“You’re happy with your station?” Frederickson asked Bampfylde who gave a start at being thus addressed, then looked around the bluff as if seeking a safer place to fight.

“I am content,” he said after a pause.

“Major?” Frederickson asked Sharpe.

“Content.” The butt of the pistol was made of cross-hatched walnut. The gun felt heavy and unbalanced in Sharpe’s hand, but that was only because he was not used to such weapons. It was undoubtedly a gun of great precision.

“If you’ll turn, gentlemen?” Ford’s voice was shaking.

Sharpe turned so that he was staring out to sea. The freshening wind had begun to fleck the slaty swell with rills of white foam. The wind, he noted, was coming straight into his face so he would not have to aim the pistol off to compensate for a cross-breeze.

“You may cock your weapons,” Frederickson said. Sharpe pulled back the hammer and felt it click into place. He was besieged by a sudden worry that the percussion cap would fall out of its recess, but when he looked he saw that the wafer’s copper edges were so crimped by the tight fit that the cap was effectively wedged tight.

“Ten paces, gentlemen,” Ford announced. “One. Two…”

Sharpe walked his normal paces. He held the gun low. He did not think he had shown any fear to Bampfylde, but his belly was like knotted ice and a muscle was trembling in his left thigh. His throat was dry as dust. He could see Harper out of the corner of his eye.

“Seven. Eight.” Ford had raised his voice so it would carry above the sound of the sea wind. Sharpe was close enough to the bluffs edge to sec the French lobstermen pulling on long oars to escape the sucking undertow at the cliffs ragged base.