"Connie Willis - One-Eyed Jack" - читать интересную книгу автора (Willis Connie)

The sun was directly overhead. Shadows had been sucked back under whatever
cast them. But Lightning Jack, when he stepped down into the street, was
shadow itself, a bolt of blackness against the dusty, glaring light. His scarred face
hid between the dark brim of his hat and the black neckerchief at his throat. You
couldn't tell whether he had one eye, or none.


He walked slowly, scarcely limping, shoulders rigid, until he reached the point of
least threat to bystanders from errant shots. Miss Lily followed along the
walkway, hips swaying in their trademark undulation, the ultimate advertisement
for her establishment. She sensed rather than saw Jack's admonitory frown but
held her ground. No matter what happened, she would be the first to reach
whatever was left of him.


Rigby moved out into the other end of the street. He took a few steps, then a
few more, bravado growing as Jack swayed slightly. Lily braced herself to keep
from running to prop her champion up.
Rigby held both hands curved tensely above the grips of his paired revolvers.
Jack's left hand extended halfway across his sunken belly toward the
double-action Colt on his right hip, but it didn't seem possible he could draw and
fire in time to do any good.


Rigby made his move; all eyes swung toward him. All but Miss Lily's. She kept
her gaze fixed on Jack's gun, and the empty sleeve above it. He had to have
some good reason for slinging his gun on that side.


It happened too fast to be sure of anything, but Miss Lily could swear that
something stiffened that empty sleeve, something drew and fired that Colt
before ever Jack's left hand reached it, and kept on firing even as he fell.


Rigby was down, and so, with farther to fall, were the men he'd posted on the
store roof. Miss Lily darted into the street and stood over Jack on guard. The
right-arm-that-wasn't still raised the gun and swung it in short arcs, searching for
more targets, jerking Jack's body from side to side, but Lily knew that Jack
himself had finally left that ruined hulk.




"It's finished," she murmured. "You did it." The sleeve collapsed. Lily knelt in the
dust, unmindful of her finery. With one hand she pulled the neckerchief up over
the ruined remains of his face; with the other she gingerly lifted the edge of the
empty sleeve and peered in. Her stomach lurched, but she refused to let her
body jerk away. She stood, moved even closer, and raised the dusty hem of her