"Wayne Wightman - The Attack Of The Ignoroids" - читать интересную книгу автора (Wightman Wayne)

WAYNE WIGHTMAN

THE ATTACK OF THE IGNOROIDS

I, DERRIK RAMSDEN, DO NOT rattle easily. So when old pal Vreedon emptied my bank
accounts, leaving me exactly $8.73, did I weep? Did I moan?

Hardly.

I did, however, contact two junkies, give them his address, and tell them that
he had five and a half pounds of crack hidden someplace in his apartment.
Vreedon, however, is no sloth. He moved too fast for them; he had already
vanished, and the junkies, pathetic skinks, got six months for trying to steal
the doors and plumbing fixtures.

A month before, Vreedon had told me, "C'mon Ramsden, I need investment capital
and I know from hacking around that you've got $9,000 stuck in miserable savings
at something like 2.1%. This is heavily big. This is, in short, a deal!" He
sprawled on my plywood-bottomed sofa drinking my last generic beer and doing a
little absent-minded tap-dance, crushing various bugs as they skittered across
my floor.

"I'll make us a killing that'll set us up for life. This one, my friend, is a
sure thing, and since we've known each other longer than we've known anyone but
family, I came to you. You, of all people, I came to. You, who live like a roach
in this dump. I thought you'd like the chance to move up. Have, you know, like
heating, like when you worked at Madame Helga's."

His reference to that singular blot on my employment history was gratuitous and
not appreciated. "You have five or six sure things a year, Vreedon, and you're
still riding the bus. So what's so majorly big about this one?"

"Trust me. The less you know about it, the better. But the return will be a
hundred to one. You give me your $9,000--a month later, I give you $900,000,
minimum. Never work again for the rest of your life."

It tempted me. Selling tombstones to welfare recipients for the last six months
dragged down my soul. It made me ask annoying questions about the purpose of
life and how to more deeply screw the relatives of the dead. It was immoral, but
it was legal. The $9,000 I'd saved plus another year's savings was supposed to
be my ticket out of this roach motel.

"No deal, Vreedon. It's too good to be true, however illegal it is."

He lurched forward and sat on the edge of the sofa. "Have I ever screwed you on
a deal, Ram?"

"Not since the business with the Hitler sex video, no."