“You go to war,” Lord William said icily, “because small-minded men can see no alternative.”

“And if every war has a winner,” Cromwell said, “it must by ineluctable logic also have a loser. If you want my advice, young man, leave the army before some politician has you killed in an ill-considered attack on France. Or, more likely, the French invade Britain and kill you along with the rest of the redcoats.”

The ladies withdrew a short while later and the men drank a glass of port, but the atmosphere was stiff and Pohlmann, plainly bored, excused himself from the company and gestured that Sharpe should follow him back to the starboard roundhouse cabin where Mathilde was now sprawled on a silk-covered sofa. Facing her on a matching sofa was an elderly man who was talking animatedly in German when Pohlmann entered, but who immediately stood and bowed his head respectfully. Pohlmann seemed surprised to see him and gestured the man to the door. “I won’t need you tonight,” he said in English.

“Very good, my lord,” the man, evidently Pohlmann’s servant, answered in the same language, then, with a glance at Sharpe, left the cabin. Pohlmann peremptorily ordered Mathilde to take some air on the poop, then, when she had gone, he poured two large brandies and gave Sharpe a mischievous grin. “My heart,” he said, clasping a dramatic hand to his breast, “almost flopped over and died when I first saw you.”

“Would it matter if they knew who you were?” Sharpe asked.

Pohlmann grinned. “How much credit will merchants give Sergeant Anthony Pohlmann, eh? But the Baron von Dornberg! Ah! They queue to give the baron credit. They trip over their fat feet to pour guineas into my purse.”

Sharpe looked about the big cabin that was furnished with two sofas, a sideboard, a low table, a harp and an enormous teak bed with ivory inlays on the headboard. “But you must have done well in India,” Sharpe said.