'Christ! Harper dived right, Sharpe left, and Sharpe clung to the soil by the wall and the noise hammered at him, growing, seeming to make the stones of the wall shake, and the air was throbbing with the noise that came closer and closer and filled their whole world with terror as the rocket slammed into the wall.

'Jesus. Sharpe rolled over and sat up. The rocket, the most accurate of the week, had demolished the stone wall where he and Harper had been standing. The broken stick toppled slowly off the wreckage. The cylinder smoked innocently in the next field. Smoke drifted over the burned grass.

They started laughing, beating the dirt off their uniforms, and suddenly it seemed hilarious to Sharpe so that he rolled onto his side, helpless with laughter. 'Holy Jesus!

'You'd better thank Him. If that had been a shell instead of roundshot. Harper left the thought unfinished. He was standing and staring at the ruins of the wall.

Sharpe sat up again. 'Is that frightening?

Harper grinned. 'You'd regret having a full belly, that's for sure, sir. He bent down and picked up his shako.

'So maybe there is something to the mad Colonel's invention.

'Aye, sir.

'And think if you could fire a whole volley at fifty paces.

Harper nodded. 'True, but there's a lot of maybes and ifs there, sir. He grinned. 'You're fond of them, aren't you? You fancy trying them out, yes? He laughed. 'Toys for Christmas.

A figure in blue uniform, leading a second horse, was riding towards them from the firing point. Harper pulled his battered shako low over his eyes and nodded towards the galloping man. 'I think he's worried he's murdered us, sir.

Clods of earth flew up behind the galloping horses. Sharpe shook his head. 'That's not Gilliland. He could see a cavalryman's pelisse across the blue uniform shoulders.

The cavalryman skirted a burning rocket wreck, urged his horse on, waved as he came close. His shout was urgent. 'Major Sharpe?