"Kim Stanley Robinson - Sixty Days and Counting" - читать интересную книгу автора (Robinson Kim Stanley)

They headed off the northeast shoulder of the hill, and were quickly down into
scrubby trees. Here the ice had hit the rock head-on, and the enormous pressures
had formed the characteristic upstream side of a drumlin: smooth, rounded,
polished, any flaw stripped open. And exposed to air for no more than ten thousand
years; thus there was hardly any soil on this slope, which meant all the trees on it
were miniaturized. They hiked down a good trail through this krummholz like giants.
It was a familiar experience for Frank, and yet this time he was following the lithe and
graceful figure of his lover or girlfriend or he didnтАЩt know what, descending neatly
before him, like a tree goddess. Some kind of happiness or joy or desire began to
seep under his worry. Surely it had been a good idea to come here. He had had to
do it; he couldnтАЩt have not done it.
The trail led them into the top of a narrow couloir in the granite, a flaw from which all
loose rock had been plucked. Cedar beams were set crosswise in the bottom of this
ravine, forming big solid stairs, somewhat snowed over. The sidewalls were covered
with lichen, moss, ice. When they came out of the bottom of the couloir, the
stairboxes underfoot were replaced by a long staircase of immense rectangular
granite blocks.
тАЬThis is more like the usual trail on the east side,тАЭ Caroline said, pointing at these
monstrous field stones. тАЬFor a while, the thing they liked to do was make granite
staircases, running up every fault line they could find. Sometimes thereтАЩll be four or
five hundred stairs in a row.тАЭ
тАЬYouтАЩre kidding.тАЭ
тАЬNo. Every peak on the east side has three or four trails like that running up them,
sometimes right next to each other. The redundancy didnтАЩt bother them at all.тАЭ
тАЬSo they really were works of art.тАЭ
тАЬYes. But the National Park didnтАЩt get it, and when they took over they closed a lot
of the trails and took them off the maps. But since the trails have these big staircases
in them, they last whether theyтАЩre maintained or not. MaryтАЩs dad collected old maps,
and was part of a group that went around finding the old trails. Now the park is
restoring some of them.тАЭ
тАЬIтАЩve never seen anything like it.тАЭ
тАЬI donтАЩt think there is anything like it. Even here they only did this for a few years. It
was like a fad. But a fad in granite never goes away.тАЭ
Frank laughed. тАЬIt looks like something the Incas might have done.тАЭ
тАЬIt does, doesnтАЩt it?тАЭ She stopped and looked back up the snowy stone steps,
splotchy here with pale green lichen.
тАЬI can see why you would want to stay here,тАЭ Frank said cautiously when they
started again.
тАЬYes. I love it.тАЭ
тАЬButтАжтАЭ
тАЬI think IтАЩm okay,тАЭ she said.
For a while they went back and forth on this, saying much the same things they had
said at the house. Whether Ed would look at her subjects, whether he would be able
to find MaryтАж
Finally Frank shrugged. тАЬYou donтАЩt want to leave here.тАЭ
тАЬItтАЩs true,тАЭ she said. тАЬI like it here. And I feel hidden.тАЭ
тАЬBut now you know better. Someone looked for you and they found you. ThatтАЩs
got to be the main thing.тАЭ
тАЬI guess,тАЭ she muttered.
They came to the road they had parked beside. They walked back to his van and she