"George R. R. Martin - WC 4 - Aces Abroad" - читать интересную книгу автора (Martin George R R)

slapped a tentacle over each one's mouth. The silence dragged on for a half
dozen heartbeats, and then one of the beggars whispered a name in a soft, awed
voice.
"Madame Brigitte."
It passed among the beggars like a whispered invocation, until even those who
had crowded around the other vehicles in the motorcade were craning their necks
to get a glimpse of her. She pressed back against the jeep, the concentrated
stares of the beggars, mixed fear and awe and wonder, frightening her. The
tableau held for another moment until the driver spoke a harsh phrase and
gestured with his stick. The crowd dispersed at once, but not, however, without
some of the beggars shooting Chrysalis final glances of mingled awe and dread.
Chrysalis turned to the driver. He was a tall, thin black in a cheap,
ill-fitting blue serge suit and an open-necked shirt. He looked back at her
sullenly, but Chrysalis couldn't really read his expression because of the dark
sunglasses he wore.
"Do you speak English?" she asked him.
"Oui. A little." Chrysalis could hear the harsh edge of fear in his voice, and
she wondered what put it there. "Why did you strike them?"
He shrugged. "These beggars are peasants.. Scum from the country, come to
Port-au-Prince to beg on the generousness of people as yourself. I tell them to
go."
"Speak loudly and carry a big stick," Wilde said sardonically from his seat in
the back of the jeep.
Chrysalis glared at him. "You were a big help."
He yawned. "I make it 'a habit never to brawl in the streets. It's so vulgar."
Chrysalis snorted, turned back to the driver. "Who," she asked, "is 'Madame
Brigitte'?"
The driver shrugged in a particularly Gallic manner, illustrating again the
cultural ties Haiti had to the country from which she'd been politically
independent for nearly two hundred years. "She is a loa, the wife of Baron
Samedi."
"Baron Samedi?"
"A most powerful loa. He is the lord and guardian of the cemetary. The keeper of
the crossroads."
"What's a loa?"
He frowned, shrugged almost angrily. "A loa is a spirit, a part of God, very
powerful and divine."
"And I resemble this Madame Brigitte?"



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He said nothing, but continued to stare at her from behind his dark glasses, and
despite the afternoon's tropical heat Chrysalis felt a shiver run down her
spine. She felt naked, despite the voluminous cloak she wore. It wasn't a bodily
nakedness. She was, in fact, accustomed to going half-naked in public as a
private obscene gesture to the world, making sure that everyone saw what she had
to see every time she looked in a mirror. It was a spiritual nakedness that she