"Jack Dann - Blind Shemmy" - читать интересную книгу автора (Dann Jack)

"Do you wish to watch or participate, Monsieur Pfeiffer?" he asked, seeming to rise an inch from
the chair as he spoke.
"I wish to play," Pfeiffer said, standing upon the rug as if he had to be positioned just right to
make it fly.
"And does your friend wish to watch?" the man asked, as Joan crossed the room to stand beside
Pfeiffer. "Or will you give your permission for Miz Otur to become telepathically connected to
you." His voice didn't rise as he asked the question.
"I beg your pardon?"
"A psyconnection, sir. With a psyconductor"-a note of condescension crept into his voice.
"I know what it is, and I don't want it," Pfeiffer snapped and then moved away from Joan. But a
cerebral hook-in was, in fact, just what Joan had hoped for.
"Oh, come on," Joan said. "Let me in."
"Are you serious?" he asked, turning toward her.
Caught by the intensity of his stare, she could only nod. "Then I'm sorry. I'm not a window for
you to stare through."
That stung her, and she retorted, "Have you ever done it with your wife?" She immediately
regretted her words.
The man at the desk cleared his throat politely. "Excuse me, monsieur, but are you aware that only
games organe are played in these rooms?"
"Yes, that's why I've come to your house."
"Then, you are perhaps not aware that all our games are conducted with psyconductors on this
floor.
Pfeiffer, looking perplexed, said, "Perhaps you had better explain it to me."
"Of course, of course," the man said, beaming, as if he had just won the battle and a fortune.
"There are, of course, many ways to play, and, if you like, I can give you the address of a very
nice house nearby where you can play a fair, safe game without hook-ins. Shall I make a
reservation for you there?"
"Not just yet," Pfeiffer said, resting his hands, knuckles down, upon the flat-top Louis XVI desk.
His feet seemed to be swallowed by the floral patterns of the rug, and Joan thought it an optical
illusion, this effect of being caught before the desk of the casino captain. She felt the urge to
grab Pfeiffer and take him out of this suffocating place.
Instead, she walked over to him. Perhaps he would relent just a little and let her slide into his
mind.
"It is one of our house rules, however," said the man at the desk, "that you and your opponent, or
opponents, must be physically in the same room."
"Why is that?" Joan asked, feeling Pfeiffer scowling at her for intruding.
"Well," he said, "it has never happened to us, of course
but cheating has occurred on a few long-distance transactions. Organs have been wrongly lost. So
we don't take any chances. None at all." He looked at Pfeiffer as he spoke, obviously sizing him
up, watching for reactions. But Pfeiffer had composed himself, and Joan knew that he had made up
his mind.
"Why must the game be played with psyconductors?" Pfeiffer asked.
"That is the way we do it," said the captain. Then, after an embarrassing pause, he said, "We have
our own games and rules. And our games, we think, are the most interesting. And we make the games
as safe as we can for all parties involved."


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