"Raymond Jones - Renegades of Time" - читать интересную книгу автора (Jones Raymond)

weren't exactly feeble after his stint of Army service, but the girl
shook free of his grip with judo ease. He stood back, awed by the
strength he had felt in her.

"Don't touch me again!" she warned. "As for where we are, I
know nothing more about it than you do. But your bungling
stupidity is responsible for us being here."

He let the accusation drop. "Are you a friend of Bill Bradley?"
Joe asked.

The girl frowned, as if the word was outside her vocabulary.
"Friend? Bill Bradley? YesтАФfriendтАФI suppose you could say so.
You may say I am a friend of Bill Bradley."

There seemed to be a gap in their mental processes, as if she
were not only unfamiliar with the English.lan-guage, but that her
basic concepts were enormously different.

Like "friend." Joe was certain she didn't understand the word
at all.

"Tell me your name," he said.

"You may call me Tamarina."

His memory jogged. He felt a chill shock of recognition.
Tamarina. That was one of the weird names he had read in Bill's
papers. He tried to remember another.

"Who is Susselein?" he demanded abruptly.

The girl reacted with a tensing of her body. "Who told you
about Susselein? Not BillтАФ"

He shrugged and felt a sense of minor triumphтАФ for no good
reason. But he had at least thrown her off balance.

"I'm Joe Simmons," he said. "Joe, to my friends."

The girl seemed willing to forget his mention of the other
name, as if it were something forbidden. She looked puzzled now.
"Am I one of your friends?"

Joe couldn't help laughing, and this seemed to anger her. He
quickly sobered. "Yes," he said. "Let us say you are my friend."

And suddenly he thought, 'We'll be much more than friends.
This is no illusion. This is reality that wDl shape all future
reality.'