‘Go to hell,’ Sharpe said.
Lanier raised his sword slowly, the polished blade reflecting the bright flames. ‘My mother taught me first,’ he said, ‘but the village priest was my real tutor. An extraordinary man! He had been a soldier, but found God. He taught me to pray in the words of the psalmist. “Béni soit l’Eternel qui dispose mes mains au combat, et mes doigts à la bataille.”’ He smiled mockingly. ‘A good prayer for a soldier, don’t you think?’ He suddenly lunged with the sword and Sharpe stumbled desperately backwards, his parry missing Lanier’s blade altogether.
‘You are clumsy, Colonel,’ Lanier said. He had pulled the lunge back at the last moment. ‘Sword fighting is an art, Colonel. It should be graceful, even subtle.’
‘Like putting gunpowder in a cellar?’ Sharpe asked. Lanier had taken a backwards step and Sharpe let his sword’s tip rest on the gravel.
‘It was Madame Delaunay’s notion,’ Lanier said. ‘A bit crude, I admit, but it might have succeeded.’ He suddenly raised his blade, lunged it to Sharpe’s left, swerved it low and kept lunging until the tip of the slightly curved blade was at Sharpe’s belly again. He pressed, forcing Sharpe back. ‘You really should yield, Colonel. I would regret killing you. You’re in pain, yes?’
‘I’ve had worse.’
‘We all have, I suppose.’ Lanier kept the pressure on Sharpe’s stomach, still forcing him backwards. Sharpe had his sword held low, but knew that the moment he moved it the Frenchman’s blade would slide forward fast. The French troops were calling to their Colonel to kill Sharpe, while Sharpe’s men were now silent. ‘It is a pity about the house,’ Lanier said, glancing to his right where the fire was rampaging through the widow’s house. The glance was swift, too swift to give Sharpe an opening. Lanier prodded the sword, its sharp tip breaking skin again. ‘Yield, Colonel,’ Lanier urged him, ‘there is no dishonour in defeat.’
‘And what honour is there in assassination?’ Sharpe asked harshly.
‘A nation’s honour,’ Lanier replied, ‘a consolation in defeat, and a lesson to the victors.’
‘A lesson?’
‘That victory has a price.’
Sharpe nodded. ‘And if I defeat you now,’ he asked, ‘is that the end of la Fraternité?’
Lanier hesitated, then nodded. ‘It is. I am the last one alive.’
Was that true? Sharpe suspected it was, but then he was disposed to believe Lanier, a man he liked, but still had to defeat. He winced and bent slightly forward as if trying to ease the pain in his back, then suddenly turned to the right and used his wrist to sweep the sword up. Lanier, taken slightly by surprise, was slow to lunge, and by then Sharpe’s turn had pushed the sword’s needle-sharp tip away from his belly and the lunge merely scored a cut across his stomach. Not deep, but Sharpe felt the warm blood as his sword knocked Lanier’s blade aside. For a heartbeat the Frenchman’s sword was held wide and Sharpe sprang. He dropped his own sword, using both hands to seize Lanier’s epaulettes. He pulled the Frenchman towards him and head-butted him hard. The blow hurt like hell and momentarily blurred his vision, but if it had hurt him he knew it must have half blinded Lanier with pain and dizziness.
Lanier staggered backwards and Sharpe kicked him hard between the legs. The Frenchman bent over and Sharpe’s fist caught him as he went down and there was suddenly blood on Lanier’s face. He tried to bring the sword around to defend himself, but Sharpe was too close and had his hands around Lanier’s neck and was squeezing. ‘Your mother taught you to fight with a sword,’ he said, ‘but mine gave birth to me in a gutter. And that’s where I learned to fight.’
Lanier could not speak, but tried to saw at Sharpe with the sword, and Sharpe kept squeezing. The sword was cutting at the back of his thighs, but the force of it was weakening as he choked the Frenchman. Lanier’s nose was broken and bleeding, the blood trickling down to Sharpe’s wrists. Then Sharpe suddenly released his grip and used his left hand to seize Lanier’s black-ribboned queue of hair. He yanked the Frenchman’s head back hard, then slid his right hand onto Lanier’s face. He used his index and little fingers to push beneath his eyeballs. ‘I’m going to blind you next,’ he promised Lanier, ‘and when I’ve gouged your eyeballs out I’m going to pick up my sword and cut off your right hand and your left foot. You understand? You can be a blind cripple or you can yield.’
Lanier made an incoherent noise and Sharpe pushed his fingers harder, feeling the pressure of the eyeballs. ‘Non, non!’ Lanier managed to gasp.
‘Do you yield?’ Sharpe snarled, pressing harder.
Lanier croaked unintelligibly. His sword still scraped at Sharpe’s legs, but feebly, and his left hand gave Sharpe’s arm two taps. ‘Is that a yes?’ Sharpe asked and felt the taps on his arm again. He let go of Lanier and stepped back. Lanier immediately swept the sword at him, but Sharpe had half expected the cut and seized Lanier’s sword wrist in his right hand and took the Frenchman’s elbow in his left. He brought his knee up and his hands down and heard the crack as he shattered Lanier’s forearm. Then he let go and stepped away, stooping to pick up his fallen sword.
Lanier had somehow held onto his sword, but his broken arm had taken away his ability to fight. Sharpe cut at him and saw the Frenchman flinch as he tried to parry. Sharpe stopped the cut just short of Lanier’s neck. ‘Yield,’ he said. His men were cheering, shouting at him to cut the Frenchman into ribbons. ‘Yield,’ Sharpe said again.
‘I yield, monsieur,’ Lanier said hoarsely.
‘You may keep your sword,’ Sharpe said, then on an impulse, ‘and in Normandy there is a farm called Seleglise. You will always be welcome there.’ He thrust his sword into its metal scabbard. ‘Captain Jefferson!’
‘Sir?’
‘Collect our wounded. There’s a wagon and horses in the warehouse and we’ll carry them back in that. We need surgeons. Colonel Kippen!’
The Prussian had come from the warehouse with his men to watch the fight, and now came to Sharpe’s side. ‘Colonel?’
‘You will stay here to make sure Colonel Lanier marches away. He’s going to the River Loire.’
‘Of course,’ Kippen said.
‘And treat them well, Colonel,’ Sharpe growled, ‘they’re brave men.’ He turned back to Lanier. ‘You have surgeons?’
‘Two.’
‘They can tend your wounded. Those who can’t march I’ll have taken to a hospital tomorrow. The rest of you must be gone by dawn.’
There was an almighty crash as half of the house roof collapsed, the burning rafters tumbling bright into the lower fires, which sprang up anew to dazzle the night. A huddle of servants stood by the gun, which had been firing from the left-hand side of Lanier’s defensive line, and Sharpe saw the widow was there. He walked towards her. ‘I apologise, madame,’ he said.
She spat at him. ‘You are a barbarian, Colonel.’