"Gordon R. Dickson - The Cloak and the Staff" - читать интересную книгу автора (Dickson Gordon R)

He stepped inside. The only danger remaining for him now was that some other Aalaag on a floor below
would have just punched for this elevator. If it stopped for one of the aliens and the door opened to
reveal him inside, he would be trapped—doubly guilty, for being where he should not be and also for
being absent from his duty, which at the present was to lie down or otherwise relax. Only Aalaag were
permitted to use elevators.

For a moment he thought the one in which he was descending was going to hesitate on the first floor. In
the back of his mind, plans flickered like heat lightning on a summer evening. If it did stop, if the door did
open and an Aalaag walked in, he planned to throw himself at the alien’s throat. Hopefully, the other
would kill him out of reflex, and he would escape being held for questioning as to why he was where he
was.

But the elevator did not stop. It continued moving downward, and the telltale light illuminating the floor
numbers as they passed showed it was approaching the floor just below street level. Shane punched for
the cage to stop. It did, the door opened, and he stepped into a small square corridor leading directly to
a glass door and a flight of steps beyond, leading upward. He had hit on one of the alien ways out of the
building.
He left the elevator and went quickly along the corridor to the door. It was locked, of course; but in his
pocket he carried the Key of Lyt Ahn, or at least the Key that all the special human servants of Lyt Ahn
were allowed to bear. It would open any ordinary door in a building belonging to the aliens.

He tried the Key now, and it worked. The door swung noiselessly open. A second later he was out of it,
up the stairs, and into the street above.

He went down the street, walking at a pace just short of a run, and turned right at the first crossing,
searching for a market area. Four blocks on, he found a large square with many shops. A single Aalaag
sat on his riding animal, towering and indifferent to the crowd about him, before a set of pillars upholding
a sidewalk arcade at one end of the square. Whether the alien was on duty or simply waiting for
something or someone, it was impossible to tell. But for Shane, now, to use a shop on this square would
not be wise.

He hurried on. A few streets farther on, he found a smaller collection of shops lining both sides of a blind
alley, and one of these was a store for such simple clothing as the Aalaag allowed humans to use
nowadays. He stepped inside and a small bell over the door chimed softly.

“Signore?” said a voice.

Shane’s eyes adjusted to the interior dimness and saw a counter piled high with folded clothing and with
a short dark-faced man with a knife-blade nose behind it. Remarkably, in these days of alien occupation,
the proprietor had a small potbelly under his loose yellow smock.

“I want a full-length robe,” Shane said. “Reversible.”

“Of course.” The proprietor began to come around the counter. “What type?”

“How much is your most expensive garment?”

“Seventy-five new lire or equivalent in trade, signore.”