"C. L. Moore - Julhi" - читать интересную книгу автора (Moore C. L)

JULHI
The tale of Smith's scars would make a saga. From head to foot his brown and
sunburnt hide was scored with the marks of, battle. The eye of a connoisseur
would recognize the distinctive tracks of knife and talon andrayburn, the
slash of the Martian drylandercrwg, the clean, thin stab of the Venu-sian
stiletto, the crisscross lacing of Earth's penal whip. But one or two scars
that he carried would have baffled the most discerning eye. That curious,
convoluted red circlet, for instance, like some bloody rose on the left side
of his chest just where the beating of his heart stirred the sun-darkened
flesh. ...
In the starless dark of the thick Venusian night Northwest Smith's pale steel
eyes were keen and wary. Save for those restless eyes he did not stir. He
crouched against a wall that his searching fingers had told him was stone, and
cold; but he could see nothing and he had no faintest idea of where he was or
how he had come there. Upon this dark five minutes ago he had opened puzzled
eyes, and he was still puzzled. The dark-piercing pallor of his gaze flickered
restlessly through
the blackness, searching in vain for some point of familiarity. He could find
nothing. The dark was blurred and formless around him, and though his keen
senses spoke to him of enclosed spaces, yet there was a contradiction even in
that, for the ah- was fresh and blowing.
He crouched motionless in the windy dark, smelling earth and cold stone, and
faintly-very faintly-a whiff of something unfamiliar that made him gather his
feet under him noiselessly and poise with one hand against the chill stone
wall, tense as a steel spring. There was motion in the dark. He could see
nothing, hear nothing, but he felt that stirring come cautiously nearer. He
stretched out exploring toes, found the ground firm underfoot, and stepped
aside a soundless pace or two, holding his breath. Against the stone where he
had been leaning an instant before he heard the soft sound of hands fumbling,
with a queer, sucking noise, as if they were sticky. Something exhaled with a
small, impatient sound. In a lull of the wind he heard quite distinctly the
slither over stone of something that was neither feet nor paws nor
serpent-coils, but akin to all three.
Smith's hand sought his hip by instinct, and came away empty. Where he was and
how he came there he did not know, but his weapons were gone and he knew that
their absence was not accidental. The something that was pursuing him sighed
again, queerly, and the shuffling sound over the stones moved with sudden,
appalling swiftness, and something touched him that stung like an electric
shock. There were hands upon him, but he scarcely realized it, or that they
were no human hands, before the darkness spun around him and the queer,
thrilling shock sent him reeling into a blurred oblivion.
When he opened his eyes again he lay once more upon cold stone in the
unfathomable dark to which he had awakened before. He lay as he must have
fallen when the searcher dropped him, and he was unhurt. He waited, tense and
listening, until his ears ached with the strain and the silence. So far as his
blade-keen senses could tell him, he was quite
alone. No sound broke the utter stillness, no sensation of movement, no whiff
of scent. Very cautiously he rose once more, supporting himself against the
unseen stones and flexing his limbs to be sure that he was unhurt.
The floor was uneven underfoot. He had the idea now that he must be in some