"Robert Frezza - McClendon's Syndrome" - читать интересную книгу автора (Frezza Robert)

"Yeah, you mentioned that. She may not even be your second choice," Harry said,
apparently recalling some of my pithier comments. "I brewed up a fresh batch of stew. Want
some?"
"Uh, no thanks." Harry's son-of-a-bitch stew is made from the parts of a bull the bull
can least do without. I took another nut out of the bowl. "Why do you give these things
away?"
Harry shrugged elaborately, which caused his foliage to ripple. "The bags to sell
them in cost more than nuts do. I make it up on drinks."
"How's business?"
Harry shook his head. "Not even fair. None of the farmers are in town, and there's
only one ship in orbit besides yours, one of the Rodents'."
"Rodents?"
"Two lights over. It's listed as Dennison's World. They have a few ships that touch
here on their way out." Harry pointed to two dark, fuzzy bowling pins sitting on the other side
of the room. "The big one there is a wheel over at the consulate."
It seemed natural to have large furry things sitting around Harry's bar. His hole in the
wall looks more like a hole in the ground—he has fake tree roots dangling from the ceiling
and mushrooms growing in hanging baskets. "He likes the place?" I commented.
Harry leaned over. "He gets buzzed on honey," he whispered.
"And you charge him double when he does," I replied, and bounced the nut off his
chest.
Harry winked and grinned. Harry is an even-tempered guy who wouldn't hurt a
fly—unless the fly really deserved it.
"How're things with you?" he asked, but his attention began to wander when a minor
disturbance commenced involving a couple of barstools and a good-time girl on the other
side of the room.
As Dinky switched to something a little up-tempo, Harry pushed back his chair and
reclaimed the sap I'd been using to crack nuts. "Ken, I'm my own bouncer tonight, I've got to
run. Oh, there's a woman, good-looking if you like them thin. She's been asking about you.
You must be popular."
"Oh? That's news to me."
"Over there in the dark glasses," he said. He scurried off, pausing on the way to
gently swat one enterprising citizen who had absently begun playing mumblety-peg on the
table.
Harry keeps the place dark enough for the good-time girls to make a living, so it took
me a few seconds to spot her. She was in the corner with a glass a few tables down from
the two Rodents. Her hair was ash blond, shoulder-length. She was wearing a large silver
butterfly pinned on a black bodysuit and large oval sunglasses, which looked strange even
for the Prancing Pony. She was slim and wore black very well—her skin was fair and then
some, pure alabaster. A long scar on her left hand made it look whiter by contrast.
The shades were definitely out of place. She must have noticed me staring, because
she grinned—lots of teeth, but better proportioned than Harry's.
I knocked back half my limewater and made a wide circuit around the riot, dropping
coins in Dinky's jar along the way. When I got to her table, I asked politely, "Hello, bright
eyes. Is this seat taken?"
She looked up. "Not at all, spacer."
"Ken," said I, hoping to keep things on a first-name basis. As I parked, Dinky shifted
to something slow and romantic.
"Catarina." She had a solitaire layout spread on the table in front of her, and I noticed
her butterfly was sprinkled with blue stones.