"Джон Варли. Платежное поручение(engl) " - читать интересную книгу автора

the lock fused and smoking. Jennings tumbled into the street and leaped to
his feet. Cruisers were all around him, honking and sweeping past. He ducked
behind a lumbering truck, entering the middle lane of traffic. On the
sidewalk he caught a momentary glimpse of the SP men starting after him.
A bus came along, swaying from side to side, loaded with shoppers and
workers. Jennings caught hold of the back rail, pulling himself up onto the
platform. Astonished faces loomed up, pale moons thrust suddenly at him. The
robot conductor was coming toward him, whirring angrily.
"Sir --" the conductor began. The bus was slowing down. "Sir, it is not
allowed --"
"It's all right," Jennings said. He was filled, all at once, with a
strange elation. A moment ago he had been trapped, with no way to escape.
Two years of his life had been lost for nothing. The Security Police had
arrested him, demanding information he couldn't give. A hopeless situation!
But now things were beginning to click in his mind.
He reached into his pocket and brought out the bus token. He put it
calmly into the conductor's coin slot.
"Okay?" he said. Under his feet the bus wavered, the driver hesitating.
Then the bus resumed pace, going on. The conductor turned away, its whirrs
subsiding. Everything was all right. Jennings smiled. He eased past the
standing people, looking for a seat, some place to sit down. Where he could
think.
He had plenty to think about. His mind was racing.
The bus moved on, flowing with the restless stream of urban traffic.
Jennings only half saw the people sitting around him. There was no doubt of
it: he had not been swindled. It was on the level. The decision had actually
been his. Amazingly, after two years of work he had preferred a handful of
trinkets instead of fifty thousand credits. But more amazingly, the handful
of trinkets were turning out to be worth more than the money.
With a piece of wire and a bus token he had escaped from the Security
Police. That was worth plenty. Money would have been useless to him once he
disappeared inside the great stone Station. Even fifty thousand credits
wouldn't have helped him. And there were five trinkets left. He felt around
in his pocket. Five more things. He had used two. The others - what were
they for? Something as important?
But the big puzzle: how had he - his earlier self - known that a
piece of wire and a bus token would save his life?" He had known, all right.
Known in advance. But how? And the other five. Probably they were just as
precious, or would be.
The he of those two years had known things that he did not know now,
things that had been washed away when the company cleaned his mind. Like an
adding machine which had been cleared. Everything was slate-clean. What he
had known was gone, now. Gone, except for seven trinkets, five of which were
still in his pocket.
But the real problem right now was not a problem of speculation. It was
very concrete. The Security Police were looking for him. They had his name
and description. There was no use thinking of going to his apartment - if
he even still had an apartment. But where, then? Hotels? The SP combed them
daily. Friends? That would mean putting them in jeopardy, along with him. It
was only a question of time before the SP found him, walking along the