Sharpe's Triumph Page 12

  "Come on, love," he said, 'you're all right now. Safe now."

  She stood. Her hat had come off when she fell from her horse and her dishevelled golden hair hung about her pale face. Sharpe saw she was tall, had an impression that she was pretty even though her blue eyes were wide with shock and she was still shaking. He stooped for her hat.

  "You look like you've been dragged through a hedge backwards, you do," he said, then shook the dust off her hat and held it out to her. Her horse was standing free in the street, so he grabbed the beast's bridle then led woman and animal to a nearby gateway that opened into a courtyard.

  "Have to look after your horse," he said, 'valuable things, horses. You know how a trooper gets a replacement mount?" He was not entirely sure why he was talking so much and he did not even know if the woman understood him, but he sensed that if he stopped talking she would burst into tears again and so he kept up his chatter.

  "If a trooper loses his horse he has to prove it's died, see?

  To show he hasn't sold it. So he chops off a hoof. They carry little axes for that, some of them do. Can't sell a three-footed horse, see?

  He shows the hoof to his officers and they issue a new horse."

  There was a rope bed in the courtyard and he led the woman to it.

  She sat and cuffed at her face.

  "They said you wouldn't come for three more days," she said bitterly in a strong accent.

  "We were in a hurry, love," Sharpe said. She had still not taken the hat so he crouched and held it close to her.

  "Are you French?"

  She nodded. She had begun to cry again and tears were running down her cheeks.

  "It's all right," he said, 'you're safe now." Then he saw the wedding ring on her finger and a terrible thought struck him. Had the white-coated officer been her husband? And had she watched him hacked down in front of her?

  "That officer," he said, jerking his head towards the street where sepoys were kicking at doors and forcing shuttered windows with their fire locks 'was he your husband, love?"

  She shook her head.

  "Oh, no," she said, 'no. He was a lieutenant. My husband is a captain." She at last took the hat, then sniffed. I'm sorry."

  "Nothing to be sorry about," Sharpe said, 'except you had a nasty fright. It's all right now."

  She took a deep breath, then wiped her eyes.

  "I seem to be crying always." She looked into Sharpe's eyes.

  "Life is always tears, isn't it?"

  "Not for me, love, no. Haven't had a weep since I was a kid, not that I can remember."

  She shrugged.

  "Thank you," she said, gesturing towards the street where she had been assailed by the sepoys.

  "Thank you."

  Sharpe smiled.

  "I didn't do anything, love, 'cept drive the buggers off. A dog could have done that as well as me. Are you all right? You weren't hurt?"

  "No."

  He patted her hand.

  "Your husband went without you, did he?"

  "He sent Lieutenant Silliere to fetch me. No, he didn't. Major Dodd sent Silliere."

  "Dodd?" Sharpe asked.

  The woman heard the interest in Sharpe's voice.

  "You know him?" she asked.

  "I know of him," Sharpe said carefully.

  "Ain't met him, not properly."

  She studied Sharpe's face.

  "You don't like him?"

  "I hate him, Ma'am."

  "I hate him too." She shrugged.

  "I am called Simone. Simone Joubert."

  "It's a pretty name, Ma'am. Simone? Very pretty."

  She smiled at his clumsy gallantry.

  "You have a name?"

  "Richard Sharpe, Ma'am, Sergeant Richard Sharpe, King's 33rd."

  "Richard," she said, trying it out, 'it suits you. Richard the Lion Heart yes?"

  "He was a great one for fighting, Ma'am."

  "For fighting the French, Sergeant," she said reprovingly.

  "Someone has to," Sharpe said with a grin, and Simone Joubert laughed and at that moment Sharpe thought she was the prettiest girl he had seen in years. Maybe not really pretty, but vivacious and blue eyed and golden-haired and smiling. But an officer's woman, Sharpe told himself, an officer's woman.

  "You must not fight the French, Sergeant," Simone said.

  "I won't let you."

  "If it looks like it's going to happen, Ma'am, then I'll let you know and you'll have to hold me down."

  She laughed again, then sighed. A fire had broken out not far away and scraps of burning thatch were floating in the warm air.

  One of the smuts landed on Simone's white dress and she brushed at it, smearing the black ash into the weave.

  "They have taken everything," she said sadly.

  "I had little enough, but it is gone. All my clothes! All!"

  "Then you get more," Sharpe said.

  "What with? This?" She showed him a tiny purse hanging from her waist.

  "What will happen to me, Sergeant?"

  "You'll be all right, Ma'am. You'll be looked after. You're an officer's wife, aren't you? So our officers will make sure you're all right. They'll probably send you back to your husband."

  Simone gave him a dutiful smile and Sharpe wondered why she was not overjoyed at the thought of being reunited with her captain, then he forgot the question as a ragged volley of shots sounded in the street and he turned to see an Arab staggering in the gateway, his robes bright with blood, and an instant later a half-dozen Highlanders leaped onto the twitching body and began to tear its clothing apart. One of them slit the victim's robes with his bayonet and Sharpe saw that the dying man had a fine pair of riding boots.

  "There's a woman!" one of the looters shouted, seeing Simone in the courtyard, but then he saw Sharpe's levelled musket and he raised a placatory hand.

  "All yours, eh? No trouble, Sergeant, no trouble." Then the man twisted to look down the street and shouted a warning to his comrades and the six men took to their heels. A moment later a file of sepoys showed in the gateway under the command of a mounted officer. They were the first disciplined troops Sharpe had seen in the city and they were restoring order. The officer peered into the courtyard, saw nothing amiss, and so ordered his men onwards. A half company of kilted redcoats followed the sepoys and Sharpe assumed that Wellesley had ordered the picquets of the day into the city. The picquets, who provided the sentries for the army, were made up of half companies from every battalion.

  There was a well in the corner of the yard and Sharpe hauled up its leather bucket to give himself and Simone a drink. He brought up more water for the Frenchwoman's horse, and just then heard McCandless shouting his name through the streets.

  "Here, sir!" he called back.

  "Here!"

  It took a moment or two for McCandless to find him, and when he did the Scotsman was furious.

  "Where were you, man?" the Colonel demanded querulously.

  "He got away! Clean away! Marched away like a toy soldier!" He had remounted his gelding and stared imperiously down on Sharpe from his saddle.

  "Got clean away!"

  "Couldn't find men, sir, sorry, sir," Sharpe said.

  "Just one company! That's all we needed!" McCandless said angrily, then he noticed Simone Joubert and snatched off his hat.

  "Ma'am," he said, nodding his head.

  "This is Colonel McCandless, Ma'am," Sharpe made the introduction.

  "And this is Simone, sir." He could not recall her surname.

  "Madame Joubert," Simone introduced herself.

  McCandless scowled at her. He had ever been awkward in the presence of women, and he had nothing to say to this young woman so he just glowered at Sharpe instead.

  "All I needed was one company, Sharpe. One company!"

  "He was rescuing me, Colonel," Simone said.

  "So I surmised, Madame, so I surmised," the Colonel said unhappily, implying that Sharpe had been wasting his time. More smuts swirled in the
smoke down to the yard, while in the street beyond the gateway the picquets were hauling looters from the shops and houses. McCandless stared irritably at Simone who gazed placidly back. The Scotsman was a gentleman and knew the woman was now his responsibility, but he resented the duty. He cleared his throat, then found he still had nothing to say.

  "Madame Joubert's husband, sir," Sharpe said, 'serves in Dodd's regiment."

  "He does, does he?" McCandless asked, showing sudden interest.

  "My husband hoped to take command of the regiment when Colonel Mathers left," Simone explained, 'but, alas, Major Dodd arrived." She shrugged.

  The Colonel frowned.

  "Why didn't you leave with your husband?" he demanded sternly.

  "That is what I was trying to do, Colonel."

  "And you were caught, eh?" The Colonel patted his horse which had been distracted by one of the burning scraps of straw.

  "Tell me, Ma'am, do you have quarters in the city?"

  "I did, Colonel, I did. Though if anything is left now .. . ?" Simone shrugged again, implying that she expected to find the quarters ransacked.

  "You have servants?"

  "The landlord had servants and we used them. My husband has a groom, of course."

  "But you have somewhere to stay, Ma'am," McCandless demanded.

  "I suppose so, yes." Simone paused.

  "But I am alone, Colonel."

  "Sergeant Sharpe will look after you, Ma'am," McCandless said, then a thought struck him forcibly.

  "You don't mind doing that, do you, Sharpe?" he enquired anxiously.

  "I'll manage, sir," Sharpe said.

  "And I am just to stay here?" Simone demanded fiercely.

  "Nothing else? That is all you propose, Colonel?"

  "I propose, Ma'am, to reunite you with your husband," McCandless said, 'but it will take time. A day or two. You must be patient."

  "I am sorry, Colonel," Simone said, regretting the tone of the questions she had shot at McCandless.

  "I'm sorry to give you so unfortunate a duty, Sharpe," McCandless said, 'but keep the lady safe till we can arrange things. Send word to me where you are, and I'll come and find you when everything's arranged."

  "Yes, sir."

  The Colonel turned and spurred out of the courtyard. His spirits, which had collapsed when Dodd had marched out of the city's northern gate, were reviving again for he saw in Simone Joubert a God-sent opportunity to ride into the heart of his enemy's army. Restoring the woman to her husband might do nothing to visit the vengeance of the Company on Dodd, but it would surely be an unparalleled opportunity to scout Scindia's forces and so McCandless rode to fetch Wellesley's permission for such an excursion, while Simone led Sharpe through the exhausted streets to find her house. On their way they passed an ox cart that had been tipped backwards and weighted down with stones so that its single shaft pointed skywards. A sepoy hung from the shaft's tip by his neck. The man was not quite dead yet and so made small spasmodic motions, and officers, both Scottish and Indian, were forcing sheepish and half-drunken men to stare at the dying sepoy as a reminder of the fate that awaited plunderers. Simone shuddered and Sharpe hurried her past, her horse's reins in his left hand.

  "Here, Sergeant," she said, leading him into an alley that was littered with discarded plunder. Above them smoke drifted across a city where women wept and redcoats patrolled the walls. Ahmednuggur had fallen.

  Major Dodd had misjudged Wellesley, and that misjudgement shook him. An escalade seemed too intrepid, too headstrong, for the man Dodd derided as Boy Wellesley. It was neither what Dodd had expected nor what he had wanted from Wellesley. Dodd had wanted caution, for a cautious enemy is more easily defeated, but instead Wellesley had shown a scathing contempt for Ahmednuggur's defenders and launched an assault that should have been easily beaten back. If Dodd's men had been on the ramparts directly in the path of the assault then the attack would have been defeated, of that Dodd had no doubt, for there had only been four ladders deployed and that small number made the ease and swiftness of the British victory even more humiliating. It suggested that General Sir Arthur Wellesley possessed a confidence that neither his age nor experience should have provided, and it also suggested that Dodd might have underestimated Wellesley, and that worried him. Dodd's decision to desert to Pohlmann's army had been forced on him by circumstance, but he had not regretted the decision, for European officers who served the Mahratta chiefs were notorious for the riches they made, and the Mahratta armies far outnumbered their British opponents and were thus likely to be the winners of this war, but if the British were suddenly to prove invincible there would be no riches and no victory. There would only be defeat and ignominious flight.

  And so, as he rode away from the fallen city, Dodd was inclined to ascribe Wellesley's sudden success to beginner's luck. Dodd persuaded himself that the escalade must have been a foolish gamble that had been unfairly rewarded with victory. It had been a rash strategy, Dodd told himself, and though it had succeeded, it could well tempt Wellesley into rashness again, and next time the rashness would surely be punished.

  Thus Dodd attempted to discover good news within the bad.

  Captain Joubert could find no good news. He rode just behind Dodd and continually turned in his saddle for a glimpse of Simone's white dress among the fugitives that streamed from the northern gate, but there was no sign of her, nor of Lieutenant Silliere, and each disappointment made Pierre Joubert's loss harder to bear. He felt a tear prickle at the corner of his eye, and then the thought that his young Simone might be raped made the tear run down his cheek.

  "What the hell are you blubbing about?" Dodd demanded.

  "Something in my eye," Joubert answered. He wished he could be more defiant, but he felt belittled by the Englishman and unable to stand up to his bullying. In truth Pierre Joubert had felt belittled for most of his life. His small stature and timid nature made him a target, and he had been the obvious choice when his regiment in France had been ordered to find one officer who could be sent as an adviser to Scindia, the Maharajah of Gwalior. They had chosen Joubert, the one officer no one would miss, but the unpopular posting had brought Joubert the one stroke of good fortune that had ever come his way when the ship bringing him to India had stopped at the lie de France. He had met Simone, he had wooed her, he had won her, and he was proud of her, intensely proud, for he knew other men found her attractive and Joubert might have enjoyed that subtle flattery had he not known how desperately unhappy she was. He put her unhappiness down to the vagaries of a newly married woman's temperament and to the heat of India. He consoled himself with the thought that in a year or two he would be summoned back to France and there Simone would learn contentment in the company of his huge family. She would become a mother, learn to keep house and so accept her comfortable fate. So long, that was, as she had survived Ahmednuggur's fall. He spurred his horse alongside Dodd's.

  "You were right, Colonel," the Frenchman said grudgingly.

  "There was nothing to be gained by fighting."

  He was making conversation in order to keep his mind away from his fears for Simone.

  Dodd acknowledged the compliment with a grunt.

  "I'm sorry about Madame Joubert," he forced himself to say.

  "The British will send news, I'm sure," Joubert said, clinging to a hope that Simone would have been rescued by some gallant officer.

  "But a soldier's best off without a woman," Dodd said, then twisted in his saddle to look at the rear guard

  "Sikal's company is lagging," he told Joubert.

  "Tell the buggers to hurry up!" He watched Joubert ride away, then spurred to the head of the column where his vanguard marched with fixed bayonets and charged muskets.

  The regiment might have escaped from Ahmednuggur, but it was not yet clear of all danger. British and Mahratta cavalry had ridden around the city to harass any of the garrison who might succeed in escaping, and those horsemen now threatened both flanks of Dodd's column, but their threat
was small. Scores of other men were fleeing the city, and those fugitives, because they were not marching in disciplined formations, made much easier targets for the horsemen who gleefully swooped and circled about the refugees. Dodd watched as lances and sabres slashed into the scattered fugitives, but if any of the horsemen came too close to his own white-jacketed ranks he called a company to halt, turned it outwards and made them level their muskets. The threat of a volley was usually enough to drive the horsemen to search for easier pickings, and not one of the enemy came within pistol shot of Dodd's ranks. Once, when the column was some two miles north of the city, a determined squadron of British dragoons tried to head off the regiment's march, but Dodd ordered two of fl|s small cannon to be unlimbered and their paltry round shots, bouncing across the flat, dry ground, were sufficient to make the blue-coated horsemen veer away to find another angle of attack. Dodd reinforced the threat by having his lead company fire one volley of musketry which, even though it was at long range, succeeded in unhoiJng one dragoon. Dodd watched the defeated horsemen ride away and felt a surge of pride in his new regiment. This was the first time he had observed them in action, and though the excited cavalry was hardly a worthy foe, the men's calmness and efficiency were entirely praiseworthy. None of them hurried, none shot a ramrod out in panic, none seemed unsettled by the sudden, savage fall of the city and none had shown any reluctance to fire on the civilians who had threatened to obstruct their escape through the north gate. Instead they had bitten the enemy like a cobra defending itself, and that gave Dodd an idea. The Cobras! That was what he would call his regiment, the Cobras! He reckoned the name would inspire his men and put fear into an enemy. Dodd's Cobras. He liked the thought.

  Dodd soon left his pursuers far behind. At least four hundred other men, most of them Arabs, had attached themselves to his regiment and he welcomed them for the more men he brought from the disaster, the higher his reputation would stand with Colonel Pohlmann. By early afternoon his Cobras had reached the crest of the escarpment that looked across the vast Deccan plain to where, far in the hazy distance, he could see the brown River Godavery snaking through the dry land.