Sharpe's Enemy by Bernard Cornwell Page B

the trouble of taking the money back, so we’re keeping that too.’ He laughed, watching their faces. ‘You can take a message back instead. You understanding this, Froggie?’
    Dubreton’s voice was scornful. ‘I understand. Are they alive?’
    The blue eyes opened wide, feigning innocence. ‘Alive, Froggie? Of course they’re bloody alive. They stay alive as long as you keep away from here. I’ll show you one of them in a minute, but you bloody listen first, and listen good.’
    He twitched again, the face jerking on its long neck and the pinned cravat slipped, showing the scar on the left side of his neck and he pulled at the cravat till the scar was hidden. He grinned, showing the blackened stumps of his teeth. ‘They ain’t been hurt. Not yet, but they will be. I’ll burn them first, mark them, and then the lads can have them, and then they’ll die! You understand?’ He screamed the question at them. ‘Sharpy! You understand?’
    ‘Yes.’
    ‘Froggie?’
    ‘Yes.’
    ‘Clever aren’t you!’ He laughed, eyes blinking, tooth-stumps grinding in his mouth. The face twitched suddenly, once, then stopped. ‘Now you’ve brought the money so I’ll tell you what you’ve done. You’ve bought their virtue!’ He laughed again. ‘You’ve kept them safe for a little while. Course we might want more money if we decide their virtue’s expensive, follow me? But we got women now, all we want, so we won’t use your bitches if you pay up.’
    Sharpe dreamed some nights of killing this man. Hakeswill had been his enemy for nigh on twenty years and Sharpe wanted to be the man who proved that Hakeswill could be killed. The rage he felt at this moment was impotent.
    Hakeswill laughed, shuffled sideways down the balustrade. ‘Now, I’ll show you one bitch and you can talk to her. But!’ His finger pointed again at the brazier. ‘Remember the spikes. I’ll carve a bloody letter on her if you ask her where we keep her. Understand? You don’t know which bloody building they’re locked in, do you? And you’d like to know, wouldn’t you? So don’t bloody ask or else I’ll mark one of the pretties. You understand?’
    Both officers nodded. Hakeswill turned and waved at a man who stood in the courtyard close to where the first woman had been dragged away. The man turned, called to someone behind him.
    Sharpe sensed Dubreton stiffen as a woman was brought into the courtyard. She was dressed in a long black cloak and she stepped delicately over the broken canals. Two men guarded her, both with bayonets. Her hair, golden and wispy, was piled loosely on her head.
    Hakeswill was watching the two officers. ‘Chose this one special for you. Chatters away in French and English. Would you believe she’s English and married to a Froggie?’ He laughed.
    The woman was stopped in the centre of the courtyard and one of the soldiers nudged her, pointed upwards, and she looked at the balcony. She gave no sign of recognizing her husband, nor he of her, and Sharpe knew that both were proud people who would not give her captors the satisfaction of knowing anything about her.
    Hakeswill sidled back towards the officers. ‘Go on, then! Talk!’
    ‘Madame.’ Dubreton’s voice was gentle.
    ‘Monsieur.’ She was probably, Sharpe thought, a beautiful woman, but her face was in shadow, was marked by tiredness, and the strain of captivity had deepened the lines either side of her mouth. She was thin, like her husband, and her voice, as they spoke, was dignified and controlled. One of the soldiers guarding her was French and he listened to the conversation.
    Hakeswill was bored. ‘In English! English!’
    Dubreton looked at Sharpe, back to this wife. ‘I have the honour to introduce Major Richard Sharpe, Madame. He is of the English army.’
    Sharpe bowed, saw her incline her head in acknowledgement, but her words were drowned by a great cackle from Hakeswill. ‘Major! They made you a bleeding Major, Sharpy? Christ on the cross!