"Jeffrey Lord - Blade 25 - Torian Pearls." - читать интересную книгу автора (Lord Jeffery)

So he pulled on his oldest clothes, slung a pack on his back, and walked off into the Highlands of
Scotland.

Now it was fourteen days later, and he was walking out again. He was walking out with his pack nearly
empty, his boot soles worn thin, bruises or blisters or a coat of dirt on every part of his body, and peace
of mind for the first time in months. The two weeks in the Highlands had done the job he'd hoped they
would do-two weeks of being alone, two weeks of walking himself into a healthy exhaustion every day
and sleeping a dreamless sleep every night. He could look himself in the face now, without wondering if
he was looking at a murderer. Once more he could face the world and his next trip into Dimension X.

Blade had chosen a part of the Highlands where human dwellings were rare and telephones were rarer.
So it took several hours' more stiff hiking before he was on to a decent road. He had two more hours of
traveling along the road, with the light fading and the mist thickening around him. At the end of it all lay a
country hotel, where the owner and his wife waited for Blade with a hot bath, clean clothes, good
whiskey, a meal large enough for two ordinary men, and finally a telephone connection to London.

"Good evening, Richard," said the voice on the line. It was a well-educated, quiet, and supremely calm
voice. The man called J was getting very old, but nobody had ever guessed it from talking to him over the
telephone.

"Good evening, sir," said Blade. "I'm back from the hills."

"Very good. How soon can you reach London?"

"Is His Lordship breathing down your neck again?"

"Not precisely. He hasn't got another Portal Case in mind. But he would be happier with you on call."

Over anything except a secure line, Blade and J always used language that suggested they were
discussing an ordinary business matter to refer to the Project. A "Portal Case" was their name for one of
Lord Leighton's brainstorms, which came at unpredictable intervals and usually left in their wake
confusion, extra expense, and gray hairs on both Blade and J.

"I can easily be on call two days after reaching London," said Blade. "I trust His Lordship can wait that
long?"

"Certainly," said J. "I'm very glad to hear you're coming back." His voice was no longer quite so calm.

"It will be good to be back, sir," said Blade. "Good night." His own voice wasn't quite calm either.

J listened to the line go dead, gently put down the receiver, and stood up. Then he stretched both arms
as far as they would go, first to either side and then over his head. A great deal of tension flowed out of
him with those movements. He was tall, so that his fingers brushed the ceiling overhead, and still limber in
spite of his years. Not as limber as he'd been when he stalked Germans behind the Hindenberg Line in
the winter of 1917-18, of course. But one couldn't expect that unless one found the Fountain of Youth,
and so far even Richard Blade hadn't found that in Dimension X.

Richard hadn't found the Fountain of Youth in Dimension X, but he'd found something far more
important in the Highlands. He'd found the ability to live with himself and his duties, an ability he'd been
losing. J had been wondering if Blade would lose it for good, and he'd feared the worst.