"Campbell, Ramsey - The Parasite 1.0" - читать интересную книгу автора (Campbell Ramsey)

Instead she grabbed her handbag. Nothing had been stolen; her passport was still there. Her name, her cramped photograph, the Englishness of it were profoundly reassuring. Still, why should she have been afraid of not being able to prove who she was?

`The cops want you to go and make a statement when you're better,' Diana said. ,

Apart from her headache, Rose already felt better. The attack seemed less shocking than inevitable, one of the chances you took in New York. It seemed to have happened to someone else, not to have touched her at all.

`Maybe you could use some soup?' Diana said. She and Rose had planned to cook an elaborate dinner, but now Rose found the prospect of lying in state almost appealing. She glanced around the large narrow room. A Scriabin score perched above the keyboard of a battered piano. Above her couch, shelves heavy with leaning books clung precariously to the wall. Another couch was a battle of lumps; beside it a sweater salaamed on the floor. The apartment looked more lived in than Jack's -though Rose had yet to catch him dusting: he must work like a phantom charwoman, rumoured but never glimpsed.

Over sounds of stirring Diana called, `What do you think of Jack?'

`I like him now that I know him.'

`That's how I feel. I mean, he puts up so many barriers until you get through to him. Like at the party, he felt he had to tell me the names of all his clients. He's scared to let go of his role in case you don't like him as he is. But I can tell there's more to him.'

Rose was glancing at the ragged spines above her: Catch-22, Brautigan, Hesse, Astral Rape, Kafka, The Psychedelic Experience, The Tarot Revealed, The Tarot Explained, A Primer of the Tarot . . . `I like Bill,' Diana was saying. `He sounds just like one of the Beatles, right? You know, I didn't come to the party to meet Jack. I wanted to meet you.'

`Why, because you'd read something of ours?'

'No, never.'

Rose had pulled out Astral Rape. IF SOMEONE COULD REACH THROUGH THE WALLS OF YOUR HOME AND KIDNAP YOU, red letters blared on the glossy black cover, WOULDN'T YOU BE SCARED? PERHAPS SOMEONE CAN.

`Have you read that? That's a scary book. Just imagine that guy Peter Grace reaching inside your body. I'm glad the Nazis couldn't find his secret, aren't you?' Diana placed a small table beside Rose. `Oh, you haven't read it - but you're interested in the occult, right?'

'No, not really.' Rose stuffed the book into its gap, adding to its dog's-ears, and felt abashed: after all, she'd pestered Diana to read her Tarot. `Sorry, Diana. You'll understand that I'm rather on edge. I used to be afraid of all that kind of thing, but I grew out of that. I'm interested really.'

`Sure, I knew you were. It's like I was saying - I felt I ought to meet you. You have psychic glimpses too, don't yourT

'What do you mean?'

'Like premonitions.'

`No.' Watching Diana's disappointment, she grew impatient with herself. But Diana's missionary fervour had made her dizzy headache worse.

`I have them.' Diana looked and sounded rather like a defiant child. `That's why I came downstairs to look for you. Excuse me, you don't want to talk about that.'

`Yes, I do. I don't want to bottle it up.'

`Well, there isn't much to say. Barbara, you know she was moving, she came up to use my phone because her van broke down. Well, we were having coffee when I got this feeling. We ran down in time to scare him off - we heard him running away. He must have tried to drag you into Barbara's flat. Wait, let me just get the soup.'

When Rose sat up, the room tilted with her. She managed to prop herself precariously. `Want me to help you?' Diana said.

`Good heavens no.' It was many years since she had been so ill that Auntie Vi had fed her with a spoon. Diana's face ducked quickly amid the cover of her hair, towards her soup. `Thanks anyway,' Rose said.

It was vegetable soup, thick with chunks. Rose was wary of drinking it in case it returned in a similar form. Just in case she had concussion, oughtn't she to avoid solids? But the first mouthful seemed to strengthen her like liquor, stabilizing her head.

Diana was rolling a fat cigarette and gulping soup from a mug. Behind her a window too small for the room overlooked a fire escape. `Do you do drugs?' Diana said.

`Only alcohol. You go ahead if you want to.'