Eugene did not have time to sleep. He had trouble staying awake and in his head he felt some kind of heaviness. He understood that he urgently needed to buy several hours of sleep. Therefore, the former lieutenant of the External Intelligence Service Eugene Kmykh, without stopping anywhere, went to the nearest red telephone box. Why they were called that way, he did not know. Some claimed that once these booths served as a means of communication, when conventional telephones did not yet exist. At first, it remained symbol of London, and then it began to be used for selling sleep. Kmykh did not study the history of the Cenozoic at school, and therefore he had little faith in this version. He had a regular ring-shaped phone, which was usually attached to his ear or finger. On the way to the red telephone box, he put his finger in the ring that was in his pocket. The phone counted the fingerprint, and a hologram of the keyboard appeared in the face. Kmykh never kept the necessary numbers in the notebook of the ring. He kept all necessary twenty-digit numbers in memory.
“Hello, Bill!”
“Hello, Eugene! How are you?”
“Bill, please pay the parking of my capsule for another week. Now I have a two-hour break for eating, buying sleep and need to return to the factory. I was very lucky – the boss allowed me to work in two shifts. In a week I will accumulate weekend hours, and it will be possible to play billiards and drink Jägermeister.”
“You were unlucky. I am three hundred miles from London. Priscilla and me choose a houseboat. Fishermen are selling. The house is in very good condition. We will not be in London for three days. I will drive the house closer to the shore. Agreed with one huckster, he rents out a pile foundation just two miles from the coast. You know, if you cling to a pile, then any storm is not terrible.”
“I agree, near the coast is better than on the high seas. Here you can buy human sleep, and in the sea you have to sleep 6-8 hours daily. I do not understand how these fishermen can sleep for hours. For what?”
“Don’t worry. Your capsule will not be confiscated. Yesterday a decree of the lower house of Commons came out. Now they can only solder forfeit.”
“God bless the queen! I am glad!”
“I'm glad you're glad! Priscilla wants to buy a plot of water at sea. Here, far from the coast, they are inexpensive. She wants to set her own pile. I am against, but away from the coast I liked it. We have been here for two days. I slept twice for ten hours! I really liked it!”
