"Picnic At Lac Du Sang" - читать интересную книгу автора (Masterton Graham)

seconds without saying anything. Her eyes were extraordinary, like blue
ink that has spilled across the surface of a mirror. He dropped his gaze
and found himself looking at the cross that dangled in her cleavage. He
could smell the perfume that she exuded from between her breasts. It was
very summery and flowery, and for some reason it made him think of - what?
He couldn't think. Something elusive. Something deeply emotional.
Something that had happened a long time ago.
One of the girls came up and took his coat. Another loosened his necktie.
'You like this?' said Baubay, walking up and down the room. 'This is what
I call pampering.'
'Please, play,' said the redhead, shyly, and pulled out the piano-stool
for him. Vincent sat down, flexed his fingers, and played one of his
party-pieces, a high-speed version of Camptown Races. The girls laughed
and clapped when he had finished, and one of the blondes kissed him on the
cheek. The blonde with the long hair, more daring and more sensual, kissed
him directly on the mouth. 'Francois is right. You are a great musician.
Your music is terrible - but you - you are a great musician.' Bold words,
he thought, almost frightening. But he had never had an erection while
sitting at the piano before, as he did now. He could feel the warmth of
the girl's body through her plain white nightdress. It was unbuttoned, and
he could see the curve of a small swelling breast.
Mme Leduc brought him a golden glass of beer in a frozen glass. He drank a
little, and then be played something slower, more sentimental, a score he
had written for a poem. The blonde with the long hair came and sat next to
him, and put her arm around him, but he played this song for the brunette
who stood away from the others, her eyes lowered, her fingers trailing
through her hair.
'In your arms was still delight ... quiet as a street at night;
And thoughts of you, I do remember,
Were green leaves in a darkened chamber,
Were dark clouds in a moonless sky.'
The blonde girl massaged his shoulders, and then ran her fingers all the
way down his spine. The redhead stood behind him and stroked his hair. On
the opposite side of the room, Baubay sat with one of the curly blondes on
his knee and another kneeling on the floor beside him. He lifted his glass
of champagne and gave Vincent a blissful beam. 'Don't tell me this isn't
the life, my friend. This is the life.'
'Love, in you, went passing by,' sang Vincent. He looked toward the
brunette and she was lifting her hair so that it shone in the
softly-filtered sunlight in a fine net of filaments. He didn't know
whether she knew that he was looking at her or not. He didn't know whether
she was flirting with him or not. She appeared to be indifferent, and yet
-
'Love, in you, went passing by, ... penetrative, remote, and rare,
Like a bird in the wide air,
And, as the bird, it left no trace...'
He paused, and then he sang, very quietly, 'In the heaven ... of your
face.'
There was a momentary silence, and then Mme Leduc pattered her hands
together like a pigeon trapped in a chimney. 'You weave quite a spell,