Sharpe's Triumph Read Online Free PDF

been a sergeant in a Hanoverian regiment of the East India

    Company; now he rode an elephant and needed two other beasts to carry the chests off gold

    coin that travelled everywhere with him.
    Pohlmann stood as Dodd climbed down from his horse.
    “Well done, Major!” the Colonel called in his German-accented English.
    “Exceedingly well done!” Pohlmann's aides, half of them European and half Indian,

    joined their commander in applauding the returning hero, while the bodyguard made a

    double line through which Dodd could advance to meet the resplendent Colonel.
    “Eighty thousand cartridges,” Pohlmann exulted, 'snatched from our enemies!"
    “Seventy-three thousand, sir,” Dodd said, beating dust off his breeches.
    Pohlmann grinned.
    “Seven thousand spoiled, eh? Nothing changes.”
    “Not spoiled by me, sir,” Dodd growled.
    “I never supposed so,” Pohlmann said.
    “Did you have any difficulties?”
    “None,” Dodd answered confidently.
    “We lost no one, sir, not even a scratch, while not a single enemy soldier survived.” He

    smiled, cracking the dust on his cheeks.
    “Not one.”
    “A victory!” Pohlmann said, then gestured Dodd into the tent.
    “We have wine, of sorts. There is rum, arrack, even water! Come, Major.”
    Dodd did not move.
    “My men are tired, sir,” he pointed out.
    “Then dismiss them, Major. They can take refreshment at my cook tent.”
    Dodd went to dismiss his men. He was a gangling Englishman with a long sallow face and

    a sullen expression. He was also that rarest of things, an officer who had deserted from

    the East India Company, and deserted moreover with one hundred and thirty of his own

    sepoy troops. He had come to Pohlmann just three weeks before and some of Pohlmann's

    European officers had been convinced that Lieutenant Dodd was a spy sent by the British

    whose army was readying to attack the Mahratta Confederation, but Pohlmann had not been

    so sure. It was true that no other British officer had ever deserted like Dodd, but few

    had reasons like Dodd, and Pohlmann had also recognized Dodd's hunger, his awkwardness,

    his anger and his ability. Lieutenant Dodd's record showed he was no mean soldier, his

    sepoys liked him, and he had a raging ambition, and Pohlmann had believed the

    Lieutenant's defection to be both wholehearted and real. He had made Dodd into a major,

    then given him a test. He had sent him to Chasalgaon. If Dodd proved capable of killing his

    old comrades then he was no spy, and Dodd had passed the test triumphantly and Scindia's

    army was now better off by seventy-three thousand cartridges.
    Dodd came back to the marquee and was given the chair of honour on the right side of

    Pohlmann's divan. The chair on the left was occupied by a woman, a European, and Dodd

    could scarcely keep his eyes from her, and no wonder, for she was a rare-looking woman to

    discover in India. She was young, scarce more than eighteen or nineteen, with a pale face

    and very fair hair. Her lips were maybe a trifle too thin and her forehead perhaps a half

    inch too wide, yet there was something oddly attractive about her. She had a face, Dodd

    decided, in which the imperfections added up to attractiveness, and her appeal was

    augmented by a timid air of vulnerability. At first Dodd assumed the woman was

    Pohlmann's mistress, but then he saw that her white linen dress was frayed at the hem and some

    of the lace at its modest collar was crudely darned, and he decided that Pohlmann would

    never allow his mistress to appear so shabbily.
    “Let me introduce Madame Joubert to you,” Pohlmann said, who had noticed how hungrily

    Dodd had stared at the woman.
    “This is Major William Dodd.”
    “Madame Joubert?” Dodd stressed the "Madame', half rising and bowing from his chair as he

    acknowledged her.
    “Major,” she said in a low voice, then smiled nervously before looking down at the

    table that was spread with dishes of almonds.
    Pohlmann