"Michael Swanwick - The Dead" - читать интересную книгу автора (Swanwick Michael)

THE DEAD

Michael Swanwick

We've been worried about technological unemployment for decades, but, as the bleak and elegant
story that follows suggests, now there may be another threat to your job security: dead people.
They're back from the grave and looking for work…

Michael Swanwick made his debut in 1980, and has gone on to become one of the most popular
and respected of all that decade's new writers. He has several times been a finalist for the Nebula
Award, as well as for the World Fantasy Award and for the John W. Campbell Award, and has
won the Theodore Sturgeon Memorial Award and the Asimov's Readers Award poll. In 1991, his
novel Stations of the Tide won him a Nebula Award as well, and last year he won the World
Fantasy Award for his story Radio Waves. His other books include his first novel, In the Drift,
which was published in 1985, a novella-length book, Griffin's Egg, and 1987's popular novel
Vacuum Flowers. His critically acclaimed short fiction has been assembled in Gravity's Angels and
in a collection of his collaborative short work with other writers, Slow Dancing Through Time. His
most recent book is a new novel, The Iron Dragon's Daughter, which was a finalist for the World
Fantasy Award and the Arthur C. Clarke Award. He's just completed a new novel, Jack Faust.
He's had stories in our Second, Third, Fourth, Sixth, Seventh, Tenth, and Thirteenth Annual
Collections. Swanwick lives in Philadelphia with his wife, Marianne Porter, and their son Sean.



Three boy zombies in matching red jackets bused our table, bringing water, lighting candles, brushing
away the crumbs between courses. Their eyes were dark, attentive, lifeless; their hands and faces so
white as to be faintly luminous in the hushed light. I thought it in bad taste, but "This is Manhattan,"
Courtney said. "A certain studied offensiveness is fashionable here."

The blond brought menus and waited for our order.

We both ordered pheasant. "An excellent choice," the boy said in a clear, emotionless voice. He went
away and came back a minute later with the freshly strangled birds, holding them up for our approval. He
couldn't have been more than eleven when he died and his skin was of that sort connoisseurs call
"milk-glass," smooth, without blemish, and all but translucent. He must have cost a fortune.

As the boy was turning away, I impulsively touched his shoulder. He turned back. "What's your name,
son?" I asked.

"Timothy." He might have been telling me the specialite de maison. The boy waited a breath to see if
more was expected of him, then left.

Courtney gazed after him. "How lovely he would look," she murmured, "nude. Standing in the moonlight
by a cliff. Definitely a cliff. Perhaps the very one where he met his death."

"He wouldn't look very lovely if he'd fallen off a cliff."

"Oh, don't be unpleasant."

The wine steward brought our bottle. "Chateau Latour '17." I raised an eyebrow. The steward had the