Silvertongue Read Online Free PDF

stuck it in his mouth and sucked on it reflectively.
    “Well, young ’un. It ain’t like we haven’t had this conversation before, is it?”
    “I’m just . . .”
    “You’ve just got a memory like a bleeding sieve is what it is. First off, he’s cavalry, see, and in his day cavalry went out in front and done the forward scouting. Secondly, he don’t quite trust us, which looking at you I can’t help thinking he’s half right about. And finally, he’s a hundred percent copper-bottomed, writ-up-in-the-history-books, kicked-Boney-in-the-arse-at Waterloo, fire-eating hero, isn’t he?”
    “But ain’t we heroes?” whispered the Young Soldier.
    “I dunno,” said the Old Soldier, “but I do know we’re mincemeat if he hears you rabbiting on like this, and that’s a fact.”
    He nodded toward the Duke, who was leaning forward on his horse, craning for a view around the front of the bus. Something on the other side of the street was getting his full attention. He reached back and silently waved the soldiers forward.
    “Come on,” said the Old Soldier, gripping his pipe between his teeth in a grimace of unwelcome anticipation. “Keep your cakehole shut and stay low.”
    They ducked below the snow-laden roofs of the cars and low-ran quickly forward to the bus. The Duke backed his horse a couple of paces and leaned down to talk quietly to them.
    “Something’s got my horse spooked,” he said as he smoothed the neck of the large stallion. The soldiers could see it was trembling, and it pawed skittishly on the ground as the Duke continued. “Something over there.”
    They peered through the windows in the bus, trying to see across the street.
    “Nothing what I can see,” began the younger soldier, looking around. “Where are we anyway?”
    “Cannon Street,” replied the Old Soldier.
    “There’s nothing on Cannon Street,” said the Young Soldier. “No taints what I can think of, nothing except . . .”
    “The London Stone,” said the Duke calmly, nodding across the street. “Over there.”
    The Old Soldier peered through the frost-rimed glass of the bus window. He couldn’t see much, and what he could see was bleary and indistinct. He turned to find the Duke looking at him. One of the things that made the Duke such an uncomfortably good leader—if you were a follower—was that he seemed to be able to give orders without actually speaking them. The Old Soldier nodded and cleared his throat quietly.
    “I, er, could crawl over and have a look-see. . . .”
    “Ah, if you’d be so kind.” The Duke nodded. “I’d be much obliged.”
    The Old Soldier pocketed his pipe, dropped to his knees, and crawled around the rear of the bus. He edged forward through the snow, his zigzag route dictated by the need to keep cars between him and the Stone until he could get close enough to get a better look.
    Only once did he pause and look back, and as soon as he saw that the others could still see him, he gave them a thumbs-up, put his finger to his lips, and continued on until only a taxi stood between him and the strip of pavement in front of the London Stone’s cage.
    He tried to look under the taxi, but the snow was already too deep. So he quietly propped his rifle against the side of the vehicle and reached up to the passenger door handle.
    “What’s he doing?” breathed the Young Soldier, voice suddenly cracking with tension.
    The Duke put a hand on his shoulder. “He’s doing a damn fine job, youngster. Using all available cover, if I’m any judge. . . .”
    The Old Soldier quietly opened the passenger door and crawled inside the taxi. The only thing between him and the ten feet of clear air separating him from the Stone was the thin glass of the side window. He calmly turned the peak of his cap backward, and lifted himself off the floor just high enough for his eye to sneak a peek over the lintel of the window.
    “Bloody hell,” he whispered.
    Maybe something heard him. Or maybe it was just