"Sonya Dorman - The Sons of Bingaloo" - читать интересную книгу автора (Dorman Sonya)

young people at all.
тАЬAre you one of his students?тАЭ Pettrey asked her.
тАЬYes,тАЭ she said, and refused further communication by leaning her head back and closing her eyes.
Pettrey thought it a shame to waste that much beauty in his field, and immediately amended his
thoughts, though he couldnтАЩt have helped them. It was simply that he liked to see beauty displayed in the
performing arts, and didnтАЩt enjoy thinking about it hidden in some private burrow such as his own. But
then, after a certain number of years . . . what was that kind of beauty worth? . . . compared to his own.
He had no idea how long he must wait; it could be half an hour or half a day, depending on the person
before him. At any rate, heтАЩd been here on time, and had spent yesterday morning supporting the
apprentice singers with his presence. One or two of them had been quite fine, so it hadnтАЩt been a loss for
him.
But after all these years, Pettrey was still astonished at how many came to be licensed, how many with
no talent, no beauty, nothing but a little bit of a dream. The purpose of licensing was to prevent these
people from overflowing in a difficult field, and from swindling the interested public. He could not imagine
a better system, even if he fell victim to it. Not if he looked at it objectively.
The entry door swung open, a clerk spoke his name, and vanished.
Pettrey went into the inner room, which was smoothly paneled, well lighted at the writing table, and
quite plain, except for the huge chandelier in the center of the ceiling. In the dark, still air, the prisms and
crystals hardly stirred, though just his quiet progress across the room to the table caused a small
coruscation to occur,
He appreciated the absence of any presence, as he thought of it. He sat down in the comfortable chair,
and lined up the writing tools, of which there was a good selection. He fingered the various papers. A
new one, this year, with a kind of pale fiber running through. Pettrey thought it might have been begged
from a draftsman, it was so nice both to eye and hand. As always, he reached for the plain student block,
which was most familiar and comfortable to him.
Now he began his discipline, for which he had been prepared; but nothing went right. The moment he
began to breathe evenly, his mind cavorted off, tara-taroo, like a child at recess. How the rivers ran
silvery over the white moss. How last week Memee had said to him, тАЬOh, Pettrey, IтАЩd love you even if
you worked in stone.тАЭ
As if I did not, Pettrey thought acidly, answering her a little too late. For what he must do, figuratively
speaking, was to create a lace from adamant rock, to make a lively and flexible dancing slipper from a
ton of metal. He could feel it, cold and dead, weighing down his mind.
Now, discipline, Pettrey told himself.
Tra-la, tra-loo, we are the sons of Bingaloo, went his mind.
Pettrey cursed aloud.
He sat in the pool of light at the table, physically comfortable, quite alone as he wished to be, and died
his many deaths. What if it had gone. What if it never came back. What if he could not produce a word
today, but woke up next morning and poured out a masterpiece, one day too late? What if he lost his
license? What if he could make love to MassonyтАЩs beautiful student?
Picking up a gernsey point, he wrote one line of exceedingly erotic poetry, and crossed it out in a rage.
That was not his m├йtier, that kind of celebration; too narrow, and as a person grew older, less
challenging. He had already accomplished that so many times.
Pettrey sat back in the chair and closed his eyes, giving his mind freedom. The clich├йs came to seduce
him: worn images, damaged phrases, jingles, and that hideously intrusive childrenтАЩs rhyme about
Bingaloo. A mythical, rhythmic country, where children dwelled.
He began to breathe at a slower rate. His mind wandered further from its rational tether. For a
moment, the little invisible valve in his forehead opened, then it closed again, but he knew it was a start.
No matter how deeply at work or at rest Pettrey was in his chair, he resisted even the slightest thought
of the chandelier hanging still as death above him. Before his first license, he had learned all about it; the
computer buried in the ceiling, the delicate calibrations which responded to increased electrical activity of