"(Brian Aldiss)-Outside" - читать интересную книгу автора (Aldiss Brian W)

something definite. And until he faced it, he could not even say what the
something definite was he wanted to do.
A footfall behind him. Without turning, Harley deftly pushed up the
piano lid and ran a finger along the keys. Only then did he look back
carelessly over his shoulder. Calvin stood there, hands in pockets,
looking solid and comfortable.
"Saw the light in here," he said easily. "I thought I'd drop in as I
was passing."
"I was thinking I would play the piano awhile," Harley answered with
a smile. The thing was not discussable, even with a near acquaintance like
Calvin because ... because of the nature of the thing ... because one had
to behave like a normal, unworried human being. That at least was sound
and clear and gave him comfort: behave like a normal human being.
Reassured, he pulled a gentle tumble of music from the keyboard. He
played well. They all played well, Dapple, May, Pief ... as soon as they
had assembled the piano, they had all played well. Was that - natural?
Harley shot a glance at Calvin. The stocky man leaned against the
instrument, back to that disconcerting model, not a care in the world.
Nothing showed on his face but an expression of bland amiability. They
were all amiable, never quarrelling together.
The six of them gathered for a scanty lunch, their talk was trite and
cheerful, and the afternoon followed on the same pattern as the morning,
as all the other mornings: secure, comfortable, aimless. Only to Harley
did the pattern seem slightly out of focus; he now had a clue to the
problem. It was small enough, but in the dead calm of their days it was
large enough.
May had dropped the clue. When she helped herself to jelly, Jagger
laughingly accused her of taking more than her fair share. Dapple, who
always defended May, said: "She's taken less than you, Jagger."
"No," May corrected, "I think I have more than anyone else. I took it
for an interior motive."
It was the kind of pun anyone made at times. But Harley carried it
away to consider. He paced round one of the silent rooms. Interior,
ulterior motives... Did the others here feel the disquiet he felt? Had
they a reason for concealing that disquiet? And another question:
Where was "here"?
He shut that one down sharply.
Deal with one thing at a time. Grope your way gently to the abyss.
Categorize your knowledge.
One: Earth was getting slightly the worst of a cold war with Nitity.
Two: the Nititians possessed the alarming ability of being able to
assume the identical appearance of their enemies.
Three: by this means they could permeate human society.
Four: Earth was unable to view the Nititian civilization from inside.
Inside ... a wave of claustrophobia swept over Harley as he realized
that these cardinal facts he knew bore no relation to this little world
inside. They came, by what means he did not know, from outside, the vast
abstraction that one of them had ever seen. He had a mental picture of a
starry void in which men and monsters swam or battled, and then swiftly
erased it. Such ideas did not conform with the quiet behaviour of his