"Ron Goulart - The Panchronicon Plot" - читать интересную книгу автора (Goulart Ron)

"Any difference?"
"You might possibly have some trouble with the bathtub in 206. We had a catman in there until
yesterday, fellow with some sort of guilt compulsion which prompted him to take a lot of baths.
Result is the drain's somewhat clogged with wads and tufts of fur."
"I'll take 201."
THE PANCHRONICON PLOT 9


"We hope to get a plumber up to 206 within the week." He tossed a key to Conger. "We use
only human help here, gives the Primitive Facilities Inn a real old-fashioned charm."
Conger picked up his suitcase. "I've heard a good deal about the Free Colony Free School
Kibbutz. How far is that from here?"
"Ten miles south." The clerk adjusted his Indian chief headdress. "Funny none of our guests
have been interested in that before and then this week you're the third to evidence curiosity."
"Oh, really? I'm in education myself, which is why I'd like to drop out there during my
vacation," said Conger. "Who were the other interested guests? Perhaps they're colleagues of
mine."
"First off it was Dr. Madrid, he's the cyborg chiropractor. That is to say, he's not a cyborg
himself but he treats cyborgs in need of the chiropractic art. You should have seen his luggage, a
mixture of nostrums and lubricating oil, medical instruments and garage tools. A very strange era
we live in, Mr. Shawn."
"It is, yeah. Who else asked about the kibbutz school?"
"The Hellroarers."
"The Hellroarers?"
"Actually it was only half of them," amplified the befeathered clerk. "As you probably know
the group split up some nine or ten years back. We have Neddy and Nobby staying with us.
"The old electroshock-bluegrass musical group of the 10s?"
"Yes, many's the Hellroarers concert I'd used to port to in my youth. I was telling Neddy about
a Tangier concert whereat he introduced his cardiac arrest hoedown number. Difficult to believe it
was ten long years ago. Little did I dream while I sat there holding hands with the virginal—"
"Maybe I'll encounter them during my stay." Conger walked away from the desk.
"No bellhops, no elevators," the clerk called after him.
"So I surmised." Conger went up a spongy ramp to the second floor, wondering if the others
who were interested in the kibbutz school were also interested in Buford True who taught there.


"Oof! Ow! Ouch!"
"I sense a lingering tension, Mrs. Gurney."
"You near to broke me good leg, Dr. Madrid, tugging and pummeling it that way."
Dr. Madrid was a little chubby man, dressed in a white 1-piece doctorsuit. He was bent over the
fat face-down naked woman on the floating massage table. "It isn't everyone I admit to my private
quarters, Mrs. Gurney," he said. "The American Mechanical Medical Society frowns on its
members plying their trade in their hotel suites whilst on desert vacations." He whacked her flesh
leg with his fist.
"Owl Oof! It ain't I don't appreciate it, doc. I mean ter say I been in virtual agony, if yer know
what I mean."
10 RON GOULART


The chubby chiropractor poked at the woman's other, aluminum, leg with his finger. "Your