"029 (B012) - The Quest of Qui (1935-07) - Lester Dent" - читать интересную книгу автора (Robeson Kenneth)

"Kettler, I tell you I didn't let her go deliberately," the man said earnestly. "She banged me on the head with a rock. Look, you can see where she hit me."



He did not point, but Johnny looked, then blinked, for there was a fearsome bruise on the man's forehead. But the wounded man was still talking.



"She ran away," the man said. "I don't know where she went. I think she went north, back toward Qui. She ain't normal, that dame. But what else can you expect from Qui?"



The man stopped and breathed a little deeper than usual, and the result was a gurgling explosion that shot a crimson spray through his teeth and over the surrounding snow. From the number of blood spots frozen in the snow, that must have happened before. It was more than a minute before he went on.



"Kettler, you can't find Qui again without the golden-haired dame."



He had said that before.



"I couldn't help her scramming, Kettler," he said. "Don't shoot me."



He said that much too calmly.



"Damn you, Kettler," he said. "You've shot me. You left me here to croak. I hope you never get a smell of Qui again."



It was like listening to a story from fully conscious lips. But it was horrible, because of the dead quality of the tone. The man was dying, but dying so slowly that he might go on thus for hours, for days if he got proper treatment. He might not die, even.



"You won't find Qui, Kettler," said the man. "Don't like that, do you? Too bad, ain't it? Qui will go on like it is for maybe another twelve hundred years. Sure it will, when you don't get back to do your killing. Damn your killing, Kettler. I didn't like that part of the scheme."



Then, so suddenly that it surprised Johnny a little, the wounded man's mumbling became unintelligible. A gout of scarlet had worked up in the fellow's throat, and it bubbled there, making the words inarticulate.