"Richard Preston - The Cobra Event" - читать интересную книгу автора (Preston Richard)

her knapsack. They were going to become part of the Box that she was constructing in Mr
Tafides's art room at the Mater School, a private girls' school on the Upper East Side.
'Katie!' Nanette was calling.
'Okay, okay.' She sighed and threw her knapsack over her shoulder and went out into the
living area -- a large open space with polished wood floors and antique furniture and rugs. Her
parents had both already left for work. Her father was a partner in a Wall Street investment
house, and her mother was an attorney at a midtown law firm.
In the kitchen, Nanette had poured orange juice and toasted a bagel.
Kate shook her head. She wasn't hungry. She sneezed.
Nanette tore off a paper towel and handed it to her. 'Do you want to stay home?'
'Uh-uh.' Kate was already out the door and into the elevator.
It was a glorious morning. She hurried along Fifteenth Street to Union Square, striding on
long legs, heading for the subway entrance. The ash trees in the square were threatening to
break bud. Puffy white clouds drifted in a blue sky over the city, winds whipping in from the
southwest, bringing a warmer day than Kate had expected. The daffodils were mostly gone
and the tulips were blown and flopping their petals. Spring was beginning to give way to
summer. A homeless man passed Kate going in the other direction, leaning into the warm wind
as he pushed a shopping cart piled high with plastic garbage bags full of his possessions. She
threaded through the stalls of the farmer's market that filled up the northern and western
sides of the square, and at the subway kiosk she ran down the stairs and caught the uptown
Lexington Avenue express.
The train was crowded, and Kate found herself crushed in a corner of the first car by the
front window. It was where she had liked to stand when she was a girl riding with her mother
and father, back when they had more time to take her places. You could look out the window
and see the steel columns marching by under the car's headlights, and the track extending
out into seemingly infinite darkness. Switches and branches whirled past, and if you were on
an express train that caught up with a local on the adjacent track, there would be a moment
when the two trains were locked together in a shuddering rush forward.
She didn't like it. The lights flashing in the tunnel made her feel sick. She turned away.
Then she found herself looking at the faces in the subway car. The faces bothered her. If you
look at too many faces jammed together, every face begins to look alien. People in the
subway can look ... humanoid.
The Mater School was only a few blocks from the Eighty-sixth Street subway station. Kate
was still running a little late, and by the time she got to the stone parish building that housed
the school, the younger girls had mostly gone inside, although some of the upperschool girls
were hanging around on the steps.
'Kates, I have to tell you something.' It was her friend Jennifer Ramosa. They walked in
together, with Jennifer talking about something that Kate didn't follow. Kate felt strange, as if
a feather had brushed across her face ...
A gong rang ... and there was the headmistress, Sister Anne Threader, going by ... For a
moment Kate had a feeling of vertigo, as if she were staring into a black pit with no bottom,
and she dropped her knapsack. It hit the floor with a smack. There was a sound of breaking
glass.
'Kate? You moron. What's the matter with you?' Jennifer said.
Kate shook her head. It seemed to clear. She was going to be late for homeroom.
'What's going on, Kates?' Jennifer asked.
'I'm fine.' She picked up her knapsack. It slushed and rattled. 'Something broke. Damn, I
broke my prism.' She headed into class, annoyed with herself.
 At about ten o'clock in the morning, Kate went to the nurse's office and got some Tylenol.
It didn't help her cold, which was getting worse and worse. It was a real sinus cold. Her