"Linda Evans - Time Scout 2 - Wages of Sin" - читать интересную книгу автора (Evans Linda)

hour, moving the gate inexorably along to the next opening two weeks hence.
Marcus hid a shiver, remembering his single trip through that portal to arrive
here. He had never really believed in Rome's strange gods until his final
master had dragged him, terrified and fainting, through the Porta Romae into
La-La Land. Now he knew better and so never failed to give the powerful Roman
gods their proper libations.
"Marcus! Just the person I'm dying to see." Skeeter's grin was infectious
and genuine. Very little else about Skeeter Jackson was, which made him one of
the loneliest people Marcus knew.
"Hello, Skeeter. You wish your favorite beer?" Marcus was so uncomfortable
with Skeeter's lifestyle he tried hard not to mention it, in the probably vain
hope he could save the young a and downtimer from the life he led. Marcus was,
in fact, doubtless the only one in the whole of The Found Ones who offered the
odd young man his friendship. To be raised in two times, then set adrift in a
third ...
Skeeter Jackson was greatly in need of a friend.
So
Marcus, busy as he was with demanding work at the bar and an equally
demanding-but more fun job as the father of two little girls, added a third
Herculean task to his life: the eventual conversion of Skeeter Jackson from
Scoundrel to Honest Man, deserving of the title Found One.
Skeeter's grin widened. "Sure. I won't turn down a beer, you know that."
Both men laughed. "But mostly, I wanted to talk to you. Got a minute?"
Marcus glanced out at the other tables. Most were empty. Nearly everyone
was out on the Commons, watching the fun as La-La Land's Roman gate prepare to
open into the past. Between now and then, a whole series of antics would
unfold as tourists and Time Tours guides and baggage handlers tried to get
through the portal with all their baggage, money purses, and assorted children
still intact, waiting impatiently while much of the previous tour exited the
Porta Romae in staggering, white-faced clumps. The rest coming back through
were fine, swaggering down the ramp like aloof, supremely self-confident Roman
Senators.
Marcus shook off his mental astonishment that every tour came back like
this, some pleased as kittens with a bowl of cream and others ... Well, the
drawings circulating amongst The Found Ones said it all, didn't they?
Marcus smiled at Skeeter, who waited hopefully.
"Of course. Let me get the beer for you, please."
"Get one for yourself, too. I'm buying."
Oh-oh. Marcus hid a grin. Skeeter wanted something. He was a thoroughgoing
scoundrel, was Skeeter Jackson, but Marcus understood why, something most
'eighty-sixers didn't. Not even most Found Ones knew. Marcus hadn't even told
Ianira, although with his beautiful Ianira, what she did or did not know was
always a complete mystery to Marcus.
Skeeter had been so drunk that night, he probably didn't remember
everything he'd said. But Marcus did. So he kept trying, hope against hope, to
befriend Skeeter Jackson, asking the gods who had watched over his own life to
help his friend finally figure it all out-and do something about it besides
swindle, cheat, and steal his way toward the grave.
Marcus set down Skeeter's beer first, then took a chair opposite and seated
himself, waiting as was appropriate for Skeeter to drink first. Skeeter had