"Alfred Bester - Demolished Man, The" - читать интересную книгу автора (Bester Alfred)

Over and over again... The Man With No Face, and Finance, Transportation,
and Mars."
"That doesn't mean anything to me."
"It must mean something, Mr. Reich. You must be able to identify this
terrifying figure. Why else would you attempt to escape by rejecting his
face?"
"I'm not rejecting anything."
"I offer as further clues the altered word `Dort' and the forgotten
name of the company that coined the slogan `We Transport You Into---' "
"I tell you I don't know who it is." Reich arose abruptly from the
couch. "Your clues don't help. I can't make any identification."
"The Man With No Face does not fill you with fear because he's
faceless. You know who he is. You hate him and fear him, but you know who
he is."
"You're the peeper. You tell me. "
"There's a limit to my ability, Mr. Reich. I can read your mind no
deeper without help."
"What do you mean, help? You're the best E.M.D. I could hire. If..."
"You're neither thinking nor meaning that, Mr. Reich. You deliberately
hired a 2nd Class Esper in order to protect yourself in such an emergency.
Now you're paying the price of your caution. If you want the screaming to
stop, you'll have to consult one of the 1st Class men... Say, Augustus Tate
or Gart or Samuel @kins..."
"I'll think about it," Reich muttered and turned to go. As he opened
the door, Breen called: "By the way... `We Transport You Into Transports'
is the slogan of the D'Courtney Cartel. How does that tie in with the
alteration of `bort' to `dort'? Think it over."
"The Man With No Face!"
Without staggering, Reich slammed the door across the path from his
mind to Breen and then lurched down the corridor toward his own suite. A
wave of savage hatred burst over him. "He's right. It's D'Courtney who's
giving me the screams. Not because I'm afraid of him. I'm afraid of myself.
Known all along. Known it deep down inside. Known that once I faced it I'd
have to kill that D'Courtney bastard. It's no face because it's the face of
murder."

Fully dressed and in his wrong mind, Reich stormed out of his
apartment and descended to the street where a Monarch Jumper picked him up
and carried him in one graceful hop to the giant tower that housed the
hundreds of floors and thousands of employees of Monarch's New York Office.
Monarch Tower was the central nervous system of an incredibly vast
corporation, a pyramid of transportation, communication, heavy industry,
manufacture, sales distribution, research, exploration, importation.
Monarch Utilities & Resources, Inc. bought and sold, traded and gave, made
and destroyed. Its pattern of subsidiaries and holding companies was so
complex that it demanded the full-time services of a 2nd Class Esper
Accountant to trace the labyrinthine flow of its finances.
Reich entered his office, followed by his chief (Esper 3) secretary
and her staff, bearing the litter of the morning's work.
"Dump it and jet," he growled.