on her lap. Kunwar Singh watched them, but did not try to come close.

For a second neither Sharpe nor Mary had anything to say. ‘I’ve been watching that naked fellow,’ Sharpe said, ‘and he ain’t moved an inch.’

‘It’s one way to worship,’ Mary said softly.

‘Bloody odd though. The whole thing’s odd.’ Sharpe gestured around the decorated shrine. ‘Looks like a circus, don’t it? Can’t imagine it at home. Painted clowns in church, eh? Can you imagine that?’ Then he remembered Mary had never seen England. ‘It ain’t the same,’ he said weakly, then jerked his head towards the ever watchful Kunwar Singh. ‘You and him, eh?’ Sharpe said again.

Mary nodded. ‘I’m sorry, Richard. Truly.’

‘It happens, lass,’ Sharpe said. ‘But you don’t want him to know about you and me, is that it?’

She nodded and again looked fearful. ‘Please?’ she begged him. Sharpe paused, not to keep Mary on tenterhooks, but because the naked man had at last moved. He had slowly clasped his hands together, but that seemed the extent of his exertions for he went quite still again. ‘Richard?’ Mary pleaded. ‘You won’t tell him, will you?’

He looked back to her. ‘I want you to do something for me,’ he said.

She looked wary, but nodded. ‘Of course. If I can.’

‘There’s a fellow in this city called Ravi Shekhar. Got the name? He’s a merchant, God knows what he sells, but he’s here right enough and you’ve got to find him. Do they ever let you out of the house?’

‘Yes.’

‘Then you get out, lass, and find this Ravi Shekhar and tell him to get a message to the British. And the message is this. They mustn’t attack the west wall. That’s it, just that. The daft buggers are setting themselves to attack it right now, so it’s urgent. Will you do that?’

Mary licked her lips, then nodded. ‘And you won’t tell Kunwar about us?’

‘I wouldn’t have told him anyway,’ Sharpe said. ‘Of course I wouldn’t. I wish you joy of the fellow, sister, eh?’ He smiled. ‘Sister Aruna. It’s nice to have some family and you’re all I’ve got. And I hate to ask you to find this Shekhar fellow, but the Lieutenant and me, we just can’t manage to escape so someone else has to send the message out. Looks like you.’ Sharpe grinned. ‘But it looks like you’ve changed sides now and I don’t blame you. So you don’t mind doing this for me?’

‘I’ll do it for you. I promise.’

‘You’re a good lass.’ He stood. ‘Do brothers kiss sisters in India?’

Mary half smiled. ‘I think they do, yes.’

Sharpe gave her a very respectable kiss on the cheek, smelling her perfume. ‘You look grand, Mary,’ he said. ‘Too grand for me, eh?’

‘You’re a good man, Richard.’

‘That won’t get me very far in this world, will it?’ He backed away from Mary then grinned at Kunwar Singh who offered him a stiff, slight bow. ‘You’re a lucky man!’ Sharpe said, and then, with a backwards glance at the tall elegant woman who now called herself Aruna, he walked away from Mary Bickerstaff. Easy come, easy go, he thought, but there was also a pang of jealousy for the tall good-looking Indian. But what the hell? Mary was doing her best to survive and Sharpe could never blame someone for doing that. He was doing the same himself.

He had turned back towards the barracks where Gudin’s battalion was quartered. He was thinking about Mary and about how graceful, even unapproachable, she had looked, and he was hardly looking where he was going when a cheerful shout warned him of an approaching bullock cart that was loaded with great barrels. Sharpe stepped hastily aside as the bullocks, their horns painted yellow and blue and tipped with small silver bells, lumbered past. He saw that the brightly painted cart was heading down a narrow alley which led towards the gatehouse in the western wall and the sentries at the gate, seeing the cart approach, heaved back the huge double doors.

And Sharpe instinctively knew something was amiss. He stood watching and suspected he was on the edge of solving the city’s mystery. The guards were opening the gates, yet so far as Sharpe knew there were no gates in the city’s western wall which faced the South Cauvery river. He knew of the Bangalore Gate to the east, the Mysore Gate to the south, and the much smaller Water Gate to the north, but no one had ever spoken of a fourth gate, yet there it was. Once, plainly, there had been another water gate here, a gate that opened onto the South Cauvery, and presumably that entrance to the city had long ago been sealed up, yet now Sharpe was watching the gates being opened and he impulsively turned and followed the cart down the alley. The cart had already vanished into the deep gloom inside the gate’s tunnel and the two guards were dragging the big double doors closed, but then they saw the bright gold medallion on Sharpe’s chest and maybe that rare token convinced them that he had the authority to enter. ‘Looking for Colonel Gudin!’ Sharpe offered in brazen explanation when one of the two men nervously moved to intercept him. ‘Got a message for the Colonel, see?’

Then he was through the gate and he saw that it was not a passage out of the city at all, but was rather a long tunnel that led only to a blank stone wall. It had once been a gateway, that much was obvious, but at some time the old outer gate had been walled shut to leave this gloomy tunnel that was now stacked with barrels. They had to be powder barrels, for Sharpe could see pale lengths of fuses coming from their stoppered bungholes. The whole northern side of the tunnel was crammed with the powder barrels. Just the northern side.

An officer saw him and shouted angrily. Sharpe played the innocent. ‘Colonel Gudin?’ he asked. ‘Have you seen Colonel Gudin, sahib?’

The Indian officer ran towards him and, as he came, he drew a pistol, but then, in the tunnel’s dim dusty light, he saw the gold medal on Sharpe’s chest and he pushed the pistol back into his sash. ‘Gudin?’ he asked Sharpe.

Sharpe smiled eagerly. ‘He’s my officer, sahib. I’ve got a message for him.’

The Indian did not understand, but he did know the significance of the medal and it was enough to make him respectful. But he was still firm. He pointed Sharpe towards the door and gestured that he was to leave.

‘Gudin?’ Sharpe insisted.

The man shook his head and Sharpe, with a grin, left the tunnel.

He had forgotten Mary now for he knew he was on the verge of understanding what was being kept so secret. He went back down the alley and at its end he turned and looked at the wall above and he wondered why there were no gunners standing by the brass guns, and why no sentries stood in the embrasures and why no flags were hung on the battlements. Everywhere else on the walls there were flags and sentries and gunners, but not here. He waited until the tunnel gates had been closed, then he hurried up the nearby ramp that led to the wall’s firestep. The wall here was made of red mud bricks and was not nearly so formidable as the southern wall which was constructed from massive granite blocks. Nor was this wall more than twenty feet thick, whereas the tunnel had been nearer a hundred feet long. He ran up to the parapet where the big guns waited and, when he reached the firestep, he understood everything.

For there was not one wall here, but two. The one he was standing on was the inner wall and it was new, so new that some short stretches of the wall were still festooned with scaffolding and ropes where the Tippoo’s labourers hastened to complete the work. And sixty feet away, beyond an empty inner ditch, was the city’s outer wall where the flags were hung and where the gunners and sentries stood guard. That old outer wall was a couple of feet higher than this new inner wall, but opposite Sharpe, and close to where he had seen the powder-crammed tunnel, those older ramparts had crumbled at their top. That decay would surely serve as a beacon to the British, enticing them to aim their guns at that stretch of decayed wall in the certainty that they could soon finish its destruction with their bombardment. The big eighteen- and twenty-four-pounder guns would hammer away until the older outer wall collapsed to leave a ramp-like breach. The British, staring across the river at that breach, would doubtless see the new inner wall, but they might well think it was nothing but the flank of a warehouse or a temple. And so the assault would come storming across the shallow river and up the ramp of the breach in the outer wall, and then spill down into the space between the two walls. More and more men would come, those behind forcing the ones in front ever onward, and slowly the crush between the walls would grow. The guns and rockets on the inner wall would rain down death, but after a while, when the attackers filled the space between the walls, the huge charge of powder, stored in what remained of the old elaborate gateway, would be detonated. And that explosion, its force funnelled by the old and new walls, would tear into the narrow gap and flood the ditch between the walls with blood. Sharpe looked to his left and saw that the tunnel was built beneath a squat gate tower. That ancient tower would surely collapse, spilling stones onto any troops who might survive the terrible blast.

‘Bloody hell,’ Sharpe said, and then he slipped back down the inner wall’s ramp and went to find Lawford. If Mary did not get the news out, he thought, there would be slaughter when the assault came. It would be pure slaughter, and it seemed that only Mary, who was now in love with the enemy, could prevent it.