He saw Sharpe kneeling beside a body and hurried across. 'Got a sword there, Sharpie? Hakeswill asked. 'Stole it, did you?

'I killed the man, Sergeant. Sharpe looked up.

'Doesn't bleeding matter, does it, lad? You ain't permitted to carry a sword. Officer's weapon, a sword is. Mustn't get above your station, Sharpie. Get above yourself, boy, and you'll be cut down. So I'll take the blade, I will. Hakeswill half expected Sharpe to resist, but the Private did nothing as the Sergeant picked up the silver-hilled blade. 'Worth a few bob, I dare say, Hakeswill said appreciatively, then he laid the sword's tip against the stock at Sharpe's neck. 'Which is more than you're worth, Sharpie. Too clever for your own good, you are.

Sharpe edged away from the sword and stood up. 'I ain't got a quarrel with you, Sergeant, he said.

'But you do, boy, you do. Hakeswill grimaced as his face went into spasm. 'And you know what the quarrel's about, don't you?

Sharpe backed away from the sword. T ain't got a quarrel with you, he repeated stubbornly.

'I think our quarrel is called Mrs Bickerstaff, Hakeswill said, and grinned when Sharpe said nothing. 'I almost got you with that flint, didn't I? Would have had you flogged raw, boy, and you'd have died of a fever within a week. A flogging does that in this climate. Wears a man down, a flogging does. But you got a friendly officer, don't you? Mister Lawford. He likes you, does he? He prodded Sharpe's chest with the sword's tip. 'Is that what it is? Officer's pet, are you?

'Mister Lawford ain't nothing to me, Sharpe said.

'That's what you say, but my eyes tell different. Hakeswill giggled. 'Sweet on each other, are you? You and Mister Lawford? Ain't that nice, Sharpie, but it don't make you much use to Mrs Bickerstaff, does it? Reckon she'd be better off with a real man.

'She ain't your business, Sharpe said.

'Ain't my business! Oh, listen to it! Hakeswill sneered, then prodded the sword forward again. He wanted to provoke Sharpe into resisting, for then he could charge him with attacking a superior, but the tall young man just backed away from the blade. 'You listen, Sharpie, Hakeswill said, 'and you listen well. She's a sergeant's wife, not the whore of some common ranker like you.

'Sergeant Bickerstaff's dead, Sharpe protested.

'So she needs a man! Hakeswill said. 'And a sergeant's widow doesn't get rogered by a stinking bit of dirt like you. It ain't right. Ain't natural. It's beneath her station, Sharpie, and it can't be allowed. Says so in the scriptures.

'She can choose who she wants, Sharpe insisted.

'Choose, Sharpie? Choose? Hakeswill laughed. 'Women don't choose, you soft bugger. Women get taken by the strongest. Says so in the scriptures, and if you stand in my way, Sharpie' — he pushed the sword hard forward — 'then I'll have your spine laid open to the daylight. A lost flint? That would have been two hundred lashes, lad, but next time? A thousand. And laid on hard! Real hard! Be blood and bones, boy, bones and blood, and who'll look after your Mrs Bickerstaff then? Eh? Tell me that. So you takes your filthy hands off her. Leave her to me, Sharpie. He leered at Sharpe, but still the younger man refused to be provoked and Hakeswill at last abandoned the attempt. 'Worth a few guineas, this sword, the Sergeant said again as he backed away. 'Obliged to you, Sharpie.

Sharpe swore uselessly at Hakeswill's back, then turned as a woman hailed him from among the heaped bodies that had been the leading ranks of the Tippoo's column. Those bodies were now being dragged apart to be searched and Mary Bickerstaff was helping the work along.

He walked towards her and, as ever, was struck by the beauty of the girl. She had black hair, a thin face and dark big eyes that could spark with mischief. Now, though, she looked worried. 'What did Hakeswill want? she asked.

'You.

She spat, then crouched again to the body she was searching. 'He can't touch you, Richard, she said, 'not if you do your duty.

'The army's not like that. And you know it.

'You've just got to be clever, Mary insisted. She was a soldier's daughter who had grown up in the Calcutta barrack lines. She had inherited her dark Indian beauty from her mother and learned the ways of soldiers from her father who had been an engineer sergeant in the Old Fort's garrison before an outbreak of cholera had killed him and his native wife. Mary's father had always claimed she was pretty enough to many an officer and so rise in the world, but no officer would marry a half-caste, at least no officer who cared about advancement, and so after her parents' death Mary had married Sergeant Jem Bickerstaff of the 33rd, a good man, but Bickerstaff had died of the fever shortly after the army had left Madras to climb to the Mysore plateau and Mary, at twenty-two, was now an orphan and a widow. She was also wise to the army's ways. 'If you're made up to sergeant, Richard, she told Sharpe now, 'then Hakeswill can't touch you.

Sharpe laughed. 'Me? A sergeant? That'll be the day, lass. I made corporal once, but that didn't last.

"You can be a sergeant, she insisted, 'and you should be a sergeant. And Hakeswill couldn't touch you if you were.

Sharpe shrugged. 'It ain't me he wants to touch, lass, but you.

Mary had been cutting a tiger-striped tunic from a dead man, but now she paused and looked quizzically up at Sharpe. She had not been in love with Jem Bickerstaff, but she had recognized that the Sergeant was a good, kind man, and she saw the same decency in Sharpe. It was not exactly the same decency, for Sharpe, she reckoned, had ten times Jem Bickerstaff's fire and he could be as cunning as a snake when it suited him, but Mary still trusted Sharpe. She was also attracted to him. There was something very striking about Sharpe's lean good looks, something dangerous, she acknowledged, but very exciting. She looked at him for a few seconds, then shrugged. 'Maybe he won't dare touch me if we're married, she said. 'I mean proper married, with the Colonel's permission.

'Married! Sharpe said, flustered by the word.

Mary stood. Tt ain't easy being a widow in the army, Richard. Every man reckons you're loot.

'Aye, I know it's hard, Sharpe said, frowning. He stared at her as he thought about the idea of getting married. Till now he had only been thinking of desertion, but maybe marriage was not such a bad idea. At least it would make it much harder for Hakeswill to get his hands on Mary's skin. And a married man, Sharpe reckoned, was more likely to be promoted. But what was the point of rising an inch or two in the dunghill? Even a sergeant was still at the bottom of the heap. It was better to be out of the army altogether and Mary, Sharpe decided, would be more likely to desert with him if she was properly married to him. That thought made him nod slowly. 'I reckon I might like to be married, he said shyly.

'Me too. She smiled and, awkwardly, Sharpe smiled back. For a moment neither had anything to say, then Mary excitedly fished in the pocket of her apron to produce a jewel she had taken from a dead man. 'Look what I found! She handed Sharpe a red stone, half the size of a hen's egg. 'You reckon it's a ruby? Mary asked eagerly.

Sharpe tossed the stone up and down. 'I reckon it's glass, lass, he said gently, 'just glass. But I'll get you a ruby for a wedding gift, just you watch me.

'I'Il more than watch you, Dick Sharpe, she said happily and put her arm into his. Sergeant Hakeswill, a hundred paces away, watched them and his face twitched.

While on the edges of the killing place, where the looted and naked bodies lay scattered, the vultures came down, sidled forward and began to tear at the dead.

The allied armies camped a quarter of a mile short of the place where the dead lay. The camp sprawled across the plain: an instant town where fifty thousand soldiers and thousands of camp followers would spend the night. Tents went up for officers well away from the places where the vast herds of cattle were guarded for the night. Some of the cattle were beeves, being herded and slaughtered for food, some were oxen that carried panniers filled with the eighteen- and twenty-four-pounder cannonballs that would be needed to blast a hole through the walls of Seringapatam, while yet others were bullocks that hauled the wagons and guns, and the heaviest guns, the big siege pieces, needed sixty bullocks apiece. There were more than two hundred thousand cattle with the army, but all were now scrawny for the Tippoo's cavalry was stripping the land of fodder as the British and Hyderabad armies advanced.