Sharpe's Triumph (20 page)

Sharpe began running.

“Come back!” McCandless shouted again, and then there was another gunshot and Sharpe
heard the Colonel yelp like a whipped dog. A score of men were shouting now. The officers
who had been playing cards were running towards McCandless's tent and Pohlmann's
bodyguards were following them. Sharpe dodged round a fire, leaped a sleeping man, then saw
a figure hurrying away from the commotion. The man had a musket in his hand and he was
half crouching as if he did not want to be seen, and Sharpe did not hesitate, but just
swerved and ran at the man.

When the fugitive heard Sharpe coming, he quickened his pace, then realized he would be
caught and so he turned on his pursuer. The man whipped out a bayonet and screwed it onto
the muzzle of his musket.

Sharpe saw the glint of moonlight on the long blade, saw the man's teeth white in the dark,
then the bayonet lunged at him, but Sharpe had dropped to the ground and was sliding forward
in the dust beneath the blade. He wrapped his arms around the man's legs, heaved once and the
man fell backwards. Sharpe cuffed the musket aside with his left hand, then hammered his
right hand down onto the moon-whitened teeth. The man tried to kick Sharpe's crotch, then
clawed at his eyes, but Sharpe caught one of the hooked fingers in his mouth and bit hard. The
man screamed in pain, Sharpe kept biting and kept hitting, then he spat the severed
fingertip into the man's face and gave him one last thump with his fist.

“Bastard,” Sharpe said, and hauled the man to his feet. Two of Pohlmann's officers had
arrived now, one still with a fan of cards in his hand.

“Get his bloody musket,” Sharpe ordered them. The man struggled in Sharpe's hands, but he
was much smaller than Sharpe and a good kick between his legs brought him to order.

“Come on, you bastard,” Sharpe said.

One of the officers had picked up the fallen musket and Sharpe reached over and felt the
muzzle. It was hot, showing that the weapon had just been fired.

“If you killed my Colonel, you bastard, I'll kill you,” Sharpe said and dragged the man
through the campfires to the knot of officers who had gathered about the Colonel's
tent.

McCandless's two horses were gone. Both the mare and the gelding had been stolen, and
Sharpe realized it was their hoofbeats he had heard go past him. McCandless, woken by the
noise of the horse thieves, had come from the tent and fired his pistol at the men, and one of
them had fired back and the bullet had buried itself in the '39

Colonel's left thigh. He was lying on the ground now, looking horribly pale, and
Pohlmann was bellowing for his doctor to come quickly.

“Who's that?” he demanded of Sharpe, and nodding at the prisoner.

“The bastard who fired at Colonel McCandless, sir. Musket's still hot.”

The man proved to be one of Major Dodd's sepoys, one of the men who had deserted with
Dodd from the Company, and he was put into the charge of Pohlmann's bodyguard. Sharpe knelt
beside McCandless who was trying not to cry aloud as the newly arrived doctor, the Swiss
man who had sat beside Sharpe at dinner, examined his leg.

“I was sleeping!” the Colonel complained.

“Thieves, Sharpe, thieves!”

“We'll find your horses,” Pohlmann reassured the Scotsman, 'and we'll find the
thieves."

“You promised me safety!” McCandless complained.

“The men will be punished,” Pohlmann promised, then he helped Sharpe and two other men
lift the wounded Colonel and carry him into the tent where they laid him on the rope cot.
The doctor said the bullet had missed the bone, and no major artery was cut, but he still
wanted to fetch his probes, forceps and scalpels and try to pull the ball out.

“You want some brandy, McCandless?” Pohlmann asked.

“Of course not. Tell him to get on with it.”

The doctor called for more lanterns, for water and for his instruments, and then he
spent ten excruciating minutes looking for the bullet deep inside McCandless's upper
thigh. The Scotsman uttered not a sound as the probe slid into his lacerated flesh, nor
as the long-necked forceps were pushed down to find a purchase on the bullet. The Swiss
doctor was sweating, but McCandless just lay with eyes tight shut and teeth clenched.

“It comes now,” the doctor said and began to pull, but the flesh had closed on the
forceps and he had to use almost all his strength to drag the bullet up from the wound. It
came free at last, releasing a spill of bright blood, and McCandless groaned.

“All done now, sir,” Sharpe told him.

“Thank God,” McCandless whispered, 'thank God." The Scotsman opened his eyes. The
doctor was bandaging the thigh and McCandless looked past him to Pohlmann.

“This is treachery, Colonel, treachery! I was your guest!”

“Your horses will be found, Colonel, I promise you,” Pohlmann said, but though his men made
a search of the camp, and though they searched until morning, the two horses were not found.
Sharpe was the only man who could identify them, for Colonel McCandless was in no state to
walk, but Sharpe saw no horses that resembled the stolen pair, but nor did he expect to for
any competent horse thief knew a dozen tricks to disguise his catch. The beast would be
clipped, its coat would be dyed with blackball, it would be force-fed an enema so that its
head drooped, then it would as likely as not be put among the cavalry mounts where one horse
looked much like another. Both McCandless's horses had been European bred and were
larger and officer quality than most in Pohlmann's camp, yet even so Sharpe saw no sign of
the two animals.

Colonel Pohlmann went to McCandless's tent and confessed that the horses had
vanished.

“I shall pay you their value, of course,” he added.

“I won't take it!” McCandless snapped back. The Colonel was still pale, and shivering
despite the heat. His wound was bandaged, and the doctor reckoned it should heal swiftly
enough, but there was a danger that the Colonel's recurrent fever might return.

“I won't take my enemy's gold,” McCandless explained, and Sharpe reckoned it must be
the pain speaking for he knew the two missing horses must have cost the Colonel dearly.

“I shall leave you the money,” Pohlmann insisted anyway, 'and this afternoon we shall
execute the prisoner."

“Do what you must,” McCandless grumbled.

“Then we shall carry you northwards,” the Hanoverian promised, 'for you must stay under
Doctor Viedler's care."

McCandless levered himself into a sitting position.

“You'll not take me anywhere!” he insisted angrily.

“You leave me here, Pohlmann. I'll not depend on your care, but on God's mercy.” He let
himself drop back onto the bed and hissed with pain.

“And Sergeant Sharpe can tend me.”

Pohlmann glanced at Sharpe. The Hanoverian seemed about to say that Sharpe might not wish
to stay with McCandless, but then he just nodded his acceptance of McCandless's
decision.

“If you wish to be abandoned, McCandless, so be it.”

'1 have more faith in God than in a faithless mercenary like you, Pohlmann."

“As you wish, Colonel,” Pohlmann said gently, then backed from the tent and gestured for
Sharpe to follow.

“He's a stubborn fellow, isn't he?” The Hanoverian turned and looked at Sharpe.

“So, Sergeant? Are you coming with us?”

“No, sir,” Sharpe said. Last night, he reflected, he had very nearly decided to accept
the Hanoverian's offer, but the theft of the horses and the single shot fired by the
sepoy had served to change Sharpe's mind.

He could not leave McCandless to suffer and, to his surprise, he felt no great
disappointment in thus having the decision forced on him. Duty dictated he should
stay, but so did sentiment, and he had no regret.

“Someone has to look after Colonel McCandless, sir,” Sharpe explained, 'and he's looked
after me in the past, so it's my turn now."

I'm sorry,“ Pohlmann said, 'truly I am. The execution will be in one hour. I think you
should see it, so you can assure your Colonel that justice was done.”

“Justice, sir?” Sharpe asked scornfully.

“It ain't justice, shooting that fellow. He was put up to it by Major Dodd.” Sharpe had
no proof of that, but he suspected it strongly. Dodd, he reckoned, had been hurt by
McCandless's insults and must have decided to add horse-thieving to his catalogue of
crimes.

“You have questioned your prisoner, haven't you, sir?” Sharpe asked.

“Because he must know that Dodd was up to his neck in the business.”

Pohlmann smiled wearily.

“The prisoner told us everything, Sergeant or I assume he did, but what use is that?
Major Dodd denies the man's story, and a score of sepoys swear the Major was nowhere near
McCandless's tent when the shots were fired. And who would the British army believe? A
desperate man or an officer?” Pohlmann shook his head.

“So you must be content with the death of one man, Sergeant.”

Sharpe expected that the captured sepoy would be shot, but there was no sign of any
firing squad when the moment arrived for the man's death. Two companies from each of
Pohlmann's eight battalions were paraded, the sixteen companies making three sides of a
hollow square with Pohlmann's striped marquee forming the fourth side. Most of the other
tents had already been struck ready for the move northwards, but the marquee remained and
one of its canvas walls had been brailed up so that the compoo's officers could witness
the execution from chairs set in the tent's shade. Dodd was not there, nor were any of the
regiment's wives, but a score of officers took their places and were served sweetmeats and
drink by Pohlmann's servants.

The prisoner was fetched onto the makeshift execution ground by four of Pohlmann's
bodyguards. None of the four carried a musket, instead they were equipped with tent pegs,
mallets and short lengths of rope. The prisoner, who wore nothing but a strip of cloth
around his loins, glanced from side to side as if trying to find an escape route, but, on a
nod from Pohlmann, the bodyguards kicked his feet out from beneath him and then knelt beside
his sprawling body and pinioned it to the ground by tying the ropes to his wrists and
ankles, then fastening the bonds to the tent pegs. The condemned man lay there,
spreadeagled gazing up at the cloudless sky as the mallets banged the eight pegs home.

Sharpe stood to one side. No one spoke to him, no one even looked at him, and no wonder, he
thought, for this was a farce. All the officers must have known that Dodd was the guilty man,
yet the sepoy must die. The paraded troops seemed to agree with Sharpe, for there was a
sullenness in the ranks. Pohlmann's compoo might be well armed and superbly trained, but it
was not happy.

The four bodyguards finished tying the prisoner down, then walked away to leave him
alone in the centre of the execution ground. An Indian officer, resplendent in silk
robes and with a lavishly curved tulwar hanging from his belt, made a speech. Sharpe did
not understand a word, but he guessed that the watching soldiers were being harangued
about the fate which awaited any thief. The officer finished, glanced once at the
prisoner, then walked back to the tent and, just as he entered its shade, so Pohlmann's
great elephant with its silver-encased tusks and cascading metal coat was led out from
behind the marquee. The mahout guided the beast by tugging on one of its ears, but as soon
as the elephant saw the prisoner it needed no guidance, but just plodded across to the
spreadeagled man. The victim shouted for mercy, but Pohlmann was deaf to the pleas.

The Colonel twisted round.

“You're watching, Sharpe?”

“You've got the wrong man, sir. You should have Dodd there.”

“Justice must be done,” the Colonel said, and turned back to the elephant that was
standing quietly beside the victim who twisted in his bonds, thrashed, and even managed
to free one hand, but instead of using that free hand to tug at the other three ropes that
held him, he flailed uselessly at the elephant's trunk. A murmur ran through the watching
sixteen companies, but the jemadars and havildars shouted and the sullen murmur ceased.
Pohlmann watched the prisoner struggle for a few more seconds, then took a deep breath.

"Haddahl' he shouted.

Had daM The prisoner screamed in anticipation as, very slowly, the elephant lifted
one ponderous forefoot and moved its body slightly forward. The great foot came down on
the prisoner's chest and seemed to rest there.

The man tried to push the foot away, but he might as well have attempted to shove a
mountain aside. Pohlmann leaned forward, his mouth open, as, slowly, very slowly, the
elephant transferred its weight onto the man's chest. There was another scream, then the
man could not draw breath to scream again, but still he jerked and twitched and still the
weight pressed on him, and Sharpe saw his legs try to contract against the bonds at his
ankles, and saw his head jerk up, and then he heard the splinter of ribs and saw the blood
spill and bubble at the victim's mouth.

He winced, trying to imagine the pain as the elephant pressed on down, crushing bone and
lung and spine. The prisoner gave one last jerk, his hair flapping, then his head fell back
and a great wash of blood brimmed from his open mouth and puddled beside his corpse.

There was a last crunching sound, then the elephant stepped back and a sigh sounded
gently through the watching ranks. Pohlmann applauded, and the officers joined in. Sharpe
turned away. Bastards, he thought, bastards.

And that night Pohlmann marched north.

Sergeant Obadiah Hakeswill was not an educated man, and he was not even particularly
clever unless slyness passed for wits, but he did understand one thing very well, and that
was the impression he made on other men. They feared him. It did not matter whether the
other man was a raw private, fresh from the recruiting sergeant, or a general whose coat
was bright with gold lace and heavy with braid. They all feared him, all but two, and those two
frightened Obadiah Hakeswill. One was Sergeant Richard Sharpe, in whom Hakeswill sensed a
violence that was equal to his own, while the other was Major General Sir Arthur
Wellesley who, when he had been colonel of the 33rd, had always been serenely impervious
to Hakeswill's threats.