Sharpe's Waterloo Read Online Free PDF Page A

a sergeant and later, because of an act of suicidal bravery, became one of the few men promoted from the ranks to become an officer. He had joined the 95th Rifles and later commanded the red-coated Prince of Wales’s Own Volunteers. He had fought in Flanders, in India, in Portugal, in Spain and in France. He had been a soldier for almost all his life, but of late he had been a farmer in Normandy, drawn to the land of his enemies by a woman met by chance in the chaos of peace. Now, by the chaos of war, and because the exiled Napoleon had returned to France and thrust a new period of battle on Europe, Sharpe was a lieutenant-colonel in the 5th Belgian Light Dragoons, a regiment he had never met, had no wish to meet, and would not have recognized if it had formed line and charged him. The promotion was nothing more than a device to give Richard Sharpe some status on the Prince of Orange’s staff, but so far as Sharpe himself was concerned he was still a Rifleman.
    The rising sun, lancing down the Sambre valley, dazzled Sharpe. He pulled the tricorne hat low over his eyes. The land he rode was marshy, forcing him to weave an intricate course past the more treacherous patches. He kept glancing north to make certain no enemy troops appeared to pin him against the river. Not that he believed that the firing he had heard had been caused by the French. They were not expected to advance till July, and were certainly not expected in this part of Belgium, so Sharpe suspected that the musketry had been caused by Prussian troops at firing practice, yet a long acquaintance with war’s surprises had spurred Sharpe to investigate the sound.
    His horse put up waterfowl and once disturbed a whole field of rabbits that scampered in panic towards the hedgerows. His dog, scenting breakfast, took off in pursuit. ‘Nosey, you bastard! Heel!’ The dog had been named Nosey on the grounds that the Duke of Wellington, ‘Nosey’ to his men, had spent twenty years giving Sharpe orders, so, when Sharpe had found the dog in peacetime, he had decided to return the compliment.
    Nosey reluctantly slunk back to Sharpe, then saw something across the river and gave a bark of warning. Sharpe saw horsemen. For a second he supposed them to be Prussian, then recognized the shape of the cloth-covered helmets. Dragoons. French. His heart quickened. He had thought, after the battle of Toulouse, that his fighting days were over, that an emperor exiled to Elba spelt a Europe at peace, but now, fourteen months later, the old enemy was in sight again.
    He spurred the horse into a canter. So the French had ridden into Belgium. Maybe it was nothing but a cavalry raid. The enemy Dragoons had seen Sharpe and ridden to the water’s edge, but none tried to cross the deep river. Two of the green-coated horsemen unholstered their carbines and took aim at Sharpe, but their officer shouted at the troopers to hold their fire. The Rifleman was too far away for the short-barrelled, smooth-bore guns to be effective.
    Sharpe angled away from the river, guiding the horse beside a field of rye which had grown as tall as a man. The field path led uphill, then, after picking a delicate path through a tangled copse where tree roots gave treacherous footing for the horse, Sharpe slid down an earthen bank on to a rutted road where he was shadowed and hidden from the Dragoons by the trees that arched overhead. From his saddlebag he took out a frayed and crease-torn map. He unfolded it carefully, took a stub of pencil from his ammunition pouch, and marked a cross where he had seen the enemy cavalry. The position was approximate, for he was still not certain how far he was from Charleroi.
    He pushed the map away, uncorked his canteen, and took a drink of cold tea. Then he took off his hat which left the mark of its rim indented in his unwashed hair. He rubbed his face, yawned, then crammed the hat back onto his head. He clicked his tongue, urging the horse to the end