"Child Of The Stones" - читать интересную книгу автора (Mcauley Paul J)

When she had entered my house, squeezing past me at the door, I had taken the opportunity to pick the pocket of her hooded top. I placed her mobile phone and travel card on the table, and said, УYou donТt live as long as I do without learning a few tricks necessary for survival.Ф

УI knew you took those,Ф she said, but could not quite hide her twitch of alarm, and clearly did not know what I had done to her mobile phone, for otherwise she would not have put it straight in her pocket.

УYou think that I am old-fashioned, which in a way is true enough, but it does not mean that I am out of touch with the world. And there is a good, practical reason why I do not have electricity here, nor a telephone nor any of the paraphernalia of modern life. Electricity attracts imps and other nuisances. You must know this. Look at any street lamp at night, and you will see more than moths whirling around the light.Ф

УYou didnТt know who that the bloke who talked to you last night was. And I bet you donТt know who Donny Halliwell works for these days, do you?Ф

УI am sure that I can find that out without your help. I have extensive resources, and a man who is able break my wards will be well known in the circles in which I move.Ф

Miranda rose to my bait. УMy mum knows all about him, and I bet she doesnТt move in those СcirclesТ. У

УYou wish to make a bargain, is that it? You will help me, and I will help you, turn and turn about.Ф

УShake on it,Ф Miranda said, and stuck out her hand.

I smiled at her boldness and took her hand and shook it, knowing that the bargain meant nothing to either of us.

Miranda told me that Donny Halliwell had met a pop star while he was in prison. The pop star, Rainer Sue, had been serving a short sentence for possession of a variety of Class A drugs; Donny Halliwell had been coming to the end of a longer sentence for extracting money with menaces from restaurants in North London. When he had been freed, heТd gone to work for Rainer Sue, now a recluse in his house in Cheyne Walk, one of ChelseaТs most exclusive addresses, as a bodyguard and a general fixer.

УHow do you know so much about these people?Ф

УMy mum was keen on old Rainer when she was my age, back in the 1980s. But he ainТt done nothing in years and years except go to parties and film premieres and like that. My mum, she comes home with a few inside her or she sees his picture in Hello! or whatever, and she puts on one of his CDs and goes all smoochy. ItТs real bad stuff though, tinny synthesizers and like a drum machine and saxophones. Bad as in shit, not like in good.Ф

УI know what bad means.Ф

УI bet you donТt. Anyway, thatТs why I know about Donny Halliwell, and about the Jag too.Ф

УThe Mark I Jaguar.Ф

Miranda pretended to be surprised.

УI do try to keep up,Ф I said.

УHas personalized number plates, doesnТt it? RA 1 NR. I see that straight away, and know who owns it. Anyway, the thing about Rainer Sue is that heТs famous for being into weird shit. He wasnТt exactly a Goth back in the day, but he dressed like Christopher Lee in those old Dracula movies, had skulls and coffins and lots of candles on stage, shit like that, yeah? I suppose he found out about you, thought you had something he wanted, is that it?Ф

УHe wished to purchase a book that I own.Ф

УYeah? Like a book of spells?Ф

УIn a way. The Stenographia is the masterwork of a monk and magician who called himself Trithemius, and contains codes and conjurations and various prayers which its author claimed could cause angels to act on behalf of those deploying them. My copy is not of the much corrupted edition that was published long after TrithemiusТs death, in 1676, but one of only five volumes printed in 1504, the year before he was summoned before Maximillian I and interrogated on matters of faith. Mr Halliwell - or the man for whom he works - probably traced it through the records of the auction house where I purchased it some twenty years ago.Ф

УEver tried any of those spells out?Ф Miranda tried to sound casual, but her eyes were shining.

УOf course not. If you were in possession of a bomb, would you try to detonate it to see if it worked?Ф

У СCourse I would. And I wouldnТt leave it in a house with an unlocked door, neither.Ф

УThe house was protected by more than mere locks, as you well know, but I will admit that you have a valid point.Ф