"Paul Di Filippo - A year in the Linnear City" - читать интересную книгу автора (Di Filippo Paul)

тАЬSure, Lyle. Save me a bunch of green ones, and I'll pick them up later today.тАЭ
Diego rucked up his jacket collar against the chill and made to move off, but Gimlett stopped him with a
hand on Diego's elbow. The grocer leaned in conspiratorially and said, тАЬAny chance you and your pals
will be getting more of these soon?тАЭ

From beneath the bib of his white stained apron, Gimlett produced an odd locket. Strung on a leather
cord threaded through a drilled hole, a thick iridescent reptilian scale big as a fat potato chip shimmered
in chromatic uncertainty across most of the spectrum.

Diego flinched from the sight. Bad memories of dire times, when he had been down on his luck and
willing to take risks that nowadays appeared unacceptable, tumbled out of the mental attic trunks where
he had thought them safely stored.

тАЬIтАФyou need to talk to Zohar Kush about more scales.тАЭ

тАЬFine, fine, you both come around some evening after the store's closed. I'll give you a good price for
them, since I can sell as many of these as you can get me. People always need a little good luck. Here,
take an apple, Diego.тАЭ

Diego accepted the fruit and hustled off. But once out of sight of Gimlett, he consigned the fruit to the
gutter, despite his hunger, where it sat cradled in dirty winter icy suspension like an insouciant autumn
orphan.
****
The gelidly slick blacktop of Broadway hosted its usual complement of pushcarts and cyclists struggling
through the chunky slop, as well as the occasional oddball electrical buggy cobbled together by one
journeyman ingeniator or another, for the inventor's own use or a client's. (These one-of-a-kind vehicles
ranged from tiny single-rider buckboards not much bigger than a bicycle-wheeled couch to the elaborate
charabanque crafted by Tolkan Sinsalida and owned by Mayor Copperknob.) Heading downtown,
Diego felt the steadily rising Daysun in a clean sky warm his shoulders as the orb made its regular slow
transit over Broadway from Uptown morning ascension to Downtown evening decline. Muscles
loosened, and he registered surprise that he had been hunching them at all. His father's morose long
dying, Gimlett's greedy unsettling requestтАФboth barbs must have sunk into him and twisted.

Sighting the newsstand where he gave his trade, chock-a-block with colorful mags, Diego suddenly
realized that today marked the publication of a new issue of his favorite magazine, Mirror Worlds.
Moreover, said issue would contain a new story by none other than Diego Patchen, voted by the readers
of MW as their favorite writer the past two months running! Picking up his pace, Diego hastened to the
stand, to be greeted by Snarky Chuff.

Clad in numerous layers against the chill, including several scarves, two pairs of soiled fingerless gloves
and an assortment of mad-patterned clashing shirts and trousers, Chuff maintained his overpacked stand
under all weathers, from well before Daysunup to the hour when crowds of theatergoers streamed
homeward. Diego imagined that the smallish, good-natured, ageless vendor slept somewhere within the
sturdy but makeshift structure, and found it impossible, despite straining his considerable professional
talents, to visualize him in any other locale.

тАЬDiego my friend!тАЭ called Chuff, efficiently dealing out newspapers and journals to customers as he
chatted. тАЬFresh issue of your mag here! Already sold three today, on the strength of your byline. And the
new story looks a corker!тАЭ