"Vukcevich-CountOnMe" - читать интересную книгу автора (Vukcevich Ray)

She returned with two filled wine glasses and the bottle, the cake apparently
forgotten, and handed me one. She took the chair in front of me, swept her long
red hair back behind one ear and sipped her wine. Deliberately showing me her
forehead, I thought. No mark. Must be hidden on her body. I decided to proceed
cautiously.

"What made you decide on this building.?" I asked.

She just gave me a look, a knowing look, I thought, and grinned. "So, you're a
military man. I'm a school teacher."

"A school teacher?"

"You want to know how much money I make."

I had the sinking feeling I was losing control of the Examination. "How much
money you make.?"

"People always want to know how much teachers make," she said. "I make 22,122
dollars a year."

"Base 4," I said.

She grinned an evil grin. "Teaching is a lot like hunting," she said.

"Like hunting.?"

"You've got to be very quiet when you're trying to get an idea across. You've
got to sneak up on the student and shoot him in the ear with a metaphor."

"Shoot him in the ear?"

She filled our wine glasses again and put the bottle back on the floor by her
chair. "Shooting," she said. "You should know about shooting, Palmer, being in
the Army and all."

"I was in the Signal Corps."

"Well, even if I'm not really moved in yet." She made a face at the piles of
boxes, the clutter. "I'm still taking off tomorrow to go shooting."

I gulped my wine. I knew the answer to my question, but I had to ask it anyway.
Fools rush in. "What kind of gun will you use?"

"A .3030, of course."

Of course. 3030, the Number of the Beast, base 6.

"And where will you go to do this shooting?"