"Chalker, Jack L - Soul 1 - Spirits Of Flux And Anchor" - читать интересную книгу автора (Chalker Jack L)

to bring it out. He didn't usually let it get the

Jack L. Chalker

12

better of him, though, unless he'd been drinking,
and while she braced for at least a hard and foul
tongue-lashing, it never came. Like everyone else
in Anchor Logh, her father had once been The Age
himself, facing his own Census. As rough as he was
now, and he'd been even rougher back then, he
knew what the sight of a stringer this close to Cen-
sus would have done to him back then, and he was
never the sort of man to hold anyone to a higher
standard than that to which he held himself.

Instead he said, "Welt, don't fret about it. The
Holy Mother knows you got enough on your mind
right now."

Feeling very relieved, she decided she should
make amends anyway and so she responded, "Want
me to go back out there now? I don't mind. I got
nothing much to do."

"Naw, that's all right. I hav'ta go out there my-
self in an hour or two anyway, and if there's any-
thing I guess it'll wait 'til then. You just get along
now and enjoy yourself."

She thought for a moment, the crisis already far
in the past in her mind, and decided to take advan-
tage of her father's unusual good nature. "Maybe I
could takл Leanspot into the city, then? I got to
return some books to the Temple library and pick
up some others."

He thought it over. Under ordinary circumstances
he'd have given a flat no, but she was The Age, and
if she couldn't take care of herself and gain self-
confidence now, she sure as hell better know it.

"Yeah, sure," he said at last. "Take all the time
you want. But if you stay past nightfall, you'd best
stay at the Temple overnight. With this crowd
coming in and Census coming up you don't want
to take no chances, you hear?"

She nodded soberly. "I promise."