Читать книгу Sleeping Booty - Richard Wilson - Страница 4

Harry Protagonist thought up the device one evening as he lay in a warm bath. How wonderful it would be, he mused drowsily, to design a watertight sleeping bag in which a person could lie comfortably in warm water and doze off to sleep. What a boon to insomniacs!

Harry soon had a working model. Not choosing to test it himself, he placed a small classified ad. It said: “Wanted: male insomniac for scientific experiment. Easy work.”

Late that night a heavyset but impoverished-looking man rang Harry Protagonist’s doorbell. He gave his name as George Grimes and said he had seen the ad in a discarded newspaper. “Misfortune has reduced me to the pitiful state in which you now observe me,” he told Harry. “Once I was president of a large corporation. I chose a high cash salary instead of retirement benefits and tax-avoiding emoluments. Then, after a merger, I was dismissed. Inflation has eaten all my cash.”

Harry Protagonist murmured sympathetically as he led Mr. Grimes to his workshop. “You have trouble getting to sleep?”