Граф Орлов
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The bartender, without making any unnecessary movements, presented Valdemar with an assortment of drinks offered at his establishment.
-- So, my commander sent my squadron out on a foraging mission, -- the bottle was almost empty, and Valdemar, though not yet completely drunk, was quite tipsy and spoke enthusiastically, not paying much attention to whether anyone was listening. -- They reached some village, killed the men who decided to resist, and then started looting. Well, everyone knows what a free foraging mission is like – they harass women here, rob houses there, and I have to gather them up and make them load at least some oats and bread. Then one of the soldiers calls me, and asks me to come to some basement. And in the basement – there were a hundred bottles of that Pontus wine, even more. So, your grace, would you like to have a drink? And then we can enjoy it together. And I see – half of them are already drunk, sly faces, so drunk that even their own horses shy away from them. Well, what could I do? I gave the order to stay there overnight.
Valdemar poured the remaining brandy into a glass of wine, swirled it gently, and drank it down in one gulp.
-- Forgive me – I wouldn't have drunk this if you had Lisliar wine! Well, the soldiers got drunk, and in the morning we put the wine right into sacks of oats – so it wouldn't break, and we left. By evening, we caught up with the others, and the commander was happy, saying how much forage they had gathered! And at night, I woke up – and my men, one by one, were stealing wine from the sacks! They thought that if I could do it, then they, the common soldiers, were also allowed to. I hissed at them, but there was nothing I could do, I didn't want to wake everyone up. In short, the wine didn't survive. In the morning, the commander asked: what happened, Cornet Karafa, why are the sacks half empty?! He asked, and he himself was drunk as a pig – he had a barrel of cognac with him, but he didn't give anyone any, he drank it all himself, and he looked like a barrel himself. So I answered him, with all innocence: the mice ate it, sir commander! He: why are you staggering so much, Cornet? I – I'm just very tired, sir commander... We then asked to go on another foraging mission to the same place, and he didn't suspect anything...
