"Dann,_Jack_-_The_Diamond_Pit" - читать интересную книгу автора (Dann Jack)

"Yes, of course. I'm sorry."
She turned back to me and asked, "Well, do you still want to kiss me?"
"I never said I wanted to kiss you."
But against all judgment -- of course -- I did.
* * * *
Phoebe and I lay in bed. It was evening, and the garden was a fantasia of fairy lights. A sweetly scented breeze wafted in through the balcony, shadows and pale, milky lights played over a wall-sized Flemish tapestry of Neptune standing upon a shell and creating a horse of air with his trident. The walls were covered with blue brocade from Scalamandre, and the gilded wood ceiling glowed as if lit by fireflies. Phoebe was curled up beside me, and we were wrapped in smooth satin sheets as blue as the brocade.
"You see, everything is perfect," Phoebe said. "I knew it would be. I always know."
"Ah, so you always lure lonely prisoners into your den to have your way with them, is that it?"
"Exactly so." After a pause, she said, "How could you even imagine I would have anything to do with anyone else?"
There was nothing to say to that, so I enjoyed being close to her, feeling her smooth shoulder and slipping my hand down to caress her small breast. She was thin and long and smooth and as perfect as I had imagined.
"Well, just in case it might interest you, I've never had anything to do with anyone down there" -- I knew she meant the pit -- " or anyone who Poppa has brought to visit."
"So your father does have guests here," I said. "Doesn't he worry about security?" For an instant, Phoebe seemed to be nonplussed, but then she giggled and said, "Poppa worries about everything."
"What if they told their friends? Why -- "
"They're very rich," Phoebe said. "Not nearly as rich as we are, of course, but they're worth quite a boodle, you can count on that. And Poppa could just as easily make their shares in the stock market go up or down. He can make it do whatever he wants. But you, Mr. Paul Rudolph Valentino Piano-player, you're like a big dog with a bone, aren't you? Now, do you _really_ want to talk about Poppa's friends, or -- "
She was quite persuasive; and I was indeed, in all respects, like a dog with a bone. "What was all that business about not getting to keep me until September?" I insisted. "What did your brother mean by that?"
She drew away from me and pulled the sheets up to her neck, as though she were wearing them as a nightgown. "You got what you want, so thanks for the buggy ride. And now you want to play twenty questions."
I tried to put my arm around her, but she turned away, taking most of the sheets with her. It suddenly felt cold in the room.
"I didn't mean to hurt your feelings." I said. "I -- "
"Then say you're sorry."
"I'm sorry."
She unraveled herself from the sheets and turned toward me. "I'm coming out in London in September. I'll be presented at court, and I'll meet King George. He's also a friend of Poppa's. Now does _that_ answer your question?"
Of course it didn't; but I would bide my time. I nodded.
"Then you may have your way with me again."
But that wasn't to be either because there was a sharp knock on the door, followed by the booming voice of God.
* * * *
"I'm not dressed, Poppa," Phoebe said sweetly, sitting up in the bed. She seemed to be talking to the polychrome sculpture of Saint John that was positioned beside the paneled door. "I'll meet you down in the library." She looked at me and shrugged.
"You'll open this door right now, young lady!"
"No I _won't!_"
I started to get up. I could grab my clothes, perhaps hide; but Phoebe said, "Don't be goofy. He'll go away in a minute. Absolutely-positively."
Then I heard Jefferson say something incomprehensible in a low voice -- most likely, he was speaking to one of his slaves.
I was right.
I should have known better than to listen to Phoebe. Now it was too late.
A key turned in the lock, Robert pushed the great door open, and Master Randolph Estes Jefferson, dressed impeccably in formal eveningwear -- white tie and tails -- walked into the room. Phoebe was a blur rushing into the adjoining bathroom; it was a wonder she didn't slip on the blue, diamond-smooth floor. She slammed the door shut and left me to face the music by myself. There was nothing I could do but pull the sheets around me. My clothes were strewn across the floor.
Passion had certainly taken precedence over foresight.
"Do you see what happens, Robert, when you leave guests unattended?" Master Jefferson spoke to his slave in English.
Robert nodded and looked at me as if I were the wayward child and he was the parent.
"Well, good evening, Mr. Orsatti," Jefferson said. "I see that you have already provided my daughter with her first lesson. I will expect you to attend to my daughter's musical education with as much ardor as you seem to have displayed here tonight." He lifted my undershorts with the toe of his polished leather spats and then kicked them across the room. "And I am expecting to see a marked improvement in her proficiency at the piano, Mr. Orsatti. In September, she will give a recital at Carnegie Hall. It's all arranged."
"Sir, don't you think that's a bit, er, premature -- ?"
Jefferson gave me a genial smile, his ruddy, fleshy face the picture of cheerfulness, his eyes as hard as the diamond mountain below us. "Wouldn't you say _this_ is premature, sir?" he said, looking around the room, indicating my situation with a simple turn of his head. Then he nodded to Robert, who picked up my scattered clothes and laid them out neatly on the corner of the bed.
"You look perplexed, Mr. Orsatti," Jefferson continued. "Did you expect I would have you beaten? Or killed? Or thrown back into the pit with your colleagues? No, you're Phoebe's guest now. And Phoebe is a woman of the '20s. Why, she's practically emancipated."
"_Practically_ emancipated?" Phoebe asked, opening her bathroom door a crack and peering out. The light behind her transformed her curly hair into a halo.
"Well, maybe you'd prefer to leave school and go to work for Mrs. Millie Scotch Barker and her suffragettes," Jefferson said. "But this is none of your business, young lady. You're taking your bath, are you not? while poor Mr. Orsatti must make his own introductions."
"For your information, her name isn't Millie Scotch Barker. It's Abby Scott Baker, and in case you've been too busy to notice, Poppa, we've won the right to vote."
"_You_ don't have the right to vote, nor do I think you'd care to be poor."
"I know poor people at school," Phoebe said.
"Ah, yes, those poor girlfriends of yours who can't afford to keep their own staffs of servants.
"Well, I know Mr. Orsatti."
"Ah, yes, Mr. Orsatti, whom you're going to make as rich as Croesus, isn't that so?"
"If you have no objections, Poppa," Phoebe said meekly, then closed the bathroom door.
Jefferson chuckled and said, "Well, Croesus had better dress for dinner, hadn't he? When Robert is finished with you, Mr. Orsatti, he'll bring you to my library, and I will explain everything before we join the ladies. No, better yet, Robert, bring him to the theater. Do you like moving pictures, Mr. Orsatti -- ?"