"Adams, Douglas -- So Long and Thanks for All The Fish (4)" - читать интересную книгу автора (Adams Douglas)

well. The lost figure, shivering desperately, presently reached a
junction, where a side road turned off to the left. Opposite the
turning stood a signpost which the figure suddenly hurried to and
studied with feverish curiosity, only twisting away from it as
another car passed suddenly.

And another.

The first whisked by with complete disregard, the second flashed
meaninglessly. A Ford Cortina passed and put on its brakes.

Lurching with surprise, the figure bundled his bag to his chest
and hurried forward towards the car, but at the last moment the
Cortina span its wheels in the wet and carreered off up the road
rather amusingly.

The figure slowed to a stop and stood there, lost and dejected.

As it chanced, the following day the driver of the Cortina went
into hospital to have his appendix out, only due to a rather
amusing mix up the surgeon removed his leg in error, and before
the appendectomy could be rescheduled, the appendicitis
complicated into an entertainingly serious case of peritonitis
and justice, in its way, was served.

The figure trudged on.

A Saab drew to a halt beside him.

Its window wound down and a friendly voice said, "Have you come
far?"

The figure turned toward it. He stopped and grasped the handle of
the door.

The figure, the car and its door handle were all on a planet
called the Earth, a world whose entire entry in the Hitch Hiker's
Guide to the Galaxy comprised the two words "Mostly harmless".

The man who wrote this entry was called Ford Prefect, and he was
at this precise moment on a far from harmless world, sitting in a
far from harmless bar, recklessly causing trouble.

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Chapter 4

Whether it was because he was drunk, ill or suicidally insane
would not have been apparent to a casual observer, and indeed
there were no casual observers in the Old Pink Dog Bar on the
lower South Side of Han Dold City because it wasn't the sort of