"Frank Herbert - Dune 1 - Dune (2)" - читать интересную книгу автора (Herbert Brian & Frank)

Behind her, Mapes paused in clearing the wrappings from the bull's head, looked at the
retreating back. "She's the One all right," she muttered. "Poor thing."

===========================

"Yueh! Yueh! Yueh!" goes the refrain. "A million deaths were not enough for Yueh!"
-from "A Child's History of Muad'Dib" by the Princess Irulan

The door stood ajar, and Jessica stepped through it into a room with yellow walls. To her left
stretched a low settee of black hide and two empty bookcases, a hanging waterflask with dust on
its bulging sides. To her right, bracketing another door, stood more empty bookcases, a desk from
Caladan and three chairs. At the windows directly ahead of her stood Dr. Yueh, his back to her,


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his attention fixed upon the outside world.
Jessica took another silent step into the room.
She saw that Yueh's coat was wrinkled, a white smudge near the left elbow as though he had
leaned against chalk. He looked, from behind, like a fleshless stick figure in overlarge black
clothing, a caricature poised for stringy movement at the direction of a puppet master. Only the
squarish block of head with long ebony hair caught in its silver Suk School ring at the shoulder
seemed alive--turning slightly to follow some movement outside.
Again, she glanced around the room, seeing no sign of her son, but the closed door on her
right, she knew, let into a small bedroom for which Paul had expressed a liking.
"Good afternoon. Dr. Yueh," she said. "Where's Paul?"
He nodded as though to something out the window, spoke in an absent manner without turning:
"Your son grew tired, Jessica. I sent him into the next room to rest."
Abruptly, he stiffened, whirled with mustache flopping over his purpled lips. "Forgive me, my
Lady! My thoughts were far away . . . I . . . did not mean to be familiar."
She smiled, held out her right hand. For a moment, she was afraid he might kneel. "Wellington,
please."
"To use your name like that . . . I . . . "
"We've known each other six years," she said. "It's long past time formalities should've been
dropped between us--in private."
Yueh ventured a thin smile, thinking: I believe it has worked. Now, she'll think anything
unusual in my manner is due to embarrassment. She'll not look for deeper reasons when she believes
she already knows the answer.
"I'm afraid I was woolgathering," he said. "Whenever I . . . feel especially sorry for you.
I'm afraid I think of you as . . . well, Jessica."
"Sorry for me? Whatever for?"
Yueh shrugged. Long ago, he had realized Jessica was not gifted with the full Truthsay as his
Wanna had been. Still, he always used the truth with Jessica whenever possible. It was safest.
"You've seen this place, my . . . Jessica." He stumbled over the name, plunged ahead: "So
barren after Caladan. And the people! Those townswomen we passed on the way here wailing beneath
their veils. The way they looked at us."
She folded her arms across her breast, hugging herself, feeling the crysknife there, a blade
ground from a sandworm's tooth, if the reports were right. "It's just that we're strange to them--
different people, different customs. They've known only the Harkonnens." She looked past him out