"Alastair Reynolds - Zima Blue" - читать интересную книгу автора (Reynolds Alastair)

Zima Blue
ALASTAIR REYNOLDS
From Gardner Dozois - The Year's Best Science Fiction 23rd Annual Collection (2006)

Here's another story by Alastair Reynolds, whose "Beyond the Aquilla Rift" appears elsewhere in
this anthology. In this one, he investigates a mysterious artist for whom no canvas is too big, and
whose origins are unknown тАФ perhaps even to himself.

After the first week people started drifting away from the island. The viewing stands around the pool
became emptier by the day. The big tourist ships hauled back toward interstellar space. Art fiends,
commentators and critics packed their bags in Venice. Their disappointment hung over the lagoon like a
miasma.

I was one of the few who stayed on Murjek, returning to the stands each day. I'd watch for hours,
squinting against the trembling blue light reflected from the surface of the water. Face down, Zima's pale
shape moved so languidly from one end of the pool to the other that it could have been mistaken for a
floating corpse. As he swam I wondered how I was going to tell his story, and who was going to buy it. I
tried to remember the name of my first newspaper, back on Mars. They wouldn't pay as much as some
of the bigger titles, but some part of me liked the idea of going back to the old place. It had been a long
timeтАж I queried the AM, wanting it to jog my memory about the name of the paper. There'd been so
many sinceтАж hundreds, by my reckoning. But nothing came. It took me another yawning moment to
remember that I'd dismissed the AM the day before.

"You're on your own, Carrie," I said. "Start getting used to it."

In the pool, the swimming figure ended a length and began to swim back toward me.

Two weeks earlier I'd been sitting in the Piazza San Marco at noon, watching white figurines glide against
the white marble of the clock tower. The sky over Venice was jammed with ships parked hull-to-hull.
Their bellies were quilted in vast glowing panels, tuned to match the real sky. The view reminded me of
the work of a pre-Expansion artist who had specialised in eye-wrenching tricks of perspective and
composition: endless waterfalls, interlocking lizards. I formed a mental image and queried the fluttering
presence of the AM, but it couldn't retrieve the name.

I finished my coffee and steeled myself for the bill.

I'd come to this white marble version of Venice to witness the unveiling of Zima's final work of art. I'd
had an interest in the artist for years, and I'd hoped I might be able to arrange an interview. Unfortunately
several thousand other members of the in-crowd had come up with exactly the same idea. Not that it
mattered what kind of competition I had anyway; Zima wasn't talking.

The waiter placed a folded piece of card on my table.

All we'd been told was to make our way to Murjek, a waterlogged world most of us had never heard of
before. Murjek's only claim to fame was that it hosted the one hundred and seventy-first known duplicate
of Venice, and one of only three Venices rendered entirely in white marble. Zima had chosen Murjek to
host his final work of art, and to be the place where he would make his retirement from public life.

With a heavy heart I lifted the bill to inspect the damage. Instead of the expected bill there was a small
blue card, printed in fine gold italic lettering. The shade of blue was that precise, powdery, aquamarine