"Niven, Larry & Pournelle, Jerry - Gripping Hand, The" - читать интересную книгу автора (Niven Jennifer)

0 God! I could be bounded in a nutshell, and count myself a king of infinite space, were it not that I have bad dreams.

-William Shakespeare, Hamlet, Act 2, Scene 2


A severed head spun across black sky. He had been a Marine: square jaw, close-cropped blond hair, glittering dead eyes. The slack mouth tried to speak. "Tell them," it said. "Stop them." Vacuum made its skin puffy, and blood made frozen bubbles on the thick neck. "Wake them. Wake them up. Mr. Bury, sir, wake up," it said urgently. The sky swarmed with small six-limbed shapes. They thrashed in the vacuum, found their balance, and swain toward him, past him, toward the battleship Lenin. Vacuum swallowed his scream. "Wake up," they chittered at him. "Please, Excellency, you must wake up."
His Excellency, Horace Hussein Al-Shamlan Bury, Trader and Magnate, jerked and twitched and was sitting upright. He shook his head and forced his eyes open.
The small, dark man was standing a safe distance away. Bury said, "Nabil. What time is it?"
"It's two in the morning, Excellency. Mr. Renner insisted. He said to tell you, 'The gripping hand.'"
Bury blinked. "Is he drunk?"
"Very. I woke Cynthia. She's making espresso for him. I made him take vitamins and drink some water. He was attacked outside the house. We killed all three, Excellency."
"Careless." So: three corpses. At least Renner had some excuse for waking him.
"Mr. Renner was drunk and I was asleep when the alarms rang," Nabil apologized. "Sir, they were using firearms."
"All right. The gripping hand? Renner's been watching too many holoflicks."
"Yes, sir. Excellency, I should be seeing to things,"
"Yes, the bodies. We'll want to know all about those. The gripping hand?" Bury eased out of the water bed. His head spun with the motion, and all his joints creaked in protest. "Ill be right down. Have coffee for me, real coffee. Allah help you both if you woke me for nothing but a mugging."

Renner's fine new Spartan tunic was covered with blood, still wet. He had trouble focusing his eyes. He was already talking as Bury took Turkish coffee from Cynthia and sat down.
"They were waiting outside," he said. "I sent the taxi off and started for the door. Two stepped out of God knows where. One grabbed my arms from behind. One sprayed Peaceable Sam in my face. I think that's what it was; I didn't try to sniff it. Held my breath. Bit the alarm tooth and ejected my sleeve gun and sprayed him back. He fell against me. Sounded like popcorn going off all through his body. That's where all the blood came from. The guy behind me, I sprayed his feet."
Nabil was at a console, monitoring as one of Bury's agents began an autopsy on the first of the dead muggers. He looked up to say, "Mr. Renner had called in that he was coming, so the staff was waiting for him, of course. When we heard the alarm they were ready."
"Ready," Renner said. "Nabil, I haven't thanked you. Horace, he deserves a bonus, Horace."
Bury sipped at sweet Turkish coffee in a tiny cup. Renner gulped at what Nabil had given him: evil black espresso, service for four in a full-sized mug with a lemon slice floating it in. It popped his eyes open and stood his hair on end.
Bury winced, too, just watching. He said, "The gripping hand?"
"The gripping hand. One hand, other hand, gripping hand. I've been hearing it all night. I didn't haul you out of bed to tell you about a god damned mugging."
He could follow Bury's thoughts. Drunk. Not making sense. Then the sense caIne through and the blood drained from Bury's dark face. Renner said, "Hey!" and reached out to steady him.
Bury brushed the hand off. "Report."
Renner sat a little straighter. "I went out to look around, as usual. Dressed fancy. Well-paid pilot to a billionaire trader, carrying money and looking for fun. First-"
"You were doing Renner."
"It's the easy part of my job. Usually."
"Go on."
His lips felt numb and rubbery. Somehow he made them work. "On Maxroy's Purchase a brothel is called an 'interaction nook.' I'd heard about Ressina's. I went there. I didn't want their best girl; I wanted a native. I came away with a lady named Belinda...

Space is vast. Customs change, and every human colony is different. Some slavishly imitate the manners of the Imperial court. Others try to be like their Terran ancestors-or more likely, the way they've been told their Terran ancestors were.
The sun was setting somewhere behind the fog when they reached Shibano's Sea Cave. Maxroy people kept early hours.
Belinda was a pale blonde, tall, with a heart-shaped face. She had a thick Maxroy's Purchase accent. "Oh, it's lovely! I've never been here myself. You understand, you won't get a drink here?"
Renner had in fact chosen the place. It was a Mormon-Japanese restaurant. Maxroy's Purchase had first been settled by Mormons, and they were still a fair percentage of the populace.
Belinda was alarmed when he tried to order crottled greeps. "Do you know what you're getting?"
"I've read about this dish."
'All right." And she grinned. "I'll help you."
He'd had his doubts about alcohol-removed sake, but it tasted fine. He could get drunk later. Renner often thought of himself as a playboy-spy. Get the sense of the land, while Bury used his own means of gathering information.
Bury's means often startled him.
Bury kept track of the flow of money through the Empire. Only that. He was the same merchant prince he'd always been, with only this difference: that for the past quarter of a century, he watched for Outie maneuvering and kept the Navy informed.
Outies were worlds outside the Empire of Man. Some were harmless, some were not. Fifteen years ago, Outie piracy had been driven from Maxroy's Purchase and from the system. It was to be expected that the flow of money through the system would have dropped off. Only Bury would have noticed that it had not decreased enough. Bury sold civilization; and the Purchase was buying too much of it.
And Bury had some time . . . and Imperial Autonetics owned three ships here...
The almond-eyed waiter was trying to hide a smirk when he brought Renner's main course. The dish was conspicuous, a shallow bowl over a foot across and five inches high. Customers at other tables broke off conversation to watch as he set it in front of Renner.
The creatures in the bowl might have been four-legged crabs. Their sides pulsed. Renner remembered reading that they were land creatures. They could almost reach the rim before they dropped back. Their eyes were locked on Renner's as they climbed toward him. They looked hungry and determined.
"Pick up the crottling fork," Belinda whispered. "The two-pronged fork. Use your thumb and two fingers."
It was sitting beside the bowl. Renner picked it up. Belinda whispered, "Stab just behind the head plate. Do it hard enough to set the prongs. You don't want it to drop off."