"Harry Harrison - SSR 09 - The Stainless Steel Rat Goes to He" - читать интересную книгу автора (Harrison Harry)

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CHAPTER 1

I POURED A GOOD MEASURE of whiskey over the ice, scowled at it-then added a splash more.
But, as I lifted the glass and drank it with glugging pleasure, my raised eyes drifted across the
clock that was set into the wall above the bar. It was just ten in the morning.
"My, my, Jim, you are hitting the sauce a little earlier each day," I growled wordlessly.
So what? It was my liver wasn't it? I gurgled the glass empty just as the house computer spoke to
me in rich, educated-and possibly sneering?-tones.
"Someone is approaching the front door, Sire."
"Great. Perhaps it is the booze shop delivery?" Venom dripped from my voice; but all
Computers are immune to sarcasm.
"Indeed not, Sire, for Garry's Grog and Groceries delivers by freight tube. I identify the
person approaching as Rowena Vinicultura. She has stopped her popcar on the front lawn and is
emerging from it."
My morale plummeted as the name slithered across my eardrums. Of all the beautiful bores
on Lussuoso, Rowena was possibly the most beautiful-and certainly the most boring. I had to flee-
or commit suicide-before she came in. I was already heading for the back of the house, to possibly
drown myself in the swimming pool, when the housebot's computer voice stopped me in my tracks.
"Ms. Vinicultura appears to have fallen down onto the plastic mat outside the door that
spells Out WELCOME in six languages."
"What do you mean fallen?"
"I believe the description is an apt one. She closed her eyes and her body became limp.
Then she descended slowly towards the ground and is now lying, unmoving, with her eyes still
closed. Her pulse appears to be slow and irregular as detected by the pressure plate in the mat.
Lacerations and bruises on her face..."
The thing's voice followed me as I ran back through the house.
"Open the door!" I shouted. It swung wide and I dived through.
Her cameo face was pale, her dark hair tousled gracefully, her ample bosom rising and
falling slowly. There was blood on her cheeks and a darkening bruise on her forehead. Her lips
moved and I leaned close.
"Gone she said, barely audible. "Angelina...gone..."
It felt as though my body temperature had dropped thirty degrees. This did not slow me in
the slightest. While I was still reaching down for her I managed to tap the number 666 into my
wrist communicator.
"Where is the home medical treatment center?" I shouted as I slipped my arms under warm
thighs, soft back, and lifted her as carefully as I could.
"The settee in the library, Sire."
I ran, ignoring the cold knot of despair her words had punched into me. Since both
Angelina and I were strenuously healthy we had never used the medical services in this house. I
had glanced at the specs when I signed the rental agreement; with the price we were paying, the
medical arrangements should equal that of a provincial hospital at least. By the time I had
carried Rowena to the library the settee had vanished into the wall and an examining bed had risen
in its place. Even as I laid her on the bed the detectors were snaking down from the medbot that
had popped out of the ceiling. An analyzer fastened onto the back of my neck and I slapped it
away.
"Not me! Her, on the bed, you moronic machine."
I stepped back out of reach while it set to work with mechanical enthusiasm. A glistening
row of readouts sprang to life on the screen. Everything from temperature and pulse to endocrine