"Jack Vance - The Last Castle" - читать интересную книгу автора (Vance Jack)

turn tail and flee. During the fighting 0. Z. Garr displayed the
most exemplary demeanor, directing the attack from the seat
of his power-wagon, a pair of Meks standing by with shields
to ward away arrows.
The conflict ended in a rout of the Nomads. They left
twenty-seven lean black-cloaked corpses strewn on the field,
while only twenty Meks lost their lives.
0. Z. Garr's opponent in the election was Claghorn, elder
of the Claghorn family. As with 0. Z, Garr, the exquisite
discriminations of Hagedorn society came to Claghorn as
easily as swimming to a fish.
He was no less erudite than 0. Z. Garr, though hardly so
versatile, his principal field of study being the Meks, their
physiology, linguistic modes, and social patterns. Claghom's
conversation was more profound, but less entertaining and
not so trenchant as that of 0. Z. Garr. He seldom employed
the extravagant tropes and allusions which characterized
Garr's discussions, preferring a style of speech which was
almost unadorned. Claghorn kept no Phanes; 0. Z. Garr's
four matched Gossamer Dainties were marvels of delight, and
at the viewing of Antique Tabards Garr's presentations were
seldom outshone. The important contrast between the two
men lay in their philosophic outlook. 0. Z. Garr, a traditional-
ist, a fervent exemplar of his society, subscribed to its tenets
without reservation. He was beset by neither doubt nor guilt;
he felt no desire to alter the conditions which afforded more
than two thousand gentlemen and ladies lives of great rich-
ness. Claghorn, while by no means an Expiationist, was
known to feel dissatisfaction with the general tenor of life at
Castle Hagedorn, and argued so plausibly that many folk
refused to listen to him, on the grounds that they became
uncomfortable. But an indefinable malaise ran deep, and
Claghorn had many influential supporters.
When the time came for ballots to be cast, neither 0. Z.'
Garr nor Claghorn could muster sufficient support. The office
finally was cofaferred upon a gentleman who never in his most
optimistic reckonings had expected it: a gentleman of deco-
rum and dignity but no great depth; without flippancy, but
likewise without vivacity; affable but disinclined to force an
issue to a disagreeable conclusion: 0. C. Charie, the new
Hagedorn,
Six months later, during the dark hours before dawn, the
Hagedom Meks evacuated their quarters and departed, taking
with them power-wagons, tools, weapons and electrical equip-
ment. The act had clearly been long in the planning, for
simultaneously the Meks at each of the eight other castles
made a similar departure.
The initial reaction at Castle Hagedom, as elsewhere, was
incredulity, then shocked anger, thenwhen the implications
of the act were pondereda sense of foreboding and calam-