Sharpes Escape   ::   Корнуэлл Бернард

And then, from far off, half heard, there was a noise like thunder. It rose and fell, faded to nothing, came again, and at its loudest the windows shook softly in their frames. Sarah stared into the yard and saw the cold gray mist and she knew it was not thunder she heard from so far away.

It was the French.

Because it was dawn and, at Bussaco, the guns were at work.



CHAPTER 3



Sharpe slept badly. The ground was damp, it got colder as the night wore on and he was hurting. His damaged ribs stabbed like knives every time he moved, and when he finally abandoned sleep and stood in the pre-dawn darkness, he wanted to lie down again because of the pain. He fingered his ribs, wondering if the injury was worse than he feared. His right eye was swollen, tender to the touch and half shut.

"You awake, sir?" a voice called from nearby.

"I'm dead," Sharpe said.

"Mug of tea, then, sir?" It was Matthew Dodd, a rifleman in Sharpe's company who had been newly made up to corporal while Sharpe was away. Knowles had given Dodd the extra stripe and Sharpe approved of the promotion.

"Thanks, Matthew," Sharpe said and grimaced with pain as he stooped to collect some damp scraps of wood to help make a fire. Dodd had already used a steel and flint to light some kindling that he now blew into bright flame.

"Are we supposed to have fires, sir?" Dodd asked.

"We weren't supposed to last night, Matthew, but in this damned fog who could see one? Anyway, I need some tea, so get her going." Sharpe added his wood, then listened to the crack and hiss of the new flames as Dodd filled a kettle with water and threw in a handful of tea leaves that he kept loose in his pouch. Sharpe added some of his own, then fed the fire with more wood.

"Damp old morning," Dodd said.

"Bloody mist." Sharpe could see the fog was still thick.

"Be reveille soon," Dodd said, settling the kettle in the flames.

"Can't even be half past two yet," Sharpe said. Here and there along the ridge other men were lighting fires that made glowing, misted patches in the fog, but most of the army still slept. Sharpe had picquets out at the ridge's eastern edge, but he did not need to check them for another few minutes.

"Sergeant Harper said you fell down some steps, sir," Dodd said, looking at Sharpe's bruised face.

"Dangerous things, steps, Matthew. Especially in the dark when it's slippery."

"Sexton back home died like that," Dodd said, his gaunt face lit by the flames. "He went up the church tower to fasten a new rope on the big tenor bell and he slipped.