"Zelazny, Roger - Angel, Dark Angel" - читать интересную книгу автора (Zelazny Roger)

УЕ And you havenТt tasted your drink.Ф

УI know.Ф

Her hand came to rest upon his arm, and he put his drink aside and drew her to him once again, just as she put hers to rest.

УYou are quite different from most men,Ф she said.

УЕ And you from most women.Ф

УIs it growing warm in here?Ф

УVery,Ф he said.

Somewhere it is raining. Controlled or artificialЧsomewhere it is always raining, any time you care to think about it. Always remember that, if you can.

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A dozen days had passed since the finale of the Cyborg City Mixed Open. Every day Stain and Galatea moved together somewhere. His hand upon her elbow or about her waist, she showed him Cyborg City. They laughed often, and the sky was pink and the winds were gentle and in the distance the cliffs of Ankus wore haloes of fog prismatic and crowns of snow and ice.

Then he asked her of the fresco as they sat in her living room.

УIt represents the progress of human thought,Ф she said. УThat figureЧfar to the left, contemplating the birds in flightЧis Leonardo da Vinci, deciding that man might do likewise. High at the top and somewhat to the left, the two figures ascending the ziggurat toward the rose are Dante and Virgil, the Classic and the Christian, joined together and departing the Middle Ages of Earth into a new freedomЧthe place where Leonardo might contemplate. That man off to the right is John Locke. ThatТs the social contract in his hand. That man near the middleЧthe little man clutching the figure eightЧis Albert Einstein.Ф

УWho is the blinded man far to the left, with the burning city at his back?Ф

УThat is Homer.Ф

УAnd that one?Ф

УJob, on a heap of rubble.Ф

УWhy are they all here?Ф

УBecause they represent that which must never be forgotten.Ф

УI do not understand. I have not forgotten them.Ф

УYet the final five feet to the right are blank.Ф

УWhy?Ф

УThere is nothing to put there. Not in a century has there been anything worth adding. Everything now is planned, prescribed, directedЧФ

УAnd no ill comes of it, and the worlds are managed well. Do not tell me how fine were the days of glorious discontent, days through which you never lived yourself. The work done then has not gone to waste. Everything is appreciated, used.Ф

УBut what new things have been added?Ф

УSize, and ease of operation within it. Do not preach to me of progress. Change is not desirable for its own sake, but only if it offers improvement. I could complete your fresco for youЧФ