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

Hesitating was bad: the greeps would move. You couldn't Blaine them. Renner stabbed one and lifted the fork. Belinda said, "Scrape it off on the edge. You didn't stab hard enough. They bite."
Renner scraped it off and tried another. The beasts weren't fast,
but it wasn't easy to center the fork. He stabbed.

Good. Pick it up. Your left hand takes the tail. Pull hard."
Renner pulled. The exoskeletal tail came right off, exposing two inches of pale meat.
All eyes were on Renner, to watch him make a fool of himself. The naked tail writhed. Renner felt like a murderer. He said, "So, wretched sand dweller! Now will you tell us of your troop movements?"

"Actually, it was delicious. You really ought to try it," Renner said.
Bury merely looked at him.
"I've done this before, you know. Order something conspicuous, like crepes suzettes. Get 'em looking at me, then pick a conversation. This time I got the proprietor. He came over to lecture. 'Look at that greep. See the shimmy? On the one hand, if they shimmy too hard, they may be diseased. On the other, if they don't shimmy, they haven't eaten well. On the gripping hand, if they're too young and healthy they will escape and attempt to eat you. You would not like that.' I jumped a foot when he stuck his hand in the bowl. He liked that. 'But look here, see how it attacks my artificial finger. This is a healthy greep. Other places, they will see a tourist, and they will serve anything. Not here. Lex Shibano will not serve anything but healthy food. If it goes into your body, it must be healthy. I would-''
"Renner!"
"Oh. Anyway, once Shibano came over, no one wanted to be near us. I guess it's one of the hazards of eating there. When he went away, the people at the next table had all lost interest. So I eavesdropped a little. Pair of men to my right were bankers, I think."
"I assume you'll get to the point sooner or later."
Renner nodded. " 'We could sell out and take a capital gain. Then again, the market's going up on Tabletop. We could hang on and make some real money.' The other one said, 'On the gripping hand, inflation's running wild on Tabletop. Let's get into something else.'
Bury was getting older as he watched.
"I talked to Belinda. She's got ambitions, but stupid. She . . . see if I can get this right...
Yes, Kevin, I could have spent my life as an honest housewife. Farm life isn't bad if you can afford to keep up the machines but if I'm careful and lucky, maybe I can get to Sparta. Get rich. Then start a restaurant or something. What are my chances of getting to Sparta?'
"I didn't want to lie to her, so-"
"Go on."
"I didn't say anything. She looked down at her plate and said, 'The gripping hand is, I'll never be more than a Maxroy spill. The accent, the way I walk . . . how high can I climb?' " Renner stopped to trickle espresso past his tongue and chase it with half a glass of water.
"Gripping hand," Bury prompted him.
"I wanted a drink. I took her to the Top of the World. It's a rotating bar and restaurant at the edge of the spaceport. The people at the next table looked like prospectors. 'Prices are good for opal meerschaum and we need the money.' Second guy said, 'I hear it's getting harder to find blocks as large as we have. The price will go up.' The first one said, 'Horace Bury landed on the Purchase yesterday. If anybody can find the real source, he can. The gripping hand is, we'd better sell our stock before the price drops.' Bury, it was everywhere!"
"More?"
"I sent Belinda back to the interaction nook. She's looking for a ticket out. She thought I was it. I thought I'd better send her back. A car took off right behind the taxi. I didn't think anything of it, I just tend to notice-"
"My training."
"Right. I strolled on into the spill section. I wanted an overview, and it really felt like I was onto something. That's where I got so drunk. Local whiskey. Made from-"
'Gripping hand'?"
Renner sipped more espresso. 'Gah! They looked like hunters. Smelled like hunters. Oh, I'm used to hunting snow ghosts. The furs sell for a lot, and if you know their habits, they aren't so dangerous.' One said, 'On the other hand, they did get Serge Levoy a month ago. You think they're learning, maybe? Mutating?' Another one laughed and said, 'On the gripping hand, Page, you're too lazy to do anything else for a living.'
Bury shuddered. "Through the Coal Sack. The Mote is just on the other side of the Coal Sack. Moties must have come through the Coal Sack in slower-than-light ships."
"Not since we were there," Renner said. "Not enough time. And before that-Bury, they couldn't use that lightsail trick through the Coal Sack. Just sending that one ship to New Cal soaked up so many resources it collapsed their whole civilization."
"Gripping hand," Bury said. "Three alternatives, one dominant. Two delicate right arms and a powerful left. People don't think that way. Moties do! There's too much money on this planet. We were looking for outies. Maybe it isn't outies. Maybe it's far worse than outies."
"I don't believe it."
"I don't want to." Bury grimaced. "It is a pity that Nabil had to kill all three who attacked you. I think we might have learned something interesting from them."
Renner tried to look thoughtful and gave up. He finished the glass of water. "How so?"
"They wanted you alive. Not the actions of random muggers. Peaceable Sam is a gas used by police, not sold to civilians. They were skilled, and desperate, and had resources, but if they had been truly skilled, they would have succeeded."
"Desperate skilled amateurs," Renner said. "Who?"
"I trust we will know in the morning."
"Excellency?"
Bury turned. "Do you have something, Nabil?"
"The records office is closed and the computer is not responsive, so we cannot check retinal pattern identifications tonight, but Wilfred has made progress. Neither the first or second assassin had any trace of darkening in the lungs, no alcohol or drugs in the bloodstream."
"Look for caffeine."
Nabil nodded and spoke to the console.
"Mormons," Renner said. "Narrows it a bit. I'm about to fall over, Horace."
"To bed."


Renner was naked in the sauna. Despite the water and vitamins he had taken the night before, his head throbbed, and his stomach rejected all notions of food. When cold air touched him, he bellowed, "Shut it!"
Nabil smiled thinly. "You were more pleased to see me last night."
"I was still drunk. What do you have?"