"Cornwell, Bernard - Sharpe 00 - Sharpe's Triumph" - читать интересную книгу автора (Cornwell Bernard)

blinked, fearing that the small motion would attract one of the
killers, but no one noticed.

Chasalgaon. That's where he was. Chasalgaon; a miserable, thorn
walled fort on the frontier of Hyderabad, and because the Rajah of
Hyderabad was a British ally the fort had been garrisoned by a hundred
sepoys of the East India Company and fifty mercenary horsemen from
Mysore, only when Sharpe arrived half the sepoys and all of the
horsemen had been out on patrol.

Sharpe had come from Seringapatam, leading a detail of six privates and
carrying a leather bag stuffed with rupees, and he had been greeted by
Major Crosby who commanded at Chasalgaon. The Major proved to be a
plump, red-faced, bilious man who disliked the heat and hated
Chasalgaon, and he had slumped in his canvas chair as he unfolded

Sharpe's orders. He read them, grunted, then read them again.

"Why the hell did they send you?" he finally asked.

"No one else to send, sir."

Crosby frowned at the order.

"Why not an officer?"

"No officers to spare, sir."

"Bloody responsible job for a sergeant, wouldn't you say?"

"Won't let you down, sir," Sharpe said woodenly, staring at the leprous
yellow of the tent's canvas a few inches above the Major's head.

"You'd bloody well better not let me down," Crosby said, pushing the
orders into a pile of damp papers on his camp table.

"And you look bloody young to be a sergeant."

"I was born late, sir," Sharpe said. He was twenty-six, or thought he
was, and most sergeants were much older.

Crosby, suspecting he was being mocked, stared up at Sharpe, but there
was nothing insolent on the Sergeant's face. A good-looking man,
Crosby thought sourly. Probably had the bibb is of Seringapatam
falling out of their saris, and Crosby, whose wife had died of the
fever ten years before and who consoled himself with a two-rupee
village whore every Thursday night, felt a pang of jealousy.

"And how the devil do you expect to get the ammunition back to
Seringapatam?" he demanded.