"Wolfe, Gene - The Urth Of The New Sun" - читать интересную книгу автора (Wolfe Gene)

"Well, let me tell you that this is a working ship; it's just
that she wasn't built by people like you and me. Autarch--does
that mean you run the whole Urth?"
"No, I ran only a small part of it, although I was the
legitimate head of the whole of it. And I've known ever
since I began my journey that if I succeed, I won't come
back as Autarch. You seem singularly unimpressed."
"There are so many worlds," she told me. Quite suddenly
she crouched and leaped, rising into the air like a large
blue bird. Even though I had made such leaps myself, it
was strange to see a woman do it. Her ascent carried her a
cubit or less above the platform, and she might honestly
have been said to have floated down upon it.

Without thinking, I had supposed the crew's quarters
would be a narrow room like the forecastle of the _Samru_.
There was a warren of big cabins instead, many levels
opening onto walkways around a common airshaft. Gunnie
said she had to return to her duty, and suggested I look
for an empty cabin.
It was on my tongue to remind her I had a cabin already,
which I had left only a watch before; but something
stopped me. I nodded and asked her what location was
best--by which I meant, as she understood, which would
be nearest hers. She indicated it to me, and we parted.
On Urth the older locks are charmed by words. My
stateroom had a speaking lock, and though the hatches had
needed no words at all and the door Sidero had flung open
had required none, the olive doors of these crew compartments
were equipped with locks of the same kind. The first
two I approached informed me that the cabins they
guarded were occupied. They must have been old mechaisms
indeed; I noticed that their personalities had begun
to differentiate.
The third invited me to enter, saying, "What a nice
cabin!"
I asked how long it had been since the nice cabin had
been inhabited.
"I don't know, master. Many voyages."
"Don't call me master," I told it. "I haven't decided to
take your cabin yet."
There was no reply. No doubt such locks are of severely
limited intelligence; otherwise they might be bribed, and
they would surely go mad soon. After a moment the door
swung open. I stepped inside.
It was not a nice cabin compared with the stateroom I
had left. There were two narrow bunks, an armoire, and a
chest; sanitary facilities in a corner. Dust covered everything
to such a thickness that I could readily imagine it
being blown from the ventilating grill in gray clouds,