The Sultan's Tigers Read Online Free PDF Page A

should help clean up the house.”
    â€œTom, it’s not—”
    â€œI’m going back upstairs.”
    â€œTom. Come back here, Tom!
Tom!
”
    I was already halfway up the stairs. She could have run after me. She could have threatened me with all kinds of unusual punishments. She could have done just about anything, but she didn’t, because, I think, she knew I was right and she was wrong. They really should have taken me to the lunch.

5
12 September 1798. Aboard the Audacious. Somewhere in the middle of the ocean, although I know not where, nor do I much care.
My dear Susanna,
Life aboard a ship is exceeding monotonous, particularly when you are a soldier and a landlubber, and have no job, no task, nothing to occupy your hands or your mind. I have taken to walking the decks for hours each day, excepting when the storms have hit us, and then I have huddled below decks in the company of my fellow officers, cursing the demons who enrage the skies, spitting us with rain and hurling us about with waves as big as a house.
We have been a week without sight of land. Yesterday a whale swam alongside us. We fired muskets at him but he appeared not even to notice them.
In the wind, the ship shrieks like a pig running from the butcher. I hope she will not fall apart. A man could not survive longer than a few minutes in these waters.
I wish now I had taken my father’s suggestion and returned to my native Cornwall. I think often and fondly of the farm that awaits us, the fields to be tilled. If only we had the money to buy it! Let me make my fortune once we arrive in India, my dearest wife, and bring it home, and then we shall purchase the house that we deserve.
I do not know when I shall have a chance to send this letter to you, nor when it might arrive in Southampton, but I must write to you nevertheless, missing you so fervently as I am. I shall add this letter to the pile that I have wrote and send them when we reach dry land.
How is little Thomas? And my darling Charlotte? Give them each a kiss from their father. I miss them more than I can say. I only hope I shall survive these rolling seas and dark skies and return to see them soon.
With all warm affection from your seasick husband,
Horatio
    Â 
    That wasn’t very exciting. Horatio sounded more like my dad than Grandpa or Uncle Harvey. Maybe the Trelawney genes had skipped him, too.
    I added that letter to the pile on the bed and unfolded the next one, in which Horatio arrived in India. He complained about the heat, the bugs, the food, his fellow officers, and the men under his command.
    What did I know about India? Not much. I could find it on a map. I knew the main religion was Hinduism and the women wore dresses called saris. I’m pretty good friends with an Indian kid at school, Kartick, and I’ve been to his house a few times, but it wasn’t much different from anyone else’s. You wouldn’t even know he was Indian. He was born in the States and I think his mom and dad were too.
    Curry. That was the one Indian thing that I knew about. I’d eaten enough of it. Rogan josh is my favorite. Lamb, not chicken. That’s pretty much my favorite meal. A couple of crackly poppadoms to start with, please, then a plate of lamb rogan josh with pilau rice and some naan bread.
    All this thought of curry was making me hungry. I opened the doggy bag that Grace had given me, nibbled the contents—I wasn’t quite sure what they were, but they tasted great—and kept on reading. The next few letters described the dreary routines of a soldier stationed in a foreign country without much to do. Horatio’s days were taken up with parades and inspections. He had to check that every soldier under his command was carrying a clean musket and a supply of powder. He developed a red rash on his legs and spent three weeks in bed with an upset stomach. He wrote a whole letter about his wife’s homemade plum pudding and how he