The Lon Williams Weird Western Megapack. Lon Williams

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СКАЧАТЬ me to endure every sort of discord, imperfection and nuisance—including persons who are bent on being sociable. My name, since you are determined to be a quidnunc, is Aloysius McGuffy”

      Bogie put down glass and polishing cloth. He placed his big hands, palms down, on his bar and stared in wonder. “Ah, indeed!” He shook his head in mock amazement. “Now, if you’ll indulge my further inquisitiveness, would you, by any chance, be a Boston McGuffy?”

      Aloysius McGuffy lifted bushy eyebrows and lowered, expressive mouth-corners. “Boston, eh? How did you know?”

      Doc Bogannon leaned back and folded his arms contentedly. He was a tall man—broadly built— with a fine head, luxuriant black hair, and mild, sympathetic eyes. In appearance, he would have graced any position of honor or power; yet, for reasons best known to himself, he was satisfied with life as owner of a saloon and companion of a half-breed Shoshone wife—in a semi-ghost town of gold-diggers and assorted wayfarers.

      He looked upon Aloysius McGuffy not with merited distaste, but with heartfelt affection. “I did not exactly know, McGuffy, that you’re from Boston, but I’ll say this: Boston does put a mark of distinction upon a man.”

      “Fa!” popped McGuffy. He resumed his half-angry promenade. “Boston has been my undoing, my curse. Until I saw Boston, I derived some measure of satisfaction from things about me. A clouded sunset, for example, gave me a modest thrill by its evanescent glory. Sweeping clouds inspired vague suggestion of vast, unharnessed power. I saw a measure of beauty in a rosebud, sensed a faint touch of divinity in its fragrance. At night a wind-whisper was not unknown to initiate poetic thoughts, though I confess that it set no ethereal bells to ringing in my soul.” McGuffy swung his arms in a gesture of hopeless frustration. “Then, in Boston, I studied art.”

      “Ah,” said Bogie. “So you’re an artist!” McGuffy stopped and stared at him. “I was an artist. I gave it up to escape madness. As an artist I began to see things as they are—not perfect and beautiful, but deformed and ugly. In one deluging rush, I realized that nothing was perfect. I was overcome by that appalling truth; I fled from it as from a pestilence. Yet, wherever I go, it haunts and depresses me.” He swung his arms wide. “It’s everywhere. Just look! That mirror behind you—it is a mass of flaw and blemish. At one spot your image looks like an ogre; at another, a deformed ape. And those dented, lopsided lamps, with their smoke-darkened chimneys. And those—”

      Bogannon’s batwings squeaked, and a lean, middle-aged man with a badge and a strapped-down six-gun strode in.

      “Winters!” exclaimed Bogie. “Come in and meet a new friend of mine.”

      Winters approached, stopped, lifted hands to hips and stared at Aloysius McGuffy. “There’s usually a jinx on your new friends, Doc. What’s wrong with this one?”

      Bogie leaned on his bar and smiled broadly. “Deputy Winters, this is Aloysius McGuffy. If I should undertake to characterize him—which I don’t, of course—I’d say he is a most excellent man who is hard to please.”

      Winters moved up and planked down a coin. “Maybe a glass of wine would help his disposition. Fill ’em up, Doc; both on me.”

      Bogie filled two glasses with sparkling red wine. He slid one to Winters, one toward McGuffy. “Step right up, McGuffy. When Deputy Winters indulges in generosity, it’s big-heartedness at its best, indeed—without a flaw or blemish.”

      McGuffy stepped forward with alacrity and lifted his glass. “I wouldn’t be so sure of that; basically, all human behavior is selfish.”

      Winters sipped leisurely. “Good wine, though.” McGuffy held his glass toward a light and stuck out his lips in contempt. “Far from pure vintage, I’d say; nothing to compare with madeira. Burgundy is far superior. Champagne, port, hock, sherry—all are much better. This, I would surmise, is merely a cheap grade of claret. Of course Winters is generous—as that term is vulgarly used—but generous with what?” He drank and put down his empty glass. “Generous with what, in ordinary circumstances, I would disdain to touch.”

      Winters drained his glass and set it aside. “You know, Doc, when I was a button down in Texas, there was a neighbor boy just like this here McGuffy. At table, when there was fried chicken, he always grabbed for best pieces. Even so, he wasn’t satisfied. There’s just something in McGuffy makes me think of that wishbone-breast-gizzard-grabber.”

      Aloysius McGuffy, unused to reminder of imperfection on his own part, backed away in sudden wrath. “I will not be criticized by a bottom-strata, dust-ridden, desert varmint—here or elsewhere. Especially will I not be criticized by an arrogant, overlording deputy-marshal. I dislike deputy-marshals instinctively.

      “It is a peculiar thing I have consistently observed about them. They are products of an amazing transformation. You can take a fellow of most ordinary makeup and ability, put a deputy-marshal badge on his chest, a few legal papers in his pocket, a six-gun on his hip, and he is no longer an ordinary mortal. Suddenly he is a giant who moves astride this narrow world like a Colossus. Imperfection it is—imperfection magnified a thousand fold. A magnitudinous manifestation of that inherent arrogance and evil—”

      “Enough,” snapped Winters. “I know when I’m beat; goodnight, Doc.” Winters swung on his heels and made a hurried retreat.

      Bogie leaned back again and folded his arms. This Aloysius McGuffy intrigued him, as had so many queer ducks before him. To many of them, Forlorn Gap had been a crossroads of destiny. Some here had departed from accustomed ways, to become earthly saints or unmitigated sinners. Not a few here had their natural or acquired evil tendencies brought to their natural and logical conclusions. Bogie wished—in vain, of course— for a prophetic eye: he would have liked to foresee McGuffy’s future, and McGuffy’s end.

      But a stranger rose from a back table and flapped forward like a blanket in a stiff wind. Now, here was a character, thought Doc, if ever one there was. He was big—bigger than Doc himself—dark, wearing a big black hat whose stiffness had long since departed. Most noticeable, however, of all of his qualities was his overall flabbiness, evident in face, mouth, skin, and joints. Inseparable from that looseness of texture, too, was a flabby imitation of genial spirit.

      He moved straight to Aloysius McGuffy and put a big arm about his shoulders, deceptive friendliness wrapping itself around McGuffy as something warm and protective against a frigid world. “Brother to my heart,” said a voice, full of richness and melody. “I am Professor Whitson Pettigrew, lecturer, philosopher and philanthropist. I overheard your learned, observant remarks, McGuffy; they touched me deeply. I, too, have been to Boston, city of industry, commerce and culture. I, too, became a skeptic; for a time I lost contact with all things that lent joy to living. Yet, after a bitter struggle—and as all true artists should do—I found again that which was lost.” Pettigrew glanced at Bogie. “Two glasses of wine, Bogannon. As I was befriended in my darkest hour, so must I befriend this wise, good man. McGuffy is an unhappy captive of fate; I have been designated by a higher destiny as McGuffy’s angel of deliverance.”

      Bogie filled two glasses and took his pay. In McGuffy he discerned birth of a new spirit, surcease of trouble, contentment after sorrow. A cat in similar situation, thought Bogie, would have begun to purr.

      In Whit Pettigrew, Bogie detected a contradiction of qualities. Friendliness— insincerity. Generosity—leonine voracity. If Pettigrew had suddenly gobbled up his charmed captive, Bogie would have been surprised, though not bewildered. Professor Pettigrew was a consummate actor. Bogie himself felt a hypnotic tug; slightly shaken, he grabbed a bar-rag and moved out of range.

      A moment later СКАЧАТЬ