"The World Jones Made" - читать интересную книгу автора (Dick Phillip K)

"That's him."

"And they finally got around to arresting him?"

"It's not an easy thing."

"I thought it was all rigged; I thought you could get anybody."

"We can--but we don't want to. We only want people who seem to be dangerous. You think I'd arrest your brother's cousin because she goes around saying Beethoven quartets are the only music worth listening to?"

"You know," Nina said idly, "I don't remember a single thing I read in Hoff's book. We had it in school, of course. Required text in sociology." Blithely, she finished: "I just can't seem to get interested in Relativism . . . and now here I am married to a--" She glanced around. "I guess I shouldn't say. I still can't get used to this clandestine sneaking around."

"It's in a good cause," Cussick said.

Nina sighed. "I just wish you were in something else. In the shoelace business. Or even dirty postcards. Anything you could be proud of."

"I'm proud of this."

"Oh? Are you really?"

"I'm the town dog catcher," Cussick said soberly. "Nobody likes the dog catcher. Little kids pray a thunderbolt will strike the dog catcher. I'm the dentist. I'm the tax collector. I'm all the stern men who show up with folders of white paper, summoning people to face judgment. I didn't know that, seven months ago. I know it now."

"But you're still in the secret-service."

"Yes," Cussick said. "I still am. And I probably will be the rest of my life."

Nina hesitated. "Why?"

"Because Security is the lesser of two evils. I say evils. Of course, you and I know- there's no such thing as evil. A glass of beer is evil at six in the morning. A dish of mush looks like hell around eight o'clock at night. To me, the spectacle of demagogues sending millions of people to their deaths, wrecking the world with holy wars and bloodshed, tearing down whole nations to put over some religious or political 'truth' is--" He shrugged. "Obscene. Filthy. Communism, Fascism, Zionism--they're the opinions of absolutist individuals forced on whole continents. And it has nothing to do with the sincerity of the leader. Or the followers. The fact that they believe it makes it even more obscene. The fact that they could kill each other and die voluntarily over meaningless verbalisms . . ." He broke off. "You see the reconstruction crews; you know we'll be lucky if we ever rebuild."

"But secret police . . . it seems so sort of ruthless and--well, and cynical."

He nodded. "I suppose Relativism is cynical. It surely isn't idealistic. It's the result of being killed and injured and made poor and working hard for empty words. It's the outgrowth of generations of shouting slogans, marching with spades and guns, singing patriotic hymns, chanting, and saluting flags."

"But you put them into prison. These people who don't agree with you--you won't let them disagree with you , . . like this Minister Jones."

"Jones can disagree with us. Jones can believe anything he wants; he can believe the Earth is flat, that God is an onion, that babies are born in cellophane bags. He can have any opinion he wants; but once he starts peddling it as Absolute Truth -"

"Then you put him in prison," Nina said tightly.

"No," Cussick corrected. "Then we put out our hand; we say simply: Put up or shut up. Prove what you're saying. If you want to say the Jews are the root of all evil--prove it. You can say it--if you can back it up. Otherwise, into the work camp."

"It's--" She smiled a little. "It's a tough business."

"You bet it is",

"If you see me sipping cyanide through a straw," Nina said, "you can't tell me not to. I'm free to poison myself."

"I can tell you it's cyanide in the bottle, not orange juice."