"De Camp, L Sprague - RK 1 - The Undesired Princess UC" - читать интересную книгу автора (De Camp L Sprague)

from his right, marched out the door.

* * *

As the darkness closed around him, Rollin Hobart tried to slip out of his coat. But Hoimon had gathered a considerable fold of shirt and vest into his iron grip. Hobart felt for the ascetic's fingers and tried to wrench them apart, but he might as well have tried to twist the tail of one of the New York Public Library's lions.

The environment through which he was being hauled was not the hallway outside his spic three-roomer, but a dark tunnel. The light from the door of his living room picked out sides and roof of rock. Hien his feeble illumination went out sharply, as though George had closed the door. Hobart thought of the folly of keeping up with lightweight friends whose sole virtue was that they were fun to argue with.

Hobart continued his struggles long after it was obvious that they were getting him nowhere. When he finally stopped kicking and clawing it was from exhaustion. His relaxation allowed his mind to take in the implication of the tunnel.

He gasped: "What the hell—is—this, the fourth dimension?"

Hoimon spoke softly behind him: "Talk not, O Rollin, lest you draw the cave-folk nigh."

"Oh, is that so? Well, you answer my questions or I'll raise a hell of a holler!" Hobart filled his lungs to shout.

THE UNDESIRED PRINCESS

11

Hoimon conceded: "In that case I must speak, lest you ignorantly bring disaster upon yourself. Not that the cave-folk would harm me, but you—"

"All right, get to the point! What's the idea of this kidnapping?"

Hoimon sighed. "I fear you resent the high-handed tactics I was forced to use—"

"You're damn tootin' I resent 'em! The F.B.I.'s going to hear about this! Now what—"

"I had to use force, and therefore, unless you abandon your hostility, I shall be forced to punish myself, oh, most grievously, for having laid constraint upon a living creature. I should not have considered a course so out of keeping with my humility, had it not been necessary in order to avert a greater evil. Know, O Rollin, that by the ancient curse laid on the Kings of Logaia—hark!"

Hoimon broke off, and Hobart kept his silence for the nonce. Through the darkness came a shrill sound, like the highest note of a violin; a spine-tickling cry.

"The cave-folk!" breathed Hoimon. "Now we must hasten. If I put you down, will you accompany me in orderly fashion? You cannot return to you own world in any case."

"I'll walk," grumbled Hobart. "What d'you do, unscramble the dimensions?"

"As I am no scholar, I cannot fathom your talk of dimensions. All I know is that by purity of heart I have acquired powers, said to have been possessed by certain philosophers of yore, of visiting strange universes like yours, where the laws of reason hold not and nought is what it seems."

"What d'you mean, the laws of reason don't hold?"

"In your world the earth appears to stand still while the sun goes around it, but I was assured on good authority that the reverse is the case. In Logaia,

12

L. Sprague de Camp

when the sun seems to go around the earth, it really does so. Let there be more progress and less talk."

The shrill wail came again, lending more speed to Hobart's legs than exhortations from his abductor would have done. A spot of daylight appeared ahead. Soon they arrived at the exit, and stood on the crest of the fan of detritus that spread out from the mouth of the tunnel. Hobart swiveled his head, blinking. The sun was high in the brilliantly blue heavens. All about were mountains, steep and conical, and somehow not quite right. After a few seconds Hobart saw what was wrong with them; they were too regular and too much alike. They reminded him of a lot of ice-cream cones—that is, the cone part without the ice cream—placed upside down in regular rows on a flat table.