Free Sharpe's Trafalgar by Bernard Cornwell Page A

pocket

    watch hanging from a hook. “Three hundred and twenty-nine guineas,” Cromwell told Sharpe,

    tapping the timepiece.
    “I’ve never owned a watch,” Sharpe said.
    “It is not a watch, Mister Sharpe,” Cromwell said in disgust, “but a chronometer. A

    marvel of science. Between here and Britain I doubt it will lose more than two seconds. It

    is that machine, Mister Sharpe, that tells us where we are.” He blew a fleck of dust from the

    chronometer’s face, tapped the barometer, then carefully closed and locked the cupboard.

    “I keep my treasures safe, Mister Sharpe. You, on the other hand, flaunt yours.”
    Sharpe said nothing, and the captain waved at the cabin’s only chair. “Sit down, Mister

    Sharpe. Do you wonder about my name?”
    Sharpe sat uneasily. “Your name?” He shrugged. “It’s unusual, sir.”
    “It is peculiar,” Peculiar Cromwell said, then gave a harsh laugh that betrayed no

    amusement. “My people, Mister Sharpe, were fervent Christians and they named me from the

    Bible. ‘The Lord has chosen thee to be a peculiar people unto himself,’ the book of

    Deuteronomy, chapter fourteen, verse two. It is not easy, Mister Sharpe, living with such

    a name. It invites ridicule. In its time that name has made me a laughing stock!” He said

    these last words with extraordinary force, as though resenting all the folk who had ever

    mocked him, but Sharpe, perched on the edge of the chair, could not imagine anyone mocking

    the harsh-voiced, heavy-faced Peculiar Cromwell.
    Cromwell sat on his bunk bed, placed his elbows on the charts and fixed his eyes on Sharpe.

    “I was put aside for God, Mister Sharpe, and it makes for a lonely life. I was denied a

    proper education. Other men go to Oxford or Cambridge, they are immersed in knowledge,

    but I was sent to sea for my parents believed I would be beyond earthly temptation if I

    was far from any shore. But I taught myself, Mister Sharpe. I learned from books”—he waved at

    the shelves—”and discovered that I am well named. I am peculiar, Mister Sharpe, in my

    opinions, apprehensions and conclusions.” He shook his head sadly, rippling his long

    hair which rested on the shoulders of his heavy blue coat. “All around me I espy educated

    men, rational men, conventional men and, above all, sociable men, but I have

    discovered that no such creature ever did a great thing. It is among the lonely, Mister

    Sharpe, that true greatness occurs.” He scowled, as though that burden was almost too heavy

    to bear. “You too, I think, are a peculiar man,” Cromwell went on. “You have been plucked by

    destiny from your natural place among the dregs of society and have been translated into

    an officer. And that”—he leaned forward and jabbed a finger at Sharpe—”must make for

    loneliness.”
    “I have never lacked friends,” Sharpe said, evading the embarrassing

    conversation.
    “You trust yourself, Mister Sharpe,” Cromwell boomed, ignoring Sharpe’s words, “as I

    have learned to trust myself in the knowledge that no one else can be trusted. We have been

    set aside, you and I, as lonely men doomed to watch the traffic of those who are not

    peculiar. But today, Mister Sharpe, I am going to insist that you put your mistrust

    aside. I shall demand that you trust me.”
    “In what, sir?”
    Cromwell paused as the tiller ropes creaked and groaned beneath him, then glanced up at a

    telltale compass fixed above the bunk. “A ship is a small world, Mister Sharpe,” he said,

    “and I am appointed the ruler of that world. Upon this vessel I am lord of all, and the

    power of life and death is granted to me, but I do not crave such power. What I crave,

    Mister Sharpe, is order. Order!” He slapped a hand on the charts. “And I will not abide

    thievery on my ship!”
    Sharpe sat up in indignation. “Thievery! Are you ... “
    “No!” Cromwell interrupted him. “Of course I am not accusing you. But there