'Portfires alight! Harper seemed determined to keep up a commentary on his own death. Sharpe could see his own Company sitting by Gilliland's rocket 'cars', his specially fitted supply wagons. ‘Oh, God! Harper crossed himself.

Sharpe knew the portfires were going down to touch the rocket fuses. 'You said yourself they couldn't hit a house at fifty yards.

'I'm a big target. Harper was six feet and four inches tall. There was a wisp of smoke far down the field. That one rocket would already be moving, burning the grass, leaping like quickfire above the soil, hammering in front of its fire and smoke. The others burst into life.

'Oh, God, Harper groaned.

Sharpe grinned. 'If they're close, just jump over the wall.

'Anything you say, sir.

For a second or two the rockets were curious twisting dots, haloed by fire, centred on their pulsing smoke trails. The trails weaved as the missiles climbed and wandered and then, so fast that Sharpe would have had no time to throw himself behind the low stone wall, the rockets seemed to leap towards the two men. The sound filled the valley, the fire blazed behind the spread of missiles, and then they were past, screaming above the wall and Sharpe found he had ducked even though the closest rocket had been thirty yards away.

Harper swore, looked at Sharpe.

'Not so funny here, eh? Sharpe found himself feeling relieved that the rockets had gone. Even at thirty yards the noise and fire was alarming.

Harper grinned. 'Wouldn't you say our duty was done, sir?

'Just the big ones, then it's done.

'For what we are about to receive.

The next volley was not to be ground fired, but to be aimed upwards in firing tubes supported by a tripod. Gilliland, Sharpe knew, would be working at the mathematics of the trajectory. Sharpe had always supposed mathematics to be the most exact of all the sciences and he did not clearly see how it could be applied to the inexact nature of rocketry, but Gilliland would be busy with angles and equations.