"Spider Robinson - The End of the Painbow" - читать интересную книгу автора (Robinson Spider)

I started to protest that I wasn't annoyed at allтАФand swallowed the words. Why would anyone want
to get telepathic with a liar? `You're right," I said. "It was stupid to ask, if I wasn't prepared to hear an
honest answer. I think we're a pretty special bunch of human beingsтАФbut I've known us for years, been
through a lot with us."
"And since you know how terrific you all are," he said, "you have no doubt in your mind that before
long either I will realize that, or I'm so much of a jerk you wouldn't want me around anyway. So we have
no problem."
I had to grin. "Nope. I guess we don't."
"The heck we don't," Tom Hauptman said in genuine alarm from farther down the bar. "We're out of
beer."

Rooba rooba rooba. Consternation and astonishment competed for dominance. I went with denial.
"Bullshit," I cried, and turned to look.
Tom was holding down all six draft taps. Not a drop was flowing. "Tap city," he said hollowly.
I forgave him; he was under stress. "How is that possibleтАФ?" I began, and cut myself off when I
heard my voice come out sounding like a Pekingese in a snit. I tried again. "There is no way in hell this
many people could have drunk six barrels dry in a night and a half. Not even these people." This time my
voice was better, more like a beagle in a snit.
Could that thief of a distributor have sold me kegs that weren't full? No, I'd hauled them in the door
myself, and my lower back was certain they'd been full then. A leak that massive would have left the
place smelling like a brewery. "Well, there's only one sensible thing to do," I said. "Have a drink.
Reverend, fix me a cup of Geb, will you?тАФand double up on the Black Bush."
"Sure thing, Jake," Tom said. He went to the Fount, and shortly handed me a mug of Geb
Keyserlingck's magic coffee from Daintree, Oz. I took a deep gulp, and nearly choked. "Jesus, Tom, you
forgot the whiskey!"
"The hell you say," the ex-minister said, shocked enough to use profanity. Our eyes met. "Oh my
golly-gosh," he said slowly.
He unlocked the front panel of the Fount of All Blessings and swung it open. Sure enough, the
Bushmill's bottle inside was empty. As we stared, the little red pilot light on the panel that warned of that
very condition lighted for the first time. I looked to the row of replacement bottles beside the machine,
and was only slightly startled to find them empty as well. So was every bottle on the shelf above the cash
register.
I glanced around. Not every glass and container in the room was empty.
Just the ones with alcohol in them.
Rooba rooba ROOBA ROOBAтАФ
"AARGH!" the Duck exclaimed, and yanked both hands away from his shot glass. It hung in midair,
like Wile E. Coyote ten feet past the edge of the cliff, for long enough that I could see the tumbler was
bone-dry, somehow emptied while he'd held it in his hands; then it fell, hit his foot, skittered across the
floor at high speed, rolled up Merry Moore's leg and under her skirt, and committed a mischief upon her.
She made the same sound the Duck had, in a higher octave, and ... expelled the glass, somehow. It
bounced high off the floor, once, and as it descended the Duck tugged his waistbands an inch or two
away from his belly with an air of weary resignation. Thop. The shot-glass landed squarely in his basket.
He flinched slightly, and let go of his various pants. Snap. "Should have known better," he said sourly.
"My own fault."
Silence, as glutinous as old peanut butter....
"There's a few more cases of juice outside in the van," Tom Hauptman suggested.
"If it's still there," I said, "it's going to stay there until I figure out what happened to the last load.
Booze costs money; I can't go pissing it away." Nobody reacted to the lame joke. "Duck, could all this
be something to do with you?"
"Possible," he admitted, "but I can't figure out the mechanism. Something on the quantum level,