"Cornwell, Bernard - Sharpe 10 - sharpe's battle" - читать интересную книгу автора (Cornwell Bernard)

sharpe's battle.

by bernard cornwell.

CHAPTER I
Sharpe swore. Then, in desperation, he turned the map
upside down. "Might as well not have a bloody map,' he
said, 'for all the bloody use it is.'
"We could light a fire with it,' Sergeant Harper sug
gested. "Good kindling's hard to come by in these hills.'
"It's no bloody use for anything else,' Sharpe said.
The handArawn map showed a scatter of villages, a few
spidery lines for roads, streams or rivers, and some vague
hatchings denoting hills, whereas all Sharpe could see
was mountains. No roads or villages, just grey, bleak,
rock littered mountains with peaks shrouded by mists,
and valleys cut by streams turned white and full by the
spring rains. Sharpe had led his company into the high
ground on the border between Spain and Portugal and
there become lost. His company, forty soldiers carrying
packs, haversacks, cartridge cases and weapons, seemed
not to care. They were just grateful for the rest and so
sat or lay beside the grassy track. Some lit pipes, others
slept, while Captain Richard Sharpe turned the map right
side up and then, in anger, crumpled it into a ball. "We're
bloody lost,' he said and then, in fairness, corrected him
self. "I'm bloody lost.'
"My grand a got lost once,' Harper said helpfully.
"He'd bought a bullock from a fellow in Cloghanelly
Parish and decided to take a short cut home across the
Derryveagh Mountains. Then the fog rolled in and
 grandAa couldn't tell his left from his right. Lost like a
wee lamb he was, and then the bullock deserted the
ranks and bolted into the fog and jumped clear over a
cliff into the Barra Valley. Grand a said you could hear
the poor wee beast bellowing all the way down, then
there was a thump just like you'd dropped a bagpipe off
a church tower, only louder, he said, because he
reckoned they must have heard that thump all the way
to Ballybofey. We used to laugh about it later, but not
at the time. God, no, it was a tragedy at the time. We
couldn't afford to lose a good bullock.'
"Jesus bloody wept ' Sharpe interrupted. "I can afford
to lose a bloody sergeant who's got nothing better to do
than blather on about a bloody bullock '
"It was a valuable beast ' Harper protested. '&sides,
we're lost. We've got nothing better to do than pass the
time, sir.'
Lieutenant Price had been at the rear of the column,
but nowjoined his commanding officer at the front. "Are