Dear friends, let me introduce you to Gustave Aimard – a French writer, author of adventure novels, one of the classics of the western genre. For all who love historical suspenseful prose in the style of Dean Reed or Fenimore Cooper.

An excerpt from Gustave Aimard’s novel “Sacramenta”.

The stranger headed towards where our friends were sitting, casually nodded to them, and took a seat on the opposite side of the table. Without wasting a moment, he began to rap his fist on the table, intending to attract the attention of the drowsy owner.

The latter woke up and, reluctantly leaving his place behind the counter, approached the stranger with a disgruntled look.

“Pineapple wine!” the stranger ordered, not very kindly. “And make it quick, I’m in a hurry.”

“Everything takes time,” grumbled the owner, nevertheless setting off to fulfill the order. Placing the pineapple wine in front of the stranger, he hurried back to the counter with an obvious intention to dive back into sleep.

Meanwhile, the stranger, pretending not to notice the rude behavior of the tavern owner, gulped down two glasses of wine one after the other, as if a man tormented by thirst. Then he rolled a cigarette, took out a flint from his pocket, a golden, finely crafted one, struck a flame, lit the cigarette, and soon drowned in a cloud of bluish aromatic smoke.

While the stranger drank wine and smoked with the air of a man disdainful of everyone and everything, our friends discreetly watched his every move.

The stranger was no more than thirty years old. Tall, slender, with quick and graceful movements. A high, handsome forehead, a straight nose, lively black eyes, thin carefully curled mustaches – in short, a handsome, manly face testified to a resolute and impeccably honest character.

He wore an elegant suit indicating that he was a resident or native of the northern provinces: a jacket and trousers of blue cloth. Under the jacket, trimmed with a golden braid and unbuttoned, a thin embroidered batiste shirt and a yellow silk tie, the ends of which were threaded through a ring adorned with a large diamond; the trousers were tightened at the hips by a silk sash adorned with a golden fringe and a double row of skillfully chiseled buttons; on his feet were the so-called cowboy boots, pulled up under the knee with a silver-woven garter. Huge Mexican spurs were attached to the heels. A Mangal adorned with gold cord was casually thrown over his shoulders, and a dashing straw hat adorned his head. A long sword with a gold hilt hung on his right side, two six-shot revolvers were visible on his belt, and the handle of a knife peeked out from the shin of his right boot.

With such weaponry, the stranger could engage in battle with several opponents simultaneously, and if caught off guard, victory over him would come at a high cost to his enemies.

His horse was adorned with a bridle decorated with silver; on one side of the saddle, a lasso was tied, on the other – a carbine with golden engraving.

In our library, you can find such novels by Gustave Aimard as: ” Les Pirates des prairies” and ” La Loi du Lynch”, ” Le Roi des placeres d’or” and ” Les Nuits mexicaines”, ” Sacramentaa” and ” Le Chercheur de pistes”, ” Le Souriquet”.