"Jonathan Stroud - Bartimaeus 3 - Ptolemy's Gate" - читать интересную книгу автора (Stroud Jonathan)

"What was your exact guise? Perhaps that was itself a provocation."

"I was as you see me. Gray-haired, sober, and straight-backed, the model of tedious virtue."

"Evidently the young scoundrels decided to waylay a man of such qualities. You were unlucky,
that is all."

Fritang's eyes widened and its nostrils flared. "There was more to it than that! They knew me for
what I am!"

"As a demon?" Mandrake flicked skeptically at a particle of dust upon his sleeve. "How could you
tell?"

"My suspicions were aroused by their repetitive chanting: 'Get out, get out, vile demon. We hate
you and your dangling yellow crest.'"

"Really? That is interesting. . . ." The magician appraised Fritang carefully through his lenses.
"But what yellow crest is this? I don't see it."

The demon pointed at a space above its head. "That is because you cannot see the sixth or
seventh planes. On those, my crest is self-evident, resplendent as a sunflower. I may add that it
is not dangling, though captivity does make it droop a little."

"The sixth and seventh planes . . . and you're quite sure you didn't let your guise slip for a
moment? Yes, yes." Mandrake held up a hasty hand as the demon began a vehement protest.

"I'm sure you're right and I am grateful for the information. You will doubtless want to rest after
your egg trauma. Be gone! You are dismissed."

With a yell of delight, Fritang departed in corkscrew motion through the center of the pentacle,
as if sucked noisily down a plughole. Mandrake and Ms. Piper looked at each other.

"Another case," Ms. Piper said. "Children again."

"Mmm." The magician leaned back in his chair and stretched his arms out behind his head. "You
might just check the files, get the exact number. I must summon the demons back from Kent."

He sat forward, his elbows on the desk, and made the incantation in an undertone. Ms. Piper got
up and crossed to the filing cabinet on the edge of the circle. She opened the topmost drawer
and drew out a bulging manila file. Returning to her seat, she removed the elastic around the
file and began sifting rapidly through the documents within. The incantation ended amid a

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 Jonathan Stroud - Bartimaeus 3 - Ptolemy's Gate

suffusion of jasmine and sweetbriar. In the right-hand pentacle a hulking form appearedтАФa
giant with blond, braided hair and a single glaring eye. Ms. Piper went on reading.

The giant performed a low and complex bow. "Master, I greet you with the blood of your