away. He had been about to add that Slingsby had recommended surrender, but that would have been a disavowal of responsibility and so dishonorable. 'I'm sorry, sir,' he said miserably. 'It was my decision. The Frenchman said they're fetching a cannon.'
'The miserable bastard lied to you,' Sharpe said. 'They haven't got cannon. On ground as wet as this? It would take twenty horses to get a cannon over here. No, he just wanted to scare you, because he knows as well as anyone that we could all die of old age in here. Harvey, Kirby, Batten, Peters. Shut this door,' he pointed to the front door, 'and pile all the packs behind it. Block it up!'
'Back doorway too, sir?' Rifleman Slattery asked.
'No, Slats, leave it open, we're going to need it.' Sharpe took a quick glance through one of the front windows and saw that it was so high from the ground that no Frenchman could hope to escalade the sill. 'Mister Bullen? You'll command this side,' he meant the two windows and the door at the front of the house, 'but you only need four men. They can't get through those windows. Are there any redcoats upstairs?'
'Yes, sir.'
'Get 'em down here. Rifles only up there. Carter, Pendleton, Slattery, Sims. Get up that ladder and try to look as if you're enjoying yourselves. Mister Vicente? Can you climb upstairs with your shoulder?'
'I can,' Vicente said.
'Take your rifle up, look after the boys up there.' Sharpe turned back to Bullen. 'Keep your four men firing at the bastards. Don't aim, just fire. I want every other redcoat on this side of the room. Miss Fry?'
'Mister Sharpe?'
'Is that musket loaded? Good. Point it at Ferragus. If he moves, shoot him. If he breathes, shoot him. Perkins, stay with the ladies. Those men are prisoners, and you treat them as such. Sarah? Tell them to sit down and put their hands on their heads and if any one of them moves his hands, kill him.' Sharpe crossed to the four men and kicked their bags to the side of the room and heard the chink of coins. 'Sounds like your dowry, Miss Fry.'
'The five minutes are up, sir,' Bullen reported, 'at least I think so.' He had no watch and could only guess.
'Is that what they gave you? So watch the front, Mister Bullen, watch the front. That side of the house is your responsibility.'
'I will command there.' Slingsby, who had watched Sharpe in silence, suddenly pushed himself away from the hearth. 'I am in command here,' he amended his statement.
'Do you have a pistol?' Sharpe demanded of Slingsby, who looked surprised at the question, but then nodded. 'Give it here,' Sharpe said. He took the pistol, lifted the frizzen and blew out the priming powder so the weapon would not fire. The last thing he needed was a drunk with a loaded weapon. He put the gun back into Slingsby's hand, then sat him back down in the hearth. 'What you're going to do, Mister Slingsby,' he said, 'is watch up the chimney. Make sure the French don't climb down.'
'Yes, sir,' Slingsby said.
Sharpe went to the back window. It was not large, but it would not be difficult for a man to climb through and so he put five men to guard it. 'You shoot any bugger trying to get through, and use your bayonets if you run out of bullets.' The French, he knew, would have used the last few minutes to reorganize, but he was certain they had no artillery so in the end they could only rush the house and he reckoned now that the main attack would come from the rear and would converge on the window and on the door he had deliberately left open. He had eighteen men facing that door in three ranks, the front rank kneeling, the others standing. The only last worry was Ferragus and his companions and Sharpe pointed his rifle at the big man. 'You cause me trouble and I'll give you to my men for bayonet practice. Just sit there.' He went to the ladder. 'Mister Vicente? Your men can fire whenever you've got targets! Wake the bastards up. You men down here,' he turned back to the large room, 'wait.'
Ferreira stirred and pushed up to all fours and Sharpe hit him with the rifle butt again, then Harris called from upstairs that the French were moving, the rifles cracked in the roof space and there was a cheer outside and a huge French volley that hammered against the outside wall and came through the open windows to thump into the ceiling beams. The cheer had come from the back of the house and Sharpe, standing beside the one window facing east, saw men come running from behind the byres on the one side and the cottages on the other. 'Wait!' he called. 'Wait!' The French still cheered, encouraged perhaps by the lack of fire, and then the charge came up the steps to the open back door and Sharpe shouted at the kneeling men. 'Front rank! Fire!' The noise was deafening inside the room and the six bullets, aimed at three paces, could not miss. The front rank men scuttled aside to load their muskets and the second rank, who had been standing, knelt down. 'Second rank, fire!' Another six bullets. 'Third rank, fire!' Harper stepped forward with the volley gun, but Sharpe gestured him back. 'Save it, Pat,' he said, and he stepped to the door and saw that the French had blocked the steps with dead and dying men, but one brave officer was trying to lead men up between the bodies and Sharpe raised the rifle, shot the man in the head and stepped back before a ragged volley whipped up through the empty doorway.
That doorway was now blocked by corpses, one of whom was lying almost full length inside the house. Sharpe pushed the body out and closed the door, which immediately began to shake as musket balls struck the heavy wood, then he drew his sword and went to the window where three Frenchmen were clawing at the redcoats' bayonets, trying to drag the muskets clean out of their enemies' hands. Sharpe hacked down with the sword, half severed a hand, and the French backed off, then a new rush of men came to the window, but Harper met them with the volley gun and, as so often when the huge gun fired, the sheer noise of it seemed to astonish the enemy for the window was suddenly free of attackers and Sharpe ordered the five men to fire obliquely through the opening at the voltigeurs trying to clear a passage to the door.
A blast of musketry announced a second attack at the other side of the house. Voltigeurs were hammering on the front door, shaking the pile of packs behind it, but Sharpe used the men who had fired the lethal volleys at the back door to reinforce the musketry at the front of the house, each man firing fast through a window and then ducking out of sight, and the French suddenly realized the strength of the farmhouse and their attack ended abruptly as they pulled back around the sides of the house. That left the front empty of enemy, but the back of the house faced the farmyard with its buildings that offered cover and the fire there was unending. Sharpe reloaded the rifle, knelt by the back window and saw a voltigeur at the yard's end twitch back as he was struck by a bullet fired from the attic. Sharpe fired at another man, and the voltigeurs scuttled into cover rather than face more rifle fire. 'Cease fire!' Sharpe shouted. 'And well done. Saw the buggers off! Reload. Check flints.'
There was a moment's comparative silence, though the cannon from the heights were loud and Sharpe realized that the artillery in the forts was shooting at the men attacking the farm because he could hear the shrapnel rattling on the roof. The riflemen in the attic were still firing. Their rate was slow, and that was good, signifying that Vicente was making sure they aimed true before pulling the triggers. He looked across at the prisoners, reckoning he could use Perkins's rifle and the muskets that Joana and Sarah carried. 'Sergeant Harper?'
'Sir!'
'Tie those bastards up. Hands and feet. Use musket slings.' A half-dozen men helped Harper. As Ferragus was trussed he stared up at Sharpe, but he made no resistance. Sharpe tied the Major's hands as well. Slingsby was on his hands and knees, rooting at the packs piled behind the front door, and when he had found his bag with its supply of rum he went back to the hearth and uncorked the canteen. 'Poor bloody bastard,' Sharpe said, amazed that he could feel any pity for Slingsby. 'How long has he been lushed?'
'Since Coimbra,' Bullen said, 'more or less continuously.'
'I only saw him drunk once,' Sharpe said.
'He was probably scared of you, sir,' Bullen said.
'Of me?' Sharpe sounded surprised. He crossed to the hearth and went on one knee and looked into Slingsby's face. 'I'm sorry, Lieutenant,' he said, 'for being rude to you.'
Slingsby blinked at Sharpe, confusion and then surprise on his face.
'You hear me?' Sharpe asked.
'Decent of you, Sharpe,' Slingsby said, then drank some more.
'There, Mister Bullen, you heard me. One apology.'
Bullen grinned, was about to speak, but just then the rifles in the roof sounded and Sharpe turned to the windows. 'Be ready!'
