"Gardner Dozois - Horse Of Air (2)" - читать интересную книгу автора (Dozois Gardner)

-He hates birds because they have freedom of movement, because they can fly, because they- can
shift their viewpoint from spot to spot in linear space, while he can do so only- in time and .
memory, and that imperfectly. They can fly here and look at him .and then fly away, while he has
no volition: if he wants to look at them, he must wait until they decide to come to him. Ile
flicks a . piece of plaster at them, between the hoops

Startled by something, the pigeons explode upward with a whir of feathers. I watch them fly away:
skimming along the side of a building, dipping with an air current. They are soon lost in the maze
of low roofs that thrust up below at all angles and heights, staggering toward the Apartment
Towers in the middle distance. The Towers stand untouched by the sea of brownstones that break
around their flanks, like aloof monoliths wading in a surf of scummy brown brick. Other towers
march off in curving lines toward the horizon, becoming progressively smaller until they vanish at
the place where a misty sky merges with a line of low hills. If I press myself against the mesh at
the far right side of the balcony, I can see the nearest Tower to my own, perhaps sis hundred
yards away, all of steel and concrete with a vertical line of windows running down the middle and


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rows of identical balconies on either side.
Nearest to me on the left is a building that rises about a quarter of the way up my
Tower's flank: patterns of dark-brown and light red bricks, interlaced with fingers of mortar,
weathered gray roof shingles, a few missing here and there in a manner reminiscent of broken
teeth; a web of black chimney and sewage pipes crawling up and across the walls like metallic
creepers. All covered with the pale splotches of bird droppings. 'Chi Towers are much cleaner; not
so many horizontal surfaces. Windows are broken in the disintegrating buildings down there; the
dying sunlight glints from fangs of shattered glass. Curtains hang in limp shreds that snap and
drum when a wind comes up. If you squint, you can see that the wind has scattered broken twigs and
rubbish all over the floors inside. No, I am much happier in one of the towers.
(I hate the Towers. I would rather live anywhere than here.)
-He hates the Towers. As the sun starts to dip below the horizon, settling down into the
concrete labyrinth like a hog into a wallow, he shakes his head blindly and makes a low noise at
the back of his throat. The shadows of buildings are longer now, stretching in toward him from the
horizon like accusing fingers. A deep gray gloom is gathering in the corners and angles of walls,
shot with crimson sparks from the foundering sun, now dragged under and wrapped in chill masonry.
His hands go up and out, curling again around the hoops of the mesh. He shakes the mesh

violently, throwing his weight against it. The mesh groans in metallic agony but remains solid. A
few chips of concrete puff from the places where the ends of the mesh are anchored to the walls.
He continues to tear at the mesh until his hands bleed, half-healed scabs torn open again. Tiny
blood droplets spatter the heavy wire. The blood holds the deeper color of rust-
If you have enough maturity to keep emotionalism out of it, the view from here can even be
fascinating. The sky is clear now, an electric, saturated blue, and the air is as sharp as a
jeweler's glass Not like the old days. Without factories and cars to keep it fed, even the eternal
smog has dissipated. The sky reminds me now of an expensive aquarium filled with crystal tropical
water, me at the bottom: I almost expect to see huge eyes peering in from the horizon, maybe a
monstrous nose pressed against the glass. On a sunny day you can see for miles.
But it is even more beautiful when it rains. The rain invests the still landscape with an
element of motion: long fingers of it brushing across the rooftops or marching down in zigzag