"Richard Harding - Outrider 03 - Blood Highway" - читать интересную книгу автора (Harding Richard)

He thinks! He even knows how to read!" Dorca would pause dramatically then
pick out a raider, pointing with a finger as thick as a big toe. "And you
ain't. You're dumb. You think 'cause you got a gun you can take anybody. Well
one day you gonna get your mangy ass sliced into a few pieces. But Bonner is
gonna die old and peaceable...." Everyone agreed that that was probably
true.... Bonner was jammed against the overhanging rock a few hundred feet
from the waterhole. He had pushed himself into the few inches of shade that
the outcrop of giant boulders threw onto the dry brown earth. He didn't want
to be seen. The road was somewhere behind him and he could hear the loud
voices of the Devils, who, like Bonner, had stopped to get some of the
evil-smelling, sticky brown water from the dent in the parched earth. They had
found his shark-shaped war wagon packed all over with bloody flanks of beef.
The meat was his haul and he was bound for Chicago, battling time and the hot
sun, trying to get the precious bloody carcasses home before the heat turned
them into a putrid mass of rotting flesh. Bonner had paid for that meat. He
had paid for it in the current coin: hours of tracking, blood, bullets,
danger. It was his and no Devils were going to rob him of it. But first he
had to concentrate on staying alive. He listened to the shouts of the Devils.
They were happy: happy they had come upon some almost fresh food, and happy
they had found the car of the raider who had brought it. "He's gotta be here.
Gotta," someone shouted. "Kill and eat," yelled a happy voice. The Devils
made it sound as if they were his two favorite activities. Probably. Though,
thought Bonner, rape was probably right up there too. There was a clatter of
heavy boots on loose stones as the Devils fanned out, heading down the slope
to the shallow water hole. Bonner pushed himself further against the rock and
felt the warmth of the sun-heated stone. He wondered where the Mean Brothers
were. The last he had seen of the giant twins they were slopping around in the
water. When the Devils had pulled in Bonner had run for the cover of the rocks
and lost sight of the Meanies. Bonner wasn't worried about them. If the two
mute giants were scared of something Bonner had never seen it. His eyes swept
the area in search of them. They were so huge they were pretty hard to hide.
Then he saw them and smiled. The Devils had climbed over the slope that
Bonner hid against. They were spread out now in front of the Outrider. Eight.
Eight of them wandered towards the water that glittered in front of
them. "He's here somewhere," yelled one, "I can smell him." There they were
a long line of armed men with their backs to him. Bonner silently cursed
himself for casually leaving his vicious automatic rifle on the seat of his
car. One of these days he was going to get sliced for making a stupid little
slip like that, no matter what they said at Dorca's. He was armed, of course.
On one hip he carried his ancient Hi Standard Automatic and his three long,
black-handled throwing knives glittered menacingly on the other. Bonner was a
master of the silent kill. The thought of Bonner's knives had haunted the
frenzied dreams of Stormers, Snowmen, and Devils. The Hi Standard carried a
ten shot clip and it was an excellent rapid fire weapon which in the right
hands made sure that the tenth shot was as accurate as the first. If the
Devils did nothing more than scatter when the first blood flowed then the huge
automatic in Bonner's steady hands would be enough to cut down all eight. It
would even leave him the unheard of luxury of two extra shots. But no man just
lies there and lets another man kill him-unless he is a fool or a saint. The
Devils were neither. The squad leader was carrying an M-16 and if he was any