"C. S. Friedman - Downtime" - читать интересную книгу автора (Friedman C. S)

DOWNTIME
C. S. Friedman
BY the time the messenger from the DFO came, Marian had almost forgotten about the
Order. You could do that if you tried hard enough. You just tucked the unwanted thoughts d
into some backwater recess of your mind until the normal clutter of everyday life obscured
and then you pretended it wasn't there. Marian was good at that. She had her own special
places for hiding things, dark little crevices in her soul where one might tuck a fact, an
experience, or even a whole relationship, so that it never saw the light of day again.
She knew the day her sister died that a lot of new things were going to have to go in th
and she'd done her damnedest to make them all fit. She'd done so well, in fact, that when
door first chimed, there was a brief moment when she genuinely didn't know what it was ab
Who would be coming to see her in the middle of the day?
She was curled up with her children and her pets at the time: two boys, a girl, two cats
a small dog, whom she collectively referred to as "the menagerie." They couldn't all fit on
couch at one time, but they were trying. Only Amy had given up, and she knelt by the co
table now with her crayons laid out before her like the brushes of a master artist, her
screwed tight with concentration as she tried to draw a horse exactly right. When you're
oldest child, you have to do things right; the other children depend on you. Marian watched
delicate blonde curls sweep down over the paper for a moment before trying to disenta
herself from the others. With five bodies and two afghans involved it wasn't easy, and fin
she yelled out, "Coming!" at me top of her lungs, in the hope that whoever was on the other
of the door would hear it and wait.
The dog didn't come with her to the door. Maybe that was an omen. Usually he was
first one at the door, to welcome
strangers. But dogs can sense when things are wrong, sometimes even when their ow
don't. Marian walked past him, and ignored the complaints of both cats and children as
looked through the peephole to see who was there. It was a woman, neatly coifed and with
socially acceptable minimum of makeup, wearing some kind of uniform and holding a lett
her hand. That was odd. You didn't get many real paper letters these days, unless it
something important. For a moment Marian couldn't think of who would have sent h
registered paper letter . . . and then memory stirred in its hiding place, and she was sudd
afraid. She hesitated a moment before unlocking the door, but couldn't give herself a g
reason for not doing it. Trouble doesn't go away if you refuse to sign for it, does it?
As she opened the door, Marian noted that the woman's uniform didn't have any insigni
it. That could be just an oversight . . . or it could indicate that whoever had designed
uniform believed that people wouldn't open the door if they knew what she was there for. N
good sign.
The woman looked up at Marian, down at her electronic pad, and then up again. "Ma
Stiller?"
Marian could feel all the color drain from her face as she just stared at the woman f
moment. Maybe she should lie about who she was, and tell the woman Ms. Stiller w
home? Shut the door, lock the problems outside, and stuff this memory down into the
places along with all the others. That would buy her a bit more time. But what would it re
accomplish? Sooner or later they'd find her, and then there would be fines to deal with on
of all the rest. Maybe even jail time. The government was notoriously intolerant when it c
to people who tried to avoid their filial duties.
"I'm . . . I'm Marian Stiller."
The woman glanced at her pad again, as if checking her notes. You'd think the D
delivery folks would have their stuff memorized. "This letter is for you, Ms. Stiller."
handed her the envelope, thick and heavy. Marian took it numbly and waited. "I need yo