《King Of the City 》作者： - Keith Laumer【EPUB】

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The King Of The City 1 I stood in the shadows and looked across at the run-down lot with the wind-blown trash packed against the wire mesh barrier fence and the yellow glare panel that said HAUG ESCORT. There was a row of city-scarred hacks parked on the cracked ramp. They hadn't suffered the indignity of a washjob for a long time. And the two-story frame building behind them—that had once been somebody's country house—now showed no paint except the foot-high yellow letters over the office door. Inside the office a short broad man with small eyes and yesterday's beard gnawed a cigar and looked at me. &quotortal-to-portal escort cost you two thousand C's," he said. "Guaranteed." "Guaranteed how?" I asked. He waved the cigar. "Guaranteed you get into the city and back out again in one piece." He studied his cigar. "If somebody don't plug you first," he added. "How about a one-way trip?" "My boy got to come back out, ain't he?" I had spent my last brass ten-dollar piece on a cup of coffee eight hours before, but I had to get into the city. This was the only idea I had left. "You've got me wrong," I said. "I'm not a customer. I want a job." "Yeah?" He looked at me again, with a different expression, like a guy whose new-found girl friend has just mentioned a price.