"R. A. Lafferty - Stories 1" - читать интересную книгу автора (Lafferty R A)

some of those clubs and the Coq Bleu is like the inside of a tomb. Vincent
went to the clubs only about once a month, sometimes after a show when he
did not want to go home to bed, sometimes when he was just plain restless.
Citizens of the more fortunate states may not know of the mysteries
of the clubs. In Vincent's the only bars are beer bars, and only in the
clubs can a person get a drink, and only members are admitted. It is true
that a small club as the Coq Bleu had thirty thousand members, and at a
dollar a year this is a nice sideline. The little numbered membership cards
cost a penny each for the printing, and the member wrote in his own name.
But he was supposed to have a card or a dollar for a card to gain
admittance.
But there could be no entertainment in the clubs. There was nothing
there but the little bar room in the near darkness. The near darkness of the
clubs was custom only but it had the force of the law.
The man was there, and then he was not, and then he was there again.
And always where he sat it was too dark to see his face.
"I wonder," he said to Vincent (or to the bar at large, though there
were no other customers and the bartender was asleep). "I wonder if you have
read Zubarin on the relationship of extradigitalism to genius?"
"I have never heard of the work nor of the man," said Vincent.
"Doubt if either exist."
"I am Zubarin." said the man.
Vincent instinctively hid his misshapen left thumb. Yet it could not
have been noticed in that light, and he must have been crazy to believe that
there was any connection between it and the man's remark. It was not truly a
double thumb. He was not an extradigital, nor was he a genius.
"I refuse to become interested in you," said Vincent. "I am on the
verge of leaving. I dislike waking the bartender, but I did want another
drink."
"Sooner done than said."
 "What is?"
"Your glass is full."
"It is? So it is. Is it a trick?"
"Trick is a name for anything either too frivolous or too mystifying
for us to comprehend. But on one long early morning a month ago you also
could have done the trick, and nearly as well."
"Could I have? How do you know about my long early morning --
assuming there to have been such?"
"I watched you for a while. Few others have the equipment with which
to watch you when you're in the aspect."
So they were silent for some time, and Vincent watched the clock and
was ready to go.
"I wonder," said the man in the dark, "if you have read
Schimmelpenninck on the sexagintal and the duodecimal in the Chaldee
Mysteries."
"I have not, and I doubt if anyone else has. I would guess that you
are also Schimmelpenninck, and that you have just made up the name on the
spur of the moment."
"I am Schimm, it is true, but I made up the name on the spur of the
moment many years ago."