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

"Ill do that," Cussick said. "Don't forget your package." He stood a moment, until the two of them had disappeared along the hall. Then he turned and re-entered the room.

On the bed, Nina was sitting up slightly, her head against the wall, legs drawn up, feet tucked under her. She smiled up weakly at him. "Hello," she said.

"Feel better?" He locked the door and came toward her. "They left; I sent them off."

Sitting down on the edge of the bed he asked. "This is your room, isn't it?"

"Yes." She didn't look directly at him.

"How long?"

"Oh, not long. A week, maybe. Ten days."

"I don't really understand. You want to be here with these people?"

"I wanted to get away. I couldn't stand that damn little apartment ... I wanted to be on my own, do something. It's so hard to explain; some of it I don't understand, myself. It's like the stealing--I just felt I had to stand up."

"That's why you brought us all here, then. It meant nothing until you could show it to us."

"I suppose so. Yes, I guess you're right. I wanted you to see it, so you'd know. So you'd see I had somewhere to go ... not dependent on you. Not helpless, tied to your world. Outside in the main bar I got scared ... I took the heroin to get my nerve." She smiled a little. "It's such a mess."

He bent over her, holding onto her hands. Her skin was cold and faintly moist. "You're not scared now, are you?"

"No," she managed. "Not with you here."

"We'll stay here tonight," he told her. "That's what you want?"

She nodded forlornly.

"Then tomorrow morning we'll go back?"

Twisting, she answered painfully: "Don't ask me. Don't make me say. I'm afraid to say, now."

"All right." It hurt, but he didn't press for an answer. "We can decide tomorrow, after we have a good sleep and breakfast. After we get all this stuff out of our systems. This poison--this rot."

There was no answer. Nina had fallen into a partial doze; eyes shut, she lay resting against the wall, chin down, body relaxed.

For a long time Cussick sat immobile. The room grew cold. Outside, in the hall, there was only silence. His watch told him it was four-thirty. Presently he bent down and slid off Nina's shoes. He placed them on the floor by the bed, hesitated, and then unfastened the snaps of her dress. The dress was intricately held together; it took him some time. Twice, she woke slightly, stirred, and sank back into sleep. At last the dress came apart; he maneuvered one section over her head, laid it over the back of a chair, lifted her hips, and struggled the remaining part away from her.

It was surprising how really small she was. Without the ornate, expensive dress, she seemed unusually bare, defenseless, open to injury. It was impossible to feel rancor toward her. He pulled up the blankets around her shoulders and tucked them under her chin. Her heavy blonde hair spilled out over the wool fabric, thick honey streaks against the checkered pattern of red and black. Smoothing her hair back from her eyes, he seated himself beside her on the bed.

For an endless time he sat, his mind blank, gazing into the shadows of the room. Nina slept fitfully; now and then she turned, twisted, made faint unhappy sounds. Struggling in an invisible darkness, she fought lonely battles, without him, without anybody. In the final analysis, each of them was cut off from the other. Each of them suffered alone.


Towards morning, he became aware of a distant, muffled sound: a noise coming from a long way off. For a time he paid no attention; the noise beat uselessly against his dulled consciousness. And then, finally, he identified it. A human voice, harsh and loud, a voice he recognized. Stiffly, shaking with cold, he got from the bed and made his way to the door. With infinite care he unlocked it and stepped out into the chill, deserted corridor.

The voice was the voice of Jones.

Cussick walked slowly down the corridor. He passed closed doors and side passages, but saw nobody. It was five-forty a.m.; the sun was beginning to show. Through an open window at the end of the hall he caught a glimpse of bleak, gray sky, as remote and hostile as gun-metal. As he walked, the voice grew louder. All at once he turned a corner and found himself facing a great storeroom.