"Andre Norton - Cat's eye" - читать интересную книгу автора (Norton Andre)

and a large, well-padded travel cage. All three packages
were bulky, and Zul, fists on hips, eyed them closely
before he said over his shoulder, "Get a truck."

Troy went back up the corridor to claim one of the
motored platforms. He was wriggling that out of a
line of its fellows when he caught a half glimpse of a
face, a familiar face. As he jumped on the platform,
dug his boot toe into the activating button, and headed
the vehicle down the line, he wondered just what
would happen if he shouted out that a newly accepted
member of the Thieves' Guild was working here, in
the very center of the supposedly best-protected trea-
sure-transhipping center on Korwar. Every man who
entered this building had been scanned by the psycho-
check at the door, and everyone not on legitimate
business would have been unmasked by that latest
weapon in the armory of the patrollers. Yet Troy was
certain he had seen Julnuk Varms shifting a crate,
and he knew for a fact that Varms had crossed the
line into the apprenticeship ranks of the Guild.

The platform rolled to a stop before Zul, and they
went to work shifting their cargo to its surface. Each
piece was heavy enough to require the combined efforts
of the mismatched workers, and Troy wiped his hand
across his face as the second settled into place. He
eyed the curtains covering the sides of the cage,
wondering just what kind of exotic creature cowered

within.
16

Cowered? That was the wrong word. The inmate of
that cage was curious, interested, alertly eager—not
in any way cowed. Inmate? Inmates—two of them—

Troy stood very still, staring at the closely curtained
transport cage. How did he know that?


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Interest—now increasing— Something touched him,
not physically, but as if a very soft, inquiring paw had
been drawn lightly along his arm to test the quality of
his skin, the strength of his muscles, the toughness of
the bone beneath that covering. Just so did he feel