"Kate Wilhelm - The Fountain of Neptune" - читать интересную книгу автора (Wilhelm Kate)

came as a mild surprise to see that she had been to that one fountain four
different times. The pictures were dated, and the first one had been taken
April eleventh, one in early May, one mid-May, and the most recent on the
last day of May.

After putting them in chronological order to examine them, she
gasped, and stood up so quickly, so urgently that she knocked her chair
over. Steadying herself with a hand on the table, she closed her eyes hard,
rubbed them, and without looking again at the pictures yet, she backed
away from the table, and only then opened her eyes and crossed the few
feet to her tiny kitchen for a glass of water.

All the pictures were different. тАЬItтАЩs started,тАЭ she said under her
breath.

Distorted images, one of the doctors had said. Illusions.

She had entered the next phase, she thought dully, and forced herself
to return to the table, to study the set of pictures, seeking to learn when the
new phase had started without her noticing.

Some of the views were from different places around the fountain,
single shots, but the four she singled out had all been taken from the same
location. She had been seated on the same bench for each of the four. The
changes were subtle, but unmistakable. They presented a sequence in
time. First the nymphтАЩs head was turned away slightly, her hair streaming
behind her; the horseтАЩs head was lowered, and towering over them Neptune
was straining in a struggle with the octopus that had one arm wrapped
around the godтАЩs leg. Next the nymphтАЩs head was turned more to the front,
and the horse had lifted its head. The octopus was lower down on
NeptuneтАЩs leg.
 They were not illusions, she realized, but full-blown hallucinations.
She was telling herself a story and providing graphic images to illustrate it.
In the last picture the nymph had finished turning her head, and was smiling
up at Neptune, and he was done with his mock battle, and now was looking
down on the nymph, his hand extended toward her. Even the horse was
looking at him in that picture.

Slowly, moving with care, she gathered all the printouts and slipped
them into an envelope. Hallucinations, the final phase?

A church bell tolled the hour of eight, her daily signal to leave the
apartment, drop in at a newsstand to buy a newspaper, go to dinner at a
neighborhood tratoria. She stifled a giggle as she wondered if she would
hear PanтАЩs pipes, see his mad dance.

She walked the block to the newsstand, purchased her newspaper,
and on impulse asked for a picture of the Fontana di Netunno en Piazza
Navona. The shopkeeper smiled at her Italian baby talk and answered in
English, as he always did.