"Edgar Pangborn - The Golden Horn" - читать интересную книгу автора (Pangborn Edgar)

Jon Robson would tell every new guest the particulars of the massacre,
and heтАЩs probably doing it yet, along with tales about a crazy redheaded
yardboy he had once. Well, Old Jon had connections in Wilton Village,
knew the family the wolves killed and had to make a thing of it, clickety-yak.
I never knew him to keep his mouth shut more than two minutesтАФone day
when he was sick with a sore throat. He wouldnтАЩt shut it when he slept,
either. He and Mam Robson had their bedroom across the wagonyard from
my loft, and in midwinter with the windows shut tight I could still hear him
sleep, like an ungreased wagonwheel.

Before sunup that March day I fed the mules and horses. I reasoned
that somebody else ought to get his character strengthened by doing the
shoveling. It was a Friday anyhow, so all work was sinful, unless you want to
claim that shoveling is a work of necessity or piety, and I disagree. I crept
into the main kitchen of the inn, where a yardboy wasnтАЩt supposed to
appear. Safe enough. Everybody would be fasting before churchтАФthe
comfortable way, in bed. The slave-man Judd who was boss of the kitchen
wasnтАЩt up yet, and the worst heтАЩd have done would have been to flap a rag
and chase me ten steps on his gimp leg. I found a peach pie and
surrounded it for breakfast. You see, IтАЩd skipped fasting and church a good
deal alreadyтАФeasy because who cares about a yardboy?тАФand the
lightning hadnтАЩt located me yet. In the store room I collected a chunk of
bacon and a loaf of oat bread, and started thinking. Why not run away for
good?

WhoтАЩd be bothered? Maybe Jon RobsonтАЩs daughter Emmia would, a
little. Cry, and wish sheтАЩd been nicer to me. I worked on that as I stole out of
the inn and down the long emptiness of Kurin Street, dawn still half an hour
away. I worked on it hard. I had myself killed by black wolf, changed that to
bandits, because black wolf wouldnтАЩt leave any bones. There ought to be
bones for somebody to bring back. Somebody whoтАЩd say to Emmia:
тАЬHereтАЩs all thatтАЩs left of poor redheaded Davy, except his Katskil knife. He
did say he wanted for you to have that if anything happened to him.тАЭ But
bandits wouldnтАЩt have left the knife, rot them. I had a problem there.

Emmia was older than me, sixteen, big and soft like her papa only on
her it looked good. How I did cherish and play with that rosy softness in the
nightтАФall in my fancy, dumb-virgin as a baby cockerel, alone in my loft.

I was gulping by the time I passed the town green, but as I neared the
Corn Market, in North District and not far from the place where I knew I
could climb the city stockade with no guard seeing me, most of that
flapdoodle drained out of my head. I was thinking sharp and practical about
running away for real, not just goofing off the way IтАЩd done other times.

A bondservant, one grade better than a slave, IтАЩd be breaking the law
if I ran, and could be made a true slave for it, likely with a ten-year term. I
told myself that morning what they could do with the law. I had the bacon
and bread in a sack strapped across my shoulder. My Katskil knife hung in
a sheath under my shirt, and all the money IтАЩd saved during the winter, five