"Robert A Heinlein - The Number of the Beast v1.0" - читать интересную книгу автора (Heinlein Robert A)

Are men and women one race?


Hilda:
Deety and I washed dishes, then soaked in her tub and talked about husbands. We giggled, and talked with the frankness of women who trust each other and are sure that no men can overhear. Do men talk that openly in parallel circumstances? From all I have been able to learn in after-midnight horizontal conversations, all passion spent, men do not. Or not men I would take to bed. Whereas a "perfect lady" (which Jane was, Deety is, and I can simulate) will talk with another "perfect lady" she trusts in a way that would cause her father, husband, or son to faint.
I had better leave out our conversation; this memoir might fall into the hands of one of the weaker sex and I would not want his death on my conscience.
Are men and women one race? I know what biologists say-but history is loaded with "scientists" jumping to conclusions from superficial evidence. It seems to me far more likely that they are symbiotes. I am not speaking from ignorance; I was one trimester short of a B.S. in biology (and a straight-A student) when a "biology experiment" blew up in my face and caused me to leave school abruptly.
Not that I need that. degree- I've papered my private bath with honorary degrees, mostly doctorates. I hear that there are things no whore will do for money but I have yet to find anything that a university chancellor faced with a deficit. will boggle at. The secret is never to set up a permanent fund but to dole it out when need is sharpest, once every academic year. Done that way, you not only own a campus but also the town cops learn that it's a waste of
time to hassle you. A univer$ity alway$ $tand$ $taunchly by it$ $olvent a$$ociate$; that'$ the ba$ic $ecret of $chola$tic $ucce$$.
Forgive my digre$$ion; we were speaking of men and women. I am strong for women's rights but was never taken in by unisex nonsense. I don't yearn to be equal; Sharpie is as unequal as possible, with all the perks and bonuses and special privileges that come from being one of the superior sex. If a man fails to hold a door for me, I fail to see him and step on his instep. I feel no shame in making lavish use of the strongest muscles, namely male ones (but my own strongest muscle is dedicated to the service of men-noblesse oblige). I don't begrudge men one whit of their natural advantages as long as they respect mine. I am not an unhappy pseudomale; I am female and like it that way.
I borrowed makeup that Deety rarely uses, but I carry my own perfume in my purse and used it in the twenty-two classic places. Deety uses only the basic aphrodisiac: soap and water. Perfume on her would be gilding the lily; fresh out of a hot tub she smells like a harem. If I had her natural fragrance, I could have saved at least ten thousand newdollars over the years as well as many hours spent dabbing bait here and there.
She offered me a dress and I told her not to be silly; any dress of hers would fit me like a tent. "You put something bridal and frilly around your hips and lend me your boldest G-string job. Dear, I surprised you when I jockeyed you into taking off your halter, after telling you that you were wise not to rush it. But the chance showed up and I grabbed the ring on the fly. We've got our men gentled to nearly naked and we'll hold that gain. At first opportunity we'll get pants off all of us, too, without anything as childish as strip poker. Deety, I want us to be a solid family, and relaxed about it. So that skin doesn't mean sex, it just means we are home, en famille."
"Your skin is pretty sexy, Nanny Goat."
"Deety, do you think I'm trying to make a pass at Zebbie?"
"Heavens, no, Aunt Hilda. You would never do that."
"Piffle, dear. I don't have morals, just customs. I don't wait for a man to make a pass; they fumble around and waste time. But when I met him I picked Zebbie for a chum-so I gave him an opening; he made a polite pass, I carefully failed to see it, and that ended it. I'm sure he's as much fun on the workbench as you tell me he is-but bedmates are easy to find, while worthwhile male friends are scarce. Zebbie is one to whom I can holler for help in the middle of the night and be certain he'll rally around. I'm not going to let that change merely because a weird concatenation now makes him my son-in-law. Besides, Deety, although your old Aunt Sharpie may seem undignified, I refuse to be the campus widow who seduces younger men. Save for minor exceptions close to my age, I always have bedded older men. When I was your age, I tripped several three times my age. Educational."
"It certainly is! Aunt Hilda, I got ninety percent of my instruction two years ago-a widower three times my age. I was programming for him and we took shared time when we could get it, often after midnight. I didn't think anything of it until one night I was startled to find that I was helping him to take off my panties. Then I was still more surprised to learn how little I had learned in seven years. He gave me a tutored seminar, usually three times a week- all the time he was willing to spare me-for the next six months. I'm glad I got tutoring from an expert before last night rolled around-or Zebadiah would have found me a dead arse, willing but clumsy. I didn't tell this to my darling; I let him think he was teaching me."
"That's right, dear. Never tell a man anything he doesn't need to know, and lie with a straight face rather than hurt his feelings or diminish his pride."
"Aunt Nanny Goat, I just plain love you."
We quit yakking and looked for our men. Deety said that they were certain to be in the basement. "Aunt Hilda, I don't go there without invitation. It's Pop's sanctum sanctorum."
"You're warning me not to risk a faux pas?"
"I'm his daughter, you're his wife. Not the same."
"Well. . . he hasn't told me not to-and today he'll forgive me, if ever. Where do you hide the stairs?"
"That bookcase swings out."
"Be darned! For a so-called cabin this place is loaded with surprises. A bidet in each bath didn't startle me; Jane would have required them. Your walk-in freezer startled me only by being big enough for a restaurant. But a bookcase concealing a priest's hole-as Great-Aunt Nettie used to say, 'I do declare!"
"You should see our septic tank-yours, now."
"I've seen septic tanks. Pesky things-always need pumping at the most inconvenient time."
"This one won't have to be pumped. Over three hundred meters deep. An even thousand feet."
"For the love of- Why?"
"It's an abandoned mine shaft below us that some optimist dug a hundred years back. Here was this big hole, so Pop used it. There is a spring farther up the mountain. Pop cleaned that out, covered it, concealed it, put pipe underground, and we have lavish pure water under pressure. The rest of Snug Harbor Pop designed mostly from prefab catalogs, fireproof and solid and heavily insulated. We have-you have, I mean-this big fireplace and the little ones in the bedrooms, but you won't need them, other than for homeyness. Radiant heat makes it skin-comfortable even in a blizzard."
"Where do you get your power? From the nearest town?"
"Oh, no! Snug Harbor is a hideout, nobody but Pop and me-and now you and Zebadiah-knows it's here. Power packs, Aunt Hilda, and an inverter in a space behind the back wall of the garage. We bring in power packs ourselves, and take them out the same way. Private. Oh, the leasehold record is buried in a computer in Washington or Denver, and the Federal rangers know the leaseholds. But they don't see us if we see or hear them first. Mostly they cruise on past. Once one came by on horseback. Pop fed him beer out under the trees-and from outside this is just a prefab, a living room and two shedroof bedrooms. Nothing to show that important parts are underground."
"Deety, I'm beginning to think that this place-this cabin-cost more than my townhouse."
"Uh., probably."
"I think I'm disappointed. Sugar Pie, I married your papa because I love him and want to take care of him and promised Jane that I would. I've been thinking happily that my wedding present to my bridegroom would be his weight in bullion, so that dear man need never work again."
"Don't be disappointed, Aunt Hilda. Pop has to work; it's his nature. Me, too. Work is necessary to us. Without it, we're lost."
"Well. . . yes. But working because you want to is the best sort of play."
"Correct!"
"That's what I thought I could give Jacob. I don't understand it. Jane wasn't rich, she was on a scholarship. Jacob had no money-still a teaching fellow, a few months shy of his doctorate. Deety, Jacob's suit that he wore to be married in was threadbare. I know that he pulled up from that; he made full professor awfully fast. I thought it was that and Jane's good management."
"It was both."
"That doesn't account for this. Forgive me, Deety, but Utah State doesn't pay what Harvard pays."
"Pop doesn't lack offers. We like Logan. Both the town and the civilized behavior of Mormons. But- Aunt Hilda, I must tell you some things."
The child looked worried. I said, "Deety, if Jacob wants me to know something he'll tell me."
"Oh, but he won't and I must!"
"No, Deety!"
"Listen, please! When I said, 'I do,' I resigned as Pop's manager. When you said, 'I do,' the load landed on you. It has to be that way, Aunt Hilda. Pop won't do it; he has other things to think about, things that take genius. Mama did it for years, then I learned how, and now it's your job. Because it can't be farmed out. Do you understand accountancy?"
"Well, I understand it, I took a course in it. Have to understand it, or the government will skin you alive. But I don't do it, I have accountants for that- and smart shysters to keep it inside the law."
"Would it bother you to be outside the law? On taxes?"
"What? Heavens, no! But Sharpie wants to stay outside of jail-I detest an institutional diet."