"Hamilton, Peter F - Softlight Sins" - читать интересную книгу автора (Hamilton Peter F)

American Presidents.
"Where do you live?" Judge Hayward asked.
"Mississippi state, miss."
"Benjamin Harrison served one term," Barbara Johnson said.
"Eighteen-eighty-nine to ninety-three."
"What is the last thing you remember before you woke up here?" Dr Elliot
asked.
"Sir, it's the horses, sir. They's riding all around the house, sir. Must
be twenty or thirty of them. They's got torches, razing everything as they
go. Flames is rising halfway to heaven." Beads of sweat began to prick his
forehead. "Little Jose, she's inside. I can hear her. Lord, I can't see
her. Oh Jesus almighty, I'm on fire. Jose's still screaming. I'll get her
momma, I will." Thick chords of muscle rose on his throat. He began to
gurgle, a thick liquid sound as if he was choking.
Dr Elliot rushed forward. "Forget! Forget that, go back, right back. When
you were a little boy. Think of that. When you were little. What do you
remember when you were little?"
Judge Hayward pumped her cheeks out as Dr Elliot soothed Deaf Willy down
with calming words, encouraging murmurs. "At least we haven't got a zealot
this time," she said.
"No," Harvey Boden said carefully. "But you did rule that Softlight should
be used until it was successful."
Douglas couldn't believe what the Prosecution Officer had said. "Are you
telling me you want this Deaf Willy personality wiped?"
"Prosecution does have a valid point," Judge Hayward said. She looked
unhappy at what she was having to say. "If I order a halt now, then that
judgement will have to be reviewed by an appeal court. And it wouldn't
hold up, it's abysmally arbitrary; we didn't like Erich Breuer so he was
wiped, but we felt sorry for a downtrodden cotton picker boy so he was
allowed to stay. What kind of legal basis is that? No Douglas, we
committed ourselves when we wiped Erich Breuer. Either this body is wiped
clean of all its memories, or it is physically executed."
"But we have neither the moral nor legal authority to order the death of
an innocent like Deaf Willy," Douglas insisted. "And that is what we are
discussing here; Softlight is a death penalty for Deaf Willy. He is
nothing like Erich Breuer, he doesn't deserve to be erased. I contend that
what we've found in this instance is an eminently suitable replacement
personality for Adrian Reynolds's body. As you originally ruled, Judge."
"Not quite," Barbara Johnson said. "Examine that idea from a practical
standpoint, Douglas. You will have one hell of a problem trying to
integrate an illiterate nineteenth century black boy into modern European
society, not to mention acclimatising him to a white body. Without such
conditioning he would be totally adrift in time, no family to love him,
nothing he can understand, let alone relate to. In order to survive, his
antique behaviour patterns would all have to be suppressed. The memories
too, I imagine. Could you stay sane with the memory of your own death in
your mind? In fact you would probably wind up having to junk about ninety
per cent of his memories. Only the name would be left. You wouldn't be
saving him at all." She appeared saddened by the prospect. "Our era would
be as cruel to Deaf Willy as his own."