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

anyplace with that. A stub didn't take you anywhere. It only told you where
you had been.
Where you had been!
He bent down, peering at it, smoothing the creases. The printing had
been torn through the middle. Only part of each word could be made out.

PORTOLA T
STUARTSVI
IOW

He smiled. That was it. Where he had been. He could fill in the missing
letters. It was enough. There was no doubt: he had foreseen this, too. Three
of the seven trinkets used. Four left. Stuartsville, Iowa. Was there such a
place? He looked out the window of the bus. The Intercity rocket station was
only a block or so away. He could be there in a second. A quick sprint from
the bus, hoping the Police wouldn't be there to stop him --
But somehow he knew they wouldn't. Not with the other four things in
his pocket. And once he was on the rocket he would be safe. Intercity was
big, big enough to keep free of the SP. Jennings put the remaining trinkets
back into his pocket and stood up, pulling the bellcord.
A moment later he stepped gingerly out onto the sidewalk.

The rocket let him off at the edge of town, at a tiny brown field. A
few disinterested porters moved about, stacking luggage, resting from the
heat of the sun.
Jennings crossed the field to the waiting room, studying the people
around him. Ordinary people, workmen, businessmen, housewives. Stuartsville
was a small middle Western town. Truck drivers. High school kids.
He went through the waiting room, out onto the street. So this was
where Rethrick's Plant was located - perhaps. If he had used the stub
correctly. Anyhow, something was here, or he wouldn't have included the stub
with the other trinkets.
Stuartsville, Iowa. A faint plan was beginning to form in the back of
his mind, still vague and nebulous. He began to walk, his hands in his
pockets, looking around him. A newspaper office, lunch counters, hotels,
poolrooms, a barber shop, a television repair shop. A rocket sales store
with huge showrooms of gleaming rockets. Family size. And at the end of the
block the Portola Theater.
The town thinned out. Farms, fields. Miles of green country. In the sky
above a few transport rockets lumbered, carrying farm supplies and equipment
back and forth. A small, unimportant town. Just right for Rethrick
Construction. The Plant would be lost here, away from the city, away from
the SP.
Jennings walked back. He entered a lunchroom, BOB'S PLACE. A young man
with glasses came over as he sat down at the counter, wiping his hands on
his white apron.
"Coffee," Jennings said.
"Coffee." The man brought the cup. There were only a few people in the
lunchroom. A couple of flies buzzed, against the window.
Outside in the street shoppers and farmers moved leisurely by.