LITMIR.BIZ

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insists. I wish you were going.’

      ‘So do I, but the Colonel insists.’ Windham had refused Sharpe’s request. The Rifleman was not to go with the Light Company, but, instead, he was to stay with Colonel Windham. Sharpe grinned at Hogan. ‘I’m his aide-de-camp.’

      ‘His aide-de-camp?’ Hogan laughed. ‘I suppose that’s a promotion of a sort. What are you supposed to do? Run messages for him?’

      ‘Something like that. He didn’t want me with the Light Company. He said my presence would embarrass Captain Rymer.’

      Hogan shook his head. ‘I just hope your Captain Rymer’s up to it. I really do.’ He looked at his watch, snapped the lid shut. ‘Two hours to darkness.’

      The plan sounded simple enough. One Company, the Light Company, was to escort twenty sappers to the dam. The rest of the Battalion was to create a diversion by making a false attack on the fort and, under the cover of the noise, the sappers were to stack their twenty kegs of powder at the dam’s base. It sounded simple, but Sharpe did not trust it. Night attacks, as the army had discovered only four nights before, could lead to confusion, and the whole of Windham’s plan depended on the Light Company reaching the foot of the dam by precisely eleven o’clock. If they were late, and the Colonel would have no way of knowing their progress, the false attack would merely wake up the garrison and put sentries on the alert. Sharpe had suggested to Windham that the false attack was unnecessary, that the Light Company should go alone, but the Colonel had shaken his head. He wanted to lead the Battalion into action, was looking forward to the night’s events, and seemed unworried by Sharpe’s doubts. ‘Of course they’ll make it on time!’

      There seemed little reason why not. The Light Company and their sappers did not have far to go. In the darkness they would leave the first parallel and head north for the river. Once on the bank of the Guadiana they would turn to their left and follow a path that led to the Rivillas stream below the castle walls. Their faces would be blackened, their equipment muffled, and they would move silently down into the ravine of the Rivillas and turn left. The most difficult moments would be the approach, upstream, towards the dam. It would be a journey of a hundred and fifty yards, within earshot of Badajoz’s walls, till the men were between the San Pedro bastion and the dam’s fort. It was not a long journey, they had plenty of time to make it, but it would be slowed by the need for absolute silence. Hogan fidgeted with the lid of his watch. It was he who had convinced Wellington that the dam could be blown up, but his scheme was at the mercy of Windham’s implementation. He exchanged his watch for his snuffbox and forced a smile on his face. ‘At least everything else is going well!’

      The second parallel was being dug. It was much closer to the walls of Badajoz and, from its cover, new batteries were being made that would bring the siege guns within four hundred yards of the city’s south-east corner where, on the Trinidad bastion, the chipped dent had become a hole exposing the rubble at the wall’s core. The French were sending out work parties at night to repair the damage, while the British kept firing in the hope of killing the workmen. All day and all night the guns fired.

      At dusk, Sharpe watched the Light Company move out. Harper was with them, in the ranks, insisting that his back was mended well enough. Hakeswill paraded them. He was making himself indispensable to Captain Rymer, anticipating his wishes, flattering him, taking the burden of discipline from his shoulders. It was a classic performance; the reliable Sergeant, tireless and efficient, and it disguised Hakeswill’s victory over the Company. He had divided them, made them suspicious, and there was nothing Sharpe could do. Colonel Windham inspected the Company before they set off. He stopped in front of Harper and pointed to the massive seven-barrelled gun slung on the Irishman’s shoulder.

      ‘What’s that?’

      ‘Seven-barrelled gun, sir.’

      ‘Is it regulation issue?’

      ‘No, sir.’

      ‘Then take it off.’

      Hakeswill stepped forward, his mouth twisted into a grin. ‘Give it to me, Private!’

      The gun had been a present from Sharpe to Harper, but there was nothing Harper could do. He took the gun from his shoulder, slowly, and Hakeswill snatched it from him. The Sergeant put it on his own shoulder and looked at the Colonel. ‘Punishment, sir?’

      Windham looked puzzled. ‘Punishment?’

      ‘For carrying a non-issue weapon, sir?’

      Windham shook his head. He had punished Harper already. ‘No, Sergeant. No.’

      ‘Very good, sir!’ Hakeswill scratched at his scar and followed Windham and Rymer down the rank. After the inspection, when the Colonel told the Company to stand easy, Hakeswill took off his shako and stared into its greasy interior. There was a curious smile on his face, and Sharpe was puzzled. He found Lieutenant Price, pale beneath the burnt cork on his skin, and jerked his head towards the Sergeant. ‘What’s he doing?’

      ‘God knows, sir.’ Price still thought of Sharpe as a Captain. ‘He’s always doing it now. Takes his hat off, stares inside, smiles, then puts it on again. He’s mad, sir.’

      ‘He takes his hat off? And stares into it?’

      ‘That’s right, sir. He should be in bloody Bedlam, sir, not here.’ Price grinned. ‘Perhaps the army is a madhouse sir, I don’t know.’

      Sharpe was about to demand the seven-barrelled gun from Hakeswill when Windham, now mounted on his horse, called the Light Company to attention. Hakeswill put his shako on, snapped his heels together, and stared at the Colonel. Windham wished them luck, told them their job was to protect the sappers in case they were discovered and, if they were not detected, to do nothing. ‘Off you go! And good hunting!’

      The Light Company filed into the trench, Hakeswill still carrying the seven-barrelled gun, and Sharpe wished he was going with them. He knew how dearly Hogan wanted the dam blown, how much easier the assault on the breach would be if the lake was gone, and it irked him to be absent from the attempt. Instead, as the cathedral clock sounded half-past ten, he was at Windham’s side as the nine remaining companies of the Battalion climbed out of the parallel on to the dark grass. Windham was nervous. ‘They should be nearly there.’

      ‘Yes, sir.’

      The Colonel half drew his sword, thought better of it, and slid the blade back into the scabbard. He looked round for Collett. ‘Jack?’

      ‘Sir?’

      ‘Ready?’

      ‘Yes, sir.’

      ‘Off you go! Wait for the clock!’

      Collett walked forward into the darkness. He was taking four companies towards the city, towards the fort that protected the dam, and, when the clock struck eleven, he was to open fire on the face of the fort to make the French believe that an attack was coming. The other companies, under Windham, were in reserve. The Colonel, Sharpe knew, was hoping that the false attack might reveal a weakness in the fort and turn itself into a real attack. He had hopes of leading the South Essex across the ditch, up the stone wall, and into the defences. Sharpe wondered how the Light Company were doing. At least there had been no shots from the castle, no shouted challenge from the dam’s fort, so presumably they were still undetected. The Rifleman felt uneasy. If all went well, according to Windham’s timetable, the dam should be blown a few minutes after eleven, but Sharpe’s instincts were gloomy. He thought of Teresa inside the city, of the child, and wondered whether the explosion, if it ever came, would wake up the baby. His baby! It still seemed miraculous that he had a child.

      ‘The powder should be in place, Sharpe!’

      ‘Yes, sir.’ He only half heard the Colonel’s words but he knew that Windham was merely talking to cover his nervousness. They had no way of knowing where the powder was. Sharpe tried to imagine the sappers, laden down like south coast brandy smugglers, creeping up the ravine towards the dam, but Windham interrupted his thoughts.

      ‘Count the musket flashes,

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