"H. Beam Piper - Lone Star Planet" - читать интересную книгу автора (Piper H Beam)

Starting that eveningтАФor what passed for evening aboard a ship in hyperspaceтАФHoddy and I began a
positively epochal binge together.

I had it figured this way: as long as we were on board ship, I was perfectly safe. On the ship, in fact,
Hoddy would definitely have given his life to save mine. I'd have to be killed on New Texas to give
Kl├╝ng's boys their excuse for moving in.

And there was always the chance, with no chance too slender for me to ignore, that I might be able to get
Hoddy drunk enough to talk, yet still be sober enough myself to remember what he said.

Exact times, details, faces, names, came to me through a sort of hazy blur as Hoddy and I drank
something he called superbourbonтАФa New Texan drink that Bourbon County, Kentucky, would never
have recognized. They had no corn on New Texas. This stuff was made out of something called
superyams.

There were at least two things I got out of the binge. First, I learned to slug down the national drink
without batting an eye. Second, I learned to control my expression as I uncovered the fact that everything
on New Texas was supersomething.

I was also cautious enough, before we really got started, to leave my belt and guns with the purser. I
didn't want Hoddy poking around those secret holsters. And I remember telling the captain to radio New
Austin as soon as we came out of our last hyperspace-jump, then to send the ship's doctor around to
give me my hangover treatments.

But the one thing I wanted to remember, as the hangover shots brought me back to normal life, I found
was the one thing I couldn't remember. What was the name of that girlтАФa big, beautiful blondтАФwho
joined the party along with Hoddy's grass widow from Alderbaran and stayed with it to the end?

Damn, I wished I could remember her name!




When we were fifteen thousand miles off-planet and the lighters from New Austin spaceport were
reported on the way, I got into the skin-tight Levis, the cataclysmic-colored shirt, and the loose vest,
tucked my big hat under my arm, and went to the purser's office for my guns, buckling them on. When I
got back to the suite, Hoddy had put on his pistols and was practicing quick draws in front of the mirror.
He took one look at my armament and groaned.

"You're gonna get yourself killed for sure, with that rig, an' them popguns," he told me.

"These popguns'll shoot harder and make bigger holes than that pair of museum-pieces you're carrying," I
replied.

"An' them holsters!" Hoddy continued. "Why, it'd take all day to get your guns outa them! You better let
me find you a real rig, when we get to New Austin...."

There was a chance, of course, that he knew what I was using and wanted to hide his knowledge. I
doubted that.