LITMIR.BIZ

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Sharpe’s levity. ‘If Lavisser fails, Lieutenant, then I want you to bring him and the money out of Copenhagen to the safety of our army. We do not want the Danish government announcing a failed and clumsy attempt at a bribe.’ He took a piece of paper from his pocket. ‘If you need assistance in Copenhagen then this man may provide it.’ He held the paper out to Sharpe, then pulled it back. ‘I have to tell you, Sharpe, that I have worried greatly about revealing this name to you. The man is valuable. I devoutly hope you won’t need his help.’

      ‘What treason are you talking, my lord?’ Baird demanded loudly.

      ‘I was merely remarking on the beauty of the scene, Sir David,’ Lord Pumphrey observed in his high-pitched voice, ‘and noting to Lieutenant Sharpe the delicate tracery of the ships’ rigging. I should like a chance to depict the scene in watercolours.’

      ‘Good God, man, leave that to the proper bloody artists!’ Baird looked appalled. ‘That’s what the idiots are for.’

      Lord Pumphrey pressed the piece of paper into Sharpe’s hand. ‘Guard that name, Lieutenant,’ he said softly. ‘You alone possess it.’

      Meaning, Sharpe thought, that Lavisser had not been trusted with the man’s name. ‘Thank you, my lord,’ he said, but Lord Pumphrey had already walked away for the Cleopatra’s launch had come to the jetty that gave access to the deep-water channel. The chest was being loaded into the launch’s belly and Baird held out a hand to Lavisser. ‘I’ll bid you farewell, God speed and good fortune,’ Baird said. ‘I’ll allow I won’t mind if you fail, but there’s no point in real soldiers dying if a handful of gold can keep them alive.’ He shook Sharpe’s hand. ‘Keep our guardsman alive, Sharpe.’

      ‘I will, sir.’

      The two officers did not speak as they were rowed out to the Cleopatra which, in her haste to use a favourable wind and tide, was already hauling her anchor. Sharpe could hear the chant of the seamen as they tramped round the capstan and see the quivering cable shedding drops of water and lumps of mud as it came from the grey river. The topmen were aloft, ready to drop the high sails. Sharpe and Lavisser scrambled up the ship’s side to be met by the dutiful squeal of bosuns’ whistles and by a harassed lieutenant who hurried them aft to the quarterdeck while the hulking Barker carried the baggage down below and a dozen seamen hauled a line to bring the gold on deck. ‘Captain Samuels begs to be excused while we get under way,’ the Lieutenant said, ‘and requests that you keep to the stern rail, gentlemen, until the sails are set.’

      Lavisser grinned as the Lieutenant hurried away. ‘Meaning that Captain Samuels don’t want us in the way while he makes a muck of getting under sail. And he’s under the eye of the Admiral, no less! Rather like setting the guard at Windsor Castle. I don’t suppose you’ve ever done that, Sharpe? Placed a guard at Windsor?’

      ‘I haven’t, sir,’ Sharpe said.

      ‘You do it perfectly, then some decrepit old fool who last saw action fighting against William the Conqueror informs you that Guardsman Bloggs has an ill-set flint in his musket. And for God’s sake stop calling me “sir”,’ Lavisser said with a smile. ‘You make me feel old, and that’s dreadful unkind of you. So what was on that piece of paper little William gave to you?’

      ‘Little William?’

      ‘Lord Pumps. He was a pallid little worm at Eton and he’s no better now.’

      ‘It’s just his address,’ Sharpe said. ‘He says I should report to him when I get back.’

      ‘Nonsense,’ Lavisser said, though he did not appear offended that Sharpe had lied to him. ‘If my guess is any good then it’s the name of a man in Copenhagen who might help us, a name, I might add, that the suspicious bastards at the Foreign Office refused to give me. Divide and rule, that’s the Foreign Office way. Aren’t you going to tell me the name?’

      ‘If I remember it,’ Sharpe said. ‘I threw the paper overboard.’

      Lavisser laughed at that untruth. ‘Don’t tell me little Pumps told you to keep it secret! He did? Poor little Pumps, he sees conspiracy everywhere. Well, so long as one of us has the name I suppose it don’t matter.’ He looked upwards as the topsails were released. The canvas shook loudly until the seamen sheeted the sails home. Men slid down shrouds and scrambled along spars to loose the mainsails. It was all so very familiar to Sharpe after his long voyage home from India. Captain Samuels, heavy and tall, stood at the white line which marked off the quarterdeck from the rest of the flush-decked frigate. He said nothing, just watched his men.

      ‘How long a voyage is it?’ Sharpe asked Lavisser.

      ‘A week? Ten days? Sometimes much longer. It all depends on Aeolus, our god of the winds. May he blow us swiftly and safely.’

      Sharpe grunted an acknowledgement, then just stared ashore where the herring smokers made a haze over the land. He leaned on the stern rail, suddenly wishing he was anywhere but at sea.

      Lavisser leaned on the rail beside him. ‘You ain’t happy, Sharpe,’ the guardsman said. Sharpe frowned at the words, which struck him as intrusive. He said nothing, but was acutely aware of Lavisser so close beside him. ‘Let me guess.’ The Guards Captain raised his eyes to the wheeling gulls and pretended to think for a while, then looked at Sharpe again. ‘My guess, Sharpe, is that you met Lady Grace Hale on shipboard and that you’ve not been afloat since.’ He held up a cautionary hand when he saw the anger in Sharpe’s eyes. ‘My dear Sharpe, please don’t mistake me. I feel for you, indeed I do. I met the Lady Grace once. Let me see? It must be a dozen years or more ago and I was only a sprat of fifteen, but I could spot a beauty even then. She was lovely.’

      Sharpe said nothing, just watched Lavisser.

      ‘She was lovely and she was clever,’ the Guards Captain went on softly, ‘and then she was married off to a tedious old bore. And you, Sharpe, forgive my being forward, gave her a time of happiness. Isn’t that something to remember with satisfaction?’ Lavisser waited for Sharpe to respond, but the rifleman said nothing. ‘Am I right?’ Lavisser asked gently.

      ‘She left me in bloody misery,’ Sharpe admitted. ‘I can’t seem to shake it. And, yes, being on a ship brings it back.’

      ‘Why should you shake it?’ Lavisser asked. ‘My dear Sharpe, may I call you Richard? That’s kind of you. My dear Richard, you should be in mourning. She deserves it. The greater the affection, the greater the mourning. And it’s been cruel for you. All the gossip! It’s no one’s business what you and Lady Grace did.’

      ‘It was everyone’s business,’ Sharpe said bitterly.

      ‘And it will pass,’ Lavisser said gently. ‘Gossip is ephemeral, Richard, it vanishes like dew or smoke. Your grief remains, the rest of the world will forget. They’ve mostly forgotten already.’

      ‘You haven’t.’

      Lavisser smiled. ‘I’ve been racking my brains all day trying to place you. It only came to me as we climbed aboard.’ A rush of feet interrupted them as seamen came aft to secure the mizzen sheets. The great sail banged above their heads, then was brought under control and the frigate picked up speed. Her ensign, blue because the fleet’s commander was an Admiral of the Blue, flapped crisply in the evening wind. ‘The grief will pass, Richard,’ Lavisser went on in a low voice, ‘it will pass. I had a sister who died, a dear thing, and I grieved for her. It’s not the same, I know, but we should not be ashamed of demonstrating our feelings. Not when it is grief for a lovely woman.’

      ‘It won’t stop me doing my job,’ Sharpe said stoically, fighting off the tears that threatened.

      ‘Of course it won’t,’ Lavisser said fervently, ‘nor, I trust, will it stop you from enjoying the fleshpots of Copenhagen. They are meagre and few, I can assure you, but such as they are we shall enjoy.’

      ‘I can’t afford fleshpots,’ Sharpe said.

      ‘Don’t be so dull, Richard! We’re sailing with forty-three

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