"Mack Reynolds - Romp" - читать интересную книгу автора (Reynolds Mack)

yielded to his efforts in a matter of minutes.
 Pop Rasch sighed and said, "They don't make them the way they used to. No challenge, like." He
added, a note of nostalgia in his voice, "They don't even have watchmen, anymore."
Rosy Porras entered first. He looked up and down the halls. Some lights were burning. Not many.
The Administration Building was inoperative at night.
"All clear," he said. "Let's go." Automatically, he shrugged his shoulders to loosen his harness and
have the feel of the handgun ready to be drawn.
They proceeded down the hall. Pop Rasch had a simple chart of the building in his hand. They turned
several corners, finally emerged into a long room banked with Tabulaters, Collaters, Sorters and
Computers. Leading off it, in turn, were several rooms of punched-card files, tape files, shelves of bound
reports.
"O.K.," Pop said to Mary Zogbaum. "Now you're the boss. Go to it. Just for luck, I'm going to look
up that cloddy Rosy claims is going to be sleeping for the rest of the night."
"It's not necessary," Rosy growled. "He's got enough dope to keep him under."
"Just the same," Pop said, "double-checking never hurt nobody—especially since he's the only guy in
the building."
Mary Zogbaum wet his lips nervously and entered the first of the file rooms, after taking up the valise.
He opened the bag and brought forth a sheaf of closely typed reports.
He said importantly, "Now you two leave me alone. I have to concentrate." He fished from the valise
a small manually operated card punch.
"Take it away, fella," Rosy said tolerantly. "I'm the heavy. I’ll stand guard."
Pop Rasch left on his checking mission.

Rosy Porras had remained free to operate on the wrong side of a society that was supposedly crime
free, only by exercising an instinct for self-preservation that had served him well on more than one
occasion when he found himself in the dill.
Something didn't feel right now.
Pop Rasch, an old pro, capable of becoming bored even while on a job, had sunk into a swivel chair
and had actually drifted off into a fitful sleep, snoring raspingly.
Marvin Zogbaum was busy in the files, humming and sometimes whistling to himself in concentration.
He'd pull a card here, another there, sometimes substituting one from the valise, sometimes punching
another hole or so. On several occasions, he displaced whole boxes of tapes, or cards, and actually
stored three of them away in the bag.
Rosy Porras, suddenly unhappy, left the room and retraced the route by which they'd progressed
through the building.
Everything looked the same.
He returned to the door by which they had entered, and opened it a fraction to peer out along the
darkened street.
There were three hovercars that hadn't been present earlier, parked out there.
He closed the door quickly. His face was expressionless. The gun slid into his hand as though
wizard-commanded. He stood for a long moment in thought, then moved in quick decision.
He paralleled the wall for several hundred feet, along the semidark hallway, then stopped by a
window. It took a while for his eyes to accustom themselves to the dark outside. Across the road was a
small park, benches, trees, bushes, a small fountain.
There was a man quietly sitting on a bench alone. After a time Rosy Porras was able to make out
two other figures standing behind tree trunks.
There was no doubt about how things stood now. The whole thing had pickled. Rosy moistened dry
lips.
He hurried back to the room where Mary Zogbaum labored over the punched cards and tape files.
Pop Rasch still slumbered fitfully.