"Bailey-Legacy" - читать интересную книгу автора (Bailey Dale)

I slept uneasily that first night in Stowes Corners, unaccustomed to the rural
quiet that cradled the house. The nightly symphony of traffic and voices to
which I had been accustomed was absent, and the silence imparted a somehow
ominous quality to the stealthy mouse-like chitterings of the automaids as they
scurried about the sleeping house.

I woke unrested to the sound of voices drifting up from the parlor. Strange
voices -- my aunt's, only half-familiar yet, and a second voice, utterly
unknown, mellifluous and slow and fawningly ingratiating.

This voice was saying, "You do realize, Miss Powers, there are limits to what we
are permitted to do?"

I eased out of bed in my pajamas and crept along the spacious hall to the head
of the stairs, the hardwood floor cool against my bare feet.

My aunt said, "Limits? The advertising gave me the impression you could do most
anything."

I seated myself on the landing in the prickly silence that followed. A breeze
soughed through the upstairs windows. Through the half-open door in the ornate
foyer below, I could see a car parked in the circular drive. Beyond the car, the
morning sun gleamed against the stand of maple and sent a drowsy haze of mist
steaming away into the open sky.

My aunt was rattling papers below. "It doesn't say anything about limits here."

"No, ma'am, of course not. And I didn't mean to imply that our products were not
convincing. Not by any means."

"Then what do you mean by limits?

The stranger cleared his throat. "Not technological limits, ma'am. Those exist,
of course, but they're not the issue here." "Well, what in heaven's name is the
issue?"

"It's a legal matter, ma'am -- a constitutional matter, even. We're a young
company, you know, and our product is new and unfamiliar and there's bound to be
some controversy, as you might well imagine." He paused, and I could hear him
fumbling about through his paraphernalia. A moment later I heard the sharp
distinct snick of a lighter.

He smoked, of course. In those days, all men smoked, and the acrid gritty stink
of tobacco smoke which now began to drift up the stairs reminded me of my
father.

I do not smoke. I never have.

"Our company," he resumed, "we're cognizant of the objections folks might raise