"Jack Williamson - The Happiest Creature" - читать интересную книгу автора (Williamson Jack)

bullets on the walls had been covered with new plaster, and the whole station was
shining with fresh paint, like everything else in town.
He reached for the gun when he saw the slight dark boy coming from the grease
rack, wiping his hands on a rag. It was Carmen's brother Tony, smiling with an
envious adoration at the yellow Cadillac. Tony had always been wild about cars.
"Yes, sir! Fill her up?" Tony recognized him then, and dropped the greasy rag.
"Casey James!" He ran out across the driveway. "Carmen told us you'd be home!"
He was raising the gun to shoot when he saw that the boy only wanted to shake
his hand. He hid the gun hastily; it wasn't Tony that he had come to kill.
"We read all about your pardon." Tony stood grinning at him, caressing the side
of the shining car lovingly. "A shame the way you were framed, but we'll all try to
make it up to you now." The boy's glowing eyes swept the long car. "Want me to fill
her up?"
"No!" he muttered hoarsely. "Gabe Melendez—don't he still work here?"
"Sure, Mr. James," Tony drew back quickly, as if the car had somehow burned
his delicate brown hands. "Eight to five, but he isn't here yet. His home is that white
stucco beyond the acequia madre."
"I know. "
He gunned the car. It lurched back into the street, roared across the acequia
bridge, skidded to a screaming stop in front of the white stucco. He dropped the
gun into the side pocket of his coat and ran to the door, grinning expectantly.
Gabe would be taken by surprise. The outsiders had set it up for him very
cleverly, with all their manufactured evidences that he had been innocent of any
crime at all, and Gabe wasn't likely to be armed.
The door opened before he could touch the bell, but it was only Carmen. Carmen,
pale without her makeup but beautiful anyhow, yawning sleepily in sheer pink
pajamas that were half unbuttoned. She gasped when she saw him.
"Casey!" Strangely, she was smiling. "I knew you'd come!"
She swayed toward him eagerly, as if she expected him to take her in his arms, but
he stood still, thinking of how she had watched him in the courtroom, all through his
trial for killing her father, with pitiless hate in her dark eyes. He didn't understand it,
but old puffy-guts had somehow changed her.
 "Oh!" She turned pink and buttoned her pajamas hastily. "No wonder you were
staring, but I'm so excited. I've been longing for you so. Come on in, darling. I'll get
something on and make us some breakfast."
"Wait a minute!"
He shook his head, scowling at her, annoyed at the out-siders. They had
somehow cheated him. He wanted Carmen, but not this way. He wanted to fight
Gabe to take her. He wanted her to go on hating him, so that he would have to beat
and frighten her. Old blubber-belly had been too clever and done too much.
"Where's Gabe?" He reached in his pocket to grip the cold gun. "I gotta see
Gabe."
"Don't worry, darling." Her tawny shoulders shrugged becomingly. "Gabriel isn't
here. He won't be here any more. You see, dear, the state cops talked to me a lot
while they were here digging up the evidence to clear you. It came over me then that
you had always been the one I loved. When I told Gabriel, he moved out. He's living
down at the hotel now, and we're getting a divorce right away, so you don't have to
worry about him."
"
I gotta see him, anyhow. "