"Oswald Bastable - 03 - The Steel Tsar" - читать интересную книгу автора (Moorcock Michael)

he would be quite glad to
continue the tradition with you. Particularly, he says, since you've had rather
better success in getting his stories
published!' She laughed.
The manuscript was a sizable one. I weighed it in my hand. 'So he was never
able to find his own period again?
Or return to the life he so desperately wanted?'
'That's not for me to say. You'll notice from the manuscript that there's
little explanation as to how he came to
the particular alternative time-stream he describes. Suffice to say he returned
to Teku Benga, crossed into yet
another continuum and found his way to the airship-yards at Benares. This time
he was reconciled to what had
happened and, being an experienced airshipman, claimed slight
Amnesia and a loss of papers. Eventually he got himself a mate's certificate,
though it was impossible for him,
without impeccable credentials, to find a berth with any of the major lines.'
I smiled. 'And he's still haunted by angst, I suppose?'
'To a degree, He has many lives on his conscience. He knows only worlds at
war. But we of the Guild
understand what a responsibility we carry and I think membership has helped
him.'
'And I'll never meet him?'
'It's unlikely. This stream would probably reject him, turn him into that
poor creature your grandfather
described, flung this way and that through Time, with no control whatsoever over
his destiny.'
'He has that in common with most of us,' I remarked.
She was amused. 'I see you're still not completely over your self-pity,
Moorcock.'
I smiled and apologized. 'I'm very excited by this.' I held up the
manuscript. 'Bastable presumably wants it
published as soon as possible. Why?'
'Perhaps it's mere vanity. You know how people become once they see their
names in print.'
'Poor?'
We both laughed at this.
'He trusts you, too,' she continued. 'He knows that you did not tamper with
his work and also that he has been
of some use to you in your researches.'
'As have you, Mrs. Persson.'
'I'm glad. We enjoy what you do.'
'You find my speculations funny?' I said.
'That, too. We leave it to your rather strange imagination to produce the
necessary obfuscations!'
I looked at the manuscript. I was surprised to notice a few peculiar
correspondences and coincidences when
compared with my grandfather's first manuscript. Yet Bastable appeared not to
make some of the connections the
reader might make. I remarked on it to Mrs. Persson.