"Morrison, William - Bedside Manner v1.0" - читать интересную книгу автора (Morrison William)

"There is an old freighter of your people which we have found abandoned and adrift. We have repaired it and stocked it with food taken from your own ship. You will awaken inside the freighter and be able to reach your own people."
"But won't IЧcan't I even get the chance to see you?"
"That would be inadvisable. We have some perhaps peculiar ideas about keeping our nature secret. That is why we shall take care that you carry away nothing that we ourselves have made."
"If I could onlyЧwell, even shake handsЧdo somethingЧ"
"I have no hands."
"No hands? But how could youЧhow can youЧdo such complicated things?"
"I may not answer. I am sorry to leave you in a state of bewilderment, but I have no choice. Now, please, no more questions about me. Do you wish to talk to your husband for a time before you sleep again?"
"Must I sleep? I feel so excited . . . I want to get out of bed, tear off my bandages, and see what I look like!"
"I take it that you are not anxious to speak to your husband yet."
"I want to see myself first!"
"You will have to wait. During your last sleep, your new muscles will be exercised, their tones and strength built up. You well receive a final medical examination. It is most important."
She started to protest once more, but he stopped her. "Try to be calm. I can control your feelings with drugs, but it is better that you control yourself. You will be able to give vent to your excitement later. And now I must leave you. You will not hear from me after this."
"Never again?"
"Never again. Goodbye."
For a moment she felt something cool and dry and rough laid very lightly against her forehead. She tried to reach for him, but could only twitch her new hands on her new wrists. She said, with a sob, "Goodbye, Doctor."
When she spoke again, there was no answer.
She slept.

This time, the awakening was different. Before she opened her eyes, she heard the creaking of the freighter, and a slight hum that might have come from the firing of the jets.
As she tried to sit up, her eyes flashed open, and she saw that she was lying in a bunk, strapped down to keep from being thrown out. Unsteadily, she began to loosen the straps. When they were half off, she stopped to stare at her hands. They were strong hands, well-shaped and supple, with a healthily tanned skin. She flexed them and unflexed them several times. Beautiful hands. The Doctor had done well by her.
She finished undoing the straps, and got to her feet. There was none of the dizziness she had expected, none of the weakness that would have been normal after so long a stay in bed. She felt fine.
She examined herself, staring at her legs, bodyЧstaring as she might have done at a stranger's legs and body. She took a few steps forward and then back. Yes, he had done well by her. It was a graceful body, and it felt fine. Better than new.
But her face!
She whirled around to locate a mirror, and heard a voice: "Margaret!"
Fred was getting out of another bunk. Their eyes sought each other's face, and for a long moment they stared in silence.
Fred said in a choked voice, "There must be a mirror in the captain's cabin. I've got to see myself."
At the mirror, their eyes shifted from one face to the other and back again. And the silence this time was longer, more painful.
A wonderful artist, the Doctor. For a creatureЧa personЧwho was insensitive to the differences in human faces, he could follow a pattern perfectly. Feature by feature, they were as before. Size and shape of forehead, dip of hairline, width of cheeks and height of cheekbones, shape and color of eyes, contour of nose and lips and chinЧnothing in the two faces had been changed. Nothing at all.
Nothing, that is, but the overall effect. Nothing but the fact that where before she had been plain, now she was beautiful.
I should have realized the possibility, she thought. Sometimes you see two sisters, or mother and daughter, with the same features, the faces as alike as if they had been cast from the same moldЧand yet one is ugly and the other beautiful. Many artists can copy features, but few can copy with perfect exactness either beauty or ugliness. The Doctor slipped up a little. Despite my warning, he's done too well by me.
And not well enough by Fred. Fred isn't handsome any more. Not ugly reallyЧhis face is stronger and more interesting than it was. But now I'm the good-looking one of the family. And he won't be able to take it. This is the end for us.
Fred was grinning at her. He said, "Wow, what a wife I've got! Just look at you! Do you mind if I drool a bit?" She said uncertainly, "Fred, dear, I'm sorry."
"For what? For his giving you more than you bargained forЧand me less? It's all in the family!"
"You don't have to pretend, Fred. I know how you feel."
"You don't know a thing. I asked him to make you beautiful. I wasn't sure he could, but I asked him anyway. And he said he'd try."
"You asked himЧoh, no!"
"Oh, yes," he said. "Are you sorry? I hoped he'd do better for me, but well, did you marry me for my looks?"
"You know better, Fred!"
"I didn't marry you for yours either. I told you that before, but you wouldn't believe me. Maybe now you will.Ф
Her voice choked. "PerhapsЧperhaps looks aren't so important after all. Perhaps I've been all wrong about everything. I used to think was essential."
"You have," agreed Fred. "But you've always had a sense of inferiority about your appearance. From now on, you'll have no reason for that. And maybe now we'll both be able to grow up a little."
She nodded. It gave her a strange feeling to have him put around her a pair of arms she had never before known, to have him kiss her with lips she had never before touched. But that doesn't matter, she thought. The important thing is that whatever shape we take, we're us. The important thing is that now we don't have to worry about ourselvesЧand for that we have to thank him.
"Fred," she said suddenly, her face against his chest. "Do you think a girl can be in love with twoЧtwo peopleЧat the same time? And one of themЧone of them not a man? Not even human?"
He nodded, but didn't say anything. And after a moment, she thought she knew why. A man can love that way too, she thoughtЧand one of them not a woman, either.
I wonder if he . . . she . . . it knew. I wonder if it knew.