"Frank Herbert - The Eyes of Heisenberg" - читать интересную книгу автора (Herbert Brian & Frank)

 'It's all over the hospital,' she said. 'Security's been alerted. The Durants have been
scanned and they're in Lounge Five with closed circuit to the cutting room.'
Anger blazed through him. 'Damn it to hell! Can't they do anything right in this stupid
place?'
'Now, Doctor,' she said, stiffening into the prime departmental dictator. 'There's no call to
lose your temper. The Durants quoted the law. That ties our hands and you know it.'
'Stupid damn' law,' Potter muttered, but his anger had subsided. The law! he thought.
More of the damn' masquerade. He had to admit, though, that they needed the law. Without
Public Law 10927, people might ask the wrong kinds of questions. And no doubt Svengaard
had done his bumbling best to try to dissuade the Durants.
Potter assumed a rueful grin, said, 'Sorry I snapped like that. I've had a bad week.' He
sighed. 'They just don't understand.'
'Is there any other record you wish. Doctor?' she asked.
Rapport was gone. Potter saw. 'No thanks,' he said. He took the Durant folder, headed for
Svengaard's office. Just his luck: a pair of watchers. It meant plenty of extra work.
Naturally!
The Durants couldn't be content with seeing the tape after the cut. Oh, no. They had to
be on the scene. That meant the Durants weren't as innocent as they might appear - no
matter what this hospital's Security staff said. The public just did not insist anymore. That
was supposed to have been cut out of them.
The statistical few who defied their genetic shaping now required special attention.
And Potter reminded himself, I did the original cut on this pair. There was no mistake.
He ran into Svengaard outside the latter's office, heard the man's quick resume.
Svengaard then began babbling about his Security arrangements.
'I don't give a damn what your Security people say,' Potter barked. 'We've new
instructions. Central Emergency's to be called in every case of this kind.'
They went into Svengaard's office. It pretended to wood paneling - a comer room with a
view of flowered roof gardens and terraces built of the omnipresent three-phase
regenerative plasmeld, the 'plasty' of the Folk patios. Nothing must age or degenerate in this
best of all Optiman worlds. Nothing except people.
'Central Emergency?' Svengaard asked.
'No exceptions,' Potter said. He sat in Svengaard's chair, put his feet on Svengaard's
desk, and brought the little ivory-colored phone box to his stomach with its screen only
inches from his face. He punched in Security's number and his own code identification.
Svengaard sat on a corner of the desk across from him, appearing both angry and cowed.
They were scanned, I tell you,' he said. They were carrying no unusual devices. There's
nothing unusual about them.'
'Except they insist on watching,' Potter said. He jiggled the phone key. 'What's keeping
those ignoramuses?'
Svengaard said, 'But the law-'
'Damn the law!' Potter said. 'You know as well as I do that we could route the view signal
from the cutting room through an editing computer and show the parents anything we want.
Has it ever occurred to you to wonder why we don't do just that?'
'Why... they... ah...' Svengaard shook his head. The question had caught him off balance.
Why wasn't that done? The statistics showed a certain number of parents would insist on
watching and...
'It was tried,' Potter said. 'Somehow, the parents detected the computer's hand in the
tape.' 'How?'
 'We don't know.'
'Weren't the parents questioned and...' They killed themselves.' 'Killed them- How?' 'We