"E. C. Tubb - Dumarest 20 - Web of Sand" - читать интересную книгу автора (Tubb E. C)

"You there!" His manager, eager for trade, thrust his hand
toward Dumarest. "A hundred kren if you last a minute. Five
hundred if you leave the ring the winner. Your friends can see
fair play."

"Five hundred," said Kemmer. "For a smashed face and
broken bones."

For bruises and internal injuries; a ruptured liver or spleen,
broken ribs thrusting jagged ends into lungs and membranes.

The boxer had fists like hammers and would use them as
such. Dumarest studied the face and eyes, seeing and
recognizing the dullness, the lack of interest. A man who had
fought too hard and too often. A living machine lacking sense
and feeling. One day the ruined cells in his brain would send him
toppling in paralysis or death; until then he was fit for nothing
but to kill.

Santis said, "Why isn't he fighting in the arena?"

"He is too gentle," said the manager quickly. "Too reluctant to
hurt. A kindly creature who wants only to demonstrate his skill.
Win and you will be paid. Lose and you can tell all your friends
that you have faced and fought with a champion."

"For a hundred kren, you say?" A burly youth with a painted
girl hanging on his arm, eager to display his masculinity and win
her favors, thrust himself toward the booth. "A hundred?"

"Last for a single minute and it's yours. Five times as much if
you win. Step forward now! Hurry! Hurry!"

Dumarest moved on as the youth, pressed by a crowd eager to
see blood and pain, entered the booth followed by those willing
to pay to watch the combat. He could win if the boxer retained
the ability to soften his blows and the manager had the sense to
prime the crowd. An easy victory to encourage others to fight
and their companions to bet. If so the youth would be lucky—but
Dumarest wouldn't bet on it.

Santis said, "Ten years ago I might have taken him on. I was
always good at unarmed combat."
 "For five hundred? It isn't enough." Kemmer stepped to one
side to allow a tall man with a strained and painted face a direct
passage. The man had eyes like blank windows, the pupils
enormous, a rim of white showing around the contracted iris.
Froth edged his writhing lips and his hands, like claws, snapped
at the air before him. Drugged, in delusion such a man could be
dangerous. Uneasily he said, "Earl, are we close?"