"Lumley,.Brian.-.Titus.Crow.2.-.Transition.Of.Titus.Crow" - читать интересную книгу автора (Lumley Brian)

Strangely fatigued by an experience which could hardly be called physical, I eventually forced myself to my feet and left the ruins of Blowne House. But I could not shut out of my mind that hideous vision of Cthulhu pursuing Crow's clock, a vastly loathsome bulk against a background of leering stars and nighted nebulae. Thus I went my way oppressed by a gloom springing not alone of the bleak November skies, a gloom which seemed to weigh tangibly upon my shoulders.
Some few weeks later these terrible attacks had become so frequent - each one occurring without the slightest warning - that it was almost unbearable. I had just about made up my mind to see a doctor, a psychiatrist, frankly, about the problem. Then, just ten days before Christmas, I received a most disturbing, indeed an astounding communication. Having slept late on that particular morning, I found this letter waiting for me with my morning newspaper:
Marshfield Dear Mr de Marigny -
Do please make yourself available at home on the afternoon of the 16th; I shall be traveling down to see you. I should get into London about 3 P.M. - and no need to meet me, I'll know where to find you. I may come by car. And please, no mention of this to anyone from the Foundation. As you know, I am just as much a member of that organization now as you yourself were ten years ago - I mention this simply to assure you that my

visit goes in no way against our own and the Foundation's mutual interests - but I want to talk to you about Titus Crow, and I have reason to believe that he would not want what I have to tell you to go any further.
Until we meet then,
Sincerely,
Eleanor Quarry
P.S. Do not look for me in the telephone book. I have no telephone. I abhor the things.
EQ
Upon first reading this completely cryptic note my mind simply went blank; I frankly did not know how to react. Only after a second hurried reading did the implications begin to dawn on me, and then a whole host of suddenly galvanized emotions brought me quickly to what must have been a sort of mental hysteria.
Eleanor Quarry, 'Mother' Quarry, was the medium whose timely letter had warned Titus Crow of the CCD's insidious trap ten years earlier; it had sent us fleeing for our lives from stricken, doomed Blowne House in the doubtful confines of an alien time machine whose shape was that of a hideous grandfather clock. While I had never met her, I had always looked upon her peculiar psychic practices very dubiously, despite the fact that Titus Crow had seemed to have the utmost faith in her. Anyway, here she was, this woman, as good as telling me that Crow was alive, almost implying that she had been in communication with him, and that the substance of that communication was for my ears only!
Well, what was I to make of it? My mind flew in several directions at once, quite uselessly, completely out of control. Questions piled themselves up in my head, unanswered but demanding attention, whirling madly about in my mind until I had to force myself to sit down and think the problem out as calmly as possible.

If Crow was alive, where was he now, and why the secrecy? Could it be, perhaps, that he was in some terrible peril, maybe even a prisoner of the CCD? No, that last seemed out of the question. The CCD would never hold Titus Crow a prisoner; they would simply kill him out of hand as soon as the opportunity presented itself. He had been far too dangerous to their cause, a thorn in their sides. So had I, for that matter.
But just think of it - Titus Crow alive!
My mood leaped from one of worried tribulation to wild speculation. Crow alive! Could it really be? Had we indeed traveled into time, he and I, and was that really the reason behind my apparent loss of ten years? And had he then gone on into the future while, incapable of understanding the time-clock's principles, I had fallen overboard almost at the onset of our flight?
On the other hand, why was it important that he now remain incognito, as it were? Again my spirits tumbled. How much confidence could I place in this woman, this Eleanor Quarry? And could this possibly be yet another ploy of the CCD? I did not care at all for the woman's demand that I should not mention her proposed visit to anyone from the Foundation.
But the sixteenth! Why, that was tomorrow, and today was already well into the afternoon. In just twenty-four hours I would know as much as there was to know of this mystery. All my questions would be answered . . . but it would certainly be the longest twenty-four hours I had ever known in my life . . .

Mother Quarry
(From de Marigny's notebooks)
The knocking at my door brought me bolt upright in my chair, startling me from unquiet but mercifully unremem-bered dreams. A glance at my watch showed me that it was three P.M. exactly.
I realized what had happened: finally exhausted, having paced the floors of my house all through the previous evening and night, mentally juggling with the infinite possibilities in connection with Eleanor Quarry's visit, I must have fallen asleep right after an early lunch. And now. now here she was and I was still unshaved, blinking the sleep from my eyes, clutching my star-stone tightly in one hand for fear it was not Eleanor Quarry at the door at all but something else.
Not knowing what to expect, still half asleep, I went to the door. The knocking came again, more decisively, and a voice, not loud but penetrating the door quite clearly called, 'Mr de Marigny, I am not a shoggoth, I assure you, so do please open up and let me in!' That voice had the instant effect of dispelling most of my doubts and fears, so that I immediately threw open the door.
Eleanor Quarry was tiny and old, elegant in a smartly modern matching jacket and skirt; she was gray-haired, with gray unfaded eyes that twinkled despite their age through ancient pince-nez glasses. She took my hand firmly and pumped it as I stepped aside to let her in.
'I'm Eleanor Quarry,' she said, making the introduction formal, leading the way to my study as though she had lived in my house all her life, 'but please call me Mother. Everybody does. And do please stop thinking of me as an

old charlatan. I am a perfectly respectable, quite genuinely psychic person.'
'I can assure you, er, Mother, that I - ' I began.
She cut me off. 'And don't lie, young man. You've always considered me to be a charlatan, I know you have. Doubtless it's due to the way that rascal Titus Crow has spoken of me. And yet he always had more than a fair share of the old sixth sense himself, you know.'
'Er, yes, indeed he had,' I answered, beginning to feel more at ease. In my study she turned to face me, smiling when she saw the star-stone in my hand.
'I wear mine around my neck,' she leaned forward to whisper, a mock frown drawing her eyebrows together.
'Oh! Er, I just - '
'No need to explain.' She smiled, drawing up a golden chain from her bosom. At the end of the chain a star-stone dangled. 'A damned uncomfortable thing,' she remarked, 'and yet very comforting, too, in its way.'
My last doubts were finally dispelled. I smiled at my visitor and rubbed ruefully at the stubble on my chin. 'I had intended to shave before you arrived,' I started to explain, 'but -'
'No, no, you were right to have a little nap,' she said, cutting me off yet again. 'No doubt your mind is all the fresher for it, and that's important over all, that your mind be fresh, I mean. Anyway, I like my men rugged!'
She began to laugh and I joined in, but I sobered quickly as I thought back over the preceding few minutes to some of the rather weird correct guesses this lady had made. She had been more or less right when she hinted that perhaps I pictured something other than a human knocking on my door; she had been right to accuse me of believing her an old fraud (though I was already changing my mind) and finally she had correctly - to my confusion and embarrassment - named me a liar, albeit a white one.

Perhaps she was a fraud even now, but if so then she was a very clever one.
'I am psychic, Mr de Marigny,' she said, breaking into my thoughts, 'though in the main my powers should really be relegated to the lower levels of ESP, and even there they are limited. Primarily I am telepathic, a one-way receiver, a mind reader. If I could only project as well. .. ah, but then Titus Crow wouldn't need you!'
So fascinated had I become with this remarkable old woman that I had almost forgotten the purpose of her visit. 'Titus!' I gasped, suddenly remembering. 'Titus Crow! But is he . . .?'
'Alive?' She raised her eyebrows. 'Oh, yes, he is alive. He is close, too, and yet far away. Frankly, I do not understand as much as I would like to understand. Although I have received his messages, I could not tell where they originated. I mean that, well, for one thing, I don't believe him to be here on this planet.'
She stared at me for a moment as if waiting for some reaction, then nodded. 'Good. You don't find what I just said strange, so obviously I must be on the right track. You know more of his situation than I. No, Titus Crow is not on Earth, and yet he is distant in more than one sense, almost as though -'
'As though,' I finished it for her, 'he were also remote
in time?'
Her mouth fell open and her eyes widened even as I spoke the words. Obviously she had read my thought an instant before I voiced it. 'But that is exactly it!' she cried. 'It surprises me I didn't think of it that way myself.'
'Oh?' I said, 'I hardly find it surprising. Time-travel is something out of science fiction, surely? Not something for merely mundane speculation.'
'And what of telepathy?' she returned, smiling.