once at the walls they would die.
'T-I-K, Sharpe said, scratching the letters in the dust of the cell's floor where he had cleared a patch of straw. 'L-O-K.
'Picklock, Lawford said. 'Very good, but you've left out two CV
'But I've got the picklock, sir, Sharpe said, and produced it from his coat pocket. It was a small cluster of metal shafts, some curiously bent at their tips, which he quickly hid once he had shown it to Lawford.
'Why didn't they find it? Lawford asked. Both men had been searched when they had been taken to the palace after their arrest, and though the guards had left the page of the Bible in Lawford's pocket, they had taken everything else of value.
'I had it somewhere it couldn't be found, sir, Sharpe said. 'Colonel Gudin thought I was scratching my arse, if you follow me, but I was hiding it.
'I'd rather not know, Lawford said primly.
'A good picklock like that can take care of those old padlocks in seconds, sir, Sharpe said, nodding at the lock on their cell door. 'Then we just have to rush the guards.
'And get a bellyful of lead? Lawford suggested.
'When the assault comes, Sharpe said, 'the guards will like as not be at the top of the steps, trying to see what's happening. They won't hear us. Sharpe's back was still painful, and the wounds inflicted by the jetti were crusted with dried blood and pus that tore whenever he moved too quickly, but there was no gangrene and he had been spared any fever, and that good fortune was restoring his confidence.
'When the assault comes, Sharpe, Colonel McCandless intervened, 'our guards are more likely to be on the walls, leaving our security to the tiger.
'Hadn't thought of that, sir. Sharpe sounded disappointed.
'I don't think even you can rush a tiger, McCandless said.
'No, sir. I don't suppose I can, Sharpe admitted. Each night, at dusk, the guards left the cells, but first they released the tiger. It was a difficult process, for the tiger had to be held away from the guards with long spears as they retreated up the steps. It had evidently tried to charge the guards once for it bore a long scar down one muscular striped flank, and these days, to prevent another such attack, the guards tossed down a great chunk of raw goat meat to satisfy the tiger's hunger before they released it, and the prisoners would spend the night hours listening to the creature grinding and slavering as it ripped the last pieces of flesh from the bones. Each dawn the tiger was herded back to its cell where it slept through the heat of the day until its time for guard duty came again. It was a huge and mangy beast, not nearly so sleek as the six tigers kept in the palace yard, but it had a hungrier look and sometimes, in the moonlight, Sharpe would watch it pacing up and down the short corridor, the fall of its pads silent on the stone as it endlessly went up and down, up and down, and he wondered what tiger thoughts brewed behind its night-glossed yellow eyes. Sometimes, for no reason, it would roar in the night and the hunting cheetahs would call back and the night would be loud with the sound of the animals. Then the tiger would leap lithely up the steps and roar another challenge from the bars at the head of the staircase. It always came back down, its approach silent and its gaze malevolent.
By day, when the tiger twitched in its sleep, the guards would watch the cells. Sometimes there were just two guards, but at other times there were as many as six. Each morning a pair of prisoners from the city's civilian jail arrived in leg irons to take away the night-soil buckets, and when these had been emptied and returned, the first meal was served. It was usually cold rice, sometimes with beans or scraps of fish in it, with a tin jug of water. A second pail of rice was brought in the afternoon, but otherwise the prisoners were left alone. They listened to the sounds above them, ever fearful that they might be summoned to face the Tippoo's dreaded killers, and while they waited McCandless prayed, Hakeswill mocked, Lawford worried and Sharpe learned his letters.
At first the learning was hard and it was made no easier by Hakeswill's constant scoffing. Lawford and McCandless would tell the Sergeant to be quiet, but after a while Hakeswill would chuckle again and start talking, ostensibly to himself, in the far corner of his cage. 'Above himself, ain't he? Hakeswill would mutter just loud enough for Sharpe to hear. 'Got hairs and bleeding graces. That's what Sharpie's got. Hairs and graces. Learning to read! Might as well teach a stone to fart!
It ain't natural, ain't right. A private soldier should know his place, says so in the scriptures.
'It says nothing of the sort, Sergeant! McCandless would always snap after such an assertion.
And always, every daylight hour of every day, there was the sound of the besiegers' guns. Their thunderous percussions filled the sky and were echoed by the crack of iron on sun-dried mud as the eighteen-pound round shots struck home, while, nearer, the Tippoo's own guns answered. Few such cannon had survived on the western walls, but closer to the dungeons, on the northern rampart, the Tippoo's gunners traded shot for shot with the batteries across the Cauvery and the sound of the weapons punched the warm air incessantly.
'Working hard, them gunners! Hakeswill would say. 'Doing a proper job, like real soldiers should. Working up a proper muck sweat. Not wasting their time with bleeding letters. C-A-T? Who the hell needs to know that? It's still a bleeding pussy cat. All you needs to know is how to skin the thing, not how to spell it.
'Quiet, Sergeant, McCandless would growl.
'Yes, sir. I shall be quiet, sir. Like a church mouse, sir. But a few moments later the Sergeant could be heard grumbling again. 'Private Morgan, I remembers him, and he could read and he wasn't nothing but trouble. He always knew more than anyone else, but he didn't know better than to be flogged, did he? Would never have happened if he hadn't had his letters. His mother taught him, the silly Welsh bitch. He read his Bible when he should have been cleaning his musket. Died under the lash, he did, and good riddance. A private soldier's got no business reading. Bad for the eyes, sends you blind.
Hakeswill even talked at night. Sharpe would wake to hear the Sergeant talking in a low voice to the tiger, and one night even the tiger stopped to listen. 'You're not such a bad puss, are you? Hakeswill crooned. 'Down here all alone, you are, just like me. The Sergeant reached a tentative hand through the bars and gave the beast's back a swift pat. He was rewarded with a low snarl. 'Don't you growl at me, puss, or I'll have your bleeding eyes out. And how will you catch mouses then? Eh? You'll be a hungry blind pussy cat, that's what you'll be. That's it. Lay you down now and rest your big head, see? Doesn't hurt, does it? And the Sergeant reached out and, with remarkable tenderness, scratched the big cat's flank and, to Sharpe's wonder, the huge beast settled itself comfortably against the bars of the Sergeant's cell. 'You're awake, aren't you, Sharpie? Hakeswill called softly as he scratched the tiger. 'I knows you are, I can tell. So what happened to little Mary BickerstafF, eh? You going to tell me, boy? Some heathen darkie got his filthy hands on her, has he? She'd have done better lifting her skirts to me. Instead she's being rogered by some blackie, ain't she? Is that what happened? Still now, still! he soothed the tiger. Sharpe pretended to be asleep, but Hakeswill must have sensed his attention. 'Officer's pet, Sharpie? Is that what you are? Learning to read so you can be like them, is that what you want? It won't do you no good, boy. There's only two sorts of officers in this army, and the one sort's good and the other sort ain't. The good sort knows better than to get their hands dirty with you rankers; they leave it all to the sergeants. The bad sort interfere. That young Mister Fitzgerald, he was an interferer, but he's gone to hell now and hell's the best place for him, seeing as how he was an upstart Irishman with no respect for sergeants. And your Mister Lawford, he ain't no good either, no good at all. Hakeswill suddenly quietened as Colonel McCandless groaned.
The Colonel's fever was growing worse, though he tried hard not to complain. Sharpe, abandoning his pretence of sleep, carried the water bucket to him. 'Drink, sir?
'That's kind of you, Sharpe, kind.
The Colonel drank, then propped his back against the stone wall at the back of the cell. 'We had a rainstorm last month, he said, 'not a severe one, but these cells were flooded all the same. And not all of the flooding was rain, a good deal was sewage. I pray God gets us out of here before the monsoon.
'No chance of us still being here then, is there, sir?
'It depends, Sharpe, whether we take the city or not.
'We will, sir, Sharpe said.
'Maybe. The Colonel smiled at Sharpe's serene confidence. 'But the Tippoo might decide to kill us first. McCandless fell silent for a while, then shook his head. 'I wish I understood the Tippoo.
'Nothing to understand, sir. He's just an evil bastard, sir.
'No, he's not that, the Colonel said severely. 'He's actually rather a good ruler. Better, I suspect, than most of our Christian monarchs. He's certainly been good for Mysore. He's fetched it a deal of wealth, given it more justice than most countries enjoy in India and he's been tolerant to most religions, though I fear he did persecute
