Sharpes Siege   ::   Корнуэлл Бернард

“Jesus Christ!” Sharpe echoed Frederickson’s blasphemy. The Vengeance had launched three longboats and each was filling with red-jacketed Marines. “There must be a hundred of them!” He watched the men gingerly descend the tumble-home to step into the rocking boats. The sea, miraculously, was gentle this morning, heaving with the long swells of the ocean, but not broken into whitecaps. Sharpe raised the glass, cursing because the small movements of the Amelie made training the telescope difficult, and he saw yet more red-coated Marines waiting on the Vengeance’s maindeck. “That bastard didn’t need us at all!”

“Not to take the fort, perhaps,” Sweet William lit a cheroot, “but a force of trained Riflemen will be damned useful for the march on Bordeaux.”

“Damn his bloody soul!” Sharpe understood now. Wigram had sent de Maquerre to force a decision, and Bampfylde had secreted the Marines to implement the decision. Come hell or high water Wigram and Bampfylde wanted to take Bordeaux, and Sharpe was caught in the middle. He watched the packed longboats pull towards the breaking surf and he felt a bitter anger at Bampfylde who had lied about a malady so that he could have trained skirmishers for his madcap scheme. Even the sun, showing through the clouds for the first time in weeks, could not alleviate Sharpe’s anger.

“It’s my belief,” Frederickson said, “that he wanted you personally.”

“Me?”

“He probably has an exalted view of your ability,” Frederickson said drily. “If the celebrated Major Sharpe fails, then no reasonable man could expect Captain Bampfylde to succeed. On the other hand, of course, who better than yourself to guarantee success?”

“Bugger Bampfylde,” Sharpe said.

The longboats landed their red-coated troops, then were launched back through the surf. The oarsmen, tugging against wind and tide, jerked like small marionettes to pull the heavy boats free of the shore’s suction. They did not come to the Amelie; instead they went to the Vengeance where still more Marines waited for disembarkation.

The morning ticked on. A breakfast of gravy-dipped bread was passed around the Riflemen who waited on the Amelie’s deck. Those Marines already ashore formed up in ranks and, to Sharpe’s astonishment, a half Company was marched off the beach towards the shelter of the dark pines. Sharpe himself was supposed to command the land operations, yet he was being utterly ignored.