"Jack Finney - Invasion of the Body Snatchers" - читать интересную книгу автора (Finney Jack)

Then I smiled, too. "I don't know. But I don't."
"Yeah." Jack nodded in agreement, then we all sat there for several moments, sipping our drinks. Jack
rattled the ice idly in his glass and, staring down at it, said slowly, "I have a feeling that this is a time to do
something more than call the police. That this isn't a time to pass the buck, and let someone else do the
worrying. What exactly could the police do? This isn't just a body, and we know it. It's" тАУ he shrugged,
his face sombre тАУ "something terrible. SomethingтАж I don't know what." He looked up from his glass,
glancing around at us all. "I only know, and somehow I'm certain of this, that we mustn't make a mistake
here. That there is some one thing тАУ the wise thing, the single correct thing, the one and only thing to do тАУ
and if we fail to do it, if we guess wrong, something terrible is going to happen."
I said, "Do what, for instance?"
"I don't know." Jack turned away to stare out the window for a moment. Then he looked back at us,
and smiled a little. "I have a terrible urge toтАж call the President at the White House direct, or the head of
the Army, the FBI, the Marines, or the Cavalry, or something." He shook his head in wry, smiling
amusement at himself, then the smile faded. "Miles, what I mean is, I want somebody тАУ exactly the right
person, whoever he is тАУ to realize from the very start how important this is. And I want him, or them, to
do whatever should be done, without a mistake. And the thing is that whoever I got in touch with, if he'd
even listen to or believe me, might be exactly the wrong person, somebody who'd do exactly the worst
thing possible. Whatever that might be. But I do know this isn't something for the local police. This isтАУ"
He shrugged, realizing he was repeating himself, and stopped talking.
"I know," I said. "I have the same feeling, the feeling that the world better hope we handle this right." In
medicine sometimes, on a puzzling case, an answer or a clue will pop up out of nowhere; the
subconscious mind at work, I suppose. I said, "Jack, how tall are you?"
"Fiveten."
"Exactly?"
"Yeah. Why?"
"How tall would you say the body downstairs is?"
He looked at me for a moment, then said, "Fiveten."
"And what do you weigh?"
"One forty." He nodded. "Yeah, just about what that body downstairs weighs. You've hit it; it's my size
and build. Doesn't especially look like me, though."
"Or anyone e1se.You got an ink pad in the house?"
He turned to his wife. "Have we?"
"A what?"
"An ink pad. The kind you use for rubber stamps."
"Yes." Theodora got up and crossed the room to a desk. "There's one in here somewhere." She found
and brought out an ink pad, and Jack went over, took it, then opened another drawer and brought out a
sheet of stationery.
I went over to the desk and so did Becky. Jack inked the ends of all five fingers of his right hand, then
held out his hand to me. I took it, then pressed the fingers, carefully rolling each one, on the sheet of
paper, getting a full set of clean, sharp prints. Then I picked up stamp pad and paper. "You girls want to
come?" I nodded at the door.
They looked at each other; they didn't want to go back to that billiard table, and they didn't want to
stay up here waiting, either. Becky said, "No, but I'm going to," and Theodora nodded.
Downstairs, Jack turned on the light over the billiard table. It swung a little, and I reached out to the
shade to steady it. But my fingers trembled, and I only made it worse. The shade still swung in a tiny
halfinch arc, the light spilling off over the edge of the table, then retreating to the open eyes of the body,
leaving the smooth forehead in semidark for an instant. It gave you the impression that the body was
moving a little, and I picked up the right wrist, concentrating on that, not looking at the face. I inked the
ends of all five fingers, then I laid the sheet of paper containing Jack's fingerprints on the wide table ledge,
beside the body's right hand. I brought the hand up, laid it on the white sheet, and rolling each finger, I