"Emil Petaja - Tramontane" - читать интересную книгу автора (Petaja Emil)

Al looked. He looked carefully, for the first time. Curiosity stirred
vaguely through the boiling heat. Like most of the other men he had
ignored Kullervo as beneath his notice. Too stupid to even yell about it
when the colonistsтАЩ kids screamed bad names at him and hit him with
rocks, or when somebody jolted him out of the way on the narrow dome
streets.

Maybe there was more to the guy. Maybe.

The face was too wide, as if somebody had taken hold of those hairy
ears and pulled hard. KullervoтАЩs nose was a misplaced lump, not so much
oversize as it was distorted. The mouth was purple and wide. The
dry-cracked lips bled a little, but it was the big animal teeth, spaced with
gaps between, and the tongue lolling out like a hog liver, that made it
impossible to even laugh at the guy. His hair straggled like a pile of
urine-soaked hay over scabby ears. The eyes seemed to have no color
whatever, or else it was because they were set in so deep and the puckers
around them were so deep that it just seemed so. The shapeless chin had a
cleft in it like another lipless mouth and was vaguely obscene. His chest,
bare where the blouse had been ripped in the manhandling during the
street-court trial, was heavily matted with yellow-gray hair and there was
more of it on the backs of his stubby-fingered hands.

тАЬYeah. YouтАЩre right, Pot. YouтАЩre damn right.тАЭ He whistled thoughtfully.
Colony Captain Ralph Langois had been right when he didnтАЩt interfere
with the kangaroo court, when he took the word of the vicious
scandalmongers who said they had seen Kullervo slinking around during
the sleep-periods, molesting kids. Nothing was proved and nobody, even
Captain Langois, really believed there was anything to prove. But there
was something about KullervoтАж Something un-nameable. Something that
hinted that with a creature like him any outrage was possible, even
probable.

Captain LangoisтАЩ job of running Ryler 8 was no easy one. If just having
Kullervo Kasi around made people behave like that then the thing to do
was get rid of him. For good. No shunting him back to the Mothership
next time it called. Do them all a favor.

тАЬCap Longois was right to stand by the kangaroo courtтАЩs decision,тАЭ Al
said aloud.

тАЬSure he was. WeтАЩre a democracy, ainтАЩt we? What the majority says
goes, donтАЩt it?тАЭ He gave Kullervo a forward shove with his boot. тАЬOnly
whyтАЩn hell did Cap have to pick us?тАЭ

They reached the brink of the volcanic fissure. It was deep. The
writhing crack belched up tendrils of vomit-making gases. You couldnтАЩt
see how far down it went because of those angry orange-red clouds.

Pot shoved Kullervo Kasi close to the drop; all three of the kill-detail