"Brian Lumley - E-Branch 2 - Invaders" - читать интересную книгу автора (Lumley Brian)

of the Australian Macpherson Range of mountains.
Now it was night, but still the work on Mr Milan's alterations continued. He wanted the work
completed to his specifications before he reopened Xanadu to the public in just a few days' time.
And in his private accommodation in the high bubble dome, Milan himself supervised the last of the
work; or if not supervised, at least he was there to see it finished to his satisfaction. But
Milan's presence - or more specifically the annoyance that accompanied it - wasn't to Derek
Hinch's liking.
Hinch was a painter and decorator, but at times like this he tended to think of himself more as a
steeplejack. Inside the bubble it wasn't so bad ... there wasn't very far to fall if he made the

VTTT


classic mistake of stepping back a few paces to admire his work! But outside, some fifty or sixty


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feet off the ground: that had been nerve-racking, and thank God he was done with it now.
But black? Painting perfectly good windows black, both inside and out? It didn't make a lot of
sense to Derek Hinch. And as for Mr Milan: he didn't make much sense either! The guy must be some
kind of eccentric, a nut case, albeit a very rich, powerful one. The way he prowled through the
glitzy false opulence of this place, apparently lost in some indefinable distance, in space and
time; though mainly (Hinch suspected) lost in a world of his own, the extravagance of his
thoughts.
And his music ... his bloody terrible, interminable music! There was a gleaming antique jukebox at
one end of a small, gently curving, mahogany-topped bar on the perimeter of the bubble, and when
Milan was taking it easy he would sit there in an armchair with a drink, just listening to the
music ... the same damn tunes or songs, or just, well, music, over and over again. And it was
driving Hinch nuts, too!
Not that Hinch didn't care for the stuff; he liked - or he used to like, and he would have
continued to like - all of this stuff just fine ... if he hadn't been obliged to listen to each
piece at least thirty or forty times in the space of just seven nights. So thank God he was almost
finished here!
But nights! Why in hell couldn't this work be done in daylight hours? And why in hell couldn't
Milan sleep nights - like any other mad millionaire? And why in double-damned Ml did he have to
play his bloody music like this!?
What was it that was playing now? Damn, the tunes had kind of run together in Hindi's head; he had
heard them so often, he knew what was coming next! Mr rich-foreign-handsome-bloody-bastard Milan
kept playing them in sequence, in some kind of order of preference. But it was the order of
disorder, totally out of order, to Hinch's way of thinking.
Oh, yes - now he remembered - Zorba's Dance, that was it! All bouzoukis, fast drumbeats, and
Anthony bloody Quinn dancing

on a beach! A Greek thing that was almost as much an antique as the machine that played it. One of
those tunes that never dies, one which as far as Hinch was concerned could die any time it fucking
well liked! And of course as the tune ended, Hinch knew the next item in the circular, never-
ending repertoire. And here it came yet again:
'Sunshine, you may find my window but you won't find me ...' Some kind of blues with a Country and