Lavisser had found Barker’s discarded horse and rode it down the hill to see his servant facing Sharpe. The renegade looked surprised, then smiled. “What on earth are you doing here, Richard?” He sounded oddly cheerful.
“Came to get you.”
Lavisser glanced up the hill. The remnants of his force were running and the British must have been approaching the trees, but he sounded quite unworried. “Bloody militia. Redcoats are good, though. How are you, Richard?”
“Taken up dentistry, have you?” Sharpe sneered. “Failed as a bloody soldier so you draw teeth now?”
“Oh, Richard.” Lavisser sounded disappointed. “You should leave attempts at wit to the witty.”
Sharpe raised the saber as Barker stirred, but the big man was just moving to stand between Sharpe and Lavisser. “You’re not fighting for Denmark,” Sharpe said to Lavisser, “but for the Frogs.”
“Comes to the same thing, Richard,” Lavisser said cheerfully. He drew a pistol, then pulled a cartridge from a pouch. “Denmark is a little country,” Lavisser explained when he had pulled a cartidge open with his teeth, “and she was always going to be raped by either Britain or France. Britain has got her pleasure in first, but all she’ll do is drive Denmark into France’s arms, and I really can’t imagine that the Emperor will want to leave dim Frederick as Crown Prince. No, he’ll be looking for some splendid and vigorous young man to be his ruler here.” He poured powder into the barrel. Barker took a step toward Sharpe who slashed the saber to drive the servant back. “It’s all right, Barker,” Lavisser said, “I shall take care of the Lieutenant.”
“I told him he could go,” Barker said. “He’s been in the city, sir, but he’s leaving.”
Lavisser raised his eyebrows. “You are generous, Barker.” He looked at Sharpe. “I don’t really want to kill you, Richard. I rather like you. Does that surprise you? I suppose that’s not important, is it? What’s important is that Mister Skovgaard is now unguarded. Is that a safe assumption?”
“Assume what you like,” Sharpe said.
“How very obliging of you, Richard.” Lavisser rammed the bullet home, then paused and looked reflective. “A nauseatingly dull man, our Ole. He’s the kind of fellow I really dislike. He’s so upright, so hard-working, so bloody pious. He’s an affront to me.” He lifted the frizzen to prime the gun. “Pretty daughter, though.”
Sharpe used the efficacious word. Lavisser laughed, then a shout up the hill made him turn. A skirmish line had appeared among the trees. Sharpe had been expecting it. “Down here!” he shouted. “Down here! Quick!”
A musket fired and the ball tore leaves to shreds above Lavisser. Men were coming fast and quick and Lavisser did not finish priming the pistol, but just turned the horse. “Au revoir, Richard!” he called.
The two men fled. Sharpe started to follow, then a dozen shots riddled the laurels and he crouched instead. Barker and Lavisser vanished.
Sharpe took off his greatcoat and rescued his discarded pistol. A group of redcoats came down the slope. Their coats had blue facings, Welch Fusiliers, and their muskets were tipped with bayonets that pointed toward Sharpe. Then a sergeant saw Sharpe’s uniform and pushed the nearest gun down. He was a short man, his broad face incredulous as he stared at the green jacket. “I’m not drunk, Harry, am I?” he asked a private.
“I’m not drunk, Harry, am I?” he asked a private.
“No more than ever, Sergeant.”
“Looks like a rifleman!”
Sharpe sheathed his saber. “Morning, Sergeant.”
“Sir!” The Welshman gave a twitch that was a gesture toward standing to attention. “If you don’t mind my bloody asking, sir, but what are the bloody Rifles doing here?”
“Got lost, Sergeant.”
A captain came down the slope with a group of men who held Jens prisoner. “What the devil’s happening, Sergeant Davies?”
“Got a lost rifleman, sir,” the Sergeant said.
“Lieutenant Sharpe,” Sharpe said, “reporting for duty, sir. You wouldn’t know where Sir David Baird is, would you?”
“Sir David?”
“He’s expecting me,” Sharpe lied. “And that fellow’s with me.” He gestured at Jens. “We’ve been making a reconnaissance in the city. Nice morning, isn’t it?” He began climbing the hill and the Captain followed him.
“You’ve been in the city?”
“It’s a good place,” Sharpe said, “but with very fat churches. You’d best pray God isn’t tempted to take sides, Captain, because there are a terrible number of Danes battering His eardrums.” He grinned at Jens. “Are you all right?”
“Yes.” Jens, not surprisingly, looked bewildered.
“You were with the Danes?” the Captain asked.
“They were only militia,” Sharpe said, “but there was a company of proper troops on the next hill. No artillery though.” He emerged onto the hill top which was horrid with bodies. Welsh bandsmen tended the Danish wounded while a few miserable prisoners stood among the thinning smoke. “Would you know where Sir David is?” Sharpe asked the Captain.
“He’s at brigade, I think. Over there.” He pointed beyond the ditch. “Last I saw of him he was by some glasshouses.”
“Are you coming, Jens?” Sharpe asked, and he sounded a lot more cheerful than he felt. For it was time to face the music.
And time to confess that he had failed.
CHAPTER 7
Sharpe walked Jens away from the carnage. Once beyond the ditch and out of sight of the two redcoat battalions Sharpe pointed back toward the city. “Get into that lower ground”—he showed Jens how to sneak round the side of the fusiliers—”and then just keep walking.”
Jens frowned. “You are not American?”
“I’m not.”
Jens seemed reluctant to go. “Did you know what would happen back there?”
“No. But it wasn’t hard to guess, was it? They’re real soldiers, lad. Trained to it.” Sharpe took the remaining pistol from his belt. “You know Ulfedt’s Plads?”
“Of course.”
“There’s a man called Skovgaard there. Give this gun to him. Now hurry, before the British capture the rest of the gardens. Keep in those lower trees and then go straight to the gate. Understand?”
“You’re English?”
“I’m English.” Sharpe pushed the unprimed gun into Jens’s hand. “And thank you for saving my life. Now go on. Hurry.”
Jens gave Sharpe a bewildered glance then ran. Sharpe watched until the Dane was safely hidden among the trees, then slung his greatcoat over his shoulder and walked on. Failed, he thought. Failed utterly.
He climbed a low hill. The newly dug ditch where the fusiliers had fired their volleys had evidently been the beginning of a new Danish outwork that had been captured before they could throw up walls or mount guns, and now red-coated engineers were standing on the hill’s summit from where they trained telescopes on the city walls. They were obviously considering the hill as a place for a battery. The sea could be seen to the south, while on the hill’s northern side, in a gully, a gardener was carefully carrying plants into a greenhouse. Beyond the gully the land rose to a low ridge where a group of mounted British officers watched another battalion advance into the woodlands. Thick smoke smeared the eastern air. The Danes, retreating from the suburbs closer to the city, had set some houses on fire, presumably so that the British could not use them as advance positions. Farther north, out of sight, there was some heavy artillery at work, for the air was being punched by the percussive blasts and the sky was streaked and silting with smoke.
Major General Sir David Baird had a musket wound on his left hand and another rivulet of blood where a ball had grazed his neck, but he was feeling ebullient. He had led a brigade into the gardens, ejected some Danish regulars, massacred some brave idiots from the militia and now watched as his men secured the southern ground that would finally isolate Copenhagen from the rest of Zealand. Captain Gordon, his aide and nephew, had been wasting his breath by chiding the General for exposing himself to unnecessary danger, but Baird was enjoying himself. He would have liked to keep the advance going, right through the western suburbs, across the lakes and into the city itself. “We could have the fleet by nightfall,” he claimed.