Hitler's war
- Автор: Тертлдав Гарри Норман
- Серия: The War that came early #1
- Язык: английский
- Жанр: Альтернативная история
Электронная книга - «Hitler's war». Краткое содержание книги:
Now, in this thrilling, provocative, and fascinating alternate history by Harry Turtledove, another scenario is played out: What if Chamberlain had not signed the accord? What if Hitler had acted rashly, before his army was ready-would such impatience have helped him or doomed him faster? Here is an action-packed, blow-by-blow chronicle of the war that might have been-and the repercussions that might have echoed through history-had Hitler reached too far, too soon, and too fast.
Turtledove uses dozens of points of view to tell this story: from American marines serving in Japanese-occupied China to members of a Jewish German family with a proud history of war service to their nation, from ragtag volunteers fighting in the Abraham Lincoln Battalion in Spain to an American woman desperately trying to escape Nazi-occupied territory-and witnessing the war from within the belly of the beast.
A novel that reveals the human face of war while simultaneously riding the twists and turns that make up the great acts of history, Hitler's War is the beginning of an exciting new alternate history saga. Here is a tale of powerful leaders and ordinary people, of spies, soldiers, and traitors, of the shifting alliances that draw some together while tearing others apart. At once authoritative, brilliantly imaginative, and hugely entertaining, Hitler's War captures the beginning of a very different World War II-with a very different fate for our world today.
With money in his pocket and kao liang in his veins, Pete wasn’t inclined to worry about that-not now, anyway. Even a Marine corporal was a rich man in Peking. He knew damn well the Restaurant of Rich and Fine Viands had overcharged him and his pals as much as the Chinamen thought they could get away with. He didn’t care…too much. The chow was good, and it was still damn cheap. Whorehouses worked the same way. You could get whatever you wanted, and it wouldn’t cost you half of what you’d pay in Honolulu or San Diego. The Chinese put down less? Well, so what?
The Marines came out of Hsi La Hutung-an alleyway wider than McGill’s wingspan, but not by a whole lot-and out onto Morrison Street. Somebody’d told McGill that the Chinese name for the street was Main Street of the Well of the Prince’s Palace, but it was Morrison Street to all the foreigners in Peking. Iron sheeting covered the well these days, but people still shoved it out of the way and drew up water every now and then. Some of the Royal Marines said Morrison had been a writer for the Times of London, and he’d lived at Number 98. Nowadays, an Italian firm occupied the building.
Chinese on foot, Chinese on bicycles, plump Chinese riding in rickshaws pulled by gaunt Chinese, older Chinese women hobbling along on what they called lotus feet, Chinese (inevitably) selling things, Chinese spitting and blowing their noses…
Chinese scrambling out of the way…Chinese leaping from the street onto the rickety sidewalks…Chinese bowing low…
“Oh, fuck,” Puccinelli said. “Here come those goddamn slant-eyed mothers.”
Chinese were slant-eyed, too, but Pooch wasn’t talking about them. Up Morrison Street came a long column of Japanese soldiers. They marched in formation, a bayoneted rifle on each tough little man’s right shoulder. When a noncom spotted a Chinaman who failed to show proper respect, four Japs jumped out of the line, grabbed the offender, and kicked him and beat him with rifle butts. They left him groaning and bloody and hustled back into place.
“Nod to the slanty bastards,” McGill said. He met a Japanese sergeant’s eye and nodded, equal to equal. The Jap gazed back. His gaze showed nothing for a moment. But then he nodded back. He’d won the exchange-Pete had acknowledged him first.
The other Marines also nodded to the Japanese troops. They got a few nods in return. Most of the Japs just ignored them. Nobody gave them a hard time. As far as Pete was concerned, that would do fine.
When the tail of the column got out of earshot, Szulc said, “Been a lot of the little monkeys going through town lately.”
“Yeah.” McGill nodded. “I hear they’re mostly getting on trains and heading north.”
“They gonna finally get off the pot with the Russians?” Szulc said. “Talk about deserving each other…” No Marine in Peking felt anything better than grudging respect for the Japanese, and Pete had never run into a Polack who had anything good to say about Russians.
“Who cares? That ain’t our worry any which way. We were gonna get laid, remember?” Puccinelli kept his mind firmly on what mattered-or in the gutter, depending on how you looked at things.
* * *
Number 1 Good Time, the joyhouse said in English. It had a bigger sign in Chinese. Pete would have bet that was dirtier. The Chinese had no idea what shame was, as far as he could see.
“Marines!” the madam exclaimed. Meal tickets! was what it sounded like. Sure as hell, they would have to pay more for this than the locals did, too. “Make you happy!” the middle-aged woman went on. Make me rich, she probably meant. Her cut of the wages of sin looked pretty nice. She wore brocaded silk. Gold gleamed around her neck and on her fingers and ears; jewels sparkled in her hair.
“Show us the girls!” That was Szulc, who also didn’t believe in dicking around when it came to dicking around.
“Yes, yes, yes!” The madam was all smiles. Pete McGill heard the ching of a cash register in her agreement. Well, what the hell did you expect when you went to a whorehouse? This gal had blond sisters back in the States. He’d dealt with his share of them. All the same, it did take a little of the edge off.
He got the edge back when he picked his girl. She reminded him of a Siamese cat, except her eyes weren’t blue. He paid the madam and took the girl upstairs.
His being large and hairy didn’t faze her. She wasn’t just in from the countryside, then; she’d seen round-eyes before. She didn’t know any English, though. Oh, well, McGill thought. He could show her what he wanted. He could-and he did.
The way she gasped and squeezed him inside at the end made him think he brought her off, too. Of course, whores were part actresses. If they made the john think he was a prize stud, he’d shell out more. And Pete did give her an extra dollar, saying, “Don’t tell the old bitch downstairs.”
She hugged him and kissed him and made the fat silver coin disappear even though she was naked. Pete didn’t see exactly where it went. Into her lacquered hair? Or…? He shrugged. It wasn’t his worry.
Szulc was sitting in the waiting room when he got down there. Puccinelli took longer coming back. “Twice!” he said proudly.
“You went off in your pants the first time?” McGill gibed.
“Not likely!” Pooch said. “You shoulda heard that broad squeal!”
“Thank you! Thank you! Drink?” the madam said. Herman Szulc looked ready, but Pete shook his head and steered his buddies out.
“You don’t wanna have any fun,” Szulc complained.
“I don’t wanna get drugged and rolled,” McGill answered. “I may be dumb, but I ain’t that dumb. If I was a regular there, I might chance it, but not when it’s my first time in the joint.”
“Let’s go some place where they do know us and drink there,” Pooch said.
“Now you’re talking!” Szulc said. It sounded good to Pete, too.
When they got back to the barracks, they were drunk as lords. The next morning, McGill repented of his sins. Coffee and aspirins blunted down the whimwhams without stopping them.
Pete felt so rotten, he almost forgot about the long column of Japanese troops he’d seen the night before. Almost, but not quite. He reported to Captain Horner, his company commander.
Horner heard him out, then nodded. “Uh- huh,” the officer said thoughtfully. “You think they were going to head north?”
“Well, I don’t know for sure, sir,” McGill replied. “If I was a betting man, though, that’s how I’d lay my money.”
“If you were a betting man…” Horner snorted. “You’d bet on how many raindrops landed in a pail in twenty minutes.” He had a Tidewater accent thick enough to slice. A hell of a lot of Marines, and especially Marine officers, had a drawl. And Captain Horner knew him damn well.
“One good thing, sir,” McGill said. The captain raised a blond eyebrow. Pete went on, “If the Japs are heading north like that, they ain’t gonna jump on us right away.”
“You hope,” Horner said. Pete nodded. The company CO was right. He sure as hell did hope.
* * *
Interned. Officially, Vaclav Jezek was classed as a displaced person. It wasn’t quite the same as being a POW. The Poles were treating all the Czechs who’d got over the border-soldiers and civilians, men, women, and children-the same way.
Yeah, they were treating them all the same way, all right. They were treating them all like dogs.
Barbed wire fenced off the Czechs’ encampment from the rest of Poland. Poles with rifles and sandbagged machine-gun nests made sure the Czechs didn’t come through the wire. The DPs lived under canvas despite rain and cold. They ate Polish army rations. That was what the Poles claimed, anyhow. If it was true, Vaclav pitied Polish soldiers.