"Alan Dean Foster - The Man Who Used the Universe" - читать интересную книгу автора (Foster Alan Dean)

brought alumin pipes and the first time they took a swing at one of my screens
and intercepted the shieldfield I've got running over them they both lit up
like a pair of mollywobbles. Took me an hour just to properly deodorize the
store." His smile widened.
"I find it peculiar that Lal would send one ghit where two had failed."
Loo-Macklin gave a barely perceptible shrug. "I don't know about the
two men you're talking about or anything else that's spizzed between you and
Lal. I only know that I'm here to collect. One hundred credits for six months
back insurance and another hundred for the rest of the year."
The man laughed, shook his head in disbelief. "That's another thing
about your boss Lal; he's overpriced as well as stupid."
"He's not my boss," said Loo-Macklin quietly. "I work for him."
"Doesn't that make him your boss?"
"Not necessarily," Loo-Macklin replied. "It makes him my employer.
'Boss' has a different connotation."
"'Connotation,'" murmured the smiling owner. "Oh, I get it. He sends
along two idiots with alumin bars to try and beat me into submission and when
that doesn't work, he decides to send a semanticist to try and talk me into
it." He leaned forward over the screen, his expression turning nasty.
"Well, I'm not interested in your spiel, I'm not afraid of your _boss_,
and I'm not worried about however many ghits he decides to have visit me! He
can send along fools to talk or strike and it won't make me pay him a half-
credit.
"The security arrangements for this shop are very elaborate, the best
available in Cluria and the equal of anything that can be brought in from
Terra itself. So I'll run my business, thank you, without your boss's
'protection.' Tell him to fibble off and go bully someone else. He doesn't
frighten me. I've got friends, too. Legals. They buy a lot of merchandise from
me and they'd be damned upset if anything happened to their source of supply."
Loo-Macklin waited until the owner had finished, then said patiently,
as if speaking to a child, "You owe Hyram Lal one hundred credits back
insurance and another hundred for the remainder of this year."
The owner shook his head slowly. "A deaf semanticist he sends, no
less."
Loo-Macklin extended his right hand. "You can pay in cash or by
transfer, but please pay now. You are overdue."
The joke seemed to be wearing thin on the other man. "Oh, come on, I've
got to lock up. Why don't you just leave while you're still in one piece and
go tell the ghit you work for it will be a hell of a lot cheaper for him to
just leave me alone."
"If you don't pay me right now," Loo-Macklin told him, "I'm going to
have to kill you." This declaration was made in such a calm, utterly
emotionless tone that the shop owner's expression twisted. He lost half his
smile, replaced it with half a frown, and ended up only looking baffled.
"Really?" His hands tensed ever so slightly. "You killed many people?"
Loo-Macklin shook his head. "I've never killed anyone ... before now."
"Well, I have something to tell you, young man. Why I bother I don't
know, except that you're obviously so unsuited to what you're here for I
suppose I feel a smidgen of pity for you. You notice the position of my
hands?"