"Dick - We Can Remember it For You Wholesale" - читать интересную книгу автора (Dick Phillip K)

tainer of Martian maw-worms
And found an envelope instead.
Lifting it out he discovered, to his perplexity, that it
contained five hundred and seventy poscreds, in 'cred bills of
low denomination.
Where'd I get this? he asked himself. Didn't I spend every
'cred I had on my trip?
With the money came a slip of paper marked: one-half fee
ret'd. By McClane. And then the date. Today's date.
"Recall," he said aloud.
"Recall what, sir or madam?" the robot driver of the cab
inquired respectfully.
"Do you have a phone book?" Quail demanded.
"Certainly, sir or madam." A slot opened; from it slid a
microtape phone book for Cook County.
"It's spelled oddly," Quail said as he leafed through the
pages of the yellow section. He felt fear, then; abiding fear.
"Here it is," he said. "Take me there, to Rekal, Incorporated.
I've changed my mind; I don't want to go home."
"Yes sir, or madam, as the case may be," the driver said. A
moment later the cab was zipping back in the 'opposite
direction.
"May I make use of your phone?" he asked.
"Be my guest," the robot driver said. And presented a shiny
new emperor 3-D color phone to him.
He dialed his own conapt. And after a pause found himself
confronted by a miniature but chillingly realistic image of
Kirsten on the small screen. "I've been to Mars," he said to
her.
"You're drunk." Her lips writhed scornfully. "Or worse."
" 'S god's truth."
"When?" she demanded.
"I don't know." He felt confused. "A simulated trip, I
think. By means of one of those artificial or extra-factual or
whatever it is memory places. It didn't take."
Kirsten said witheringly, "You are drunk." And broke the
connection at her end. He hung up, then, feeling his face
flush. Always the same tone, he said hotly to himself. Always
the retort, as if she knows everything and I know nothing.
What a marriage. Keerist, he thought dismally.
A moment later the cab stopped at the curb before a
modern, very attractive little pink building, over which a
shifting, polychromatic neon sign read: REKAL, INCORP-
ORATED.
The receptionist, chic and bare from the waist up, started
in surprise, then gained masterful control of herself. "Oh
hello Mr. Quail," she said nervously. "H-how are you? Did
you forget something?"
"The rest of my fee back," he said.
More composed now the receptionist said, "Fee? I think