"Anderson, Poul - Eutopia UC" - читать интересную книгу автора (Anderson Poul)

УAnd I thought you were only trying to bed a girL Not seeking to destroy the house that befriended you!Ф
УMy lordЧФ
УHave no fears. You sucked my oath out of me. Now I must spend years trying to make amends to Ottar for cheating him.Ф
УButЧФ Calm! Calm! You might have expected this.
УYou will not ride in a warcraft. YouТll have your escort, yes. But the machine that carries you must be burned afterward. Now go wait by the stables, next to the dung heap, till weТre ready.Ф
УI meant no harm,Ф Jason protested. УI did not know.Ф
УTake him away before I kifi him,Ф Bela ordered.
Steinvik was old. These narrow cobbled streets, these gaunt houses, had seen dragon ships. But the same wind blew off the Atlantic, salt and fresh, to drive from Jason the last hurt of that sullenness which had ridden here with him. He pushed whistling through the crowds.
A man of Westfall, or America, would have slunk back. Had he not failed? Must he not be replaced by someone whose cover story bore
no hint of Hellas? But they saw with clear eyes in Eutopia. His failure was due to an honest mistake: a mistake he would not have made had they taught him more carefully before sending him out. One learns by error.
The memory of people in Ernvik and VaradyЧgusty, generous people whose friendship he would have liked to keepЧhad nagged him awhile. But he put that aside too. There were other worlds, an endlessness of them.
A signboard creaked in the wind. The Brotherhood of Hunyadi and Ivar, Shipfolk. Good camouflage, that, in a town where every second enterprise was bent seaward. He ran to the second floor. The stairs clattered under his boots.
He spread his palm before a chart on the wall. A hidden scanner identified his fingerpatterns and a hidden door opened. The room beyond was wainscoted in local fashion. But its clean proportions spoke of home; and a Nike statuette spread wings on a shelf.
Nike . . . Niki . . . IТm coming back to you! The heart leaped in him.
Daimonax Aristides looked up from his desk. Jason sometimes wondered if anything could rock the calm of that man. УRejoice!Ф the deep voice boomed. УWhat brings you here?Ф
УBad news, IТm afraid.Ф
УSo? Your attitude suggests the matter isnТt catastrophic.Ф DaimonaxТs big frame left his chair, went to the wine cabinet, filled a pair of chaste and beautiful goblets, and relaxed on a couch. УCome, tell me.Ф
Jason joined him. УUnknowingly,Ф he said, УI violated what appears to be a prime taboo. I was lucky to get away alive.Ф
УEh.Ф Daimonax stroked his iron-gray beard. УNot the first such turn, or the last. We fumble our way toward knowledge, but reality will always surprise us. . . . Well, congratulations on your whole skin. IТd have hated to mourn you.Ф
Solemnly, they poured a libation before they drank. The rational man recognizes his own need for ceremony; and why not draw it from otherwise outgrown myth? Besides, the floor was stainproof.
УDo you feel ready to report?Ф Daimonax asked.
УYes, I ordered the data in my head on the way here.Ф
Dainionax switched on a recorder, spoke a few cataloguing words and said, УProceed.Ф
Jason flattered himself that his statement was well arranged: clear, frank and full. But as he spoke, against his wifi experience came back to him, not in the brain but in the guts. He saw waves sparkle on that greatest of the Pentalimne; he walked the halls of Ernvik castle with eager and wondering young Leif; he faced an Ottar become beast; he stole from the keep and overpowered a guard and by-passed the controls of a car with shaking fingers; he fled down an empty road and stumbled through an empty forest; Bela spat and his triumph was suddenly ashen. At the end, he could not refrain:
УWhy wasnТt I informed? IТd have taken care. But they said this was a free and healthy folk, before marriage anyway. How could I know?Ф
УAn oversight,Ф Daimonax agreed. УBut we havenТt been in this business so long that we donТt stifi tend to take too much for granted.Ф
УWhy are we here? What have we to learn froth these barbarians? With infinity to explore, why are we wasting ourselves on the second most ghastly world weТve found?Ф
Daimonax turned off the recorder. For a time there was silence between the men. Wheels trundled outside, laughter and a snatch of song drifted through the window, the ocean blazed under a low sun.
УYou do not know?Ф Daimonax asked at last, softly.
УWell . . scientific interest, of courseЧФ Jason swallowed. УIТm sorry. The Institute works for sound reasons. In the American history weТre observing ways that man can go wrong. I suppose here also.Ф
Daimonax shook his head. УNo.Ф
УWhat?Ф
УWe are learning something far too precious to give up,Ф Daimonax said. УThe lesson is humbling, but our smug Eutopia will be the better for some humility. You werenТt aware of it, because to date we havenТt sufficient hard facts to publish any conclusions. And then, you are new in the profession, and your first assignment was elsewhen. But you see, we have excellent reason to believe that Westf all is also the Good Land.Ф
УImpossible,Ф Jason whispered.
Daimonax smiled and took a sip of wine. УThink,Ф he said. УWhat does man require? First, the biological necessities, food, shelter, medi
cine, sex, a healthful and reasonably safe environment in which to raise his children. Second, the special human need to strive, learn, create. Well, donТt they have these things here?Ф
УOne could say the same for any Stone Age tribe. You canТt equate contentment with happiness.Ф
УOf course not. And if anything, is not ordered, unified, planned Eutopia the country of the cows? We have ended every conflict, to the very conflict of man with his own soul; we have mastered the planets; the stars are too distant; were the God not so good as to make possible the parachronion, what would be left for us?Ф
УDo you meanЧФ Jason groped after words. He reminded himself that it was not sane to take umbrage at any mere statement, however outrageous. УWithout fighting, clannishness, superstition, ritual and taboo . . . man has nothing?Ф
УMore or less that. Society must have structure and meaning. But nature does not dictate what structure or what meaning. Our rationalism is a non-rational choice. Our leashing of the purely animal within us is simply another taboo. We may love as we please, but not hate as we please. So are we more free than men in Westf all?Ф
УBut surely some cultures are better than others!Ф
УI do not deny that,Ф Daimonax said; УI only point out that each has its price. For what we enjoy at home, we pay dearly. We do not allow ourselves a single unthinking, merely felt impulse. By excluding danger and hardship, by eliminating distinctions between men, we leave no hopes of victory. Worst, perhaps, is this: that we have become pure individuals. We belong to no one. Our sole obligation is negative, not to compel any other individual. The stateЧan engineered organization, a faceless undemanding mechanismЧtakes care of each need and each hurt. Where is loyalty unto death? Where is the intimacy of an entire shared lifetime? We play at ceremonies, but because we know they are arbitrary gestures, what is their value? Because we have made our world one, where are color and contrast, where is pride in being peculiarly ourselves?
УNow these Westf all people, with all their faults, do know who they are, what they are, what they belong to and what belongs to them. Tradition is not buried in books but is part of life; and so their dead remain with them in loving memory. Their problems are real; hence their successes are real. They believe in their rites. The family, the
kingdom, the race is something to live and die for. They use their brains less, perhapsЧthough even that I am not pertain ofЧbut they use nerves, glands, muscles more. So they know an aspect of being human which our careful world has denied itself.
УIf they have kept this while creating science and machine technology, should we not try to learn from them?Ф
Jason had no answer.
Eventually Daimonax said he might as well return to Eutopia. After a vacation, he could be reassigned to some history he might find more congenial. They parted in friendly wise.
The parachronion hummed. Energies pulsed between the universes. The gate opened and Jason stepped through.
He entered a glazed colonnade. White Neathenai swept in grace and serenity down to the water. The man who received him was a philosopher. Decent tunic and sandals hung ready to be donned. From somewhere resounded a lyre.
Joy trembled in Jason. Leif Ottarsson fell out of memory. He had only been tempted in his loneliness by a chance resemblance to his beloved. Now he was home. And Niki waited for him, Nikias Demostheneou, most beautiful and enchanting of boys.