"Destroyer 002 - Death Check.pdb" - читать интересную книгу автора (Williams Remo)

"No," said Remo, lying. He had seen the two big men, one black and the other white, pretending to lounge on the seats behind them. "Beautiful skyline, don't you think?" He breathed deeply of the almost breathable air between Staten Island and New York City.

"You are going to open the package because you want to save your life. Look behind you."

"And leave the beauty of the gulls and the twin towers of the trade center, the Empire State Building? My little island in the sun?"

Remo did a little semi-pushup against the second deck railing of the ferry and watched the white churning swirls bubble out back toward Manhattan. Then he felt two strong arms on each of his arms. He looked again at the man with the gray package and the sneer and said:

"You're not going to believe this. But I'll give you all a chance to live."

The man did not believe this. The man believed he was talking to a prankster.

So the man who cared about photography went with the large men and the man with the package to a paint store on Staten Island. The store was closed that day, but it was opened for them by a fat man. With a gun.

The man who loved photography tried. He said: "Look. You're just a messenger. You give the package to me, I'm just a messenger. I give it to someone else. Why should we fight over it?"

The man with the package sneered again. "You're wrong all around. I'm not just your messenger. He met with an accident. You are not just a messenger. I was informed otherwise. It seems you lose."

"Last chance to reconsider," Remo said.

"Sorry," said the other. "We'll have to risk it."

Remo registered the moves of his four adversaries. The two big men were obviously in condition; he had felt how light they were on their feet when they walked him off the ferry. The man with the package had been in condition once. The short man who had opened the door was very fat and had never been in condition. But he made up for it. He carried a snub-nosed revolver. A snub-nosed revolver is good for one thing. Close work. What it loses in accuracy, it gains in compactness. It's not easy to reach out, grab the barrel and the cylinder, and smother the falling hammer, all in one motion.

The two big men stayed behind Remo as the man put the gray package down on the counter. The fat man stayed near the shuttered door.

"Well," said the man who had held the package.

"This is the package and not an imitation?"

"This is the package."

"If it's an imitation, I can get hurt."

"It is the package."

"These things tend to explode."

"Open it."

Remo carefully removed the clear tape from the tips of the gray package. Through the holes in the corners protruded four knots of thin red string. The knots were symmetrical. As Remo looked at them, deeply, with his mind free, he could almost feel the inner harmony of the man who had tied them. It was the real package. Chiun had tied the knots.

"Something wrong, Pelham?"

"How did you know my name was Pelham?"

"Untie the package."

"How did you know my name was Pelham?"