"Ed Howdershelt - 3rd World Products 1" - читать интересную книгу автора (Howdershelt Ed)

тАЬWhy doesn't it surprise me that you don't know what a hustler is? That's what they call someone much
better at a game who shows up to play, especially if they're playing for drinks or money. People can get
ugly about that.тАЭ

Gary looked mildly confused. тАЬWhy should someone's skill at a game cause others to become upset?тАЭ

тАЬYou really don't get out much, do you? Trust me on this. They can and do become upset if they think
the stranger is too much better than the other players. Never let them push you into playing for money
until they've seen you play. A drink, maybe, but not money. At least they can't say later that they weren't
told.тАЭ

I finished that game and we started another game as we talked. Gary seemed to know a little about
damned near everything, but only that very little about any specific topic, and it usually sounded as if he
were reciting memorized facts.

When I tried expanding the conversation a bit concerning upcoming elections, he seemed to know the
names and parties, but appeared to have no opinions. He said that his time aboard ship had made it hard
to keep up with things.

His shooting skill improved greatly rather quickly, but I still managed to win three of the five more games
we played. Toward the end of the third game he didn't miss any more easy shots and damned few of the
harder ones. I said nothing about the unusual speed at which he learned to shoot pool.
When I used a jump shot to loft the cue ball over one of his stripes in one game, Gary mimicked the shot
sometime later without hesitation. He missed, but only by a very narrow margin. I didn't say anything
about that, either.

Susie brought me another beer after our third game. She eyed Gary as she put the beer on our table, then
glanced at me as she passed. I gave her a blank look and she kept going on her way back to the bar.

After a quick glance around to see if anyone needed a refill, she leaned on the bar to watch us play.
Either she'd also noticed Gary's quickness of learning or she just thought he was worth looking at.

Gary might have been a lot of things and Dave's guess about Gary being Navy might have been true, but
something about him didn't ring quite right with me. He reminded me of some of the spooks I'd worked
with in Europe. They'd spoken the languages, worn the Euro clothes from the local stores instead of the
stuff from the American PX/BX, and they'd generally been trained well enough to fake it if contacts with
the locals remained very brief and superficial.

In other times and places I'd learned to rely on my instincts. If something seems wrong about a trail, take
time to figure out what. Leaves turned the wrong way or upside down, for instance, meant that someone
or something has passed that way recently and damaged or moved some of the foliage, perhaps to try to
conceal an ambush. You get to where oddities register and affect your judgment and behavior before
you're consciously aware of them.

Spring Hill and the area within about fifty miles of it in any direction held no military or other government
interests worthy of note. MacDill AFB had closed, so there was nothing left to guard from spies. The
idea of Gary being an off-duty government agent of some sort didn't ring quite right, either.

I took a sip of my beer and said, тАЬGary, there may actually be one man in some branch of the U.S.
military who honestly hasn't played pool, but I'd bet you aren't him. Either you lied about never having