Sharpe's Fortress Part 80

"You're sweating, man," Morris complained.

"Why don't you find yourself some shade? There's nothing we can do until the gunners knock that b.l.o.o.d.y gatehouse flat."

"There is," Sharpe said.

Morris c.o.c.ked a sceptical eye up at Sharpe.

"I've had no orders, Ensign," he said.

"I want you and the Light Company, sir," Sharpe said respectfully.

"There's a way up the side of the ravine, sir, and if we can get a ladder to the top then we can cross the wall and go at the b.a.s.t.a.r.ds from the back."

Morris tipped the canteen to his mouth, drank, then wiped his lips.

"If you, twenty like you and the Archangel Gabriel and all the b.l.o.o.d.y saints asked me to climb the ravine, Sharpe, I would still say no. Now for Christ's sake, man, stop trying to be a b.l.o.o.d.y hero. Leave it to the poor b.a.s.t.a.r.ds who are under orders, and go away." He waved a hand.

"Sir," Sharpe pleaded, 'we can do it! I've sent for a ladder."

"No!" Morris interrupted loudly, attracting the attention of the rest of the company.

"I am not giving you my company, Sharpe. For G.o.d's sake, you're not even a proper officer! You're just a b.u.mped-up sergeant! A b.l.o.o.d.y ensign too big for your boots and, allow me to remind you, Mister Sharpe, forbidden by army regulations to serve in this regiment. Now go away and leave me in peace."

"I thought you'd say that, Charles," Sharpe said ruefully.

"And stop calling me Charles!" Morris exploded.

"We are not friends, you and I. And kindly obey my order to leave me in peace, or had you not noticed that I outrank you?"

"I had noticed. Sorry, sir," Sharpe said humbly and he started to turn away, but suddenly whipped back and seized Morris's coat. He dragged the Captain back into the rocks, going so fast that Morris was momentarily incapable of resistance. Once among the rocks, Sharpe let go of the patched coat and thumped Morris in the belly.

"That's for the flogging you gave me, you b.a.s.t.a.r.d," he said.

"What the h.e.l.l do you think you're doing, Sharpe?" Morris asked, scrambling away on his bottom.

Sharpe kicked him in the chest, leaned down, hauled him up and thumped him on the jaw. Morris squealed with pain, then gasped as Sharpe backhanded him across the cheek, then struck him again. A group of men had followed and were watching wide-eyed. Morris turned to appeal to them, but Sharpe hit him yet again and the Cap-268 tain's eyes turned gla.s.sy as he swayed and collapsed. Sharpe bent over him.

"You might outrank me," he said, 'but you're a piece of s.h.i.t, Charlie, and you always were. Now can I take the company?"

"No," Morris said through the blood on his lips.

"Thank you, sir," Sharpe said, and stamped his boot hard down on Morris's head, driving it onto a rock. Morris gasped, choked, then lay immobile as the breath sc.r.a.ped in his throat.

Sharpe kicked Morris's head again, just for the h.e.l.l of it, then turned, smiling.

"Where's Sergeant Green?"

"Here, sir." Green, looking anxious, pushed through the watching men.

"I'm here, sir," he said, staring with astonishment at the immobile Morris.

"Captain Morris has eaten something that disagreed with him," Sharpe said, 'but before he was taken ill he expressed the wish that I should temporarily take command of the company."

Sergeant Green looked at the battered, bleeding Captain, then back to Sharpe.

"Something he ate, sir?"

"Are you a doctor, Sergeant? Wear a black plume on your hat, do you?"

"No, sir."

"Then stop questioning my statements. Have the company paraded, muskets loaded, no bayonets fixed." Green hesitated.

"Do it, Sergeant!"

Sharpe roared, startling the watching men.

"Yes, sir!" Green said hurriedly, backing away.

Sharpe waited until the company was in its four ranks. Many of them looked at him suspiciously, but they were powerless to challenge his authority, not while Sergeant Green had accepted it.

"You're a light company," Sharpe said, 'and that means you can go where other soldiers can't. It makes you an elite. You know what that means? It means you're the best in the b.l.o.o.d.y army, and right now the army needs its best men.

It needs you. So in a minute we'll be climbing up there' he pointed to the ravine 'crossing the wall and carrying the fight to the enemy. It'll be hard work for a bit, but not beyond a decent light company." He looked to his left and saw Eli Lockhart leading his men down the side of the ravine with one of the discarded bamboo ladders.

"I'll go first," he told the company, 'and Sergeant Green will go last. If any man refuses to climb, Sergeant, you're to shoot the b.u.g.g.e.r."

"I am, sir?" Green asked nervously.

"In the head," Sharpe said.

Major Stokes had followed Lockhart and now came up to Sharpe.

"I'll arrange for some covering fire, Sharpe," he said.

"That'll be a help, sir. Not that these men need much help. They're the 33rd's Light Company. Best in the army."

"I'm sure they are," Stokes said, smiling at the seventy men who, seeing a major with Sharpe, supposed that the Ensign really did have the authority to do what he was proposing.

Lockhart, in his blue and yellow coat, waited with the ladder.

"Where do you want it, Mister Sharpe?"

"Over here," Sharpe said.

"Just pa.s.s it up when we've reached the top.

Sergeant Green! Send the men in ranks! Front rank first!" He walked to the side of the ravine and stared up his chosen route. It looked steeper from here, and much higher than it had seemed when he was staring through the telescope, but he still reckoned it was climbable. He could not see the Inner Fort's wall, but that was good, for neither could the defenders see him. All the same, it was b.l.o.o.d.y steep. Steep enough to give a mountain goat pause, yet if he failed now then he would be on a charge for striking a superior officer, so he really had no choice but to play the hero.