"Arkady & Boris Strugatsky - The Ugly Swans" - читать интересную книгу автора (Strugatski Arkady)

TRANSLATED FROM THE RUSSIAN BY

Alice Stone Nakhimovsky and Alexander Nakhimovsky



Arkady Strugaisky and Boris Strugaisky
COLLIER BOOKS A Division of Macmillan Publishing Co., Inc.
New York
COLLIER MACMILLAN PUBLISHERS
London

Copyright ┬й 1979 by Macmillan Publishing Co., Inc.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical,
including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the
Publisher.
Macmillan Publishing Co., Inc.
866 Third Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10022
Collier Macmillan Canada, Ltd.

Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Strugafskff, Arkadii Natanovich. The ugly swans.
Translation of Gadkie lebedi.
I. Strugafskii, Boris Natanovich, joint author. II. Title.
PZ 4.S9i 9Ug 1980 [PG3476.S78835] 891.7Y44
ISBN 0-02-007240-6 79-21366

First Collier Books Edition 1980 Printed in the United States of America

scanned by AlexQ


Chapter I


Irma left the room, carefully closing the door behind her. She was a thin, long-legged girl with a wide mouth
and her mother's red lips; she smiled politely, like an adult. When she had gone, Victor attacked his
cigarette. "That's no child," he thought, stunned. "Children don't talk like that. It's not even rudeness, it's
cruelty, no, not even crueltyтАФshe simply doesn't care. You'd think she was proving some theorem to us.
She made her cal-culations, completed her analysis, and duly communicated the results. And then she left,
serenely swinging her pigtails."
Victor got over his uneasiness and looked at Lola. Her face had broken out in red spots. Her red lips
trembled as if she were about to cry, but of course she had no intention of crying; she was furious.
"You see," she said in a high voice. "A little snot-nosed bitch. Nothing's sacred to her, every word is an
insultтАФas if I weren't her mother but a doormat for her to wipe her feet on. I can't face the neighbors. The
little brat."
"Right," thought Victor. "I lived with this woman. I went for walks with her in the mountains, I read
Baudelaire to her, I trembled when I touched her, I remembered her fragrance. I even got into fights over
her. To this day I don't understand what was going through her mind when I read her Baudelaire. No, it's
just amazing that I managed to get away from her. It boggles the mindтАФhow did she let me? No doubt I
wasn't any prize myself. No doubt I'm still no prize, but in those days I