"Robert E. Howard - Conan - Shadows In Zamboula" - читать интересную книгу автора (Howard Robert E)

SHADOWS IN ZAMBOULA

by

Robert E. Howard

1. A Drum Begins

"Peril hides in the house of Aram Baksh!"

The speaker's voice quivered with earnestness and his lean, black-nailed
fingers clawed at Conan's mightily-muscled arm as he croaked his warning. He
was a wiry, sunburnt man with a straggling black beard, and his ragged
garments prolcaimed him a nomad. He looked smaller and meaner than ever in
contrast to the giant Cimmerian with his black brows, broad chest, and
powerful limbs. They stood in a corner of the Sword Makers' Bazaar, and on
either side of them flowed past the many-tongued, many-colored stream of the
Zamboulan streets, which are exotic, hybrid, flamboyant, and clamorous.

Conan pulled his eyes back from following a bold-eyed, red-lipped Ghanara
whose short skirt bared her brown thigh at each insolent step, and frowned
down at his importunate companion.

"What do you mean by peril?" he demanded.

The desert man glanced furtively over his shoulder before replying, and
lowered his voice.

"Who can say? But desert men and travelers _have_ slept in the house of Aram
Baksh and never been seen or heard of again. What became of them? He swore
they rose and went their way -- and it is true that no citizen of the city has
ever disappeared from his house. But no one saw the travelers again, and men
say that goods and equipment recognised as theirs have been seen in the
bazaars. If Aram did not sell them, after doing away with their owners, how
came they there?"

"I have no goods," growled the Cimmerian, touching the shagreen-bound hilt of
the broadsword that hung at his hip. "I have even sold my horse."

"But it is not always rich strangers who vanish by night from the house of
Aram Baksh!" chattered the Zuagir. "Nay, poor desert men have slept there --
because his score is less than that of the other taverns -- and have been seen
no more. Once a chief of the Zuagirs whose son had thus vanished complained to
the satrap, Jungir Khan, who ordered the house searched by soldiers."

"And they found a cellar full of corpses?" asked Conan in good-humored
derision.

"Nay! They found naught! And drove the chief from the city with threats and
curses! But" -- he drew closer to Conan and shivered -- "something else was