"Gordon Eklund - Falling Toward Forever" - читать интересную книгу автора (Eklund Gordon)

"I just wanted you to know. You are a fascinating man,
Waller, but a very dangerous man. I will see you again when we
have won the battle."

"I hope so," Waller said.

"As do I," Ahmad agreed.
 CHAPTER TWO
Before morning the colonel slipped away to rejoin the main
regiment near a small insurgent village some twenty miles
distant. So it was Captain Malik, a good officer, who would be
leading them into battle today.

On the surface, their mission seemed little more than routine.
It was Waller's first action since joining the company but that
didn't make it any different. Addressing his men shortly after
dawn, Captain Malik, speaking good French, called it just that:
routine. The outpost they were hitting was an old walled village,
once a French fortress. The present occupying force of
government troops was not a large one and, for the most part,
they had always stayed safely hidden behind the shelter of their
stone wall. The colonel had let them alone in the past. Now he
needed their weapons. Various rumors claimed the outpost had
recently received a large shipment of modern American
automatic rifles. The only conceivable obstacle, said Captain
Malik, to a smoothly functioning mission was that stone wall
circling the village. It was eight feet high and kept in a state of
good repair. But the element of surprise would work against
that, Captain Malik believed. It would even the odds or tip them
slightly in favor of the insurgents. Waller wasn't so sure. The
element of surprise, he thought, was just another way of trusting
to good luck.

He was given a squad of six men to lead. Captain Malik took
each squad leader aside and explained in careful detail exactly
what would be expected once the wall was scaled. Waller listened
carefully, preferring to leave nothing to chance. Then they
marched, moving swiftly and neatly across the flat, parched
landscape. Three hours passed while they walked. The sun rose
hurtling through the empty sky, burning the life from everything
it touched. Waller noticed Ahmad at the head of the squad to his
right. They nodded once to each other but did not speak.

As soon as the first faint glimpse of the fortress village
appeared at the northern horizon, Captain Mahk ordered
everyone to get down. Now he spoke more re-vealingly of their
mission. Among the troops stationed inside the village, the
insurgents had a friend. At exactly noon, this man would open
the rear gates. Four squads would attack through there, while
the remaining four would wait in front. Once the government