"Bailey-Conquistador" - читать интересную книгу автора (Bailey Dale)

Finny Tribe Fish Store. But Frank had never called him at work. "Is that you,
Frank?"

"Yes, it's me. Now get down here!"

"But why?"

"I have something to show you!"

"But. Frank, I'm at work. I can't just walk out."

"Well, come at lunch. But come soon!"

"What is it? What have you got?" Frank's excitement was catching. Howard could
hear it in his own voice -- a shrill undercurrent of hysteria.

"You'll see," said Frank. "You'll see when you get here." He hung up.

Howard placed the receiver in its cradle and glared at the report on his desk,
his pleasant reverie of fish irretrievably lost. He looked at the clock. It was
ten thirty-eight. Reluctantly, he began to type. Lunch seemed a very long time
away.

When Howard reached the Finny Tribe, Frank pumped his arm enthusiastically.
"Howard," he said. "Have I got a treat for you." "What? What is it?"

"You'll see," Frank said.

He led Howard back into the interior of the store, past displays of nets and
oxygenators, past a window where dust motes turned in a shaft of sunshine, past
stacks of empty aquariums that gleamed with polished vacuity in the fluorescent
light. As they entered the back room, Howard inhaled deeply, savoring the ripe,
moist, aquarium smell. In that place, with the hundreds of fish secure in their
aquariums, Howard felt young and vigorous and alive, as if the endless weight of
unchanging days had fallen suddenly away.

"Look at it!" Frank said, staring in awe at the large aquarium before them.

Howard stared into the aquarium in amazement.

Within swam a conquistador, a fish Howard had always dreamed of seeing, of
owning. Muscles rippled smoothly as it powered itself through the water and its
scaly hide shimmered in the muted radiance of the aquarium. It arrowed away,
looped under a gnarled coral archway, and came to rest in the water before him,
hovering. Elaborate fins, tapering away into filmy nothingness, billowed along
its four-inch length. Even as Howard looked on in dumb wonder it shrugged the
rainbow-hued crest that swept back from its slim face like the wings of an
angel.

As the conquistador darted away to cruise the perimeter of the tank, Howard was