"A. E. Merritt - Through the Dragon Glass" - читать интересную книгу автора (Merritt A. E)

and the souls that march with them into the fires. There is no sun in the land--only the new-born moons
that shine green on the city and on the gardens."

"Jim," I cried impatiently. "What in the world are you talking about? Wake up, man! What's all that
nonsense got to do with this?"

I pointed to the hooded Dragon Glass.

"That," he said. "Why, through that lies the road to the gardens of Rak!"

The heavy gun dropped from my hand as I stared at him, and from him to the glass and back again. He
smiled and pointed to his bandaged breast.

He said: "I went straight through to Peking with the Allies. I had an idea what was coming, and I wanted
to be in at the death. I was among the first to enter the Forbidden City. I was as mad for loot as any of
them. It was a maddening sight, Ward. Soldiers with their arms full of precious stuff even Morgan
couldn't buy; soldiers with wonderful necklaces around their hairy throats and their pockets stuffed with
jewels; soldiers with their shirts bulging treasures the Sons of Heaven had been hoarding for centuries!
We were Goths sacking imperial Rome. Alexander's hosts pillaging that ancient gemmed courtezan of
cities, royal Tyre! Thieves in the great ancient scale, a scale so great that it raised even thievery up to
something heroic.

"We reached the throne-room. There was a little passage leading off to the left, and my men and I took
it. We came into a small octagonal room. There was nothing in it except a very extraordinary squatting
figure of jade. It squatted on the floor, its back turned toward us. One of my men stooped to pick it up.
He slipped. The figure flew from his hand and smashed into the wall. A slab swung outward. By a--well,
call it a fluke, we had struck the secret of the little octagonal room!

"I shoved a light through the aperture. It showed a crypt shaped like a cylinder. The circle of the floor
was about ten feet in diameter. The walls were covered with paintings, Chinese characters, queer-looking
animals, and things I can't well describe. Around the room, about seven feet up, ran a picture. It showed
a sort of island floating off into space. The clouds lapped its edges like frozen seas full of rainbows. There
was a big pyramid of a mountain rising out of the side of it. Around its peak were seven moons, and over
the peak --a face!

"I couldn't place that face and I couldn't take my eyes off it. It wasn't Chinese, and it wasn't of any other
race I'd ever seen. It was as old as the world and as young as tomorrow. It was benevolent and
malicious, cruel and kindly, merciful and merciless, saturnine as Satan and as joyous as Apollo. The eyes
were as yellow as buttercups, or as the sunstone on the crest of the Feathered Serpent they worship
down in the Hidden Temple of Tuloon. And they were as wise as Fate.

"'There's something else here, sir,' said Martin--you remember Martin, my first officer. He pointed to a
shrouded thing on the side. I entered, and took from the thing a covering that fitted over it like a hood. It
was the Dragon Glass!

"The moment I saw it I knew I had to have it--and I knew I would have it. I felt that I did not want to get
the thing away any more than the thing itself wanted to get away. From the first I thought of the Dragon
Glass as something alive. Just as much alive as you and I are. Well, I did get it away. I got it down to the
yacht, and then the first odd thing happened.