"Michelle West - The Confidence Game" - читать интересную книгу автора (West Michelle)

When he found the shop, he discovered that it had rained the night before, a rain he had not heard or
remembered, and with his head still muddied he was unable to make any sense of the smeared script on
the crinkled scraps of paper. Desperation kept him from leaving. He stared at the notices, counting them
over and over, trying to tell himself that he’d be able to read them once the pain in his head went away.
Tod didn’t realize how long he had lingered at the printer’s doorstep until he heard Keller call out to him,
in a gruff, rattling voice like wheels on cobblestones, “Well, if you’re just going to stand and block up my
door, come give a hand here.”

Tod at first became a runner for Keller, delivering the printer’s wares to his customers. He had been at
the doors of every Lesser Hall of Justice in the town of Origh, every clerk’s office, even the Great
Hall—just once, when he stood at the mouth of the servants’ tunnel, at the foot of the enormous flight of
stairs reaching upward to the giant hallowed doors. It had been a simple job, and he’d had almost no
delays, even when gin-lost. He never betrayed his illegal habit by failing to deliver an order. Then Morrn
was arrested and Tod could no longer pay the landlord.

He went to Keller’s shop to ask his employer’s leave, expecting he would have to return permanently to
his father’s house. But the printer did not give his leave. Tod had waited as Keller walked about his shop,
sorting through drawers and boxes of type, clinking metal letters together as he searched for something.
Finally he drew out a pouch, upended it, and dumped its contents in a shower of scattered words, and
tossed the pouch to Tod. Tod caught it, barely, not understanding.

“Were you sober when you made that?” Keller asked.

Tod looked at the pouch, vaguely remembering having stitched it from a scrap of irregular leather. It was
badly matched, poorly colored, but the stitches were even and straight. “More or less,” he answered.

The printer had approached him then, crossing the room in long strides, and he grasped Tod’s head with
his inky hands. He looked at Tod, holding his head so Tod couldn’t look away, and examined his eyes as
he might examine a page he’d printed. “Are you now?” Keller had asked.

Tod had nodded solemnly.

“Then try this for me,” Keller said, releasing Tod’s face and hunting out some thread, a glover’s needle,
and sheets of paper he had discarded for stains or errors. He folded the sheets into fourths and made
quarrels by nesting them inside each other. “I did this once, years ago,” Keller told Tod, in the broken
speech he lapsed into while working, words strung out like the metal letters scattered on his worktable,
“but it takes time. A lot of time.” He threaded the needle and stabbed it through the sheets at their fold.

“I think I have time,” Tod replied.

Keller had worked for the Justices all his life; he knew how to manage them. He marketed Tod’s
services to them for less than their own bookbinders were paid, and when Tod’s work became known
for its quality, Keller raised his rates. What Keller hadn’t known was that one of the displaced
bookbinders was a relative of Tod’s landlord, and the landlord raised his rent. Tod found a new tenant to
sublet the lower floor to and went on with his work.

What he worked on now, late at night, was not a job for hire. It was a book of his own, an unusual
book, irregularly bound, made up of notices and sheets of different sizes, leaves saved from a journal
he’d written as a child. He was almost ready to cover it, but now he thought he wanted to add more
pages. It was not yet finished.