"Frank Herbert - Old Rambling House" - читать интересную книгу автора (Herbert Brian & Frank)

he moved his head in the light, the wrinkles seemed to dissolve - and with them, the years
lifted from him.
'Yes, we called,' said Ted Graham. He stood aside. 'Do you want to look at the trailer now?'
Martha Graham crossed to stand beside her husband. 'We've kept it in awfully good shape,'
she said. 'We've never let anything get seriously wrong with it.'
She sounds too anxious, thought Ted Graham. I wish she'd let me do the talking for the
two of us.
'We can come back and look at your trailer tomorrow in daylight,' said Rush. 'My car's right
out here, if you'd like to see our house.'
Ted Graham hesitated. He felt a nagging worry tug at his mind, tried to fix his attention on
what bothered him.
'Hadn't we better take our car?' he asked. 'We could follow you.'
'No need,' said Rush. 'We're coming back into town tonight anyway. We can drop you off
then.'
Ted Graham nodded. 'Be right with you as soon as I lock up.'
Inside the car, Rush mumbled introductions. His wife was a dark shadow in the front seat,
her hair drawn back in a severe bun. Her features suggested gypsy blood. He called her
Raimee.
Odd name, thought Ted Graham. And he noticed that she, too, gave that strange first
impression of age that melted in a shift of light.
Mrs Rush turned her gypsy features toward Martha Graham. 'You are going to have a
baby?'
It came out as an odd, veiled statement.
Abruptly, the car rolled forward.
Martha Graham said, 'It's supposed to be born in about two months. We hope it's a boy.'
Mrs Rush looked at her husband. 'I have changed my mind,' she said.
Rush spoke without taking his attention from the road. 'It is too ... ' He broke off, spoke in
a tumble of strange sounds.
Ted Graham recognized it as the language he'd heard on the telephone.
Mrs Rush answered in the same tongue, anger showing in the intensity of her voice. Her
husband replied, his voice calmer.
Presently, Mrs Rush fell moodily silent.
Rush tipped his head toward the rear of the car. 'My wife has moments when she does not
want to get rid of the old house. It has been with her for many years.'
Ted Graham said, 'Oh.' Then: 'Are you Spanish?'
Rush hesitated. 'No. We are Basque.'
He turned the car down a well-lighted avenue that merged into a highway. They turned
onto a side road. There followed more turns - left, right, right.
Ted Graham lost track.
They hit a jolting bump that made Martha gasp.
'I hope that wasn't too rough on you,' said Rush. 'We're almost there.'
 The car swung into a lane, its lights picking out the skeleton outlines of trees: peculiar
trees - tall, gaunt, leafless. They added to Ted Graham's feeling of uneasiness.
The lane dipped, ended at a low wall of a house - red brick with clerestory windows
beneath overhanging eaves. The effect of the wall and a wide-beamed door they could see to
the left was ultramodern.
Ted Graham helped his wife out of the car, followed the Rushes to the door.
'I thought you told me it was an old house,' he said.
'It was designed by one of the first modernists,' said Rush. He fumbled with an odd curved
key. The wide door swung open onto a hallway equally wide, carpeted by a deep pile rug.