Sharpes command, p.23
Sharpe's Command, page 23
‘Eight-pounders!’ a voice behind Sharpe said enthusiastically. ‘Useful little pieces.’ Sharpe turned to see Lieutenant Love hurrying towards him. ‘Sir! Glad to see you, sir!’
‘I’m glad to see you, Lieutenant,’ Sharpe said as sincerely as he could.
‘Eight-pounders!’ Love exclaimed again. ‘Mind if I take a crack with them, sir?’
Sharpe looked at the fugitives trapped on the broken bridge. ‘They’ll all become prisoners, Lieutenant.’
‘Ah, the quality of mercy! Good for you, sir. But I was thinking of the other fort.’ Love was stooping to the nearest cannon and began wrenching the elevating screw beneath the breech to raise the muzzle. ‘Barbara, help me!’ he shouted. ‘I imagine the scoundrels were loaded with canister,’ he said to no one in particular, ‘let’s find out!’ He jiggled the firing tube in the vent-hole and, evidently satisfied that its lower end was embedded in a powder charge, looked through the chest beside the gun to find a portfire. He found one and Sharpe offered his tinderbox, but Love used his own to light the slow-match, which began fizzing and spilling small sparks. The Lieutenant swung it in a wide circle to make the end glow even brighter. ‘Nice of you to offer, sir, but my father gave me this tinderbox and it’s my tradition that it fires the first gun. Father is a canon, so it seems appropriate!’
‘A cannon?’ Sharpe asked, puzzled.
‘At Wells cathedral,’ Love answered absent-mindedly, ‘probably be a bishop one day!’ He lit the portfire, blew on the slow-match to liven the fire, then clasped the pole between his hands and looked heavenwards. ‘And thank you, Barbara, for leaving me a loaded gun. Stand back, sir, and cover your ears. This thing goes bang.’
Love touched the portfire to the firing tube and the thing went bang, gouting a thick cloud of smoke that obscured the river. The gun had been charged with canister which streaked harmlessly above the fugitives still trapped on the nearer pontoons, but the very sound of the musket balls screaming overhead provoked many to jump into the river to avoid annihilation. Sharpe, half deafened by the shot, still heard the canister balls rattling against Fort Ragusa’s high wall.
As the smoke drifted slowly downriver Sharpe saw Frenchmen on the pontoon bridge throwing their muskets into the Tagus and returning with raised hands towards the redcoats massing at Fort Napoleon’s southern gate. Lieutenant Love, meanwhile, had swabbed the cannon’s barrel with a sponge mounted on the butt end of the rammer. He covered the vent with a cloth pad to stop the escaping air encouraging a fire in the smouldering remains of the powder charge, then selected a new bag of powder and a roundshot that he rammed down the barrel. ‘I hate using French powder,’ Love said, ‘it’s not half as good as ours. Still, it works as often as not.’ He used a long metal pricker to pierce the new charge, then found a firing tube among the paraphernalia the French had left behind. He slid it down the vent, throwing down the pad of cloth. ‘I lack a leather thumb-stall,’ he said to Sharpe, ‘but Barbara will preserve us.’
‘Barbara?’ Sharpe asked, bemused.
‘Oh, Major Sharpe,’ Love said, sounding bitterly disappointed. ‘Saint Barbara is the patron saint of gunners! She was a noble young lady, a virgin, which is entirely inappropriate and somewhat disappointing, and her father, disapproving of her conversion to Christianity, locked her in a tower. What any of that has anything to do with the science of artillery is beyond me, yet it is appropriate for gunners to call on her aid. Do stand aside, sir, the thing will go bang again in a moment.’
Someone on Fort Ragusa must have seen what Lieutenant Love was doing on Fort Napoleon’s rampart, because suddenly six of their guns opened fire and a roundshot screamed over Sharpe’s head while another smacked into the wall just beneath him. ‘Rifles!’ Sharpe yelled, ‘here!’
Lieutenant Love stooped at the rear of the cannon which he had reloaded with roundshot and peered along the barrel. ‘I like it,’ he said, then stood aside and touched the still-glowing portfire to the new firing tube. The heavy garrison mount seemed to jump into the air, but it still soaked up much of the recoil as the Lieutenant’s shot screamed over the river to hammer into the northern wall of Fort Ragusa. ‘A trifle low, Barbara,’ Love said reprovingly, ‘but we shall persevere. Major, would you be so kind as to cover the vent with the cloth? Thank you, sir!’ Sharpe put the cloth pad back over the vent as the Lieutenant dipped the sponge in a bucket of water, then swabbed the barrel. The cloth pad blocked the cannon’s vent, thus stopping a draught of air caused by the swabber from igniting unburned powder in the barrel. Sharpe could hear the hissing as scraps of powder were extinguished. ‘Nothing like a May morning with plenty of Frenchmen to kill,’ Love said.
‘You’ll have to batter down that wall to kill many more,’ Sharpe said, ‘and eight-pounders won’t do the job.’
‘God hasn’t seen fit to supply me with eighteen-pounders, sir,’ Love said, ‘but with Barbara’s help we humble artillerymen will do our best.’
‘To do what?’
‘To persuade the enemy to flee! Then we can reconnect the bridge and take possession of Fort Ragusa.’ Love motioned Sharpe to stand aside and touched the portfire to the new firing tube. The cannon fired and a distant clang told of its roundshot striking Fort Ragusa’s wall beyond the billow of powder smoke. Lieutenant Love might think he was doing good, but Sharpe reckoned the eight-pounder cannon was doing nothing more than scaring birds.
Sharpe walked to the further end of the wall so he could stare at the old bridge. He wished he still had his telescope, but even with the naked eye he could just see a group of El Sacerdote’s partisans guarding the French prisoners who were dragging their mangled dead down to the river. Most of the priest’s men had come to the village of Lugar Nuevo beneath Fort Napoleon, where they were ransacking the French storehouses. Some red-coated officers were there too, doubtless trying to rescue anything useful before the whole village was burned. Already two warehouses were ablaze. ‘A disaster,’ an Irish voice said behind him.
Sharpe turned. ‘Disaster, sir?’
‘For the French, Richard!’ Major Hogan said, smiling. ‘We’ve cut off the only practicable link between Soult and Marmont! Those gentlemen will be most upset.’
‘We haven’t taken Fort Ragusa, sir, and I assume the Castle Miravete is still in their hands?’
‘It is indeed. Our nine-pounders aren’t enough to break down their defences, but it doesn’t signify. We can leave them Miravete, because without the bridge it’s guarding nothing. But to destroy the bridge we do need to take Fort Ragusa, which means we’ll have to cross the river somehow.’ Hogan stared across the wide river at the remaining fort. ‘God knows how we do it, but do it we must. Another escalade, I fear, and if we do assault the place, I’d rather not see you up another ladder, Richard. You’re too valuable to lose and, besides, you’re not a becerro any longer.’
‘A becerro?’
‘A becerro is a young fighting bull, Richard.’
‘You’re saying I’m old?’
‘Old and experienced, the worst kind of bull to fight.’ Hogan smiled. ‘How old are you?’
‘No idea. Mother died when I was born and no one else bothered to keep count.’
‘Really no idea?’
‘They tell a horse’s age by looking at its teeth,’ Sharpe said, ‘and I reckon I’m probably about thirty-five.’
‘Christ knows how you’ve lasted that long,’ Hogan said, then looked down at the burning village where El Sacerdote’s men were still searching storehouses. ‘No sign of our friend El Héroe, I suppose?’
‘I’ve not seen the bastard.’
A cheer sounded behind them and they turned to see that the French tricolour had been lowered from the staff on the tower and replaced by a redcoat’s jacket that was too heavy to catch the small wind. ‘I should have thought to bring a flag,’ Hogan said ruefully. ‘Still, that’s a grand sight.’
‘El Héroe might have crossed the river already,’ Sharpe said equally ruefully.
‘He is an expert at running away, so yes.’ Hogan peered down at the Frenchmen now trudging back across the broken pontoon bridge to their captivity. ‘There do seem to be some partisans among them. El Héroe’s men, I presume.’
Sharpe stared down and saw a tangle of men among the fugitives dressed in partisan fashion, some with swathing cloaks and nearly all in the tattered uniforms of the Spanish army. Once off the bridge the defeated men were being driven by redcoats around the fort’s western edge, but some of El Sacerdote’s men were dragging the Spaniards out from the crowd. ‘I don’t fancy those fellows will live to see another dawn,’ Hogan said, amused.
The cannon fire from Fort Ragusa had become sporadic and ill-aimed, the gunners reluctant to serve their pieces because of the accurate rifle fire from Fort Napoleon. The range was about five hundred yards, hopeless for muskets, but good practice for the Greenjackets who were making bets on each shot. ‘They seem to have plenty of coin to wager?’ Hogan suggested.
‘Not much out here to spend money on.’
‘And the hundred guineas you carried here?’
‘I’ll make enquiries about that.’
‘I’m sure you will, Richard, I’m sure you will,’ Hogan paused, ‘but I do understand that the vicissitudes of war sometimes mean that these things get lost.’
‘Vicissitudes?’
‘Buggerations, Richard.’
‘Well, I did give some of it to El Héroe,’ Sharpe said ruefully, ‘and he’s a bugger.’
‘Ah! So I can report to my masters that you delivered the gold as ordered?’
The gold? Sharpe thought. One guinea only. ‘I delivered gold, as ordered.’
‘Perfect,’ Hogan said happily, ‘it’s from the secret account, anyway, and they’re used to buggerations. Ah, I see Cupid is busy!’
Lieutenant Love had recruited half a dozen riflemen to shift a mortar from the eastern ramparts to the northern. Harper was among them, lugging the brutal weapon which plainly had a vast weight because even Harper was straining, but somehow the group managed to turn the corner of the rampart where Love ordered them to drop the gun. Sharpe and Hogan wandered nearer. ‘It isn’t pretty,’ Love greeted them, ‘but with Barbara’s help it might get the job done. You don’t mind me using a couple of your stout fellows as matrosses?’
‘Matrosses?’ Sharpe asked.
‘Gunner’s assistants,’ Love said. ‘I like to think of myself as an efficient gunner, but my efficiency is increased mightily by matrosses.’
‘Pat? Joe! You’re Mister Love’s mattresses.’
‘Yes, sir!’ Harper snapped, amused.
‘Bring me powder and a bomb,’ Love ordered, pointing to where the mortar’s equipment still lay on the eastern battlements. ‘And Sergeant! No need to bring wedges! I’m not a believer in them.’
‘He told me his father was a cannon,’ Harper said to Sharpe as he went past, ‘mad as a whisky priest!’
Lieutenant Love was using a handspike to adjust the mortar so it was aimed directly at Fort Ragusa. ‘There will be joy in heaven if this works,’ he said enthusiastically. He drew a knife from his belt and slit open an eight-pounder powder bag, then tipped some into the mortar’s mouth. He evidently decided he had poured too much because he scooped a handful out and tossed it over the rampart. A French roundshot hit the rampart close by with a deafening crack, but the Lieutenant seemed oblivious to it. ‘I do believe this is one of their new pattern mortars,’ he remarked to Sharpe, ‘and rather subtly designed. A Gomer mortar, I do believe! The old de Valliere’s were crude, but this is a thing of beauty.’ He found a firing tube which was part of the eight-pounder’s equipment and rammed it into the mortar’s vent before breaking off the tube’s top. ‘Ah, the bomb! Well done that matrosse! Pop it in, Sergeant, there’s a good fellow. No! Wait! Set it on the rampart.’
The bomb was ten inches in diameter, a sullen black ball of iron that Sharpe knew was crammed with gunpowder. A fuse projected at one side and the Lieutenant, having taken another look at Fort Ragusa to judge the distance, took his knife and sliced off two inches of the quick-fuse. ‘Now pop it in, Sergeant, but make sure the fuse is pointing toward the side of the barrel so the fire has an easy job to reach it. Careful now, don’t scrape the fuse on the barrel! That’s it! Just drop it, it won’t go bang. Splendid! Now fetch another bomb in case this one doesn’t work.’
‘Yes, sir,’ Harper said then rolled his eyes at Sharpe as he went to fetch the second bomb.
‘You think it might not work, Lieutenant?’ Hogan asked.
‘Barbara moves in mysterious ways, her slaughter to perform,’ Love said, ‘and it might fly too far, or it may fall too short, or the fuse may not ignite.’ He peered into the mortar’s chamber, ‘But this baby seems well-seated in its cradle. Of course I didn’t use wedges, but I have never subscribed to the notion of using wedges to allow the fire to lap around the bomb, so to speak. I believe it guarantees the fuse’s ignition, but it also disperses the force of the initial explosion, thus causing the projectile to fall short. But with Barbara’s help this might well be perfect, despite the weapon’s French manufacture and the employment of French powder.’
‘You want British powder?’ Sharpe asked.
‘Oh, sir, that would be a joy! But alas, the powder wagon is at Miravete Castle.’
‘Dan!’ Sharpe shouted, ‘collect half a dozen horns, bring ’em here!’
‘Right away, Mister Sharpe!’
‘Horns?’ Lieutenant Love asked.
Sharpe unbuckled his powder horn and tossed it to Love. ‘Best British gunpowder, Lieutenant, and more coming.’
‘Barbara answers prayer!’ Love exclaimed. He used the spring-loaded catch on the horn’s nozzle to eject a pinch of the powder onto one palm, then rubbed it with a finger. ‘Splendid!’ he exclaimed. ‘I could not be more joyful!’ He tossed the pinch onto the mortar bomb. ‘Fly well,’ he said to the bomb, ‘and wreak havoc among our enemies. I would stand back, gentlemen,’ he said to Sharpe and Hogan. ‘And Sergeant? Good man, put the bomb down and stay two paces away. With Barbara’s help, this first baby might suffice.’ Love took the portfire he had used to fire the cannon and swung it in the air to freshen the burning tip, and then, when satisfied, he raised his eyes to the cloudless sky. ‘Barbara!’ he called. ‘Lend your power to this bomb’s flight! Smite our enemies with your wrath!’ He leaned forward and touched the portfire to the firing tube. ‘Amen!’
There was a brief hiss as sparks and smoke vented from the firing tube, then an immense crack as the powder charge in the mortar exploded. Smoke enveloped the rampart, but as it cleared in the small wind Sharpe could see the smoke trail of the bomb’s fuse arcing over the river. He could even see the bomb itself and it seemed to him that it would overfly Fort Ragusa altogether. It was spinning wildly, which meant the fuse’s smoke trail was a whirl in the air.
‘Fall!’ Lieutenant Love ordered the bomb, ‘fall!!’
It fell, but beyond the fort, presumably on the main road. It exploded almost as soon as it vanished from sight and another immense cloud of smoke billowed beyond Fort Ragusa.
‘Damn,’ Lieutenant Love said lightly, ‘Babs can be a stubborn bitch at times. No doubt that’s why she kept her virginity, silly woman.’
‘Maybe wedges for the next bomb?’ Hogan suggested.
‘Do you know what you’re talking about?’ Sharpe asked softly.
‘Of course not,’ Hogan said, and then, louder, ‘And perhaps elevate the barrel, Lieutenant?’
‘I like the standard forty-five degrees,’ Love said, ‘it makes the mathematics easy. I suspect the answer is less powder.’
He used the cannon’s sponge to clear the hot detritus from the mortar’s belly. Sharpe’s riflemen were harassing the gunners on Fort Ragusa’s southern rampart and the cannons’ rate of fire had dropped significantly. At least those gunners were not using mortars to drop bombs into Fort Napoleon’s courtyard and Sharpe glanced down to see that Teresa had come from the old bridge and her men were now helping haul El Héroe’s followers from among the surrendering French. Those men would die, Sharpe knew, and he had no sympathy for them. They were anfrancesados, supporters of the French, and while the French prisoners would be transported to captivity in England, the Spaniards would have their throats cut.
‘Right, Sergeant,’ Love’s voice drew Sharpe back to the rampart, ‘second bomb. I’ve cut the fuse, just lift it in.’
‘You’re using British powder?’ Sharpe asked.
‘And not very much,’ Love responded, ‘its efficiency is splendid. Because of the saltpetre, of course. We import first-rate saltpetre from India and the French are forced to scrape it from the walls of cesspits, poor devils. What a ghastly job that must be! Wading waist-deep in shit to scrape mineral deposits off the walls. Still, they are French, so they possibly don’t notice. Well done, Sergeant! You make a fine matrosse!’
Harper muttered something under his breath, then, ‘Another bomb, sir?’
‘You think it will be third time lucky? Fie on you, Sergeant, for your lack of faith. Barbara will be rightfully ashamed of her first effort and will doubtless guide this bomb to bring perdition upon our enemies.’
Sharpe looked over the parapet. The pontoon bridge was empty now except for a scatter of French corpses who had been shot from the southern bank. Two redcoats were gingerly crossing the bridge. ‘Engineers, I expect,’ Hogan said, but he had hardly uttered the words when a small cannon in the far tête de pont bastion fired a canister round. It was very long range for canister fired by a small cannon, but one of the musket balls hurled one of the two redcoats back in a spray of blood.
‘Rifles!’ Sharpe called. ‘Punish those bastards.’
‘That was stupid of them.’ Hogan nodded down to the two men, one lying dead, the other scuttling back to Fort Napoleon. ‘We won’t be able to destroy the whole bridge till we’ve taken that bastard of a place over there.’ He nodded at Fort Ragusa and the much smaller tête de pont.
