"Kenneth Robeson - Doc Savage 165 - The Devil is Jones" - читать интересную книгу автора (Robeson Kenneth)

He thought about Paul Ben Hazard, whom he did not know personally, whom he had never met, but
about whom he had taken the precaution of learning quite a lot. A State Senate committee, quite a few
years ago, more than twenty years ago, in fact, had brought Hazard in from the East, from New York,
one rumor had it—another rumor, probably untrue, had it from London—to conduct a special and
touchy investigation of a state insurance scandal. The result, he understood, was that Hazard had scared
the daylights out of quite a few—this was back in the days when the state was dominated by the Kansas
City and St. Louis machines, and state politics was no place for amateurs or babies. Paul Ben Hazard
has remained. He had liked the state. Hazard, as temperamental as an opera star, as neurotic as they
come, had proved to be a confusing quantity to the hardfisted state bosses, and he had survived and they
hadn't.

Rumor had it that, by now, Paul Ben Hazard had managed to do something to, or something for, almost
everyone of importance in the state, and so he wielded a shocking amount of influence, some of it in
quarters where one wouldn't have expected it. He was a man, who, when he wanted something for the
state, used methods as direct as those of Jesse James, and on the other hand could be so benevolent it
seemed crazy. Calloway College, here in the capital, for instance, was said to be supported entirely out
of Hazard's pocket. The man was a remarkable combination of different qualities, some pixilated and
some of god-like benevolence, the reports had it, and he was unquestionably the strongest political boss
in the nation. It was said that nobody in the state, from governor to justice of the peace, took a deep
breath except by arrangement with Paul Ben Hazard.

He said, “How long does this lecture tour and preview continue?”

The office girl frowned and said, “It need go no further, because I do not think it is doing you any good.”

She went to the door, rapped on it precisely and lightly, then opened the door and went in, closing the
door behind her. She was out again presently, though.

“You may go in,” she said. “But don't shake hands unless he makes the offer first.”

“Good afternoon, Mr. Savage,” Paul Ben Hazard said loudly.

The man looked to be nine feet tall, although he was probably well under seven, and as skinny as a
well-ridden witch's broomstick.

“Good afternoon.”

“Sit down.”

“Thank you.”

Except for being very tall, he decided that Paul Ben Hazard looked—the monochromatism of personality
was somehow a shocking surprise—about the way any other normal tall man would look. Hazard was
homely, but not spectacularly so, nor historically, for he did not, as someone had said, greatly resemble
Abraham Lincoln.

Hazard did not offer to shake hands. The window drapes were thrown back, letting the southern sunlight
flood the office, and he was a little surprised when Hazard said suddenly, “I detest shadows, and have a
perverse inclination to see them when in evil fettle. I defy that. I make a practice, once each hour, of