"The Inverted World" - читать интересную книгу автора (Priest Christopher)

4

I was woken the next morning by Maichuskin moving about the hut, clattering the dishes from the previous evening’s meal. I made to get out of the bunk as soon as I was fully conscious, but at once I was paralysed by a stab of pain in my back. I gasped.

Malchuskin looked up at me, grinning.

“Stiff?” he said.

I rolled over on to my side, and tried to draw my legs up. These too were stiff and painful, but with a considerable effort I managed to get myself into a sitting position. I sat still for a moment, hoping that the pain was cramp and that it would pass.

“Always the same with you kids from the city,” Malchuskin said, but without malice. “You come out here, keen I’ll grant you. A day’s work and you’re so stiff you become useless. Don’t you get any exercise in the city?”

“Only in the gymnasium.”

“O.K… get down here and have some breakfast. After that, you’d better go back to the city. Have a hot bath, and see if you can find someone to give you a massage. Then report back here.”

I nodded gratefully and clambered down from the bunk. This was no easier and no less painful than anything else I’d attempted so far. I discovered that my arms, neck, and shoulders were as stiff as the rest of me.

I left the hut thirty minutes later, just as Malchuskin was bawling at the men to get started. I headed back towards the city, limping slowly.

It was the first time I had been left to my own devices away from the city. When in the company of others, one never sees as much as when alone. The city was five hundred yards from Malchuskin’s hut, and that was an adequate distance to be able to get some impression of its overall size and appearance. Yet during the whole of the previous day I had been able to afford it only the barest of glances. It was simply a large, gray bulk, dominating the landscape.

Now, hobbling alone across the ground towards it I could inspect it in more detail.

From the limited experience I had had of the interior of the city, I had never given much thought to what it might look like from outside. I had always conceived of it as being large, but the reality was that the city was rather smaller than I had imagined. At its highest point, on the northern side, it was approximately two hundred feet high, but the rest of it was a jumble of rectangles and cubes, fitted into what seemed to be a patternless arrangement of varying elevations. It was a dull brown and gray colour, made as far as I could tell from many different kinds of timber. There seemed to be very little use of concrete or metals, and nothing was painted. This external appearance contrasted sharply with the interior — or at least, those few areas I had seen — which were clean and brightly decorated. As Malchuskin’s hut was directly to the west of the city, it was impossible for me to estimate the width as I walked towards it, though I estimated its length to be about one thousand five hundred feet. I was surprised how ugly it was, and how old it appeared to be. There was much activity about, particularly to the north.

As I came near to the city it occurred to me that I had no idea how I could enter it. Yesterday, Future Denton had taken me around the exterior of the city, but my mind had been so swamped with new impressions that I had absorbed very few of the details pointed out to me. It had looked so different then.

My only clear memory was that there was a door behind the platform from which we had observed the sunrise, and I determined to head for that. This was not as easy as I imagined.

I went to the south of the city, stepping over the tracks which I had been working on the previous day, and moved round to the east side, where I felt sure Denton and I had descended by way of a series of metal ladders. After a long search I found such an access, and began to climb. I went wrong several times, and only after a long period of clambering painfully along catwalks and climbing gingerly up ladders did I locate the platform. I found that the door was still locked.

I had no alternative but to ask. I climbed down to the ground, and went once more to the south of the city where Malchuskin and the gang of men had started work again on dismantling the track.

With an air of aggrieved patience, Malchuskin left Rafael in charge, and showed me what to do. He led me up the narrow space between the two inner tracks, directly beneath the lip of the city’s edge. Underneath the city it was dark and cool.

We stopped by a metal staircase.

“At the top of that there’s an elevator,” he said. “You know what that is?”

“Yes.”

“You’ve got a guild key?”

I fumbled in a pocket and produced an irregularly shaped piece of metal that Clausewitz had given me. It opened the lock on the crèche door. “Is this it?”

“Yes. There’s a lock on the elevator. Go to the fourth level, find an administrator, and ask if you can use the bathroom.”

Feeling very stupid I did as he directed. I heard Malchuskin laughing as he walked back towards the daylight. I found the elevator without difficulty, but the doors would not open when I turned the key. I waited. A few moments later the doors opened abruptly, and two guildsmen came out. They took no notice of me, and went down the steps to the ground.

Suddenly, the doors began to close of their own accord, and I hurried inside. Before I could find any way of controlling the elevator, it began to move upwards. I saw a row of keyed buttons placed on the wall near the door, numbered from one to seven. I jabbed my key into number four, hoping that this was the right one. The elevator-car seemed to be moving for a long time, but then it halted abruptly. The doors opened and I stepped forward. As I came out into the passageway, three more guildsmen stepped into the car.

I caught a glimpse of a painted sign on the wall opposite the car: SEVENTH LEVEL. I had come too far. Just as the doors were closing, I hurried inside again.

“Where are you going, apprentice?” one of the guildsmen said.

“Fourth level.”

“O.K., relax.”

He used his own key on number four, and this time when the car stopped it was on the right level. I mumbled my thanks to the guildsman who had spoken to me, and stepped out of the elevator.

In my various preoccupations I had been able to overlook the discomforts in my body for the last few minutes, but now I felt tired and ill once more. In this part of the city there seemed to be so much activity: many people moving about the corridors, conversations going on, doors opening and closing. It was different from outside the city, for there was a timeless quality to the still countryside, and although people moved and worked out there the atmosphere was more leisurely. The labours of men like Malchuskin and his gang had an elemental purpose, but here, in the heart of the upper levels which had for so long been forbidden to me, all was mysterious and complicated.

I remembered Malchuskin’s instructions and, choosing a door at random, I opened it and went inside. There were two women inside; they were amused but helpful when I told them what I wanted.

A few minutes later I lowered my aching body into a bathful of hot water, and closed my eyes.

It had taken me so much time and effort to get my bath, that I had wondered whether I would benefit by it at all; the fact was that when I had towelled myself dry and dressed again the stiffness was not nearly as bad. There were still traces of it when I stretched my muscles, but the tiredness had gone from my body.

My early return to the city had inevitably brought Victoria to mind. The glimpse I had had of her at the ceremony had heightened my curiosity. The thought of returning immediately to dig old sleepers out of the ground paled somewhat — although I felt I shouldn’t stay away from Malchuskin for too long — and I decided to see if I could find her.

I left the bathroom, and hurried back to the elevator. It was not in use, but I had to summon it to the floor I was on. When it arrived I was able to study its controls in rather more detail. I decided to experiment.

I travelled first to the seventh level, but from a brief excursion into its corridors I could see no immediately obvious difference from the level I had just left. The same was true for most of the other levels, though there was more apparent activity on the third, fourth, and fifth. The first level was the dark tunnel actually beneath the city itself.

I travelled up and down a couple of times, discovering that there was a surprisingly long distance between the first and second levels. All other distances were very short. I left the elevator at the second level, feeling intuitively that this would be where I would find the crèche, and that if I was wrong I would go in search of it on foot.

Opposite the elevator entrance on the second level was a flight of steps descending to a transverse corridor. I had a vague recollection of this from when Bruch had taken me up to the ceremony, and soon I came across the door leading in to the crèche.

Once inside, I locked the door with the guild key. It was all so familiar. I realized that until the moment I shut the door my movements had been guarded and cautious, but now I felt at home. I hurried down the steps, and walked along the short corridor of the area I knew so well. It looked different from the rest of the city, and it smelt different. I saw the familiar scratches on the walls, where generations of children before me had inscribed their names, saw the old brown paint, the worn coverings on the floors, the unlockable doors to the cabins. Out of long habit I headed straight for my cabin, and went inside. Everything here was untouched. The bed had been made up, and the cabin was tidier than it had ever been when I was using it regularly, but my few possessions were still in place. So too were Jase’s, though there was no sign of him.

I looked round once more, then returned to the corridor. The purpose of the visit to my cabin had been fulfilled: I had no purpose. I headed on down the corridor, towards the various rooms where we had been given lessons. Muted noises came through the closed doors. I peered through the circular glass peepholes, and saw the classes in progress. A few days earlier, I had been in there. In one room I saw my erstwhile contemporaries; some of them, like me, no doubt headed for an apprenticeship with one of the first-order guilds, most of them destined for administrative jobs in the city. I was tempted to go in and take their questions in my stride, maintaining a mysterious silence.

There was no segregation of the sexes in the crèche, and in each room I peered into I searched for a sight of Victoria; she did not appear to be there. When I had checked all the classrooms I went down to the general area: the dining-hall (here there was background noise of the midday meal being prepared), the gymnasium (empty), and the tiny open space, which gave access only to the blue sky above. I went to the commonroom, that one place in the whole extent of the crèche which could be used for general recreation. Here there were several boys, some of whom I had been working with only a few days before. They were talking idly — as was usual when left alone for the purposes of private study — but as soon as they noticed me I became the centre of attention. It was the situation I had just now resisted.

They wanted to know which guild I had joined, what I was doing, what I had seen. What happened when I came of age? What was outside the crèche?

Curiously, I wouldn’t have been able to answer many of their questions, even if I had been able to break the oath. Although I had done many things in the space of a couple of days, I was still a stranger to all that I was seeing.

I found myself resorting — as indeed Jase had done — to concealing what little I knew behind a barrier of crypticism and humour. It clearly disappointed the boys, and although their interest did not diminish the questions soon stopped.

I left the crèche as soon as I could, since Victoria was evidently no longer there.

Descending by way of the elevator, I returned to the dark area beneath the bulk of the city, and walked out between the tracks to the sunlight. Malchuskin was exhorting his unwilling labourers to unload the bogie of its rails and sleepers, and he hardly noticed that I had returned.