"Charles L. Grant - Glow of Candles, Unicorn's eye" - читать интересную книгу автора (Grant Charles L)

I fell, gasping, spitting out water, then rolled onto my back and stared at my hands. They
were bloody, and I sat up abruptly, looking around wildly for someone to patch me.
This was not supposed to happen.
I was to be strong, clever, luring the beast to its drowning... but I was not supposed to
be clawed.
Immediately, a white-coated tech raced out from behind me and waded into the water with
two assistants, the better to lug the simulacrum back to the shop for another repair job and, I
imagined, another shot at another sucker like me. A fourth man, his shirt and trousers rumpled and
soiled, wandered over to me and slapped in quick succession antiseptic and medpatches onto my
injuries. I smiled at him. He scowled. I knew what was bothering him. If I couldn't be cajoled
into doing it again, he would have to do some pretty fancy editing to keep the blood from showing.
I think he expected me to feel sorry for him. As though it were my fault.
And when he was done, with not a word of condolence, or, even of encouragement, I moved
stiffly back to my rock and sat, waiting with dripping hair while those clouds waited to soak me
until, finally, the artfully gnarled bole of a beautiful oak on the opposite bank split open with
a zipperlike tear, r and the director stepped out.
"Great," I muttered, and dropped my hands into my lap.
The director paused for a moment as if reorienting him- .. self, sighed, and retrieved a
powered megaphone from the ' rushes on the riverbank. He sniffed, looked everywhere but at me, and
yanked a crimson beret down hard over an impossibly battered left ear. '
"You're Gordon Anderson, right?" The voice should have '' been godlike, undei the
circumstances. Unfortunately, it
wasn't. It squeaked. i
I nodded.
"You okay?"
Bless you, I thought sourly, and nodded. .
"Shouldn't have done that."
I didn't know whether he meant me or the tiger.
"Gordon Anderson," he said again, as if tasting it for some hint of its flavor, or for


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some trace of its poison.
He stared at the sky, sighed once more, and then I aealized I was expected to stand up.
That I refused to do. The last . time I was naked and standing, my female costar had nearly
strangled laughing. It had almost cost me the job, but she had felt sorry for me and blamed it on
her lunch.
Besides, those patches weren't new. The antiseptic was weak and I was hurting, badly.
Meanwhile, the squeaking continued.
"Sorry about the animal, but you're supposed to be experienced at this sort of thing,
Anderson. That's what they told me at casting. You're supposed to be experienced. A stage actor,
right? You're supposed to know about these things, Anderson, if I know anything about that sort
of... living, Am I getting through to you, Anderson? You're supposed to know!"
I could think of little more to do at the moment but nod again. My fingers kept returning
to the patches, touching, pressing, wondering how I was supposed to handle the flood sequence
without ripping open the bandages and bleeding to death. I would see the Diagmed people afterward,
of course, but I had a feeling they could do nothing for me. The healing would be speeded up, but