"John Varley - Picnic On Nearside" - читать интересную книгу автора (Varley John)

John Varley
Picnic On Nearside
formerly titled The Barbie Murders



CONTENTS



BAGATELLE

THE FUNHOUSE EFFECT

THE BARBIE MURDERS

EQUINOCTIAL

MANIKINS

BEATNIK BAYOU

GOOD-BYE, ROBINSON CRUSOE

LOLLIPOP AND THE TAR BABY

PICNIC ON NEARSIDE



AKNOWLEDGEMENTS




Bagatelle
THERE WAS A BOMB on the Leystrasse, level forty-five, right outside the Bagatelle Flower and
Gift Shoppe, about a hundred meters down the promenade from Prosperity Plaza.

"I am a bomb," the bomb said to passersby. "I will explode in four hours, five minutes, and
seventeen seconds. I have a force equal to fifty thousand English tons of trinitrololuene."

A small knot of people gathered to look at it.

"I will go off in four hours, four minutes, and thirty-seven seconds."

A few people became worried as the bomb talked on. They remembered business elsewhere
and hurried away, often toward the tube trains to King City. Eventually, the trains became
overcrowded and there was some pushing and shoving.