"Kim Stanley Robinson - Forty Signs of Rain" - читать интересную книгу автора (Robinson Kim Stanley)

In LeoтАЩs lab they had done what they could. Their job had been to get certain cell lines to become
unnaturally prolific protein factories, and they had done that. Delivery wasnтАЩt their part of the deal, and
they werenтАЩt physiologists, and now they didnтАЩt have the wherewithal to do that part of the job. Torrey
Pines needed a whole different wing for that, a whole different field of science. It was not an expertise
that could be bought for fifty-one million dollars. Or maybe it could have been, but Derek had bought
defective expertise. And because of that, a multibillion-dollar cash-cow method was stalled right on the
brink; and the whole company might go under.

Nothing Leo could do about it. He couldnтАЩt even publish his results.



THE QUIBLERSтАЩ small house was located at the end of a street of similar houses. All of them stood
blankly, blinds drawn, no clues given as to who lived inside. They could have been empty for all an
outsider could tell: no cars in the driveways, no kids in the yards, no yard or porch activity of any kind.
They could have been walled compounds in Saudi Arabia, hiding their life from the desert outside.

Walking these streets with Joe on his back, Charlie assumed as he always did that these houses were
mostly owned by people who worked in the District, people who were always either working or on
vacation. Their homes were places to sleep. Charlie had been that way himself before the boys had
arrived. That was how people lived in Bethesda, west of Wisconsin AvenueтАФwest all the way to the
Pacific, Charlie didnтАЩt know. But he didnтАЩt think so; he tended to put it on Bethesda specifically.

So he walked to the grocery store shaking his head as he always did. тАЬItтАЩs like a ghost town, Joe, itтАЩs
like someTwilight Zone episode in which weтАЩre the only two people left on Earth.тАЭ

Then they rounded the corner, and all thought of ghost towns was rendered ridiculous. Shopping center.
They walked through the automatic glass doors into a giant Giant grocery store. Joe, excited by the place
as always, stood up in his baby backpack, his knees on CharlieтАЩs shoulders, and whacked Charlie on the
ears as if he were directing an elephant. Charlie reached up, lifted him around and stuffed him into the
baby seat of the grocery cart, strapped him down with the cartтАЩs little red seat belt. A very useful feature,
that.
 Okay. Buddhists coming to dinner, Asians from the mouth of the Ganges. He had no idea what to cook.
He assumed they were vegetarians. It was not unusual for Anna to invite people from NSF over to dinner
and then be somewhat at a loss in the matter of the meal itself. But Charlie liked that. He enjoyed
cooking, though he was not good at it, and had gotten worse in the years since the boys had arrived.
Time had grown short, and he and Anna had both cooked and recooked their repertoire of recipes until
they were sick of them, and yet hadnтАЩt learned anything new. So now they often did takeout, or ate as
plainly as Nick; or Charlie tried something new and botched it. Dinner guests were a chance to do that
again.

Now he decided to resuscitate an old recipe from their student years, pasta with an olive and basil sauce
that a friend had first cooked for them in Italy. He wandered the familiar aisles of the store, looking for
the ingredients. He should have made a list. On a typical trip he would go home having forgotten
something crucial, and today he wanted to avoid that, but he was also thinking of other things, and
making comments aloud from time to time. JoeтАЩs presence disguised his tendency to talk to himself in
public spaces. тАЬOkay, whole peeled tomatoes, pitted kalamatas, olive oil extra virgin first cold
pressтАФitтАЩs the first press that really matters,тАЭ slipping into their friendтАЩs Italian accent, тАЬnow vat I am
forgetting, hm, hm, oh, ze pasta! But you must never keel ze pasta, my God! Oh and bread. And wine,