JК
Sharpes Devil :: Корнуэлл Бернард
Страница: 75 из 209"I'd rather face the Imperial bloody Guard than do that again."
They remounted and rode on, taking it in turns to balance the great box of golden guineas on their saddles' pommels. Ferdinand loped tirelessly ahead. Harper, chewing a lump of hard bread, had begun to think of Bautista. "Why does that long-nosed bastard want to kill us?"
"God knows. I've been trying to make sense of it, and I can't."
Harper shook his head. "I mean if the man wants to be rid of us, then why the hell doesn't he just let us take Don Bias's body and be away? Why send those fellows to kill us?"
"If he did send them." Sharpe, as the morning unfolded into sun-drenched innocence, had again begun to doubt the fears that had crowded in on him during the night.
"He sent them, right enough," Harper said. "He's an evil bastard, that Bautista. You only had to look in his eye. If a man like that comes into the tavern I throw him out. I won't have him drinking my ale!"
"I don't know if he's evil," Sharpe said, "but he's certainly frightened."
"Bautista? Frightened?" Harper was scornful.
"He's like a man playing drumhead." Drumhead was a card game that had been popular in the army. It was a simple game, needing only a pack of cards, as many players as wanted to risk their money and a playing surface like a drumhead. Each player nominated a card and another man dealt the cards face up onto the drumhead. The man whose card appeared last won the game.
"Drumhead?" Harper was still unconvinced.
"Bautista's playing for very big stakes, Patrick. He's cheating left, right and center and he knows, if he's caught, that he'll face court martial, disgrace, maybe even imprisonment. But if he wins, then he wins very big indeed. He's watching the cards turn over and he's dreading that he'll lose. But he can't stop playing because the winnings are so huge."
"Then why the hell doesn't he fight the war propejly?" Harper grunted as he settled the strongbox more comfortably on his pommel.
"Because he knows the war is lost," Sharpe said. "It would take an extraordinary soldier to win this war, and Bautista isn't an extraordinary soldier. Don Bias might have won it, but only if Madrid had sent him the ships to beat Cochrane, which they didn't. So Bautista knows he's going to lose, and that means he has to do two things. First, he needs to blame someone else for losing the war, and second, he has to grab as much of Chile's wealth as possible. Then he can go home rich and blameless, and he can use the money to gain power in Madrid."
"But why kill us? We're bugger all to do with his problems.
They remounted and rode on, taking it in turns to balance the great box of golden guineas on their saddles' pommels. Ferdinand loped tirelessly ahead. Harper, chewing a lump of hard bread, had begun to think of Bautista. "Why does that long-nosed bastard want to kill us?"
"God knows. I've been trying to make sense of it, and I can't."
Harper shook his head. "I mean if the man wants to be rid of us, then why the hell doesn't he just let us take Don Bias's body and be away? Why send those fellows to kill us?"
"If he did send them." Sharpe, as the morning unfolded into sun-drenched innocence, had again begun to doubt the fears that had crowded in on him during the night.
"He sent them, right enough," Harper said. "He's an evil bastard, that Bautista. You only had to look in his eye. If a man like that comes into the tavern I throw him out. I won't have him drinking my ale!"
"I don't know if he's evil," Sharpe said, "but he's certainly frightened."
"Bautista? Frightened?" Harper was scornful.
"He's like a man playing drumhead." Drumhead was a card game that had been popular in the army. It was a simple game, needing only a pack of cards, as many players as wanted to risk their money and a playing surface like a drumhead. Each player nominated a card and another man dealt the cards face up onto the drumhead. The man whose card appeared last won the game.
"Drumhead?" Harper was still unconvinced.
"Bautista's playing for very big stakes, Patrick. He's cheating left, right and center and he knows, if he's caught, that he'll face court martial, disgrace, maybe even imprisonment. But if he wins, then he wins very big indeed. He's watching the cards turn over and he's dreading that he'll lose. But he can't stop playing because the winnings are so huge."
"Then why the hell doesn't he fight the war propejly?" Harper grunted as he settled the strongbox more comfortably on his pommel.
"Because he knows the war is lost," Sharpe said. "It would take an extraordinary soldier to win this war, and Bautista isn't an extraordinary soldier. Don Bias might have won it, but only if Madrid had sent him the ships to beat Cochrane, which they didn't. So Bautista knows he's going to lose, and that means he has to do two things. First, he needs to blame someone else for losing the war, and second, he has to grab as much of Chile's wealth as possible. Then he can go home rich and blameless, and he can use the money to gain power in Madrid."
"But why kill us? We're bugger all to do with his problems.