"Theodore Sturgeon - Shottle Bop" - читать интересную книгу автора (Sturgeon Theodore)

I tried to tear loose again and couldn't. It was as if all my epidermis had turned to high-car
steel. I began cussing again, but quit in despair.
"You think altogether too much of yourself," said the pro-prietor of the Shottle Bop. "Look
you! Why, I wouldn't hire you to wash my windows. You expect to marry a girl who
accustomed to the least of animal comfort, and then you get miffed because she turns you do
Why does she turn you down? Because you won't get a job. You're a no-good. You're a bum.
he! And you have the nerve to walk around pelling teople where to get off. Now if I were in y
position I would ask politely to be released, and then I would see if anyone in this shop would
good enough to sell you a bottle full of something that might help out."
Now I never apologize to anybody, and I never back down, and I never take any guff from m
tradesmen. But this was different. I'd never been petrified before, nor had my nose rubbed in
many gaffing truths. I relented. "O.K., O.K.; let me break away then. I'll buy something."
"Your tone is sullen," he said complacently, dropping lightly to the floor and holding his atom
at the ready. "You'll have to say `Please. Pretty please.' "
He went back of the counter and returned with a paper of powder which he had me sniff. I
couple of seconds I be-gan to sweat, and my limbs lost their rigidity so quickly that it almost th
me. I'd have been flat on my back if the man hadn't caught me and solicitously led me to a chair.
strength dribbled back into my shocked tissues, it occurred to me that I might like to flatten
hobgoblin for pulling a trick like that. But a strange something stopped meтАФstrange because
never had the experience before. It was simply the idea that once I got outside I'd agree with
for having such a low opinion of me.

He wasn't worrying. Rubbing his hands briskly, he turned to his shelves. "Now, let's see .
what would be best for you, I wonder? Hm-m-m. Success is something you couldn't just
Money? You don't know, how to spend it. A good job? You're not fitted for one." He turned ge
eyes on me and shook his head. "A sad case. Tsk, tsk." I crawled. "A perfect mate? Uh-huh. Yo
too stupid to recognize perfec-tion, too conceited to appreciate it. I don't think that I canтАФWait
He whipped four or five bottles and jars off the dozens of shelves behind him and disappea
somewhere in the dark recesses of the store. Immediately there came sounds of vio-
activityтАФclinkings and little crashes; stirrings and then the rapid susurrant grating of a mortar
pestle; then the slushy sound of liquid being added to a dry ingredient during stirring; and at len
after quite a silence, the glugging of a bottle being filled through a filtering funnel. The proprie
reappeared triumphantly bearing a four-ounce bottle without a label.
"This will do it!" he beamed.
"That will do what?"
"Why, cure you!"
"CureтАФ" My pompous attitude, as Audrey called it, had returned while he was mixing. "W
do you mean cure? I haven't got anything!"
"My dear little boy," he said offensively, "you most cer-tainly have. Are you happy? Have
ever been happy? No. Well, I'm going to fix all that up. That is, I'll give you the start you need. L
any other cure, it requires your cooper-ation.
"You're in a bad way, young fellow. You have what is known in the profession as retrogress
metempsychosis of the ego in its most malignant form. You are a constitutional unemployable
downright sociophagus. I don't like you. Nobody likes you."
Feeling a little bit on the receiving end of a blitz, I stam-mered, "W-what do you aim to do?"
He extended the bottle. "Go home. Get into a room by yourself тАФthe smaller the better. Drink
down, right out of the bottle. Stand by for developments. That's all."
"ButтАФwhat will it do to me?"
"It will do nothing to you. It will do a great deal for you. It can do as much for you as you wan
to. But mind me, now. As long as you use what it gives you for your self-improvement, you