Sharpe's Fortress Part 15

"Where do I go for horseshoes?" Sharpe asked the clerk.

The clerk was reluctant to answer, but he finally spread his hands and suggested Sharpe ask in the merchants' encampment.

"Someone will tell you, sahib."

"You tell me," Sharpe said.

"I don't know!"

"So how do you know they have horseshoes?"

"I hear these things!" the clerk protested.

Sharpe stood and bullied the clerk back against the wall.

"You do more than hear things," he said, leaning his forearm against the clerk's neck, 'you know things. So you b.l.o.o.d.y well tell me, or I'll have my Arab boy chop off your goo lies for his breakfast. He's a hungry little b.u.g.g.e.r."

The clerk fought for breath against the pressure of Sharpe's arm.

"Naig." He offered the name plaintively when Sharpe relaxed his arm.

"Naig?" Sharpe asked. The name rang a distant bell. A long-ago bell.

Naig? Then he remembered a merchant of that name who had followed the army to Seringapatam.

"Naig?" Sharpe asked again.

"A fellow with green tents?"

"The very one, sahib." The clerk nodded.

"But I did not tell you this thing! These gentlemen are witnesses, I did not tell you!"

"He runs a brothel!" Sharpe said, remembering, and he remembered too how Naig had been a friend to Sergeant Obadiah Hakeswill four years before. Sharpe had been a private then and Hakeswill had trumped up charges that had fetched Sharpe a flogging.

"Nasty Naig' had been the man's nickname, and back then he had sold pale-skinned wh.o.r.es who travelled in green-curtained wagons.

"Right!" Sharpe said.

"This office is closed!" The gunner protested and the cavalry Sergeant looked disappointed.

"We're going to see Naig," Sharpe announced.

"No!" the clerk said too loud.

"No?" Sharpe asked.

"He will be angry, sahib."

"Why should he be angry?" Sharpe demanded.

"I'm a customer, ain't I?

He's got horseshoes, and we want horseshoes. He should be delighted to see us."

"He must be treated with respect, sahib," the clerk said nervously.

"He is a powerful man, Naig. You have money for him?"

"I just want to look at his horseshoes," Sharpe said, 'and if they're army issue then I'll ram one of them down his b.l.o.o.d.y throat."

The clerk shook his head.

"He has guards, sahib. He has jettisl' "I think I might let you go on your own," the East India Company Lieutenant said, backing away.

"Jettis?" The light dragoon Sergeant asked.

"Strongmen," Sharpe explained.

"Big b.u.g.g.e.rs who kill you by wringing your neck like a chicken." He turned back to the clerk.

"Where did Naig get hisjettis? From Seringapatam?"

"Yes, sahib."

"I killed enough of the b.u.g.g.e.rs," Sharpe said, 'so I don't mind killing a few more. Are you coming?" he asked the cavalry Sergeant.

"Why not?" The man grinned.

"Anyone else?" Sharpe asked, but no one else seemed to want a fight that afternoon.

"Please, sahib," the clerk said weakly.

Sharpe ignored him and, followed by Ahmed and the cavalryman, went back into the sunlight.

"What's your name?" Sharpe asked the Sergeant.

"Lockhart, sir. Eli Lockhart."

"I'm d.i.c.k Sharpe, Eli, and you don't have to call me "sir", I'm not a proper bleeding officer. I was made up at a.s.saye, and I wish the b.u.g.g.e.rs had left me a sergeant now. They sent me to be a b.l.o.o.d.y bullock driver, because I'm not fit for anything else." He looked at Lockhart's six troopers who were still waiting.

"What are they doing here?"

"Didn't expect me to carry the b.l.o.o.d.y horseshoes myself, did you?"

Lockhart said, then gestured at the troopers.

"Come on, boys. We're going to have a sc.r.a.p."