Sharpes Gold   ::   Корнуэлл Бернард

CHAPTER 17

Lossow had two minutes, no more, and he used them well. He saw the Company disappear behind his left shoulder; then the lancers were all that was ahead of him while far off to the left a battalion of infantry scrambled untidily down the hill to add their firepower to the valley. He would not wait for the infantry. He spoke to his trumpeter, listened to the charge, loved every note, and then he put his sabre in the air and let Thor have his head. A good name for a horse, Thor, especially a horse like this one that could bite a man's face off or beat an enemy down with its hooves. It was good ground, comfortable, with no damned rabbits, and Lossow would pray at night for an opportunity like this. Lancers, idiots with long spikes who never knew how to parry, and all you had to do was get inside the point and the life was yours. He could hear his men galloping behind; he twisted in the saddle to see the fine sight, the horses neck and neck, as they should be, clods of turf flung up behind, blades and teeth shining, and was it not good of the German King who sat on the English throne to give him this chance?

The French were slow and he guessed they were new troops, on remounts, and a lancer should always meet the enemy at full speed or he was done. He steered Thor to the right; they had practised this, and the trumpeter gave the call again, ragged this time because of the motion of the horse but enough to make a man's blood run cold, and he touched Thor with his left heel, never a spur in his life, and the huge horse turned like a dancer; the sabre was dropped so it pointed down like a spike from Lossow's outstretched hand, and he galloped, laughing along the face of the enemy, and simply knocked the lances away. It would not last, it never did, and someone was bright enough to face him, but by then the chaos he had created in half a dozen Frenchmen had let his first troop into the gap, and Lossow knew the job was done and he let Thor rear up and deal with the brave fellow who challenged him. The trumpeter was there, of course, because that was his duty.

'Left! Lossow ordered, and the Germans turned, chewing up the French line, the sabres wicked in their work, and Lossow was satisfied

'Lieutenant?

The man saluted, oblivious of the fight. 'Sir?

'Stirrup the infantry."

'Sir.

And his duty was done.