"Jack Vance - Tschai 3 - The DirDir" - читать интересную книгу автора (Vance Jack)

Silently, each man thinking his own thoughts, they went to the motorwagon terminus. Zarfo told
them: "Say nothing to anyone; pretend to meditate: that is the way of the Serafs. At sundown face
the east and utter a loud cry: 'Ah-oo-cha!' No one knows what it means but that is the Seraf way.
If pressed, state that you come to buy essences. So then: aboard the wagon! May you avoid the
Dirdir and succeed in all your future undertakings. And if not, remember that death comes only
once!"

"Thank you for the consolation," said Reith.

The motor-wagon trundled off on its eight tall wheels: away from Smargash, out over the plain
toward the west. Reith, Anacho and Traz sat alone in the aft passenger cubicle.

Anacho was pessimistic in regard to their chances. "The Dirdir will not be confused for long.
The difficulties will only make them keen. Do you know that the Dirdir young are like beasts? They
must be tamed, then trained and educated. The Dirdir spirit remains feral; hunting is a lust."

"Self-preservation is no less a lust with me," Reith stated.

The sun sank behind the rim; gray-brown dust settled over the landscape. The wagon paused at a
dismal little village; the passengers stretched their legs, drank brackish water raised from a
well, haggled for buns with a withered old crone who asked outrageous prices and laughed wildly at
counter-proposals.

The wagon proceeded, leaving the old woman muttering beside her tray of buns.

The dusk faded through umber into darkness. From across the wasteland came a weird hooting: the
call of night-hounds. In the east rose the pink moon Az, followed presently by blue Braz. Ahead
loomed a jut of rock: an ancient volcanic neck, so Reith surmised. From the summit glowed three
wan yellow lights. Looking up through his scanscope* Reith saw the ruins of a castle ... He dozed
for an hour and awoke to find the wagon rolling through soft sand beside a river. On the opposite
bank psillas stood outlined against the moonlit sky. Presently they passed a many-cupolaed manor-
house, apparently uninhabited and in the process of decay.


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Half an hour later, at midnight, the wagon rumbled into the compound of a large village, to
halt for the right. The passengers composed themselves to sleep on their benches or on top of the
wagon.

Carina 4269 finally rose: a cool amber disc only gradually dispelling the morning mist. Vendors
brought trays of pickled meats, pastes, strips of boiled bark, toasted pilgrim pod, from which the
passengers made a breakfast.

The wagon proceeded to the west toward the Rim Mountains, now jutting high into the sky. Reith
occasionally swept the sky with his scanscope but discovered no signs of pursuit.

"Too early yet," said Anacho cheerlessly. "Never fear; it will come."