"Фредерик Браун. Night of the Jabberwock (англ) " - читать интересную книгу автора

blood is shed. I guess it had been that kind of excitement, the vicarious
kind, that I'd felt about the things Yehudi Smith had promised. Or maybe a
better comparison would be that it had been like reading an exciting fiction
story that one knows isn't true but which one can believe in for as long as
the story lasts.
Now there wasn't even that. Across from me, I realized with keen
disappointment, was only a man who'd escaped from an insane asylum. Yehudi,
the little man who wasn't there mentally.
The funny part of it was that I still liked him. He was a nice little
guy and he'd given me a fascinating half hour, up to now. I hated the fact
that I'd have to turn him over to the asylum guards and have him put back
where he came from.
Well, I thought, at least it would give me a news story to fill that
nine inch hole in the front page of the Clarion. He said, "I hope the call
wasn't anything that will spoil our plans, Doctor."
It had spoiled more than that, but of course I couldn't tell him so,
any more than I could have told Clyde Andrews over the phone, in Smith's
presence, to call the asylum and tell them to drop around to my house if
they wanted to collect their bolted nut.
So I shook my head while I figured out an angle to get out of the house
and to put in the phone call from next door.
I stood up. Perhaps I was a bit more drunk than I'd thought, for I had
to catch my balance. I remember how crystal clear my mind seemed to be but
of course nothing seems more crystal clear than a prism that makes you see
around corners.
I said, "No, the call won't interrupt our plans except for a few
minutes. I've got to give a message to the man next door. Excuse me and
help yourself to the whisky."
I went through the kitchen and outside into the black night. There were
lights in the houses on either side of me, and I wondered which of my
neighbors to bother. And then I wondered why I was in such a hurry to bother
either of them.
Surely, I thought, the man who called himself Yehudi Smith wasn't
dangerous. And, crazy or not, he was the most interesting man I'd met in
years. He did seem to know something about Lewis Carroll. And I remembered
again that he'd known about my obscure brochure and equally obscure magazine
article. How?
So, come to think of it, why shouldn't I stall making that phone call
for another hour or so, and relax and enjoy myself? Now that I was over the
first disappointment of learning that he was insane, why wouldn't I find
talk about that delusion of his almost as interesting as though it was
factual.
Interesting in a different way, of course. Often I had thought I'd like
the chance to talk to a paranoiac about his delusions neither arguing with
him nor agreeing with him, just trying to find out what made him tick.
And the evening was still a pup; it couldn't be later than about half
past eight so my neighbors would be up at least another hour or two.
So why was I in a hurry to make that call? I wasn't.
Of course I had to kill enough time outside to make it reasonable to
believe that I'd actually gone next door and delivered a message, so I stood