"David Drake - Hammer's Slammers 10 - Paying The Piper" - читать интересную книгу автора (Drake David)

major's attitude wasn't so much formal as playfully catlike.

Instead of staring at the wall over Steuben's shoulder, Huber met the major's eyes directly. If he hadn't,
he'd have been giving in to fear. Because Major Joachim Steuben scared the crap out of him.

"Close enough," Steuben said as though he didn't much care. "What's your excuse?"

"Sir!" Huber said, truly shocked this time. "No excuse,sir ."

It was the Nieuw Friesland Military Academy answer, and it was the right answer this time beyond
question. Platoon F-3's commander had started to disembark his unit without waiting to issue sidearms
and to cycle ammunition for the vehicles' tribarrels up from their storage magazines. Five troopers had
died, a sixth had lost her left arm to a ricocheting slug, and it was the Lord's mercy alone that kept the
damage from being worse.

Steuben raised an eyebrow and smiled faintly. His console's holographic display was only a shimmer of
light from the back side, so Huber didn't know whether the major was really viewing
something—Huber's file? A stress read-out?—or if he just left it up to make the interviewee more
uncomfortable.

Which would be a pretty good trick, as uncomfortable as Huber felt even before he entered the office.

"A fair number of people in the United Cities think it'd be a mistake to go to war with Solace, Huber,"
Steuben said calmly. "They want to use the way you gutted Rhodesville as an excuse to cancel the
Regiment's contract and go back to peaceful negotiation with Solace over port fees. Do you have any
comment about that?"

Huber licked his lips. "Sir," he said, "everything my platoon did at Rhodesville was by my direct order.
No blame whatever should attach to any of my troopers."

Steuben laughed. It was a horrible sound, a madman's titter. "Goodness," he said. "An officer who has
complete control of his troops while he's driving a damaged combat car? You're quite a paragon,
Lieutenant."

Huber licked his lips again. He had to pull his eyes back to meet Steuben's.Like looking at a
cobra. . . .

"For the time being," the major continued, suddenly businesslike and almost bored, "you've been
transferred to command of Logistics Section, Lieutenant Huber. Your office is in Benjamin proper, not
Base Alpha here, because most of your personnel are locals. You have a cadre of six or so troopers, all
of them deadlined for one reason or another."

He laughed again. "None of the others have burned down a friendly community, however," he added.

"Yes sir," Huber said. He felt dizzy with relief. He'd thought he was out. He'd been pretending he didn't,
but he'd walked into this office believing he'd suddenly become a civilian again, with no friends and no
future.