The Cool War

Начало книги

The day they came for the Reverend H. Hornswell Hake was his thirty-ninth birthday, and his secretary, Jessie Tunman, had baked him a cake. Because she liked him, she had only put two candles on it. Because she was Jessie, she dumped it in front of him with a scowl. “That’s very kind of you, Jessie,” he said, eyeing the coconut frosting he couldn’t stand.

“Yeah. Better eat it fast, because your nine o’clock people are getting out of that kiddie-car of theirs right now. Aren’t you going to blow out the candles?” She watched him do it. “Well, happy birthday, Horny. I know you’d rather have chocolate, but it gives you blackheads.”

She did not wait for an answer, but closed the door behind her.

Naturally she had caught him stripped down to his shorts, doing his barbells in front of the mirror. Now that he had stopped exercising he was freezing; he quickly put the weights away, pulled on his pants, drew lined boots over his sweatsocks and began to button his shirt, covering the great network of scars that curved under his left nipple. By the time his first counseling people showed up he was sitting behind his desk, looking once more like a Unitarian minister instead of a jock.

Читать дальше →