"Jack Vance - The Demon Princes - complete" - читать интересную книгу автора (Vance Jack)

Night had long settled over the planet. Lightning crashed back
and forth; a sudden downpour began to drum on the roof.
Teehalt, lulled by the liquor, perhaps seeing visions among the
flames, said, "You could never find this world. I am resolved that
it shall not be violated."

"W^hat of your contract?"

Teehalt made a contemptuous motion. "I would honor it for
an ordinary world."

"The information is on the monitor filament," Gersen pointed
out. "The property of your sponsor."

Teehalt was silent so long that Gersen wondered if he were
awake. Finally Teehalt said, "I am afraid to die. Otherwise I would
drop myself and boat and monitor and all into a star."

Gersen had no comment to make.

"I do not know what to do." Teehalt's voice became soft, as
the drink soothed his brain, and showed him visions. "This is a
remarkable world. Beautiful, yes. I wonder if the beauty does not

12

THE DEMON PRINCES

conceal another quality which I can't fathom . . . just as a woman's
beauty camouflages her more abstract virtues. Or vices. ... In any
event the world is beautiful and serene beyond words. There are
mountains washed by rain. Over the valleys float clouds as soft and
bright as snow. The sky is a deep dark sapphire blue. The air is
sweet and coolтАФso fresh that it seems a lens. There are flowers,
though not very many. They grow in little clumps, so that to find
them is like coming on a treasure. But there are many trees, and
most magnificent are the great kings, with gray bark, which seem
to have lived forever.

"You asked if the world were inhabited. I am forced to answer
yes, though the creatures who live there areтАФstrange. I call them
dryads. I saw only a few hundred, and they seem a race ages old.
As old as the trees, as old as the mountains." Teehalt shut his eyes.
"The day is twice the length of ours; the mornings are long and
bright, the noons are quiet, the afternoons are goldenтАФlike honey.
The dryads bathe in the river or stand in the dark forest. . . ." Tee-
halt's voice dwindled; he appeared to be half asleep.

Gersen prompted him. "Dryads?"