"Kristine Kathryn Rusch - Crunchers, Inc." - читать интересную книгу автора (Rusch Kristine Kathryn)

CRUNCHERS, INC. by KRISTINE KATHRYN RUSCH

This past spring was a fruitful time for Kristine Kathryn Rusch. In addition to seeing
her well-received fantasy novelette, “Except the Music,” in our April/May issue, she
had the lead story in the March/April Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine and the cover
story in the April Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine. In her latest tale, she returns
to science fiction to investigate life’s balance sheets.

****

The scream from the middle office was loud and long.

“Damn,” said Edith. “We’ve just lost another one.”

Sure enough, Reginald Waterston burst out of the office, slamming the door
against the wall—the windowed one, with the expensive glass that formed its own
shutters.

He stopped at Edith’s desk—they all stopped at her desk, for reasons she
never quite fathomed—and said, “My grandfather gave me a horse!”

Edith resisted the urge to roll her eyes. She folded her hands on top of the file
that she hadn’t been studying, and leaned forward. The computer built into her
desktop beeped, letting her know that, on its screen, it already had Reginald’s
personnel file, his suggested severance pay, and his recommendation letter.

“A real horse?” she said, pretending interest in Reginald Waterson’s
revelation.

“A plastic horse. From 1942. It had no chips in the paint at all.” Reginald
Waterston was forty-two himself, balding, with a tummy that needed a bit of tuck.
His suit fit loosely—something Edith would have told him to change if she had been
his company advisor—and he needed to trim his fingernails.

Employees five cubicles over slid their chairs toward the aisle. People were
leaning around the ancient gray formations, so that all she could see were eyes.

Rows and rows of eyes.

It was different every time, with every single Actuarial Engineer. And everyone
except Edith thought these outbursts were interesting.

Edith resisted the urge to sigh. She needed Reginald to get the point, and if
she followed his inane line of reasoning, she would be listening to the poor man all
day.
 “This horse is important because—?”

“It’s the only thing I ever got from him.” Reginald had to mean the
grandfather, not the horse.