"H. Beam Piper - Rebel Raider" - читать интересную книгу автора (Piper H Beam)

stores of forage; now, before returning to the main Confederate Army, he had paused to visit his friend
Laura Ratcliffe. And, of course, there had been a party. There was always a party when Jeb Stuart was
in any one place long enough to organize one.

They were all crowding into the hallwayтАФthe officers of Stuart's staff, receiving their hats and cloaks
from the servants and buckling on their weapons; the young ladies, their gay dresses showing only the
first traces of wartime shabbiness; the matrons who chaperoned them; Stuart himself, the center of
attention, with his hostess on his arm.

"It's a shame you can't stay longer, General," Laura Ratcliffe was saying. "It's hard on us, living in
conquered territory, under enemy rule."

"Well, I won't desert you entirely, Miss Ratcliffe," Stuart told her. "I'm returning to Culpepper in the
morning, as you know, but I mean to leave Captain Mosby behind with a few men, to look after the loyal
Confederate people here until we can return in force and in victory."

Hearing his name, one of the men in gray turned, his hands raised to hook the fastening at the throat of his
cloak. Just four days short of his thirtieth birthday, he looked even more youthful; he was considerably
below average height, and so slender as to give the impression of frailness. His hair and the beard he was
wearing at the time were very light brown. He wore an officer's uniform without insignia of rank, and
instead of a saber he carried a pair of 1860-model Colt .44's on his belt, with the butts to the front so
that either revolver could be drawn with either hand, backhand or crossbody.

There was more than a touch of the dandy about him. The cloak he was fastening was lined with scarlet
silk and the gray cock-brimmed hat the slave was holding for him was plumed with a squirrel tail. At first
glance he seemed no more than one of the many young gentlemen of the planter class serving in the
Confederate cavalry. But then one looked into his eyes and got the illusion of being covered by a pair of
blued pistol muzzles. He had an aura of combined ruthlessness, self confidence, good humor and
impudent audacity.

For an instant he stood looking inquiringly at the general. Then he realized what Stuart had said, and the
blue eyes sparkled. This was the thing he had almost given up hoping forтАФan independent command and
a chance to operate in the enemy's rear.




In 1855, John Singleton Mosby, newly graduated from the University of Virginia, had opened a law
office at Bristol, Washington County, Virginia, and a year later he had married.
The son of a well-to-do farmer and slave-owner, his boyhood had been devoted to outdoor sports,
especially hunting, and he was accounted an expert horseman and a dead shot, even in a society in which
skill with guns and horses was taken for granted. Otherwise, the outbreak of the war had found him
without military qualifications and completely uninterested in military matters. Moreover, he had been a
rabid anti-secessionist.

It must be remembered, however, that, like most Southerners, he regarded secession as an entirely local
issue, to be settled by the people of each state for themselves. He took no exception to the position that
a state had the constitutional right to sever its connection with the Union if its people so desired. His
objection to secession was based upon what he considered to be political logic. He realized that, once
begun, secession was a process which could only end in reducing America to a cluster of impotent petty