Sharpe 3-Book Collection 1: Sharpe’s Tiger, Sharpe’s Triumph, Sharpe’s Fortress. Bernard Cornwell
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‘There’s a soldier to see you,’ Lawford explained. ‘Man’s got a request, sir.’
Morris sighed as though he was too busy to be bothered with such trifles, but then he shrugged and waved a hand as if to suggest he was making a great and generous gesture by giving the man a moment of his precious time. ‘Who?’ he asked.
‘Private Sharpe, sir.’
‘Troublemaker, sir,’ Hakeswill put in.
‘He’s a good man,’ Lawford insisted hotly, but then decided his small experience of the army hardly qualified him to make such judgements and so, diffidently, he added that it was only his opinion. ‘But he seems like a good man, sir,’ he finished.
‘Let him in,’ Morris said. He sipped from a tin mug of arrack while Sharpe negotiated the muslin screen and then stood to attention beneath the ridge pole. ‘Hat off, boy!’ Hakeswill snapped. ‘Don’t you know to take your hat off in the presence of an officer?’
Sharpe snatched off his shako.
‘Well?’ Morris asked.
For a second it seemed that Sharpe did not know what to say, but then he cleared his throat and, staring at the tent wall a few inches above Captain Morris’s head, he at last found his voice. ‘Permission to marry, sir.’
Morris grinned. ‘Marry! Found yourself a bibbi, have you?’ He sipped more arrack, then looked at Hakeswill. ‘How many wives are on the company strength now, Sergeant?’
‘Full complement, sir! No room for more, sir! Full up, sir. Not a vacancy to be had. Shall I dismiss Private Sharpe, sir?’
‘This girl’s on the complement,’ Lieutenant Lawford intervened. ‘She’s Sergeant Bickerstaff’s widow.’
Morris stared up at Sharpe. ‘Bickerstaff,’ he said vaguely as though the name was strange to him. ‘Bickerstaff. Fellow who died of a fever on the march, is that right?’
‘Yes, sir,’ Hakeswill answered.
‘Didn’t know the man was even married,’ Morris said. ‘Official wife, was she?’
‘Very official, sir,’ Hakeswill answered. ‘On the company strength, sir. Colonel’s signature on the certificate, sir. Proper married before God and the army, sir.’
Morris sniffed and looked up at Sharpe again. ‘Why on earth do you want to marry, Sharpe?’
Sharpe looked embarrassed. ‘Just do, sir,’ he said lamely.
‘Can’t say I disapprove of marriage,’ Morris said. ‘Steadies a man does marriage, but a fellow like you, Sharpe, can do better than a soldier’s widow, can’t you? Dreadful creatures, soldiers’ widows! Used goods, Private. Fat and greasy, like lumps of lard wrapped up in linen. Get yourself a sweet little bibbi, man, something that ain’t yet run to seed.’
‘Very good advice, sir,’ Hakeswill said, his face twitching. ‘Words of wisdom, sir. Shall I dismiss him, sir?’
‘Mary Bickerstaff is a good woman, sir,’ Lieutenant Lawford said. The Lieutenant, whom Sharpe had first approached with his request, was eager to do his best. ‘Sharpe could do a lot worse than marry Mary Bickerstaff, sir.’
Morris cut a cigar and lit it from the guttering candle that burned on his camp table. ‘White, is she?’ he asked negligently.
‘Half bibbi and half Christian, sir,’ Hakeswill said, ‘but she had a good man for her husband.’ He sniffed, pretending that he was suddenly overcome with emotion. ‘And Jem Bickerstaff ain’t this month in his grave, sir. Too soon for the trollop to marry again. It ain’t right, sir. Says so in the scriptures.’
Morris offered Hakeswill a cynical glance. ‘Don’t be absurd, Sergeant. Most army widows marry the next day! The ranks are hardly high society, you know.’
‘But Jem Bickerstaff was a friend of mine, sir,’ Hakeswill said, sniffing again and even cuffing at an invisible tear. ‘Friend of mine, sir,’ he repeated more hoarsely, ‘and on his dying bed, sir, he begged me to look after his little wife, sir. I know she ain’t through and through white, he told me, but she deserves to be looked after. His very dying words, sir.’
‘He bloody hated you!’ Sharpe could not resist the words.
‘Quiet in front of an officer!’ Hakeswill shouted. ‘Speak when you’re spoken to, boy, and otherwise keep your filthy mouth buttoned like God wanted it.’
Morris frowned as though Hakeswill’s loud voice was giving him a headache. Then he looked up at Sharpe. ‘I’ll talk to Major Shee about it, Sharpe. If the woman is on the strength and wants to marry you, then I don’t suppose we can stop her. I’ll talk to the Major. You’re dismissed.’
Sharpe hesitated, wondering whether he should thank the Captain for the laconic words, but before he could say anything, Hakeswill was bawling in his ear. ‘About turn! Smartly now! Hat on! Quick march! One two one two, smartly now. Mind the bleeding curtain, boy! This ain’t a pig sty like what you grew up in, but an officer’s quarters!’
Morris waited till Sharpe was gone, then looked up at Lawford. ‘Nothing more, Lieutenant?’
Lawford guessed that he too was dismissed. ‘You will talk to Major Shee, Charles?’ he pressed Morris.
‘I just said so, didn’t I?’ Morris glared up at the Lieutenant.
Lawford hesitated, then nodded. ‘Good night, sir,’ he said and ducked under the muslin screen.
Morris waited until he was certain that both men were out of earshot. ‘Now what do we do?’ he asked Hakeswill.
‘Tell the silly bugger that Major Shee refused permission, sir.’
‘And Willie Lawford will talk to the Major and find that he didn’t. Or else he’ll go straight to Wellesley. Lawford’s uncle is on the staff, or had you forgotten that? Use your wits, man!’ Morris slapped at a moth that had managed to slip through the screen. ‘What do we do?’ he asked again.
Hakeswill sat on a stool opposite the camp table. He scratched his head, glanced into the night, then looked back to Morris. ‘He’s a sharp one, Sharpie, he is. Slippery. But I’ll do him.’ He paused. ‘Of course, sir, if you helped, it’d be quicker. Much quicker.’
Morris looked dubious. ‘The girl will only find herself another protector,’ he said. ‘I think you’re wasting my time, Sergeant.’
‘What me, sir? No, sir. Not at all, sir. I’ll have the girl, sir, just you watch, and Nasty Naig says you can have all you want of her. Free and gratis, sir, like you ought to.’
Morris stood, pulled on his jacket and picked up his hat and sword. ‘You think I’d share your woman, Hakeswill?’ The Captain shuddered. ‘And get your pox?’
‘Pox, sir? Me, sir?’ Hakeswill stood. ‘Not me, sir. Clean as a whistle, I am, sir. Cured, sir. Mercury.’ His face twitched. ‘Ask the surgeon, sir, he’ll tell you.’
Morris hesitated, thinking of Mary Bickerstaff. He thought a great deal about Mary Bickerstaff. Her beauty ensured that, and men on campaign were deprived of beauty and so Mary’s allure only increased with every mile the army marched westwards. Morris was not alone. On the night when Mary’s husband had died, the 33rd’s officers, at least those who had a mind for such games, had wagered which of them would first take the widow to their bed and so far none of them had succeeded. Morris wanted to win, not only for the fourteen guineas that would accrue to the successful seducer, but because he had become besotted by the woman. Soon after she had become a widow he had asked Mary to do his laundry, thinking that thereby he could begin the intimacy he craved, but she had refused him with a lacerating scorn. Morris wanted to punish her for that scorn, and Hakeswill, with his intuition for other men’s weaknesses, had sensed what Morris wanted and promised he would arrange everything.