"Robert Weinberg - Logical Magician 02 - A Calculated Magician" - читать интересную книгу автора (Weinberg Robert)

about.
“What are we going to do with these guys?” he asked. “Explaining their condition to the police
might prove difficult.”
“No problem,” said Merlin, reaching for the telephone. “I’ll use a preserving spell on them so
they won’t decay. There’s a friendly giant who often handles heavy moving jobs for me. I’ll have him
stop by after the building closes and pick up the corpses. He’ll dispose of them for a reasonable fee.”
Sighing, Jack folded his arms across his chest in annoyance. Nine men had died today and it
wasn’t close to suppertime. He felt as if he were living in an Arnold Schwarzenegger movie.
“Continue with your story, Johnnie,” said his mother. She looked at her watch. “But make it
quick. I have a business meeting with Mr. Weissman, the herring importer, in thirty minutes. I dare not be
late. It would make your father furious.”
Jack shook his head. When the real and the imaginary worlds collided, the real world won. His
mom could deal with rampaging assassins without breaking into a sweat. However, the thought of telling
her husband that she had fumbled a business deal was an entirely different matter. He hurried on with his
explanation.
“There’s not much more to tell. In the middle of the thirteenth century, the Assassins made the
fatal mistake of killing two envoys under truce,” He glanced at the two ravens. “Seabury Quinn wrote a
story about the murders. He titled it, ’The Gentle Werewolf.’ ”
“Never heard of it,” said Hugo. “Another one from Weird Tales, I bet.”
“Right,” said Jack. “In any case, the order was crushed by its enemies and Alamut was
destroyed. Few if any members of the cult survived. But by that time it didn’t matter. The Old Man of the
Mountain had achieved legendary status.”
“I understand,” said Megan. As Merlin’s daughter, she was quite familiar with her father’s
theories about mankind’s collective subconscious mind. “People refused to accept the Old Man’s death.
Someone with that name ruled the cult for two centuries. Only an inner circle knew that it was not the
same person. Tens of thousands of people in the region considered him immortal. In time, their belief
created a supernatural being with the uncanny powers described in legends. As in the case of Dietrich
von Bern, the actual human died but later returned as a creature of myth.”
“Dozens of novels have been written in the past fifty years postulating that the Order of Assassins
has survived to this day,” said Jack. “There might be more truth to those books than the authors
imagined. These attacks on me seem to demonstrate that the cult is still in operation,” Jack paused.
“Which means that the Old Man of the Mountain is alive and well and living somewhere in America.”
“Sorry, dear,” said his mother, gathering him up in her arms for another bone-crushing hug, “but
I’ve got to leave. You can tell me the rest later. I’m taking you and Megan out for dinner. A little
celebration for your engagement. Hugo knows where. You birds stay here with Johnnie till then. Assist
him in any way possible. But stay out of trouble.”
His mother stormed out of the office, her face aglow with the joy of a Valkyrie about to engage in
battle. Jack wondered how Mr. Weissman would cope with his mother. Then he remembered his
father’s deft handling of equally enthusiastic salesmen. Maybe his mother was right and today’s
businessmen were the real dragon slayers.
“She acts like we’re not trustworthy,” said Hugo, his feathers ruffled.
“Freda always makes it sound like we encourage violence,” added Mongo.
 “Well, Jack,” asked Cassandra, interrupting the two birds, “what’s the plan?”
“Yeah, boss,” said Hugo, flapping his wings. “Who do we kill next?”
Jack grimaced. “No more violence,” he declared, trying to avoid staring at the bodies on the
floor. Instead, he found himself looking at one of the Uzis dropped by the assassins. It served as a grim
reminder that the killers intended murdering everyone in the office, not just him. Shedding innocent blood
was not one of their primary worries.
“Unless necessary,” he added, knowing he was opening a Pandora’s box by using such language
with supernatural. They bent definitions easier than politicians. “And I mean, absolutely necessary.”