With the Guard

Hakeswill sat back in his cell, not unnerved by the darkness at all - he was the most unnerving thing around here for miles. Well, not when you could Sharpe or Sir Arthur Wellesley. The sergeant spat. Sir Arthur high-and-bloody-mighty Wellesley! He was the one who'd caused all this trouble to start with; the one that had taken Sharpe away from the flogging, the one who had raised Sharpe from the ranks and given him airs above his station, made him think he was more than the dirt he truly was.

"He's dirt, he is," he muttered to the darkness. "Dirt and I knows. Only thing is he don't know it, not anymore. But I'll make 'im remember, old Obadiah will make him remember."

Him and that Welsh bastard, and those two grasshoppers... Things were going smoothly, very smoothly and Hakeswill grinned. That redcoat officer had asked him to be locked away, looked to be a friend of Sharpie's, but there was nothing he could do to pin the blame on old Obadiah. His grin broadened and he let out a cackle. He would do them all, starting with the Welsh bastard.

[Continues in The Day of the Court Martial]