She nodded again, then abruptly turned and hurried away. Sharpe stared after her, and to anyone watching it must have just seemed like another man saying farewell to his woman. She turned when she was twenty paces away and saw him gazing at her and he knew she did not want him to go, but what choice was there? He walked to the gate where his weapons made him look like any other militiaman. He turned a last time to look for Astrid, but she was gone. The crowd jostled him on and he emerged from the gate’s tunnel to see a dirty cloud above the roofs and trees of the western suburbs. It was powder smoke.
He stopped outside and stared back through the tunnel, hoping for one last glimpse of Astrid. He was confused. He was in love with a woman he did not know, except he knew her loyalty was to the enemy. Yet Denmark did not feel like an enemy, though it was. And he was a soldier still, and soldiers, he reckoned, fought for those who could not fight for themselves, and that meant he should be fighting for Astrid’s folk and not his own. But that was too great a wrench to contemplate. So he was simply confused.
A sergeant grabbed Sharpe’s elbow and shoved him toward a growing band of men who were being hurriedly assembled close to the moat-like lake. Sharpe let himself be pushed. An officer was standing on a low wall and haranguing around three hundred men, most of them confused militiamen though there was a core of sailors armed with heavy sea-service muskets. Sharpe did not understand a word, but from the officer’s tone and from the man’s gestures he gathered that the British were threatening some place to the southwest and this makeshift half-battalion was being asked to throw the invaders out. A roar of approval rewarded whatever the officer had said, then the whole group, Sharpe among them, streamed across the causeway. Sharpe made no effort to leave the group. He had no choice but to rejoin the British army and every step took him closer.
The officer led them across the moat, past a cemetery, a church, a hospital and then through streets of new houses. The sound of musketry grew louder. Bigger guns hammered to the north, clouding the sky with powder smoke. The officer stopped beside a high brick wall and waited as his ragtag followers gathered around him, then he spoke urgently, and whatever he said must have roused the men for they gave a growl of agreement. A man turned to Sharpe and asked him a question. “American,” Sharpe said.
“You’re American?”
“Sailor.”
“You are welcome I think. You know what the Captain said?”
“No.”
“The English are in the garden”—the man nodded toward the wall—“but there are not many of them and we shall throw them out. We are making a new battery here. You have fought before, perhaps?”
“Yes,” Sharpe said.
“Then I sall stay with you.” The man smiled. “I am Jens.”
“Richard,” Sharpe introduced himself. He took out one of the pistols and pretended to check its priming. The weapon was unloaded and he had no intention of charging it. “What do you do?” he asked Jens, who was a pleasant-faced, fair-haired young man with a snub nose and lively eyes.
Jens flourished his ancient musket. The lock was rusted, the stock was split and one of its barrel hoops was missing. “I kill Englishmen.”
“And when you’re not killing them?” Sharpe asked.
“I am a… what is it called? I make ships?”
“A shipwright.”
“A shipwright,” Jens agreed. “We work on a new warship, but we have left her unfinished. We do this first.”
The Captain peered through the gate, then gestured that his men should follow him. They jostled through the gate and Sharpe found himself in a wide parklike garden. Gravel paths led to groves of trees, and an elegant white summerhouse, a confection of gables, verandahs and pinnacles, stood on a small hillock. The garden looked to be a more genteel version of the Vauxhall Gardens in London. A company of regular Danish soldiers was crouching by the summerhouse, but there was no musketry sounding nearby and no sign of any British soldiers. The militia Captain, unsure what to do, ran to consult the regular officer, and his men sat on the grass. Far off to the north smoke trails whipped across the sky. Shells, Sharpe assumed. A dull explosion sounded in the distance. “Even if they take these places,” Jens said, waving his hand to show he meant the suburbs, “they will never get into the city.”
“What if they bombard it?” Sharpe asked.
Jens frowned. “You mean with guns?” He seemed shocked. “They will not do that! There are women in the city.”
The militia Captain came back, followed by two men on horseback, one a cavalry officer and the other a civilian. Sharpe stood with the others, then saw that the horsemen were Barker and Lavisser. The two men were only a few feet away and Sharpe turned his back as Lavisser began haranguing the civilian soldiers.
“We are to go forward,” Jens translated for Sharpe.
Lavisser, his sword drawn, had taken his place at the head of the militia while Barker was behind them. Sharpe pulled his brown hat down over his eyes and wished he had loaded the pistol. It was too late now, for the militia was hurrying west toward the trees. They went in a bunch and if the British had cannon there would be a massacre.
“We are to attack their side,” Jens said.
“Their flank?”
“I expect so. When it is over you can take an English gun, eh? Better than that little pistol.”
Lavisser led them into the woodland. A twisting path went downhill and Lavisser, evidently confident that no British troops were close by, spurred his horse ahead. There was plainly a battle of sorts going on just to the north for the musketry was crackling in loud bursts, but nothing was happening in this part of the gardens where the militia, confident that they were hooking around the southern flank of the British, followed Lavisser down into a gentle valley where a small stream fed an ornamental pond. Lavisser shouted at the militia, evidently ordering them into ranks. The group of sailors, all in straw hats and pigtails, set an example by forming four ranks and the two sergeants pushed the rest into crude files. Lavisser, his horse pawing great gouts from the turf, shouted excitedly. “He says the enemy is not many,” Jens translated.
“How does he know?” Sharpe wondered aloud.
“Because he is a proper officer, of course,” Jens said.
Lavisser had not looked in Sharpe’s direction and Barker was still trailing the three hundred men who now set off up the western slope where their cohesion was immediately broken by the trees. The sound of musketry was coming from Sharpe’s right, but it was sporadic now. Perhaps this makeshift half-battalion of disorganized enthusiasts really could take the approaching British on the flank, but Sharpe was relieved that he was in the rear rank and at the left-hand side, farthest from both Lavisser and the sound of battle. He was trying to load the pistol as he walked and wondering if he could somehow seize Lavisser and carry him bodily into the British lines.
Then a musket shot sounded directly ahead. The Danes were among the trees still, but there was open ground a hundred paces in front of them. Sharpe saw a drift of musket smoke at the edge of that sunlit space, then more muskets sounded. Lavisser dug in his spurs and the unwieldy mass began to run.
Sharpe ran wide to the left. He could see the redcoats now, but only a handful. He guessed there was a British skirmish line at the edge of the wood, and that meant a full battalion was not far away. The Danes were shouting excitedly, then Sharpe saw a redcoat clearly and saw the man’s wing epaulettes. A light company then, so the other nine companies were close at hand, formed and ready to fire. The Danes, knowing nothing of what waited for them, only saw the British skirmishers retreating and mistook that for victory. Lavisser must have thought the same, for he was yelping as though he was on a hunting field and holding his saber ready to strike down a fugitive.
The redcoat light company fired and retreated. One man knelt, aimed and fired while his companion reloaded, then the man who had fired ran back a few paces to let his comrade cover him while reloading. A Dane was sprawling on the ground, twitching, another was leaning against a tree and staring at the blood pouring from a wound in his thigh. Others of the Danes fired their muskets as they ran, the balls going wild and high in the trees. A whistle sounded ahead, calling the skirmishers back to the British battalion’s other nine companies. Lavisser must have seen those companies, for he turned his horse so hard that its eyes went white and its hooves scrabbled in the leaf mold. He frantically shouted for his men to halt at the wood’s edge and level their
