"Geoff Ryman - Was" - читать интересную книгу автора (Ryman Geoff)

gave his name.

"Jonathan," he said, in a faraway voice. Jonathan forgot to give his last
name. He was enchanted by the man at the Hertz desk, who was long,
lean, solemn, wearing wire glasses. He reminded Jonathan of the farmer in
the painting American Gothic. Jonathan grinned.

He passed the man an airport napkin with a confirmation number written on
it. American Gothic spoke of insurance and had forms ready to sign.
Jonathan put check marks in the little boxes and passed over a credit card.
He waited, trying not to think about how ill he was. He looked at a map on
the wall.

The map showed Manhattan the town and, to the west of it, Fort Riley, the
Army base. Fort Riley covered many miles. It had taken over whole towns.

Jonathan did not know there had once been a town in Kansas called Magic.
There had even been a Church of Magic, until the con-gregation had to
move when the Army base took over. The ghost towns were marked. Fort
Riley DZ. DZ Milford. The letters D were ambi-guously rounded.

Quite plainly on the map, there was something that Jonathan read as "OZ
Magic."

It had its own little box, hard by something called the Artillery and Mortar
Impact Area, quite close to a village called Keats.

"There you go," said American Gothic. He held out car keys.

"What's this mean?" Jonathan asked, pointing at the words.

"DZ?" the man said. "It means 'Drop Zone.' "

There were little things on the map called silos. Jonathan thought the silos
might be for storing sorghum.

"At the end of the world," said the man at the Hertz desk, "it will rain fire
from the sky." He still held out the car keys. "Manhattan won't know jack
shit about it. We'll just go up in a flash of light."

Not a single thing he had said made any sense to Jonathan. Jon-athan just
stared at the map.

"Anyway," said American Gothic, "you got the gray Chevrolet Celebrity
outside."

Jonathan thought of Bob Hope. He swayed where he stood. Sweat trickled
into his mouth.

"You all right?" the man asked.