Free Sharpe's Triumph by Bernard Cornwell Page B

battalion had been

    ordered to stay behind and guard Mysore against the bandits who still plagued the roads and

    hills. Now, it seemed, overstretched as the battalion was, Gore would have to detach a

    party to arrest Sergeant Sharpe.
    “Captain Lawford could go for him,” he suggested.
    “Hardly a job for an officer, sir,” Morris said.
    “A sergeant could do the thing just as well.”
    Gore considered the matter. Sending a sergeant would certainly be less disruptive to

    the battalion than losing an officer, and a sergeant could surely do the job as well as

    anyone.
    “How many men would he need?” Gore asked.
    “Six men, sir,” Hakeswill snapped.
    “I could do the job with six men.”
    “And Sergeant Hakeswill's the best man for the job,” Morris urged.
    He had no particular wish to lose Hakeswill's services for the few days that it would

    take to fetch Sharpe, but Hakeswill had hinted that there was money in this business.

    Morris was not sure how much money, but he was in debt and Hakeswill had been

    persuasive.
    “By far the best man,” he added.
    “On account of me knowing the little bugger's cunning ways, sir,” Hakeswill explained,

    'if you'll excuse my Hindi."
    Gore nodded. He would like nothing more than to rid himself of Hakeswill for a while, for

    the man was a baleful influence on the battalion. Hakeswill was hated, that much Gore had

    learned, but he was also feared, for the Sergeant declared that he could not be killed. He

    had survived a hanging once, indeed the scar of the rope was still concealed beneath the

    stiff leather stock, and the men believed that Hakeswill was somehow under the protection

    of an evil angel. The Colonel knew that was a nonsense, but even so the very presence of the

    Sergeant made him feel distinctly uncomfortable.
    “I'll have my clerk write the orders for you, Sergeant,” the Colonel said.
    “Thank you, sir!” Hakeswill said.
    “You won't regret it, sir. Obadiah Hakeswill has never shirked his duty, sir, not like

    some as I could name.”
    Gore dismissed Hakeswill who waited for Captain Morris under the building's porch and

    watched the rain pelt onto the street. The Sergeant's face twitched and his eyes held a

    peculiar malevolence that made the single sentry edge away. But in truth Sergeant

    Obadiah Hakeswill was a happy man. God had put Richard Sharpe into his grasp and he would

    pay Sharpe back for all the insults of the last few years and especially for the ghastly

    moment when Sharpe had hurled Hakeswill among the Tippoo Sultan's tigers. Hakeswill had

    thought the beasts would savage him, but his luck had held and the tigers had ignored him. It

    seemed they had been fed not an hour before and thus the guardian angel who preserved

    Hakeswill had once again come to his rescue.
    So now Obadiah Hakeswill would have his revenge. He would choose six men, six bitter men

    who could be trusted, and they would take Sergeant Sharpe, and afterwards, somewhere on the

    road home from Seringapatam where there were no witnesses, they would find Sharpe's money

    and then finish him. Shot while attempting to escape, that would be the explanation, and

    good riddance too. Hakeswill was happy and Sharpe was condemned.
    Colonel McCandless led Sharpe north towards the wild country where the frontiers of

    Hyderabad, Mysore and the Mahratta states met.
    “Till I hear otherwise,” McCandless told Sharpe, I'm assuming our traitor is in

    Ahmednuggur."
    “What's that, sir? A city?”
    “A city and a fort next to each other,” the Colonel said. McCandless's big gelding

    seemed to eat up the miles, but Sharpe's smaller mare offered a lumpy ride. Within an hour

    of leaving Seringapatam Sharpe's muscles were sore, within two he felt as though the backs

    of his thighs were burning, and by late afternoon the stirrup leathers had abraded through

    his cotton trousers to grind his calves into bloody patches.
    “It's one of Scindia's frontier strongholds,”