"Brian Thomsen - The Nobles 04 - The Mage in the Iron Mask" - читать интересную книгу автора (Thomsen Brian M)

life."
Volo looked around at the dark and smoke-filled streets of what had been nicknamed the
City of Dan-ger, put his arm around his boon companion, and tried to put the fellow's
one-night incarceration into proper perspective.
"Surely, the legendary son of Catinflas and Idle, scourge of the Sword Coast, expert
ballplayer and star goalie of Maztica, and circumnavigator of all Toril; not to mention master
thespian, and spon-sored actor and artist of the House of Bernd of Cor-myr, will be able to
put this behind him," the master traveler encouraged, trying not to be too sarcastic in his
tone.
"Of course you are right," Passepout conceded. "It would take more than one torturous
night's incarcer-ation to scar me for life."
"Indeed," Volo agreed, then changed the subject, asking, "by the way, how are things with
your posi-tion in the Bernd family household?"
Passepout looked sheepishly at his traveling com-panion, mentor of the road, and savior
many times over, and confessed. "I am afraid that I am no longer in the Bernd family's
employ."
"What happened?"
 "I didn't do anything wrong, really."
"Well surely Master Bernd is a fair man, and his son Curtis is quite fond of you. I'm sure
either of them would have stood by you."
"Curtis was away on his honeymoon with Shurleen," the thespian explained, slightly
wistful about the wedding of the woman whom he had at one time thought to be the love of
his life, "and my problem wasn't with Master Bernd, but rather with the au-thorities in Cormyr
itself."
"What did you do now?"
"Well, remember Sparky and Minx, the Bernd family cats?"
"Of course," Volo replied, "two nobler felines I've never met."
"Indeed," the thespian explained, "but there was a certain maid that I had taken a fancy
to. Her name was Marissa, and she was quite pretty."
"Of course."
"Well," the portly thespian continued, "Marissa complained about the additional work that
she had to do cleaning up after them, and mentioned her con-cern that the two felines might
have kittens, and thus increase her workload, resulting in less time for me."
"So?"
"So I did what we always used to do back in Bal-dur's Gate."
"Which was?"
"I had them spayed."
Volo fingered his beard, and commented, "It is a very serious crimeтАФin all of CormyrтАФto
interfere with the reproductive capabilities of a feline."
"As I soon learned," the hapless thespian replied. "The maid threatened to tell the
authorities of my deed unless I vacated the premises forthwith, and so I did. It turned out that
a certain young stable hand that she fancied, thought himself an actor, and it was all just an
elaborate scheme to put me in the doghouse, and him in the main house. If you know what I
mean."
Volo shook his head in gentle amusement, and urged his companion on. "So what then?"
"The maid was quite insistent about going to the authorities, so I figured it would probably
be pru-dent of me not to wait for Master Bernd's return. So I left a note of apology and took
to the road, to expe-rience life in the theater known as Faerun, once again."
"This way," Volo interrupted, indicating that it was time for them to turn the corner. "I've
just checked in to the Traveler's Cloak Inn." The great traveler paused for a moment,