Sharpe's Triumph

Chapter 9

"There!" Dodd said, pointing.

"I can't see," Simone Joubert complained.

"Drop the telescope, use your naked eye, Madame. There! It's flashing."

"Where?"

"There!" Dodd pointed again. "Across the river. Three trees, low hill."

"Ah!" Simone at last saw the flash of reflected sunlight from the lens of a telescope that was being used on the far bank of the river and well downstream from where Dodd's Cobras held the left of Pohlmann's line.

Simone and her husband had dined with the Major who was grimly happy in anticipation of a British attack which, he claimed, must inevitably fall hardest on his Cobras.

"It will be slaughter, Ma'am," Dodd said wolfishly, "sheer slaughter!"

He and Captain Joubert had walked Simone to the edge of the bluff above the Kaitna and shown her the fords, and demonstrated how any men crossing the fords must be caught in the mangling crossfire of the Mahratta cannon, then maintained that the British had no option but to walk forward into that weltering onslaught of canister, round shot and shell.

"If you wish to stay and watch, Madame," Dodd had offered, "I can find a place of safety for you." He gestured towards a low rise of ground just behind the regiment. "You could watch from there, and I credit no British soldier will come near you."

"I could not bear to watch a slaughter, Major," Simone had said feelingly.

"Your squeamishness does you credit, Ma'am," Dodd had answered. "War is man's work."

It was then that Dodd had spotted the British soldiers on the opposite bank and had trained his telescope on the distant men. Simone, knowing now where to look, rested the glass on her husband's shoulder and trained its lens on the far hill. She could see two men there, one in a cocked hat and the other in a shako. Both were keeping low.

"Why are they so far down the river?" she asked.

"They're looking for a way round our flank," Dodd said.

"Is there one?"

"No. They must cross here, Ma'am, or else they don't cross at all."

Dodd gestured at the fords in front of the compoo. A band of cavalrymen was galloping through the shallow water, spraying silver from their horses' hooves as they crossed to the Kaitna's south bank.

"And those horsemen," Dodd explained, "are going to see whether they will cross or not."

Simone collapsed the telescope and handed it back to the Major.

"They might not attack?"

"They won't," her husband answered in English for Dodd's benefit. "They have too much sense."

"Boy Wellesley don't have sense," Dodd said scathingly. "Look how he attacked at Ahmednuggur? Straight at the wall! A hundred rupees says he will attack."

Captain Joubert shook his head. "I do not gamble, Major."

"A soldier should relish risk," Dodd said.

"And if they don't cross," Simone asked, "there is no battle?"

"There'll be a battle, Ma'am," Dodd said grimly. "Pohlmann's gone to fetch Scindia's permission for us to cross the river. If they won't come to us, we'll go to them."

Pohlmann had indeed gone to find Scindia. The Hanoverian had dressed for battle, donning his finest coat, which was a blue silk jacket, trimmed in scarlet and decorated with loops of gold braid and black aiguillettes. He wore a white silk sash on which was blazoned a star of diamonds and from which hung a gold-hiked sword, though Dupont, the Dutchman, who accompanied Pohlmann to meet Scindia, noted that the Colonel's breeches and boots were old and shabby.

"I wear them for luck," Pohlmann said, noting Dupont's puzzled glance at his decrepit breeches. "They're from my old East India Company uniform." The Hanoverian was in a fine mood. His short march eastwards had achieved all he had desired, for it had brought one of the two small British armies into his lap while it was still far away from the other.

All he needed to do now was snap it up like a minnow, then march on Stevenson's force, but Scindia had been insistent that no infantry were to cross the Kaitna's fords without his permission and Pohlmann now needed that permission. The Hanoverian did not plan to cross immediately, for first he wanted to be certain that the British were retreating, but nor did he wish to wait for permission once he heard news of the enemy's withdrawal.

"Our lord and master will be scared at the thought of attacking," Pohlmann told Dupont, "so we'll flatter the bugger. Slap on the ghee with a shovel, Dupont. Tell him he'll be lord of all India if he lets us loose."

"Tell him there are a hundred white women in Wellesley's camp and he'll lead the attack himself," Dupont observed drily.

"Then that is what we shall tell him," Pohlmann said, "and promise him that every little darling will be his concubine."

Except that when Pohlmann and Dupont reached the tree-shaded stretch of ground above the River Juah where the Maharajah of Gwalior had been awaiting his army's victory, there was no sign of his lavish tents.

They had been struck, all of them, together with the striped tents of the Rajah of Berar, and all that remained were the cook tents that even now were being collapsed and folded onto the beds of a dozen ox carts.

All the elephants but one were gone, the horses of the royal bodyguards were gone, the concubines were gone and the two princes were gone.

The one remaining elephant belonged to Surjee Rao and that minister, ensconced in his howdah where he was being fanned by a servant, smiled benevolently down on the two sweating and red-faced Europeans.

"His Serene Majesty deemed it safer to withdraw westwards," he explained airily, "and the Rajah of Berar agreed with him."

"They did what?" Pohlmann snarled.

"The omens," Surjee Rao said vaguely, waving a bejewelled hand to indicate that the subtleties of such supernatural messages would be beyond Pohlmann's comprehension.

"The bloody omens are propitious!" Pohlmann insisted. "We've got the buggers by the balls! What more omens can you want?"

Surjee Rao smiled.

"His Majesty has sublime confidence in your skill, Colonel."

"To do what?" the Hanoverian demanded.

"Whatever is necessary," Surjee Rao said, then smiled. "We shall wait in Borkardan for news of your triumph, Colonel, and eagerly anticipate seeing the banners of our enemies heaped in triumph at the foot of His Serene Majesty's throne." And with that hope expressed he snapped his fingers and the mahout prodded the elephant which lumbered away westwards.

"Bastards," Pohlmann said to Dupont, loudly enough for the retreating minister to hear. "Lily-livered bastards! Cowards!" Not that he cared whether Scindia and the Rajah of Berar were present at the battle; indeed, given the choice, he would much prefer to fight without them, but that was not true of his men who, like all soldiers, fought better when their rulers were watching, and so Pohlmann was angry for his men.

Yet, he consoled himself as he returned southwards, they would still fight well. Pride would see to that, and confidence, and the promise of plunder.

And Surjee Rao's final words, Pohlmann decided, had been more than enough to give him permission to cross the River Kaitna. He had been told to do whatever was necessary, and Pohlmann reckoned that gave him a free hand, so he would give Scindia a victory even if the yellow bastard did not deserve it.

Pohlmann and Dupont cantered back to the left of the line where they saw that Major Dodd had called his men out from the shade of the trees and into their ranks. The sight suggested that the enemy was approaching the Kaitna and Pohlmann spurred his horse into a gallop, clamping one hand onto his extravagantly plumed hat to stop it falling off. He slewed to a stop just short of Dodd's regiment and stared above their heads across the river.

The enemy had come, except this enemy was merely a long line of cavalrymen with two small horse-drawn galloper guns. It was a screen, of course. A screen of British and Indian horsemen intended to stop his own patrols from discovering what was happening in the hidden country beyond.

"Any sign of their infantry?" he called to Dodd.

"None, sir."

"The buggers are running!" Pohlmann exulted. "That's why they've put up a screen." He suddenly noticed Simone Joubert and hastily took off his feathered hat. "My apologies for my language, Madame." He put his hat back on and twisted his horse about. "Harness the guns!" he shouted.

"What is happening?" Simone asked anxiously.

"We're crossing the river," her husband said quietly, "and you must go back to Assaye."

Simone knew she must say something loving to him, for was that not expected of a wife at a moment such as this?

"I shall pray for you," she said shyly.

"Go back to Assaye," her husband said again, noting that she had not given him any love, "and stay there till it is all over."

It would not take long. The guns needed to be attached to their limbers, but the infantry were ready to march and the cavalry were eager to begin their pursuit. The existence of the British cavalry screen suggested that Wellesley must be withdrawing, so all Pohlmann needed to do was cross the river and then crush the enemy. Dodd drew his elephant-hilted sword, felt its newly honed edge and waited for the orders to begin the slaughter.

The Mahratta cavalry pursued Wellesley's party the moment they saw that the General was retreating from his observation post above the river.

"We must look to ourselves, gentlemen!" Wellesley had called and driven back his heels so that Diomed had sprung ahead.

The other horsemen matched his pace, but Sharpe, on his small captured Mahratta horse, could not keep up. He had mounted in a hurry, and in his haste he could not fit his right boot into the stirrup and the horse's jolting motion made it all the more difficult, but he dared not curb the beast for he could hear the enemy's shouts and the beat of their hooves not far behind. For a few moments he was in a panic. The thud of the pursuing hooves grew louder, he could see his companions drawing ever farther ahead of him and his horse was blowing hard and trying to resist the frantic kicks he gave, and each kick threatened to unseat him so that he clung to the saddle's pommel and still his right boot would not find the stirrup. Sevajee, racing free on the right flank, saw his predicament and curved back towards him.

"You're not a horseman, Sergeant."

"Never bloody was, sir. Hate the bloody things."

"A warrior and his horse, Sergeant, are like a man and a woman," Sevajee said, leaning over and pushing the stirrup iron onto Sharpe's boot. He did it without once checking his own horse's furious pace, then he slapped Sharpe's small mare on the rump and she took off like one of the enemy's rockets, almost tipping Sharpe backwards.

Sharpe clung on to the pommel, while his musket, which was hanging by its sling from his left elbow, banged and thumped his thigh. His shako blew off and he had no time to rescue it, but then a trumpet sounded off to his right and he saw a stream of British cavalrymen riding to head off the pursuit. Still more cavalrymen were spurring north from Naulniah and Wellesley, as he passed them, urged them on towards the Kaitna.

"Thank you, sir," Sharpe said to Sevajee.

"You should learn horsemanship."

"I'll stay a foot soldier, sir. Safer. Don't like sitting on things with hooves and teeth."

Sevajee laughed. Wellesley had slowed now and was patting the neck of his horse, but the brief pursuit had only increased his high spirits. He turned Diomed to watch the Mahratta cavalry spur away.

"A good omen!" he said happily.

"For what, sir?" Sevajee asked.

Wellesley heard the Indian's sceptical tone.

"You don't think we should give battle?"

Sevajee shrugged, seeking some tactful way of expressing his disagreement with Wellesley's decision.

"The battle isn't always to the largest army, sir."

"Always, no," Wellesley said, "but usually, yes? You think I am being impetuous?" Sevajee refused to be drawn and simply shrugged again in answer. "We shall see, we shall see," the General said. "Their army looks fine, I grant you, but once we break the regular compoos, the others will run."

"I do hope so, sir."

"Depend on it," Wellesley said, then spurred on.

Sharpe looked at Sevajee.

"Are we mad to fight, sir?"

"Quite mad," Sevajee said, "completely mad. But maybe there's no choice."

"No choice?"

"We blundered, Sergeant. We marched too far and came too close to the enemy, so either we attack him or run away from him, and either way we have to fight. By attacking him we just make the fight shorter." He twisted in the saddle and pointed towards the now hidden Kaitna. "Do you know what's beyond that river?"

"No, sir."

"Another river, Sharpe, and they meet just a couple of miles downstream..." he pointed eastwards towards the place where the waters met, "...and if we cross that ford we shall find ourselves on a tongue of land and the only way out is forward, through a hundred thousand Mahrattas. Death on one side and water on the other." Sevajee laughed. "Blundering, Sergeant, blundering!"

But if Wellesley had blundered he was still in high spirits. Once back at Naulniah he ordered Diomed unsaddled and rubbed down, then began issuing commands. The army's baggage would stay at Naulniah, dragged into the village's alleyways which were to be barricaded so that no marauding Mahratta cavalry could plunder the wagons which would be guarded by the smallest battalion of sepoys. McCandless heard that order given, understood its necessity, but groaned aloud when he realized that almost five hundred infantrymen were thus being shorn from the attacking army.

The cavalry that remained in Naulniah were ordered to saddle their horses and ride to the Kaitna, there to form a screen on the southern bank, while the tired infantry, who had marched all morning, were now rousted from their tents and chivvied into ranks.

"No packs!" the sergeants called. "Firelocks and cartridge boxes only. No packs! Off to a Sunday battle, lads! Save your bleeding prayers and hurry up! Come on, Johnny, boots on, lad! There's a horde of heathens to kill. Look lively, now! Wake yourselves up! On your feet!"

The picquets of the day, composed of a half company from each of the army's seven battalions, marched first. They splashed through the small river north of Naulniah and were met on its far bank by one of the General's aides who guided them onto the farm track that led to Peepulgaon. The picquets were followed by the King's 74th accompanied by their battalion artillery, while behind them came the second battalion of the 12th Madras Regiment, the first battalion of the 4th Madras, the first of the 78th Madras and the first of the 10th Madras, and lastly the kilted Highlanders of the King's 78th. Six battalions crossed the river and followed the beaten-earth track between fields of millet beneath the furnace of an Indian sun. No enemy was visible as they marched, though rumour said the whole of the Mahratta army was not far away.

Two guns fired around one o'clock. The sound was flat and hard, echoing across the heat-shimmering land, but the infantry could see nothing. The sound came from their left, and the battalion officers said there was cavalry somewhere out there, and that doubtless meant that the cavalry's light galloper guns had engaged the enemy, or else the enemy had brought cannon to face the British cavalry, but the fighting did not seem to be ominous for there was silence after the two shots. McCandless, his nerves strung by the disaster he feared was imminent, galloped Aeolus a few yards westwards as if wanting to find an explanation for the two gunshots, but then he thought better of it and turned his horse back to the road.

More cannon fire sounded a few moments later, but there was nothing urgent in the distant shots which were monotonous, flat and sporadic.

If battle had been brewing to the boil the gunshots would have sounded hard and fast, but these shots were almost lackadaisical, as though the gunners were merely practising on Aldershot Heath on a lazy summer's day.

"Their guns or ours, sir?" Sharpe asked McCandless.

"Ours, I suspect," the Scotsman said. "Cavalry galloper guns keeping the enemy horse on their toes." He tugged on Aeolus's rein, moving the gelding out of the path of sixty sepoy pioneers who were doubling down the road's left verge with pick-axes and shovels on their shoulders.

The pioneers' task was to reach the Kaitna and make certain that its banks were not too steep for the ox-drawn artillery. Wellesley cantered after the pioneers, riding to the head of the column and trailing a succession of aides. McCandless joined the General's party and Sharpe kicked his horse alongside Daniel Fletcher who was mounted on a big roan mare and leading an unsaddled Diomed by a long rein.

"He'll want him when the bay's tired," Fletcher told Sharpe, nodding ahead at Wellesley who was now riding a tall bay stallion. "And the mare's in case both horses get shot," he added, slapping the rump of the horse he rode.

"So what do you do?" Sharpe asked the dragoon.

"Just stay close until he wants to change horses and keep him from getting thirsty," Fletcher said. He carried no less than five water canteens on his belt, bulked over a heavy sabre in a metal scabbard, the first time Sharpe had ever seen the orderly carrying a weapon. "Vicious thing, that," Fletcher said when he saw Sharpe glance at the weapon, "a good wide blade, perfect for slicing."

"Ever used it?" Sharpe asked.

"Against Dhoondiah," Fletcher answered. Dhoondiah had been a bandit chieftain whose depredations in Mysore had finally persuaded Wellesley to pursue him with cavalry. The resultant battle had been a short clash of horsemen that had been won in moments by the British. "And I killed a goat with it for the General's supper a week ago," Fletcher continued, drawing the heavy curved blade, "and I think the poor bugger died of fright when it saw the blade coming. Took its head clean off, it did. Look at this, Sergeant." He handed the blade to Sharpe. "See what it says there? Just above the hilt?"

Sharpe tipped the sabre to the sun. " 'Warranted Never to Fail'," he read aloud. He grinned, for the boast seemed oddly out of place on a thing designed to kill or maim.

"Made in Sheffield," Fletcher said, taking the blade back, "and guaranteed never to fail! Good slicer this is, real good. You can cut a man in half with one of these if you get the stroke right."

Sharpe grinned.

"I'll stick with a musket."

"Not on horseback, you won't, Sergeant," Fletcher said. "A firelock's no good on horseback. You want a blade."

"Never learned to use one," Sharpe said.

"It ain't difficult," Fletcher said with the scorn of a man who had mastered a difficult trade. "Keep your arm straight and use the point when you're fighting cavalry, because if you bend the elbow the bastards will chop through your wrist as sure as eggs, and slash away like a haymaker at infantry because there ain't bugger all they can do back to you, not once they're on the run. Not that you could use any kind of sword off the back of that horse." He nodded at Sharpe's small native beast. "It's more like an overgrown dog, that is. Does it fetch?"

The road reached the high point between the two rivers and Fletcher, mounted high on the General's mare, caught his first glimpse of the enemy army on the distant northern bank of the Kaitna. He whistled softly.

"Millions of the buggers!"

"We're going to turn their flank," Sharpe said, repeating what he had heard the General say. So far as Sharpe understood, the idea was to cross the river at the ford which no one except Wellesley believed existed, then make an attack on the left flank of the waiting infantry.

The idea made sense to Sharpe, for the enemy line was facing south and, by coming at them from the east, the British could well plunge the compoos into confusion.

"Millions of the buggers!" Fletcher said again in wonderment, but then the road dropped and took the enemy out of their view. The dragoon orderly sheathed his sabre. "But he's confident," he said, nodding ahead at Wellesley who was dressed in his old uniform coat of the 33rd. The General wore a slim straight sword, but had no other weapon, not even a pistol.

"He was always confident," Sharpe said. "Cool as you like."

"He's a good fellow," Fletcher said loyally. "Proper officer. He ain't friendly, of course, but he's always fair."

He touched his spurs to the mare's flanks because Wellesley and his aides had hurried ahead into the village of Peepulgaon where the villagers gaped at the foreigners in their red coats and black cocked hats. Wellesley scattered chickens from his path as he cantered down the dusty village street to where the road dropped down a precipitous bluff into the half-dry bed of the Kaitna.

The pioneers arrived a moment later and began attacking the bluff to smooth its steep slope. On the river's far bank Sharpe could see the road twist up into the trees that half obscured the village of Waroor.

The General was right, he reckoned, and there had to be a ford, for why else would the road show on both banks? But whether the ford was shallow enough for the army to cross no one yet knew.

Wellesley stood his horse at the top of the bluff and drummed the fingers of his right hand on his thigh. It was the only sign of nerves. He was staring across the river, thinking. No enemy was in sight, but nor should they have been for the Mahratta line was now two miles to the west, which meant that Scindia's army was now between him and Stevenson. Wellesley grimaced, realizing that he had already abandoned his first principle for fighting this battle, which had been to secure his left flank so Stevenson could join. Doubtless, the moment the guns began their proper, concentrated work, the sound of their cannonade would bring Stevenson hurrying across country, but now the older man would simply have to join the fight as best he could. But Wellesley had no regrets at posing such difficulties for Stevenson, for the chance to turn the enemy's flank was heaven-sent. So long, that is, as the ford was practicable.

The pioneer Captain led a dozen of his sepoys down towards the river.

"I'll just see to that far bank, sir," the Captain called up to the General, startling Wellesley out of his reverie.

"Come back!" Wellesley shouted angrily. "Back!"

The Captain had almost reached the water, but now turned and stared at Wellesley in puzzlement.

"Have to grade that bluff, sir," he shouted, pointing to where the road climbed steeply to the screen of trees on the Kaitna's northern bank. "Too steep for guns, sir."

"Come back!" Wellesley called again, then waited as the dozen men trudged back to the southern bank. "The enemy can see the river, Captain," the General explained, "and I have no wish that they should see us yet. I do not want them knowing our intentions, so you will wait until the first infantry make the crossing, then do your work."

But the enemy had already seen the pioneers. The dozen men had only been visible in the river's open bed for a few seconds, but someone in the Mahratta gun line was wide awake and there was a sudden and violent plume of water in the river and, almost simultaneously, the sky battering sound of a heavy gun.

"Good shooting," McCandless said quietly when the fifteen-foot-high fountain had subsided to leave nothing but a whirling eddy in the river's brown water. The range must have been almost two miles, yet the Mahrattas had turned a gun, trained and fired it in seconds, and their aim had been almost perfect.

A second gun fired and its heavy ball ploughed a furrow in the dry, crazed mud beside the river and bounced up to scatter bucket-loads of dry earth from the bluff's face.

"Eighteen-pounders," McCandless guessed aloud, thinking of the two heavy siege guns that he had seen in front of Dodd's men.

"Damn," Wellesley said quietly. "But no real harm done, I suppose."

The first of the infantry were now marching down Peepulgaon's steep street. Lieutenant Colonel Orrock led the picquets of the day, while behind them Sharpe could see the grenadier company of the 74th. The Scottish drums were beating a march rhythm and the sound of the flurries made Sharpe's blood race. The sound presaged battle. It seemed like a dream, but there would be a battle this Sunday afternoon and a bloody one too.

"Afternoon, Orrock," Wellesley spurred his horse to meet the infantry vanguard. "Straight across, I think."

"Has the ford been sounded?" Colonel Orrock, a lugubrious and worried-looking man, asked nervously.

"Our task, I think," Wellesley said cheerfully. "Gentlemen?" This last invitation was to his aides and orderly. "Shall we open proceedings?"

"Come on, Sharpe," McCandless said.

"You can cross after us, Captain!" Wellesley called to the eager pioneer Captain, then he put his big bay stallion down the slope of the bluff and trotted towards the river.

Daniel Fletcher followed close behind with Diomed's leading rein in his hand, while the aides and McCandless and Sevajee and Sharpe all followed. Forty horsemen would be the first men across the Kaitna and the General would be the first of all, and Sharpe watched as Wellesley's stallion trotted into the river. He wanted to see how deep the water was, and he was determined to watch the General all the way through, but suddenly the bang of an eighteen-pounder gun bullied the sky and Sharpe glanced upstream to see a puff of gunsmoke smear the horizon, then he heard a horse screaming and he looked back to see that Daniel Fletcher's mount was rearing at the water's edge. Fletcher was still in the saddle, but the orderly had no head left, only a pulsing spurt of blood from his ragged neck.

Diomed's rein was still in the dead man's hand, but somehow the body would not fall from the mare's saddle and she was screaming in fear as her rider's blood splashed across her face.

A second gun fired, but high, and the shot crashed low overhead to tear into the trees on the southern bank. A third ball smashed into the water, drenching McCandless. Fletcher's mare bolted upstream, but was checked by a fallen tree and so she stood, quivering, and still the trooper's decapitated body was in the saddle and Diomed's rein in his dead hand. The grey horse's left flank was reddened with Fletcher's blood. The trooper had slumped now, his headless trunk leaning eerily to drip blood into the river.

To Sharpe it seemed as if time had stopped. He was aware of someone shouting, aware of the blood dripping from the dragoon's collar, aware of his small horse shivering, but the sudden violence had immobilized him. Another gun fired, this one of smaller calibre, and the ball struck the water a hundred yards upstream, ricocheted once, then vanished in a plume of white spray.

"Sharpe!" a voice snapped. Horsemen were wheeling in the river's shallows and reaching for the dead man's bridle. "Sharpe!"

It was Wellesley who shouted. The General was in the middle of the river where the water did not even reach his stirrups, so there was a ford after all and the river could be crossed, but the enemy was hardly going to be taken by surprise now.

"Take over as orderly, Sharpe!" Wellesley shouted. "Hurry, man!"

There was no one else to replace Fletcher, not unless one of Wellesley's aides took over his duties, and Sharpe was the nearest man.

"Go on, Sharpe!" McCandless said. "Hurry, man!"

Captain Campbell had secured Fletcher's mare.

"Ride her, Sharpe!" the Captain called. "That little horse won't keep up with us. Just let her go. Let her go."

Sharpe dismounted and ran to the mare. Campbell was trying to dislodge Fletcher's blood-soaked body, but the trooper's feet were caught in the stirrups. Sharpe heaved Fletcher's left boot free, then gave the booted leg a tug and the corpse slid towards him. He jumped back as the bloody remnants of the neck, all sinew and flesh and tattered scraps, slapped at his face. The corpse fell into the edge of the river and Sharpe stepped over it to mount the General's mare.

"Get the General's canteens," Campbell ordered him, and an instant later another eighteen-pounder shot hammered low overhead like a clap of thunder. "The canteens, man, hurry!" Campbell urged Sharpe, but Sharpe was having trouble untying the water bottles from Fletcher's belt, so instead he heaved the body over so that a gush of blood spurted from the neck to be instantly diluted in the shallow water. He tugged at the trooper's belt buckle, unfastened it, then hauled the belt free with its pouches, canteens and the heavy sabre. He wrapped the belt over his own, hastily buckled it, then clambered up into the mare's saddle and fiddled his right foot into the stirrup. Campbell was holding out Diomed's rein.

Sharpe took the rein.

"Sorry, sir." He apologized for making the aide wait.

"Stay close to the General," Campbell ordered him, then leaned over and patted Sharpe's arm. "Stay close, be alert, enjoy the day, Sergeant," he said with a grin. "It looks as if it's going to be a lively afternoon!"

"Thank you, sir," Sharpe said.

The first infantry were in the ford now and Sharpe turned the mare, kicked back his heels and tugged Diomed through the water. Campbell was spurring ahead to catch up with Wellesley and Sharpe clumsily kicked the mare into a canter and was almost thrown as she stumbled on the riverbed, but he somehow clung to her mane as she recovered. A round shot thrashed the water white to his left, drenching him with spray. The musket had fallen off his shoulder and was dangling awkwardly from his elbow and he could not manage both it and Diomed's rein, so he let the firelock drop into the river, then wrenched the sword and the heavy canteens into a more comfortable position. Bugger this, he thought. Lost a hat, a horse and a gun in less than an hour!

The pioneers were hacking at the bluff on the northern bank to make the slope less steep, but the first galloper guns, those that accompanied the picquets of the day, were already in the Kaitna. Galloper guns were drawn by horses and the gunners shouted at the pioneers to clear out of their way. The pioneers scattered as the horses came up from the river with water streaming from the leading gun's spinning wheels; a whip cracked over the leader's head and the team galloped up the bluff with the gun and limber bouncing erratically behind. A gunner was thrown off the limber, but he picked himself up and ran after the cannon. Sharpe kicked his horse up the bluff once the second gun was safely past and suddenly he was in low ground, protected from the enemy's cannonade by the rising land to his left.

But where the hell was Wellesley? He could see no one on the high ground that led towards the enemy, and the only men on the road straight ahead were the leading companies of the picquets of the day who continued to march northwards. A slapping sound came from the river and he twisted in his saddle to see that a round shot had whipped through a file of infantry. A body floated downstream in eddies of blood, then the sergeants shouted at the ranks to close up and the infantry kept on coming. But where the hell was Sharpe to go? To his right was the village of Waroor, half hidden behind its trees and for a second Sharpe thought the General must have gone there, but then he saw Lieutenant Colonel Orrock riding up onto the higher ground to the left and Sharpe guessed the Colonel was following Wellesley and so he tugged the mare that way.

The land climbed to a gentle crest across stubble fields dotted by a few trees. Colonel Orrock was the only man in sight and he was forcing his horse up the slope towards the skyline and so Sharpe followed him.

He could hear the enemy guns firing, presumably still bombarding the ford that had not been supposed to exist, but as he kicked the mare up through the growing crop the guns suddenly ceased and all he could hear was the thump of hooves, the banging of the sabre's metal scabbard against his boot and the dull sound of the Scottish drums behind.

Orrock had turned north along the skyline and Sharpe, following him, saw that the General and his aides were clustered under a group of trees from where they were gazing westwards through their telescopes.

He joined them in the shade, and felt awkward to be in such exalted company without McCandless, but Campbell turned in his saddle and grinned.

"Well done, Sergeant. Still with us, eh?"

"Managing, sir," Sharpe said, rearranging the canteens that had tangled themselves into a lump.

"Oh, dear God," Colonel Orrock said a moment later. He was gazing through his own telescope, and whatever he saw made him shake his head before peering through the glass again. "Dear me," he said, and Sharpe stood in his stirrups to see what had so upset the East India Company Colonel.

The enemy was redeploying. Wellesley had crossed the ford to bring his small army onto the enemy's left flank, but the Mahratta commander had seen his purpose and was now denying him the advantage. The enemy line was marching towards the Peepulgaon ford, then wheeling left to make a new defence line that stretched clean across the land between the two rivers; a line that would now face head on towards Wellesley's army.

Instead of attacking a vulnerable flank, Wellesley would be forced to make a head-on assault. Nor were the Mahrattas making their manoeuvre in a panicked hurry, but were marching calmly in disciplined ranks. The guns were moving with them, drawn by bullocks or elephants. The enemy was less than a mile away now and their steady unhurried re deployment was obvious to the watching officers.

"They anticipate us, sir!" Orrock informed Wellesley, as though the General might not have understood the purpose of the enemy's manoeuvre.

"They do," Wellesley agreed calmly, "they do indeed." He collapsed his telescope and patted his horse's neck. "And they manoeuvre very well!" he added admiringly, as though he was engaged in nothing more ominous than watching a brigade go through its paces in Hyde Park. "Your men are through the ford?" he asked Orrock.

"They are, sir, they are," Orrock said. The Colonel had a nervous habit of jutting his head forward every few seconds as if his collar was too tight. "And they can reverse themselves," he added meaningfully.

Wellesley ignored the defeatist sentiment.

"Take them one half-mile up the road," he ordered Orrock, "then deploy on the high ground this side of the road. I shall see you before we advance."

Orrock gazed goggle-eyed at the General.

"Deploy?"

"On this side of the road, if you please, Colonel. You will form the right of our line, Colonel, and have Wallace's brigade on your left. Let us do it now, Colonel, if you would so oblige me?"

"Oblige you..." Orrock said, his head darting forward like a turtle. "Of course," he added nervously, then turned his horse and spurred it back towards the road.

"Barclay?" the General addressed one of his aides. "My compliments to Colonel Maxwell and he will bring all Company and King's cavalry to take post to Orrock's right. Native horse will stay south of the river."

There was still enemy cavalry south of the Kaitna and the horsemen from Britain's Indian allies would stay on that bank to keep those enemies at bay.

"Then stay at the ford," Wellesley went on addressing Barclay, "and tell the rest of the infantry to form on Orrock's picquets. Two lines, Barclay, two lines, and the 78th will form the left flank here."

The General, who had been gazing at the enemy's calm redeployment now turned to Barclay who was scribbling in pencil on a scrap of paper.

"First line, from the left. The 78th, Dallas's 10th, Corben's 78th, Orrock's picquets. Second line, from the left. Hill's 4th, Macleod's i2th, then the 74th. They are to form their lines and wait for my orders. You understand? They are to wait."

Barclay nodded, then tugged on his reins and spurred his horse back towards the ford as the General turned again to watch the enemy's redeployment

"Very fine work," he said approvingly. "I doubt we could have manoeuvred any more smartly than that. You think they were readying to cross the river and attack us?"

Major Blackiston, his engineer aide, nodded.

"It would explain why they were ready to move, sir."

"We shall just have to discover whether they fight as well as they manoeuvre," Wellesley said, collapsing his telescope, then he sent Blackiston north to explore the ground up to the River Juah. "Come on, Campbell," Wellesley said when Blackiston was gone and, to Sharpe's surprise, instead of riding back to where the army was crossing the ford, the General spurred his horse still further west towards the enemy.

Campbell followed and Sharpe decided he had better go as well.

The three men rode into a steep-sided valley that was thick with trees and brush, then up its far side to another stretch of open farmland.

They cantered through a field of unharvested millet, then across pastureland, always inclining north towards another low hill crest.

"I'll oblige you for a canteen, Sergeant," Wellesley called as they neared the crest and Sharpe thumped his heels on the mare's flanks to catch up with the General, then fumbled a canteen free and held it out, but that meant taking his left hand off the reins while his right was still holding Diomed's tether and the mare, freed of the rein, swerved away from the General. Wellesley caught up with Sharpe and took the canteen. "You might tie Diomed's rein to your belt, Sergeant," he said. "It will provide you with another hand."

A man needed three hands to do Sharpe's job, but once they reached the low crest the General halted again and so gave Sharpe time to fasten the Arab's rein to Fletcher's belt. The General was staring at the enemy who was now only a quarter-mile away, well inside cannon shot, but either the enemy guns were not ready to fire or else they were under orders not to waste powder on a mere three horsemen. Sharpe took the opportunity to explore what was in Fletcher's pouch. There was a piece of mouldy bread that had been soaked when the trooper's body fell into the river, a piece of salted meat that Sharpe suspected was dried goat, and a sharpening stone. That made him half draw the sabre to feel its edge. It was keen.

"A nasty little settlement!" Wellesley said cheerfully.

"Aye, it is, sir!" Campbell agreed enthusiastically.

"That must be Assaye," Wellesley remarked. "You think we're about to make it famous?"

"I trust so, sir," Campbell said.

"Not infamous, I hope," Wellesley said, and gave his short, high pitched laugh.

Sharpe saw they were both staring towards a village that lay to the north of the enemy's new line. Like every village in this part of India it was provided with a rampart made of the outermost houses' mud walls.

Such walls could be five or six feet in thickness, and though they might crumble to the touch of an artillery bombardment, they still made a formidable obstacle to infantry. Enemy soldiers stood on every rooftop, while outside the wall, in an array as thick as a hedgehog's quills, was an assortment of cannon.

"A very nasty little place," the General said. "We must avoid it. I see your fellows are there, Sharpe!"

"My fellows, sir?" Sharpe asked in puzzlement.

"White coats, Sergeant."

So Dodd's regiment had taken their place just to the south of Assaye.

They were still on the left of Pohlmann's line, but now that line stretched southwards from the bristling defences about the village to the bank of the River Kaitna. The infantry were already in place and the last of the guns were now being hauled into their positions in front of the enemy line, and Sharpe remembered Syud Sevajee's grim words about the rivers meeting, and he knew that the only way out of this narrowing neck of land was either back through the fords or else straight ahead through the enemy's army.

"I see we shall have to earn our pay today," the General said to no one in particular. "How far ahead of the infantry is their gun line, Campbell?"

"A hundred yards, sir?" the young Scotsman guessed after gazing through his spyglass for a while.

"A hundred and fifty, I think," Wellesley said.

Sharpe was watching the village. A lane led from its eastern wall and a file of cavalry was riding out from the houses towards some trees.

"They think to allow us to take the guns," Wellesley guessed, "reckoning we'll be so pounded by round shot and peppered by canister that their infantry can then administer the coup de grace. They wish to treat us to a double dose! Guns and fire locks!"

The trees where the cavalry had disappeared dropped into a steep gully that twisted towards the higher ground from where Wellesley was observing the enemy. Sharpe, watching the tree-filled gully, saw birds fly out of the branches as the cavalry advanced beneath the thick leaves.

"Horsemen, sir," Sharpe warned.

"Where, man, where?" Wellesley asked.

Sharpe pointed towards the gully.

"It's full of the bastards, sir. They came out of the village a couple of moments ago. You can't see them, sir, but I think there might be a hundred men hidden there."

Wellesley did not dispute Sharpe.

"They want to put us in the bag," he said in seeming amusement. "Keep an eye out for them, Sharpe. I have no wish to watch the battle from the comfort of Scindia's tent." He looked back to the enemy's line where the last of the heavy guns were being lugged into place.

Those last two guns were the big eighteen-pounder siege guns that had done the damage as the British army crossed the ford, and now the huge pieces were being placed in front of Dodd's regiment. Elephants pulled the guns into position, then were led away towards the baggage park beyond the village.

"How many guns do you reckon, Campbell?" the General asked.

"Eighty-two, sir, not counting the ones by Assaye."

"Around twenty there, I think. We shall be earning our pay! And their line's longer than I thought. We shall have to extend." He was not so much speaking to Campbell as to himself, but now he glanced at the young Scots officer. "Did you count their infantry?"

"Fifteen thousand in the line, sir?" Campbell hazarded.

"And at least as many again in the village," Wellesley said, snapping his telescope shut, "not to mention a horde of horsemen behind them, but they'll only count if we meet disaster. It's the fifteen thousand in front who concern us. Beat them and we beat all." He made a pencilled note in a small black book, then stared again at the enemy line beneath its bright flags. "They did manoeuvre well! A creditable performance. But do they fight, eh? That's the nub of it. Do they fight?"

"Sir!" Sharpe called urgently, for, not two hundred paces away, the first enemy horsemen had emerged from the gully with their tulwars and lances bright in the afternoon sun, and now were spurring towards Wellesley.

"Back the way we came," the General said, "and fairly briskly, I think."

This was the second time in one day that Sharpe had been pursued by Mahratta cavalry, but the first time he had been mounted on a small native horse and now he was on one of the General's own chargers and the difference was night and day. The Mahrattas were at a full gallop, but Wellesley and his two companions never went above a canter and still their big horses easily outstripped the frantic pursuit. Sharpe, clinging for dear life to the mare's pommel, glanced behind after two minutes and saw the enemy horsemen pulling up. So that, he thought, was why officers were willing to pay a small fortune for British and Irish horses.

The three men dropped into the valley, climbed its farther side and Sharpe saw that the British infantry had now advanced from the road to form its line of attack along the low ridge that lay parallel to the road, and the redcoat array looked pitifully small compared to the great enemy host less than a mile to the west. Instead of a line of heavy guns, there was only a scatter of light six-pounder cannon and a single battery of fourteen bigger guns, and to face Pohlmann's three compoos of fifteen thousand men there were scarcely five thousand red-coated infantry, but Wellesley seemed unworried by the odds. Sharpe did not see how the battle was to be won, indeed he wondered why it was being fought at all, but whenever the doubt made his fears surge he only had to look at Wellesley and take comfort from the General's serene confidence.

Wellesley rode first to the left of his line where the kilted Highlanders of the 78th waited in line.

"You'll advance in a moment or two, Harness," he told their Colonel. "Straight ahead! I fancy you'll find bayonets will be useful. Tell your skirmishers that there are cavalry about, though I doubt you'll meet them at this end of the line."

Harness appeared not to hear the General. He sat on a big horse as black as his towering bearskin hat and carried a huge claymore that looked as if it had been killing the enemies of Scotland for a century or more.

"It's the Sabbath, Wellesley," he finally spoke, though without looking at the General. "Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work, but the seventh is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God. In it thou shalt not do any work." The Colonel glowered at Wellesley. "Are you sure, man, that you want to fight today?"

"Quite sure, Colonel," Wellesley answered very equably.

Harness grimaced.

"Won't be the first commandment I've broken, so to hell and away with it." He gave his huge claymore a flourish. "You'll not need to worry about my rogues, Wellesley, they can kill as well as any man, even if it is a Sunday."

"I never doubted it."

"Straight ahead, eh? And I'll lay the lash on any dog who falters. You hear that, you bastards! I'll flog you red!"

"I wish you joy of the afternoon, Colonel," Wellesley said to Harness, then he rode north to speak with his other five battalion commanders.

He gave them much the same instructions as he had given Colonel Harness, though because the Madrassi sepoys deployed no skirmishers, he simply warned them that they had one chance of victory and that was to march straight into the enemy fire and, by enduring it, carry their bayonets into the Mahratta ranks. He told the commanding officers of the two sepoy battalions in the second line that they would now need to join the front line.

"You'll incline right," he told them, "forming between Corben's 78th and Colonel Orrock's picquets." He had hoped to attack in two lines, so that the men behind could reinforce those in front, but the enemy array was too wide and so he would need to throw every infantryman forward in one line. There would be no reserves. The General rode to meet Colonel Wallace who today would command a brigade of his own 74th Highlanders and two sepoy battalions which, with Orrock's picquets, would form the right side of the attacking force. He warned Wallace of the line's extension.

"I'll have Orrock incline right to give your sepoys room," he promised Wallace, "and I'm putting your own regiment on Orrock's right flank."

Wallace, because he was commanding the brigade, would not lead his own Highlanders who would be under the command of his deputy, Major Swinton. Colonel McCandless had joined his friend Wallace, and Wellesley greeted him.

"I see your man holds their left, McCandless."

"So I've seen, sir."

"But I don't wish to tangle with him early on. He's hard by the village and they've made it a stronghold, so we'll take the right of their line, then swing north and pin the rest against the Juah. You'll get your chance, McCandless, get your chance."

"I'm depending on it, sir," McCandless answered. The Colonel nodded a mute greeting to Sharpe, who then had to follow Wellesley to the ranks of the 74th.

"You'll oblige me, Swinton," Wellesley said, "by doubling your fellows to the right and taking station beyond Colonel Orrock's picquets. You're to form the new right flank. I've told Colonel Orrock to move somewhat to his right, so you'll have a good way to go to make your new position. You understand?"

"Perfectly, sir," Swinton said. "Orrock will incline right and we double round behind him to form the new flank and sepoys replace us here."

"Good man!" Wellesley said, then rode on to Colonel Orrock. Sharpe guessed that the General had ordered the 74th to move outside Orrock because he did not trust the nervous Colonel to hold the right flank.

Orrock's contingent of half companies was a small but potent force, but it lacked the cohesion of the men's parent battalions.

"You're to lead them right wards," Wellesley told the red-faced Colonel, "but not too far. You comprehend? Not too far right! Because you'll find a defended village on your front right flank and it's a brute. I don't want any of our men near it until we've sent the enemy infantry packing."

"I go right?" Orrock asked.

"You incline right," Wellesley said, "then straighten up. Two hundred paces should do it. Incline right, Orrock, give the line two hundred paces more width, then straighten and march straight for the enemy. Swinton will be bringing his men onto your right flank. Don't wait for him, let him catch you, and don't hesitate when we attack. Just go straight in with the bayonet."

Orrock jutted his head, scratched his chin and blinked.

"I go right wards."

"Then straight ahead," Wellesley said patiently.

"Yes, sir," Orrock said, then jerked nervously as one of his small six-pounder cannon, which had been deployed fifty yards in front of his line, fired.

"What the devil?" Wellesley asked, turning to look at the small gun that had leaped back five or six yards. He could not see what the gun had fired at, for the smoke of the discharge made a thick cloud in front of the muzzle, but a second later an enemy round shot screamed through the smoke, twitching it, to bounce between two of Orrock's half companies. Wellesley cantered to his left to see that the enemy guns had opened fire. For the moment they were merely sending ranging shots, but soon the guns would be pouring their metal at the red ranks.

The General cantered back southwards. It was close to mid afternoon now and the sun was burning the world white. The air was humid, hard to breathe, and every man in the British line was sweating. The enemy round shot bounced on the ground in front of them, and one shot ricocheted up to churn a file of sepoys into blood and bone. The sound of the enemy cannon was harsh, banging over the warm ground in successive punches that came closer and closer together as more guns joined the cannonade. The British guns replied, and the smoke of their discharges betrayed their positions, and the enemy gunners levered their pieces to aim at the British cannon which, hugely outnumbered, were having by far the worst of the exchange. Sharpe saw the earth around one six-pounder struck again and again by enemy round shot, each strike kicking up a barrow-load of soil, and then the small gun seemed to disintegrate as a heavy ball struck it plumb on the front of its carriage.

Splinters flew to eviscerate the crew that had been ramming the gun.

The barrel reared up, its trunnions tearing out of the carriage, then the heavy metal tube slowly toppled onto a wounded man. Another gunner reeled away, gasping for breath, while a third lay on the ground looking as though he slept.

A piper began to play as the General neared the kilted 78th.

"I thought I ordered all musicians to leave their instruments behind, drummers excepted," Wellesley said angrily.

"Very hard to go into battle without the pipes, sir," Campbell said reprovingly.

"Hard to save the wounded without orderlies," Wellesley complained. In battle the pipers' job was to save the wounded, but Harness had blithely disobeyed the order and brought his bagpipers. However, it was too late to worry about that disobedience now. Another round shot found its mark in a sepoy battalion, flinging men aside like broken dolls, while a high ball struck a tall tree, shaking its topmost leaves and provoking a small green parrot to squawk as it fled the branches.

Wellesley reined in close to the 78th. He glanced to his right, then looked back to the eight or nine hundred yards of country that separated his small force from the enemy. The sound of the guns was constant now, its thunder deafening, and the smoke of their cannonade was hiding the Mahratta infantry that waited for his assault. If the General was nervous he showed no sign of it, unless the fingers drumming softly against his thigh betrayed some worry. This was his first proper battle in the field, gun against gun and infantry against infantry, yet he seemed entirely cool.

Sharpe licked dry lips. His mare fidgeted and Diomed kept pricking his ears at the gunfire. Another British gun was hit, this time losing a wheel to an enemy round shot. The gunners rolled a new wheel forward, while the officer commanding the small battery ran forward with a handspike. The infantry waited beneath their bright silk colours, their long line of two ranks tipped with shining bayonets.

"Time to go," Wellesley said very quietly. "Forward, gentlemen," he said, but still not loudly. He took a breath. "Forward!" he shouted and, at the same time, took off his cocked hat and waved it towards the enemy.

The British drums began their beat. Sergeants shouted. Officers drew swords. The men began to march.

And the battle had begun.