Flying finish / Бурный финиш. Книга для чтения на английском языке

He oozed on to a bar stool, his bulk drooping around him. A pint for him, he said. I bought it, and a half for me, and he drank most of his off with one much practised swallow.

�How’s the globe-trotting, then?’ He ran his tongue over his upper lip for the froth.

�I like it.’

�I’ll grant you,’ he said, smiling amicably, �that you haven’t made a mess of it yet.’

�Thanks.’

�Though of course since I do all the spade work[37 - I do all the spade work – (разг.) Я делаю всю черновую работу] for you at both ends, you bloody well shouldn’t.

’

�No,’ I agreed. He was, in truth, an excellent organiser, which was mainly why Anglia often dealt with Yardman Transport instead of Clarkson Carriers, a much bigger and better known firm. Simon’s arrangements were clear, simple, and always twice confirmed: agencies, owners and air-lines alike knew exactly where they stood and at what hours they were expected to be where. No one else in the business, that I had come across at any rate, was as consistently reliable.

Being so precise myself, I admired his work almost as a work of art.

He looked me over, privately amused. �You don’t go on trips dressed like that?’

�I do, yes, more or less.’

�What does more or less mean?’

�I wear a sweater instead of my jacket, in and around the aircraft.’

�And hang up your jacket on a hanger for when you land?’

�Yes, I do.’

He laughed, but without mockery.

�You’re a rum sort of chap[38 - You’re a rum sort of chap – (разг.) Странный ты парень], Henry’. He ordered more beer, shrugged when I refused, and drank deep again. �Why are you so methodical?’

�It’s safer.’

�Safer.’ He choked on his beer, coughing and laughing. �I suppose it doesn’t strike you that to many people steeplechasing and air transport might not seem especially safe?’

�That wasn’t what I meant.’

�What, then?’

But I shook my head, and didn’t explain.

�Tell me about Yardman,’ I said.

�What about him?’

�Well, where he came from… anything.’

Simon hunched his great shoulders protectively around his pint, and pursed his lips.

�He joined the firm after the war, when he left the Army. He was a sergeant in an infantry regiment, I think. Don’t know any details: never asked. Anyway he worked his way up through the business.