"Stephen Goldin - Herds" - читать интересную книгу автора (Goldin Stephen)

going to be a good day.

Even he was surprised, though, when he reached the top and
g'anced around. He had expected maybe a handful of reporters
from a couple of county newspapers. But here the room was
jammed with people, and the only one he recognized was Dave
Grailly of the San Marcos Clarion. Everyone else was unfamiliar.
And not only were there people, there were machines as well.
Television cameras, microphones and other broadcasting
equipment lay carefully scattered about, with call letters on them
from the three major networks as well as local stations from the
Los Angeles and San Francisco areas. He was overwhelmed with
the thought that this case was attracting much greater publicity
than even he had anticipated.

Th^ instant he appeared, a loud yammering began as twenty
different people started asking him twenty different questions at
the same time. Dazed, Maschen could only stand there for a
moment under the barrage of questioning, but finally he
regained his composure. He walked up to the area where they
had set up the microphones and announced, "Gentlemen, if you
will all be patient, I plan to issue a statement in a few minutes
Carroll, get your steno pad and come into my office. w»ll vou?"

He went into his office and shut the door, leaning his back
against it. He closed his eyes, trying to regulate his breathing
and perhaps calm his nerves. Events were piling one on top of
the other too fast for his comfort. He was just a small-county
sheriff, used to a relaxed pace and easy atmosphere. Suddenly,
the world seemed to be going out of control, upsetting the
humdrum normality to which he was accustomed. Again, the
thought crossed his mind that maybe he shouldn't be a
policeman. There must be hundreds of other jobs in the world
that were better paid and less taxing.

There was a knock on the door behind "him. He moved away
and opened it and Carroll came in, pad in hand. Maschen
suddenly realized that he h?dn't the faintest idea of what to say.
Each word would be critically important because he was
speaking, not just to Dave Grailly of the Clarion, but to the wire
services and the TV networks, which meant potentially every
person in the United States. His mouth went suddenly dry with
stage fright.

He decided, finally, to stick to just the facts as he knew them.
Let the newspapers draw their own conclusions; they would,
anyway. He paced around the room as he dictated to his
secretary, stopping frequently to have her read back what he'd
said and correct some phrasing that sounded awkward. When he
was finished, he had her read it aloud to him twice, just to make