"Charles Stross - Merchant princes 03 - The Clan Corporate" - читать интересную книгу автора (Stross Charles)

"Yes, but." Helge stopped.
Her mother took a deep breath. "The Clan, for all its failings, is a very
democratic organization. Democratic in the original sense of the word. If
enough of the elite voters agree, they can depose the leadership, indict a
member of the Clan for trial by a jury of their peers-anything. Which is why
appearances, manners, and social standing are so important. Hypocrisy is the
grease that lubricates the Clan's machinery." Her cheek twitched. "Oh yes.
While I remember, love, if you are accused of anything never, ever, insist on
your right to a trial by jury. Over here, that word does not mean what you
think it means. Like the word secretary. Pah, but I'm woolgathering! Anyway.
My mother, your grandmother, has a constituency, Miri-Helge. Tarnation. Swear
at me if I slip again, will you, dear? We need to break each other of this
habit."
Helge nodded. "Yes, Iris."
The duchess reached over and swatted her lightly on the arm. "Patricia! Say my
full name."
"Ah." Helge met her gaze. "All right. Your grace is the honorable Duchess
Patricia voh Hjorth d'Wu ab Thorold." With mild rebellion: "Also known as Iris
Beckstein, of 34 Coffin Street-"
"That's enough!" Her mother nodded sharply. "Put the rest behind you for the
time being. Until-unless-we can ever go back, the memories can do nothing but
hurt you. You've got to live in the present. And the present means living
among the Clan and deporting yourself as a, a countess. Because if you don't
do that, all the alternatives on offer are drastically worse. This isn't a
rich world, like America. Most women only have one thing to trade: as a lady
of the Clan you're lucky enough to have two, even three if you count the
contents of your head. But if you throw away the money and the power that goes
with being of the Clan, you'll rapidly find out just what's under the
surface-if you survive long enough."
"But there's no limit to the amount of shit!" the younger woman burst out,
then clapped a hand to her face as if to recall the unladylike expostulation.
"Don't chew your nails, dear," her mother said automatically.


It had started in mid-morning. Miriam (who still found it an effort of will to
think of herself as Helge, outside of social situations where other people
expected her to be Helge) was tired and irritable, dosed up on ibuprofen and
propranolol to deal with the effects of a series of courier runs the day
before when, wearing jeans and a lined waterproof jacket heavy enough to
survive a northeast passage, she'd wheezed under the weight of a backpack and
a walking frame. They'd had her ferrying fifty-kilogram loads between a gloomy
cellar of undressed stone and an equally gloomy subbasement of an underground
car park in Manhattan. There were armed guards in New York to protect her
while she recovered from the vicious migraine that world-walking brought on,
and there were servants and maids in the palace quarters back home to pamper
her and feed her sweetmeats from a cold buffet and apply a cool compress for
her head. But the whole objective of all this attention was to soften her up
until she could be cozened into making another run. Two return trips in
eighteen hours. Drugs or no drugs, it was brutal: without guards and flunkies
and servants to prod her along she might have refused to do her duty.