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

large, vividly-coloured painting of a woman in a pearl necklace,
lasciviously clutching a horse's erect penis, and staring directly at the
viewer as if she were challenging everything be believed in.
Catherine closed the door. She walked across to the bed and drew back the
curtains. Then, without turning around, she lifted off her nightdress, so
that she was naked. She had a long, flared back, and very high, rounded
buttocks. Her breasts were so big that Vincent could see the half-moon
curves of them on either side.
However it was when she turned around that be had the greatest shock. He
saw now why she had gathered up her nightdress when she stood up from the
table. She had been concealing the fact that she was at least five or six
months' pregnant. Her breasts were enormously swollen and big-nippled, and
her stomach was like a lunar globe. Her vulva was swollen, too. She had
shaved herself so that Vincent could see the dark blush colour of her
lips.
Pregnant she might have been, but Vincent still thought she was achingly
beautiful. In fact, her pregnancy made her look even more beautiful. That
was why her hair shone. That was why her skin glowed. That was why she had
the secretive, knowing, self-protective look that had attracted Vincent in
the first place.
She came up to him and unfastened the top button of his shirt. He looked
down at her - at her calm, perfect face; at the trees of pale blue veins
in her breasts; at her stiffened, rouge-brown nipples.
'How old are you?' he asked her, with a phlegmy catch in his throat.
'Eighteen-and-a-half,' she replied, unfastening another button, and
another, and running her fingernails lightly through the hair on his
chest.
'You're having a baby, and yet you're still doing this?'
'What else can I do?'
'You can contact your local department of welfare, for starters. You can
get all kinds of financial help. You're a single mother-to-be, for
Christ's sake, you're entitled. You don't have to work for Madame Leduc.'
'But I do.'
'No, listen to me, you don't. This really isn't suitable work for anybody
who's pregnant.'
She looked up at him. 'So what are you trying to tell me? That you
wouldn't have picked me if you'd known that I was fat?'
'You're not fat, you're pregnant, and if you want to know the truth I find
you extremely attractive. But this isn't socially responsible.'
'You don't want me, then? You want Eloise instead? Or Martine?'
'I didn't say that. I simply said that in your condition you shouldn't be
working in a bordello.'
'I don't have any choice.'
'Yes, you do. You do have a choice. There are plenty of people you can
turn to. I mean, what about your parents?'
She looked away. 'Dead, both of them.'
'Brothers or sisters? Aunts or uncles?'
She shook her head.
'Then, listen, maybe I can help you.'
She said, 'I don't want you to help me. I don't want you even to try. This