"Pohl, Frederik - The Sweet, Sad Queen Of The Grazing Isles" - читать интересную книгу автора (Pohl Frederick)

through the solar collectors. Pumping water past the electrodes to be split into
its gases; pumping the gases into the refrigerator ships to be carried away. Out
of every hundred kilowatt-hours of energy we make, ninety-seven go into running
the gear itself.
But that three percent left over makes us rich, for once the boat is built it is
all free.
Ben Zoll had never worked on an oaty-boat, and so he had much to learn He
learned it fast If he did not have the Commodores name, he had at least
inherited his drive.
May had the name. And bastard Ben kept her from everything else, kept her from
the presidency of the Fleet, kept her from the voting rights to her stock.
He did not begrudge her money. She had the best schools. She had horses to ride
and clothes for a princess. It was no sacrifice to Ben to allow her any money
she needed. The billions of land people hungered insatiably for every grain of
ammonia and every wisp of hydrogen we could make. The company prospered under
bastard Ben.
And so did I, for my pitiful fifty shares of stock had already made me a
millionaire. I didn't need the job anymore. But I kept it, and I stayed on the
O.T. Where else was there to go? No sensible person would want to live on a
continent with all those writhing billions. Land people are a suing,
assassinating, conniving bunch. And I had formed the habit of living under the
Law of the Sea- And, besides, every now and then May came home to visit.
She did not come often. But there were school holidays. Any time there were afew
days together, she would take the long five-hour flight from Massachusetts to
the Bismarcks or the Coral Sea or wherever we were grazing, and in the summers,
always, for weeks on end. It was not May alone, for the four other Mays always
came too, to visit their families and to get away from the stink and strife.
They were beautiful girls. Girls to break a thousand hearts, and I suppose they
did. There was Maisie Richardson, huge and blond and glowing with health, and
May Holliston-Peirce, the hydrologist's daughter, with trusting blue eyes and a
sweet, guileful tongue, and Tseling Mei, who became a movie star, and May
Bancroft, black and handsome and the wisest of them all. And May herself. My
May. She was always the most beautiful of them all. There are pretty babies who
grow up blotchy or sullen or fat, but there was never a day in any company when
May was not the most beautiful there. They were all almost of an age, May and
the four other Mays, and, oh, heaven, how they brightened up the old O.T.! There
was a May for any man's taste, and all of them for every taste, for they were
kind and clever, they were lovely and loving. They chattered and whispered among
themselves, and if ever a joke went the wrong way or a word touched a nerve,
they made it up at once with a kindness and a kiss.
And then there was Betsy.
Betsy Zoll. Bitch child of the bastard, Ben. If you take the raw materials for
two young women and give all of the beauty and kindness and grace to one-say, to
May- what is left over is Betsy Zoll. May was a diamond. Betsy was flawed glass.
When the Mays were not aboard, Betsy was the princess royal, and sometimes, on a
good day, she almost looked the part. But in their shade she drooped and sulked.
The shiny glass was beside true diamonds, and its luster was gone. They let her
tag along with them, out of kindness. Out of envy, she wished them dead. So the
holidays were no joy for Betsy Zoll, and she couldn't wait, couldn't wait for
them to be over and the Mays back in school so she could try to reign again.