"Arkady & Boris Strugatsky - The Ugly Swans" - читать интересную книгу автора (Strugatski Arkady)

6 The Ugly Swans

thought. "It's not the times. That is, it's the times too, of course. Or maybe I've got a prodigy on my hands.
There are such things as prodigies, after all, and I am the father of one. An honor, but a bother, and more
of a bother than an honorтАФin fact, it's no honor at all. ... I always liked this alley because it's so narrow.
And wouldn't you know it, there's a fight. We just can't get along without fights, without fights we simply
can't manage. Since time immemorial. And two against one."
There was a streetlight at the corner. A car with a canvas top dripped in the rain at the edge of the
illuminated space. Next to the car two men in shining raincoats were forcing a third one, wearing something
black and wet, down to the gutter. The three of them were stumbling along the cobblestones, awkward and
strained. Victor stopped short, then moved closer. It wasn't clear exactly what was going on. It didn't look
like a fightтАФno one was throwing any punches. Even less did it look like a scuffle from an excess of
youthful energyтАФthere was no wild whooping and braying. Suddenly the one in black, trying to tear himself
free, fell on his back. The pair in raincoats jumped on top of him. Victor noticed that the doors of the car
were wide open; either they had just dragged the one in black out of it, or they were trying to shove him in.
Victor went up close to them and barked, "Stop!"
The pair in raincoats turned. For a split second they stared at Victor from under their pulled-up hoods.
Victor noticed only that they were both young and that they were panting from the strain. Then with
unbelievable speed they dove into the car, slammed the doors, and sped off into the darkness. The man in
black slowly lifted himself up. Victor looked at him and took a step backward. It was a patient from the
lep-rosariumтАФa "slimy," or "four-eyes" as they were sometimes called because of the yellow circles that
rimmed their eyes like eyeglasses. The lower half of his face was completely covered by a black bandage.
He was breathing heavily and painfully; vestiges of eyebrows were raised in a look of suffering. Water
streamed down his bald head.
The Ugly Swans 7

"What happened?" said Victor.
The four-eyes wasn't looking at him, but past him. His pupils widened. Victor wanted to turn around, but
at that moment something hit him in the back of the head.
When he came to, he found himself lying face up under a drain pipe. Water was gushing into his mouth;
it was warm and tasted rusty. Spluttering and coughing, he moved away and sat up with his back against
the brick wall. Water that had col-lected in his hood poured under his collar and trickled down his body.
Bells, horns, and drums reverberated in his head. Through the noise, Victor made out a thin, dark face in
front of him. A boy's face. Familiar. "I've seen him somewhere. Be-fore my jaws got smashed together."
He moved his tongue around and shifted his jaw. His teeth were okay. The boy col-lected a handful of
water from the pipe and splashed him in the face.
"Thanks, pal," said Victor. "That's enough."
"I thought that you still hadn't regained consciousness," the boy said seriously.
Carefully, Victor placed his hand under his hood and felt the back of his head. There was a
lumpтАФnothing terrible, no shattered bones, not even any blood.
"Who got me?" he asked, thoughtfully. "Not you, I hope."
"Will you be able to walk by yourself, Mr. Banev?" the boy asked. "Or should I call someone? The truth
is, you're too heavy for me."
Victor remembered who it was.
"I know you," he said. "You're Bol-Kunats, my daughter's friend."
"Yes," said the boy.
"Fine. No need to call anyone and no need to say anything to anyone. Let's just sit here for a minute and
pull ourselves together."
Now he could see that Bol-Kunats wasn't completely all right either. There was a fresh gash on his
cheek, and his upper lip was swollen and bleeding.