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Автор Гарри Гаррисон
Harry Harrison
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Harry Harrison
The Stainless Steell Rat Sings the Blues
Stainless Steel Rat — 8
Chapter 1
Walking up the wall had not been easy. But walking across the ceiling was turning out to be completely impossible. Until I realized that I was going about it the wrong way. It seemed obvious when I thought about it. When I held onto the ceiling with my hands I could not move my feet. So I switched off the molebind gloves and swung down, hanging only from the soles of my boots. The blood rushed to my head - as well it might - bringing with it a surge of nausea and a sensation of great unease.
What was I doing here, hanging upside down from the ceiling of the Mint, watching the machine below stamp out five-hundred-thousand-credit coins? They jingled and fell into the waiting baskets - so the answer to that question was pretty obvious. I nearly fell after them as I cut the power on one foot. I swung it forward in a giant step and slammed it solidly against the ceiling again as I turned the binding energy back on. A generator in the boot emitted a field of the same binding energy that holds molecules together, making my foot, at least temporarily, a part of the ceiling. As long as the power was on.
A few more long steps and I was over the baskets. I fumbled at my waist, trying to ignore the dizziness, and pulled out the cord from my oversized belt buckle. Bending double until could reach up to the ceiling, I pushed the knob at the end against the plaster and switched it on. The molebind field clamped hard and I released my feet. To hang, swinging, right side up now, while the blood seeped out of my florid face.
"Come on Jim - no hanging about," I advised myself. "The alarm will go off any second now. "
Right on cue the sirens screamed, the lights blinked, while a gargantuan hooter thundered through the walls.
I did not tell myself that I told me so. No time. Thumb on the power button so that the immensely strong, almost invisible, single-molecule cord whirred out of the buckle and dropped me swiftly down. When my outstretched hands clinked among the coins I stopped. Opened my attache case and dragged it clanking through the coins until it was full of the shining, shimmering beauties.Closed and sealed it as the tiny motor buzzed and dragged me up to the ceiling again. My feet struck and stuck: I switched off power to the lifting lug.
And the door opened below me.
"Somebody coulda come in here!" the guard shouted, his weapon nosing about him. "The door alarm went off. "
"Maybe-but I don't see nothin'," the second guard said.
They looked down and around. But never up. I hoped. Feeling the sweat rolling up my face. Collecting there. Dropping
I watched with horror as the droplets spattered down onto the guard's helmet.
