"Henry Kuttner - Clash by Night" - читать интересную книгу автора (Kuttner Henry)

cally, as I do physically, to everything. With you, there's always the last adventure. You never
know when death will come. You can't plan. Plans are dull; it's the unexpected that's important.'
Scott shook his head slightly. 'Death isn't important either. It's an automatic cancellation of
values. Or, rather-'He hesitated, seeking words. 'In this life you can plan, you can work out
values, because they're all based on certain conditions. On - let's say - arithmetic. Death is a
change to a different plane of conditions, quite unknown. Arithmetical rules don't apply as such
to geometry.'
'You think death has its rules?'
'It may be a lack of rules, Ilene. One lives realizing that life is subject to death; civilization
is based on that. That's why civilization concentrates on the race instead of the individual.
Social self-preservation.'
She looked at him gravely. 'I didn't think a Free Companion could theorize that way.'
Scott closed his eyes, relaxing. 'The Keeps know nothing about Free Companions. They don't want
to. We're men. Intelligent men. Our techniques are as great as the scientists under the Domes.'
'But they work for war.'
'War's necessary,' Scott said. 'Now, anyway.'
'How did you get into it? Should I ask?'
He laughed a little at that. 'Oh, I've no dark secrets in my past. I'm not a runaway murderer. One-
drifts. I was born in Australia Keep. My father was a tech, but my grandfather had been a soldier.
I guess it was in my blood. I tried various trades and professions. Meaningless. I wanted
something that . . . hell, I don't know. Something, maybe that needs all of a man. Fighting does.
It's like a religion. Those cultists - Men of the New Judgment - they're fanatics, but you can see
that their religion is the only thing that matters to them.'
'Bearded, dirty men with twisted minds, though.'
'It happens to be a religion based on false premises. There are others, appealing to different
types. But religion was too passive for me, in these days.'
Ilene examined his harsh face. 'You'd have preferred the church militant- the Knights of Malta,


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fighting Saracens.'
'I suppose. I had no values. Anyhow, I'm a fighter.'
'Just how important is it to you? The Free Companions?'
Scott opened his eyes and grinned at the girl. He looked unexpectedly boyish.
'Damn little, really. It has emotional appeal. Intellectually, I know that it's a huge fake.
Always has been. As absurd as the Men of the new Judgment. Fighting's doomed. So we've no real
purpose. I suppose most of us know there's no future for the Free Companions. In a few hundred
years- well!'
'And still you go on. Why? It isn't money.'
'No. There is a ... a drunkenness to it. The ancient Norsemen had their berserker madness. We have
something similar. To a Dooneman, his group is father, mother, child, and God Almighty. He fights
the other Free Companions when he's paid to do so, but he doesn't hate the others. They serve the
same toppling idol. And it is toppling, Ilene. Each battle we win or lose brings us closer to the
end. We fight to protect the culture that eventually will wipe us out. The Keeps- when they
finally unify, will they need a military arm? I can see the trend. If war was an essential part of
civilization, each Keep would maintain its own military. But they shut us out- a necessary evil.
If they would end war now!' Scott's fist unconsciously clenched. 'So many men would find happier
places in Venus- undersea. But as long as the Free Companions exist, there'll be new recruits.'