"Murphy, Warren - [Destroyer 060] - The End of the Game" - читать интересную книгу автора (Destroyer)

Waldo remembered the humiliation. Remembered wanting to die.

He sat in the dark, smoking Havana cigars, thinking for a long time. He could get back into the computer center and stick a hand under Pamela Thrushwell's dress. Or he could even follow her and do it on the street or in the subway. Maybe he would get away with it and suffer only mortification.

But what about next time? What would the voice want next time?

He took out a pencil and computed what his lifestyle would cost. He thought a couple of thousand a week for life would do, but was stunned to find out he was spending twelve thousand dollars a week and that was before food.

No more. He was taking his money and going.

He read the balance on his Insta-Charge statement and wrote a check for seven million dollars.

He went to the bank. The teller asked if he were serious. He said he was. The branch manager came over. He checked with the main office. The main office laughed. Waldo had only fifteen hundred dollars in his account and that was because of the security blanket of his overdraft checking program.

The next morning, Waldo lurked in a doorway outside the computer center. When Pamela arrived for work, he rushed up behind her and stuck his hand quickly underneath her skirt. She screamed. Another woman with a very heavy pocketbook blocked his retreat, a man yelled "masher," but Waldo dropped to his knees and crawled out of the crowd. He glanced back and saw the surveillance cameras inside the computer center pointed out toward the street. He could feel them laughing at him.

A few days later, he got another Insta-Charge statement in the mail. It was an order to show up at another address.

The soft feminine voice in the new office said, "Spank Pamela Thrushwell with a paddle." Waldo knew he would soon be asked to kill. A paddle could kill. He phoned Detective Joe Casey.

They met on a dark Hudson River pier, facing New Jersey. Waldo had picked the spot for its isolation. He was sure that whoever or whatever was behind this could see almost anywhere. He wanted to get away, away from any form of computer, away from any place that had surveillance cameras, but mostly away from all computers. A computer had started all this by changing his monthly statement. And Pamela Thrushwell worked at a computer center. Waldo thought computer and he thought get away.

"I'm in trouble," Waldo told the detective. And he explained how a bank error had led him to live a higher and higher life-style so that now he was dependent on the money. He needed it. But he was afraid of what he might have to do for it.

"I get the feeling that I'm being played with," he said. "I can't cash a check at the bank to get any real cash, but I can still buy anything with my credit card. So all I can get is what I need to live on."

"How much is that?" Casey asked.

"A half a million a year or so," Waldo said.

"Good money," Casey said.

"Where's it leading?" Waldo asked.

"A half million to cop a feel? For a little goose? A spank? Hey, Waldo, I'm a cop. I get paid a lot less for a lot tougher work."

"What are you saying?"

"I'm saying for a half million, I'd paddle the pope," Casey said.

"But where does it end?"

"What do you care?" Casey said.

"What are you saying?" Waldo asked.

"Spank the girl is what I'm saying."

Waldo shook his head. Something deep inside him said no. Enough. Bit by bit, he had been played into losing every little piece of himself. He knew that to go on further was to lose everything. Even going back to Millicent would be preferable. He was getting out.