"Child Of The Stones" - читать интересную книгу автора (Mcauley Paul J)

I made my ritual offer to put him to rest; he made his ritual refusal. УIТm still interested in whatТs goinТ on, Mr Carlyle. Day I ainТt, then maybe IТll call on your services and you can unmake me or whatever it is you do to make my kind vanish. But I ainТt by no means ready yet.Ф

I steeled myself to search the noisome streets of KingТs Cross, had no luck, and walked up the hill to Islington. I failed to find Miranda there, either, and at last gave up and returned home. It was three in the morning. For once, there was no sign of the blood-red Jaguar, and when I reached the street where my house stood I knew why. I went carefully, as if walking barefoot on broken glass, to my house. All the wards I had set in place were broken, screaming in my mind like common burglar alarms. I had never felt the need to lock my front door in more than a century, but I locked it behind me after I had stepped into the familiar gloomy clutter of my hallway.

The three ghosts that shared the house with me were all in retreat. I drew out the Huguenot silkmaker, but he claimed not to have seen anything, and fled towards the attic as soon as I released him. I lit a candle and climbed the stairs after him. I was certain that I knew who had broken into my house; sure enough, several dozen books of my little library of esoterica had been swept from their shelves, and lay tumbled like the corpses of a flock of lightning-struck birds on the worn Turkish rug that covered most of the age-blackened oak floor. I lit the gas mantles and after a few minutes determined that only one book was missing.

It was the book that the man in the red Jaguar had wished to purchase, of course - the rarest, most valuable, and most dangerous of my collection. I had bought it at a public auction only twenty years ago, finally completing my recreation of the library which had been destroyed, with so much else, in the accident that had killed my parents.

My father had searched out and purchased most of the books in that library, but in most cases he had been carrying out my motherТs instructions. She had inherited from her mother my familyТs interest and talent in the matter of the dead, and although he was as blind to revenants as any ordinary man, my father was happy to help her in any way he could. He was a small, neat man, and something of a dandy, famous for his crushed velvet suits and his elaborately carved pipes (I cannot pass the tobacconist shop on Charing Cross Road without pausing to breathe in the earthy odour that reminds me of him). Once I was old enough to accompany him on his rambles about Edinburgh, I quickly learned that he was on first-name terms with everyone from crossing sweepers to the Provost, and knew every obscure nook and cranny of the old town. Although he had many friends, none were close to him, and most believed him to be some sort of a poet. He was not, but he was a great writer of letters, and included Byron and Keats amongst his regular correspondents; almost every evening would find him in his favourite armchair, wrapped in a silk dressing gown, a tasselled cap on his head, scratching away at a letter on the writing board propped in his lap, a pipe hanging from one corner of his mouth, a glass of whisky at his elbow.

Although I have inherited so much from her, I have fewer memories of my mother. She was a practical, briskly decisive woman, absent-mindedly affectionate, busy with her clients or in her laboratory, with its sharp chemical reek, scarred wooden bench and hand-blown glassware, stained porcelain crucibles, a furnace built of brick and firestones, and intricate diagrams drawn on one whitewashed wall in black chalk and haematite. She provided me with a good grounding in our family business, giving me formal lessons each morning of my childhood and, when I was older, allowing me to attend the sessions with her clients. I remember best her sharply intent gaze, and her shapely hands with their bitten fingernails, and nicks and burns and chemical stains.

My mother and my father were as different as chalk and cheese, but they loved each other more than I am able to describe. They collaborated in experiments to augment my motherТs natural ability; they died together when their last and most elaborate work released something feral and uncontrollably powerful. They had known of the danger and had taken the precaution of sending me away to help a client in St Andrews, and so my life was saved. I have dedicated it to their memory ever since.

I had just finished reshelving the fallen books when I heard a sound elsewhere in the house, a rap on the front door only a little louder than a mouseТs scratch. I drew my blade, picked up my candle and crept back downstairs where I unlocked the door and opened it a scant inch. Miranda stood there, her pale face set like stone under the bill of her baseball cap.

УI know who took it,Ф she said.
* * * *
She gave up her story over a cup of hot chocolate in my kitchen. It was an assured performance, and even though I was certain that almost everything she told me was a lie, I had to admire her cool nerve, even though I could barely control my anger and anxiety. She told me that the night before she had hung around outside the cafe until I had left, and had followed me as I had walked homeward. She had seen the encounter with the Jaguar, and had managed to keep on my tail as I had walked a long widdershins spiral to shake off any pursuers.

УI am growing careless,Ф I said. УA few years ago I would have discovered you at once.Ф

Miranda shrugged. She sat at the scrubbed pine table in my basement kitchen, her baseball cap in her lap, her hood pulled back from her cropped blonde hair. There was a sprinkling of acne on her pale, sharp face, a faint moustache of chocolate foam on her upper lip. She was working on her third cigarette, stabbing it between her lips, blowing thin streams of smoke from the side of her mouth, tapping off the growing ash with her forefinger into the saucer I had provided.

УIТm good at following people,Ф she said flatly, as if stating her height or the colour of her eyes.

УAnd tonight you followed me again.Ф

I was angry and anxious, and I was also more than a little afraid of her. In the wrong hands, her raw talent could be very dangerous, and I was certain that she had already fallen into the wrong hands, that she was working for the man who wanted my book.

She shook her head. УI kept watch right here. I heard what that guy Halliwell said, so I thought IТd keep a lookout.Ф

УHalliwell? Is that the man in the Jaguar? How do you know his name?Ф

The little minx had her answer ready; she did not even blink. УDonny Halliwell used to be a well-known face in Islington,Ф she said, and mentioned a family that ran most of the protection rackets in the area.

УI presume that he is not working for them now.Ф

УI heard what he said about finding where you lived, so I thought IТd better keep an eye out. I was right, too.Ф

She looked at me when I laughed, and asked what was so funny.

УWhile you were here, keeping watch on my house, I was looking for you.Ф

УYeah? WhyТs that, then?Ф

УMany people have a touch of our ability, Miranda, but a few have something more than a touch. In most cases, they are either driven mad by it, or they do their best to deny it and allow it to wither, like an unused limb. But one or two, although untutored, find a use for their gift. Usually, they become charlatans, preying on the gullible and the grief-stricken, and any good that they do is by accident. Very rarely, they actively try to use their ability for the good of others. That is why I was looking for you.Ф

She shrugged.