"Card, Orson Scott - Worthing Chronicle 01 - Capital" - читать интересную книгу автора (Card Orson Scott)

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They tried it again. They started with the assumption that it was too confusing to use a near relative as the source of memories. It was too difficult when the patient knew he had once been someone else. So they took five more; again, those with the least advanced cancer. They gave them the braintapes of people their age and their sex, but told the patients nothing of the experiment. Instead, the patients were told that they had had amnesia and a serious illness, but they were getting better.

It made no difference.

Dialogue with Marian Williamson, the last of the five to remain sane. She believed her name was Lydia Harper:

Lydia, how did you sleep?

"It was hideous."

Hideous? Why?

"I kept dreaming."

About what?

"You told me you weren't a shrink."

I lied. Haven't you ever lied?

"Yes, Dr. Rines, I have."

Are you good at it?

"Very, very good." [Patient weeps.]

What's wrong, Lydia?

"Doctor, I don't know, I don't know, I keep dreaming terrible dreams, I keep seeing myself doing hideous things, what's wrong with me?"

I don't know. You were sick.

"Not that sick. Oh, I have an occasional pain in my stomach, but nothing too serious, I'm not a hypochondriac, I refuse to complain, but doctor, I can't bear living with myself."

Come now. You've lived with yourself all your life.

"I don't know how I did it. Dr. Rines, is it possible for a person to keep doing things all her life and then suddenly wish she had never done them? Suddenly wonder how in the world she had ever done them?"

Like what?

"I'm not Catholic. I don't like confessing."

Is it that terrible?

"Sometimes."

Tell me the other times.