"Allston, Aaron - Doc Sidhe 01 - Doc Sidhe" - читать интересную книгу автора (Allston Aaron)
Harris asked, УWhy?Ф Seeing AlastairТs blank look, he continued: УWhy would he want to help?Ф
Alastair thought about that for a moment. УI donТt know too much about it. HeТs almost the last of his kind, and heТd like for them to be remembered kindly.Ф
УWho is СthemТ?Ф
УPurebloods from a long time ago.Ф Alastair opened a floor-level cabinet and bent over to peer within it. УAmapershiat itifuwaddaЧФ
УI canТt hear you.Ф
УSorry.Ф Alastair straightened, looking dubious. УIТd appreciate it if you wouldnТt bandy this about. A lot of it is public record, but Doc doesnТt care to have it discussed in his presence.Ф
УSure.Ф
Alastair kept his attention on the door. УThere was a bad one a while back. One of the Daoine Sidhe, like Doc. Did a lot of harm in the years leading up to the last war. Made their kind infamous. Doc fought him several times, but the people mostly remembered the bad that one did. If you said СDaoine SidheТ to the average man on the walk twenty years ago, heТd have bit his thumb and spat.Ф
УWhatever that means.Ф
УWell, it just means that Doc ended up being the heir to a very nasty legacy. ThatТs why the Sidhe Foundation. ItТs all charities and philanthropies and fixing problems. Nowadays, you say Daoine Sidhe to the man on the walk, and heТs just as likely to think of the Foundation. Which is a victory.Ф
УI guess itТd kind of be like growing up with the name Hitler.Ф
УWhatever that means.Ф
The night had brought Gaby very little sleep, so she substituted caffeine for wakefulness and tried to keep her manner pleasant. SheТd be dealing with people all day.
She called the police. There was no news about Harris or the old man.
She called work to tell them why she wouldnТt be coming in that day, or for the next several. She didnТt tell her boss where sheТd be staying, and he said he understood. She hoped it was true. It would be monstrously unfair for her to be replaced for something that just wasnТt her fault.
She called in the theft of her credit cards to all the issuers.
That afternoon, she went for her first shooting lesson with ElaineТs husband Jim.
The directed explosions from the revolver rattled her nerves. Still, he complimented her on learning not to flinch with each pull of the trigger. Soon he was making approving noises at the way her wadcutter rounds punched holes in the paper silhouette of a target. УNot a bad grouping,Ф he said. УAnd weТre talking about self-defense here, not target shooting. That means closer range than this. YouТll do just fine . . . if you donТt let adrenaline mess up your reactions and your aim. You have to stay controlled.Ф
УControlled,Ф she repeated, and flipped the switch on the booth to send the new target back on its mechanical rail. She steadied her aim, mentally superimposed the horrible image of Adonis over the target, and prepared to give it a chest full of holes. Then, in tones so low that Jim couldnТt hear through the protective earmuffs: УIТll show you controlled.Ф
* * *
Through the open door of the bathroom, Harris could see late-afternoon sun angling into the bedroom. He lay in the claw-foot bathtub, legs drawn upЧthe thing was too short for him; he absently scrubbed at himself as the water cooled.
In spite of his worry and his intermittent nausea, heТd fallen asleep almost as soon as they got back to the Monarch Building.
Endless chiming noises had wakened him long after sunlight spilling over his eyes had failed to do so. Once he understood that the device that looked like a lizardТs arm with a balled fist at either end was the handset of a telephone, or Уtalk-box double,Ф he could answer it. On the other end was Doc, asking him to get ready for a trip in an hour or so.
And it was so big. HeТd found somewhere that no one else knew about. The map heТd seen suggested that this . . . place . . . was as big as the entire world he knew.
What the hell was he supposed to do about this? Go home and tell somebody? If he couldnТt bring people backЧpreferably guys with minicams and sound equipmentЧhe couldnТt prove anything to other people.
And what if he could prove it? TheyТd want to come here, of course. ThereТd be a hell of a lot of press. Naturally, most people back home wouldnТt believe it no matter how much press there was. Except big business; theyТd be setting up McDonaldТs restaurants on every block as fast as they could bring in the yellow-arch signs. . . . That bothered him. It just didnТt seem that Neckerdam would be improved by an invasion of junk food, tabloids, and grunge rock.
So hard to think about it. Every time he tried to put the scattered pieces of his thoughts together, other things floated up to the forefront of his memory. Gaby telling him good-bye, Gaby running for her life. GabrielleТs gaze flicking away past him as though he were unrecognizable pixels on the TV screen. Sonny WaltersТ face, the Smile, floating forward on the audienceТs roar of contempt. Nothing seemed to banish these images.
With a defeated sigh, he rose, toweled himself dry and set about dressing in his new clothes.
He tried to let the view from his window distract him. The ninety-third floor of the Monarch Building afforded him an amazing panorama of tall, bizarre buildings and tiny cars moving along the tree-lined avenues.
He loosely knotted his tie and reminded himself that it was not the ninety-third floor. It was Уup ninety-two.Ф If he were to take the elevator down to the twenty-fifth floor, that would be Уup twenty-four,Ф even if he started out above that floor. The ground floor was Уdown,Ф the basement was Уdown one.Ф It didnТt make much sense, he didnТt like it, and he knew heТd never remember it; but trying to figure out all the differences was a helpful distraction.
Differences. Like the skyscrapers all around the Monarch Building. Half of them were cylindrical towers, capped with pointed cones for roofs or with battlements like the tops of medieval castles. The other half tended to be more like the skyscrapers he was used to, comforting in their squareness, though they all had the kind of art-deco-era architecture he associated with the Empire State and the Chrysler Building.
Some of these were odd, all bright and garish. The one opposite the Monarch Building was a checkerboard of alternating squares of white and green marble; back home, no one could have found investors to build something so ghastly. He hoped not, anyway.
The Monarch Building itself took up a city block, without the setbacks that characterized the Empire State Building and other skyscrapers from its era. It was an unsettling black and had broad ledges every twenty stories; he couldnТt see the next one down, but had given them a good look on their return last night. On each ledge was a line of white marble statues of monsters like griffins and rampant dragons, men and women in medieval dress, odd symbols he could not recognize.
A single sharp rap on his door interrupted his thoughts. УCome in.Ф
Doc entered. He wore the same clothes as last night, and though no sign of lack of sleep marred his face, Harris thought he could see a certain weariness in the manТs posture. УAre you ready to go?Ф Doc asked.
УI guess. Where are we going?Ф
УA construction site. IТm looking for someone who can help us. I want him to see you, to convince him that the gap between the two worlds has indeed been bridged.Ф
In the elevator down, Doc handed him a paper bag and a strange ceramic cupЧit was capped by a hinged top like a beer stein. In the bag was a pastry something like an eclair, but the filling was meat and the breading reminded him of a bagel. The stein was filled with a thick, hot liquid as bitter as bad coffee, but tasting like unsweetened chocolate. Harris grimaced over the flavor but guessed that it was strong with the caffeine he needed.
In the basement garage, Fergus slid out from underneath DocТs top-down two-seat roadster and cheerfully told him, УItТs ready, sir; all patched. Try not to drive over the potted plants next time.Ф Harris wondered if the mechanic ever slept.
This car, lower than Jean-PierreТs but just as long, had a different sound to its engine, a throaty growl that told Harris that it was a different class of vehicle. As he and Doc roared out of the basement garage, it sounded like a leashed lion. Harris washed that thought away with the last of the bitter chocolate. УDid you get any sleep?Ф
УNo.Ф
УWell, thanks for driving, then. Did you get anything figured out?Ф
УYes.Ф Doc turned right onto the main street the Monarch Building faced and blasted his way into the southbound traffic. Harris estimated that this would be somewhere near Fifth Avenue if he were home. But the real Fifth Avenue would be southbound only instead of having two directions of traffic separated by a tree-filled median. It wouldnТt be thick with the antique autos he was growing used to. There would be lanes painted on asphalt instead of a brick surface with metal tracks set into it for the frequent rail-bound red buses they passed. Taxis wouldnТt be Christmas green. One vehicle in twenty wouldnТt be a horse-drawn cart, for ChristТs sake.
УWell, what?Ф
УFirst, unfortunately, none of the men we took has talked. I doubt they will; they are a very confident lot. TheyТre in the prison of the Neckerdam Guard now.
УSecond, though, I do have results from your valence tests of this morning.Ф
Harris grimaced. The last thing Doc and Alastair had done before heТd been allowed to go up to his room was take him into a small side laboratory and load him into a preposterous upright glass cylinder capped with electrical apparatus. Harris hadnТt been alarmed until the two men drew on thick goggles with lenses that were almost black.
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