"Pawson, Stuart - Some By Fire" - читать интересную книгу автора (Pawson Stuart)

front wheel to the frame. He peeped round the door of the downstairs
room. Two strangers were asleep on the floor, one of them no doubt
having abandoned the settee in the middle of the night when the itching
started. He tiptoed upstairs, stepping gingerly between the cans and
bottles, and skirted the rucksack, broken record player and surplus
coffee table on the landing.

His room was a dump, but it was home. The job was done. He flopped on
the bed and closed his eyes. The place smelled, even to him. That's
what going out in the fresh air does for you, he thought, and made a
mental note to avoid it in the future. He giggled to himself, and
wished Melissa was with him. He was wide awake, thanks to the
adrenalin coursing through his veins, with nowhere to go.

Melissa was in London, arranging her appointment and creating an alibi
for the two of them. He hadn't thought it necessary, but she'd
insisted. She was six years older than he was, and he'd given way to
her experience. If there was one thing he loved doing, it was giving
way to her experience. They'd recced the house together and decided it
was a piece of cake. It was the end one of a Victorian terrace, a bit
like the flat, with a small yard in front overgrown with willow-herb
and brambles,

transferred from the park via the alimentary canals of the local
pigeons.

"Nothing to it," she'd said, putting her arm through his and smiling up
at him. They'd celebrated by spending some of the twenty on a curry
and a few pints.

Duncan rolled on his side and embraced an armful of bedsheet, burying
his face in it. In one week he would have two hundred pounds, and
their troubles would be over. He fell asleep dreaming of what he could
do with the remaining hundred, and never heard the sirens of the fire
engines as they charged across the city.

It was early afternoon when he awoke. He peeled his cycling gear off
and changed into his normal uniform of jeans and Hawkwind T-shirt. One
of the strangers was in the kitchen, making toast, accompanied by Radio
Leeds from a cheap transistor on the window-sill.

"Hi, I'm Duncan," Duncan said with exaggerated bonhomie as he entered
the room. "Where are the others?"

"Oh, er, John, hi. Gone to Headingley on a demo. D'you live here?"

"Yeah. Any coffee made?"

"Coming up. Pete said it was OK if I helped myself. Hope I haven't
taken your bread."