Sharpe's Triumph (12 page)

“They should have more than two ladders, sir,” Sharpe grumbled.

“Wasn't time, laddie, wasn't time,” McCandless said.

“What's holding them?” he asked as he stared with an agonized expression at the stalled
men. The Arab defenders in the nearest bastion were being given a fine target and their
musketry was having a terrible effect on the crowded ladders. The noise of the
defenders' fire was continuous; a staccato crackle of musketry, the hiss of rockets
and the thunderous crash of cannon. Men were blasted off the ladders, and their place was
immediately taken by others, but still the men at the top of the rungs did not try to
cross the wall, and still the defenders fired and the dead and injured heaped up at the foot
of the ladders and the living pushed them aside to reach the rungs and so offer themselves
as targets to the unending gunfire. One man at last heaved himself onto the wall and
straddled the coping where he unslung his musket and fired a shot down into the city, but
almost immediately he was hit by a blast of musket fire. He swayed for a second, his
musket clattered down the wall's red face, then he followed it to the ground. The new man at
the top of the ladder heaved himself up, then, just like the rest, he checked and ducked
back.

“What's holding them?” McCandless cried in frustration.

“In God's name! Go!”

"There's no bloody fire step Sharpe said grimly.

McCandless glanced at him.

“What?”

“Sorry, sir. Forgot not to curse, sir.”

But McCandless was not worried about Sharpe's language.

“What did you say, man?” he insisted.

“There's no fire step there, sir.” Sharpe pointed at the wall where the Scotsmen were
dying.

“There's no musket smoke on the parapet, sir.”

McCandless looked back.

“By God, you're right.”

The wall had merlons and embrasures, but not a single patch of musket smoke showed in
those de fences which meant that the castellation was false and there was no fire step on the
wall's far side where defenders could stand. From the outside the stretch of wall looked
like any other part of the city's de fences but Sharpe guessed that once the Highlanders
reached the wall's summit they were faced with a sheer drop on the far side, and doubtless
there was a crowd of enemies waiting at the foot of that inner wall to massacre any man who
survived the fall. The 778th were attacking into thin air and being bloodied
mercilessly by the jubilant defenders.

The two ladders emptied as the officers at last realized their predicament and
shouted at their men to come down. The defenders cheered the repulse and kept firing as
the two ladders were carried back from the ramparts.

“Dear God,” McCandless said, 'dear God."

“I warned you,” Sevajee said, unable to conceal his pride in the fighting qualities of
the Mahratta defenders.

“You're on our side!” McCandless snarled, and the Indian just shrugged.

“It ain't over yet, sir,” Sharpe tried to cheer up the Scotsman.

“Escalades work by speed, Sharpe,” McCandless said, 'and we've lost surprise now “It
will have to be done properly,” Sevajee remarked smugly, 'with guns and a breach."

But the escalade was not defeated yet. The assault party of the 74th had now reached
the wall to the right of the gate and their two ladders were swung up against the high red
stones, but this stretch of wall did possess a fire step and it was crowded with eager
defenders who rained a savage fire down onto the attackers. The British twelve-pounders
had opened fire, and their canister was savaging the defenders, but the dead and wounded
were dragged away to be replaced by reinforcements who quickly learned that if they let
the attackers come up the two ladders then the cannon would cease fire, and so they let the
Scots climb the rungs and then hurled down baulks of wood that could scrape a ladder clear in
seconds. Then a cannon in one of the flanking bastions hammered a barrel load of stones
and scrap iron into the men crowding about the foot of the ladders.

“Oh, dear God,” McCandless prayed again, 'dear God." More men began to climb the ladders
while the wounded crawled and limped back from the walls, pursued by the musket fire of the
defenders. A Scottish officer, claymore in hand, ran up one of the ladders with the
facility of a sailor swarming up rigging. He cut the claymore at a lunging bayonet,
somehow survived a musket blast, put a hand on the coping, but then a spear took him in the
throat and he seemed to shake like a gaffed fish before tumbling backwards and carrying
two men down to the ground with him. The sound of the defenders' musketry was punctuated
by the deeper crash of the small cannon that were mounted in the hidden galleries of the
bastions. One of those cannon now struck a ladder in the flank and Sharpe watched appalled
as the whole flimsy thing buckled and broke, carrying seven men down to the ground in its
wreckage. The 778th had been repulsed and the 74th had lost one of their two ladders.

“This is not good,” McCandless said grimly, 'not good at all."

“Fighting Mahrattas,” Sevajee said smugly, 'is not like fighting men from Mysore."

Colonel Wallace's party was still a good hundred yards from the gate, slowed by the
weight of their six-pounder cannon. It seemed to Sharpe that Wallace needed more men to
handle the cumbersome gun and the enemy's musket fire was taking its toll of the few men
he did have shoving at the wheels or dragging at the traces. Wellesley was not far behind
Wallace, and just behind the General, mounted on one of his spare horses and with a
second on a leading rein, was Daniel Fletcher.

The musket fire spurted scraps of dried mud all around Wellesley and his aides, but the
General seemed to have a charmed life.

The 778th returned to the attack on the left, only this time they ran their two ladders
directly at the bastion which flanked the wall where their first attempt had failed. The
threatened bastion reacted with an angry explosion of musket fire. One of the ladders
fell, its carriers hard hit by the volley, but the other swung on up and as soon as its top
struck the bastion's summit a kilted officer climbed the rungs.

“No!” McCandless cried, as the officer was hit and fell. Other men took his place, but
the defenders tipped a basket of stones over the parapet and the tumbling rocks scoured
the ladder clear. A volley of musketry made the defenders duck and when the smoke cleared
Sharpe saw that the kilted officer was again ascending the ladder, this time without his
tall hat. He carried his claymore in his right hand and the big sword hampered him. An Arab
fleetingly appeared at the top of the ladder with a lump of timber that he hurled down at
the attacker, and the officer was thrown back a second time.

“No!” McCandless lamented again, but then the same officer appeared a third time. He
was determined to have the honour of being first into the city, and this time he had tied
his red waist-sash to his wrist and let his claymore hang by its hilt from a loop of the
silk, thus leaving both hands free and allowing him to climb much faster. He kept climbing,
and his men crowded behind him in their big bearskin hats, and the loopholes in the
bastion's galleries spat flame and smoke as they scrambled past the bastion's storeys, but
magically the officer survived the fusillade and Sharpe had his heart in his mouth as the
man drew nearer and nearer to the top. He expected to see a defender appear at any
moment, but the attackers who were not queuing at the foot of the ladder were now
hammering the bastion's summit with musket fire and under its cover the bareheaded
officer scrambled up the last few rungs, paused to take hold of his claymore's hilt, then
leaped over the top of the wall. Someone cheered, and Sharpe caught a distinct view of the
officer's claymore rising and falling above the red wall's coping. More Highlanders were
clambering up the ladder and though some were blasted off by musket fire from the
bastion's loopholes, others were at last reaching the high parapet and following their
officer onto the de fences The second ladder was swung into place and the trickle of
attackers became a stream.

“Thank God,” McCandless said fervently, 'thank God indeed."

The 778th were in the bastion, and now the 74th, which had been reduced to just one
ladder, also made their lodgement. An officer had organized two companies to give the
parapet a blast of musketry just as a sergeant reached the top of the ladder, and the
fusillade cleared the embrasures as the sergeant clambered over the wall. His bayonet
stabbed down, then he reeled backwards as a defender slashed at him with a tulwar, but a
lieutenant was behind him and he hacked down with his claymore and then kicked the
defender in the face. A third man crossed, the fourth was killed, and then another man was
on the wall and the Scotsmen screamed their war cries as they began the grim job of clearing
the defenders off the fire step Sharpe could hear the clash of blades on the wall, and see a
cloud of powder smoke above the crenellations where the Scots of the 74th were fighting
their way along the parapet, but he could see nothing on the bastion where the kilted 778th
were fighting. He guessed they were clearing the bastion floor by floor, charging down the
steep stone steps and carrying their bayonets to the gunners and infantrymen who manned
the lower galleries.

The Scots at last reached the bastion's ground floor where they killed one last defender
and then burst out of the tower's inner doorway to be faced by a horde of Arabs who poured a
volley of matchlock fire into the attackers' ranks.

“Charge the bastards! Charge them!” The same young officer who had led the assault now
rallied his men and led them against the robed defenders who were reloading their
longbarrelled muskets. The Highlanders attacked with bayonets and a ferocity born of
desperation.

The Scots were inside the city, but so far the only route to reinforce them was up the
three remaining ladders, and one of those was bending dangerously after being struck
by a small round shot. Wellesley was shouting at Wallace to get the gate open, and Colonel
Wallace was bellowing at his gunners to get their damned weapon into place. The
defenders above the gate did their best to stop the advancing cannon, but Wallace
ordered a company of infantry to help the gunners roll the cannon forward and those men
cheered as they bounced and rattled the heavy gun towards the gate.

“Give them fire,” Wallace shouted, 'give them fire!" and his remaining infantrymen
blasted a ragged volley up at the gate's defenders. The flags above the rampart twitched
as the balls snatched at the silk. The six-pounder rumbled forward, thumping over the
uneven road surface that was being pocked by musket balls spat from the gatehouse
loopholes. A bagpipe was playing and the savage music made a fine accompaniment to the
gun's wild charge.

“Keep firing,” Wallace shouted at his infantry, 'keep firing!" His men's musket balls
struck tiny puffs of dust and flakes of stone from the gate that was wreathed in smoke, smoke
so thick that the gun seemed to disappear in fog as it rolled the last few yards, but then
Sharpe heard the resounding thump as the gun's muzzle was rammed hard against the big
wooden gate.

“Get back,” the gun commander shouted, 'get back!" and the men who had hauled the gun
scrambled clear.

“Make ready!” Wallace shouted, and his men stopped their firing and dragged out bayonets
that they slotted over their blackened musket muzzles.

“Fire the gun!” Wallace shouted.

“Fire it! For God's sake, fire!” A rocket seethed out of the smoke, trailing sparks, and
for a second Sharpe thought it would plunge into the heart of Wallace's waiting men, but
then it arced up into the clear blue sky and blazed safely away.

Inside the city the Arabs who had tried to defend the bastion now retreated in front of
the battle-maddened Scots who swarmed out of the bastion's inner door. The Arabs might
come from a hard, warlike country, but so did the kilted men who came snarling into the
city.

Sepoys were climbing the ladders now and they joined the Highlanders.

Their instinct was to charge across the cleared space inside the wall and so reach the
cover of the city's alleyways, but the young officer who led the attack knew that the
defenders could still rally if he did not open the gate and so let in a flood of
attackers.

“To the gate!” he shouted, and led his men along the inner face of the wall to reach the
south gate. The Arabs waiting just inside the arch turned and fired as the Scots approached,
but the young officer seemed invincible. He screamed as he charged, then his reddened
claymore slashed down, and his men's bayonets lunged forward. Two sepoys joined them,
stabbing and screaming, and the outnumbered Arabs died or fled.

“Open the gate!” the young officer shouted, and one of the sepoys ran forward to lift
the heavy locking bar out of its iron brackets.

“Fire!” Colonel Wallace shouted on the gate's far side.

The gun captain touched his port fire to the priming reed. There was a fizz of spark, a
wisp of smoke and then the double-charged gun leaped back and the sound of its massive
discharge was magnified by the echo that bounced deafeningly off the gate's high
archway. The doors splintered, and the sepoy who had been lifting the bar was cut in two by
the six-pound ball and by the wicked-edged scraps of shattered timber that exploded into
the city. The other attackers on the inner side of the gate reeled away from the smoke and
flame of the blast, but the bar was lifted and the cannon's discharge swung the gates
open.

“Charge!” Wallace shouted, and his men screamed as they ran into the smoke-shrouded
arch and pushed past the gun and trampled over the bloody halves of the slaughtered
sepoy.

“Come on, Sharpe, come on!” McCandless had his own claymore drawn and the old man's face
was alight with excitement as he spurred his horse towards the doomed city. The assault
troops who had been waiting to climb the ladders now joined the surge of men running
towards the broken gates.