"Kress, Nancy - The Price of Oranges" - читать интересную книгу автора (Kress Nancy)

When nothing hit him, Harry opened his eyes. Gernshon was at the door. "Wait!" Harry cried. "You'll need more money!" He dug into his pocket and pulled out a twenty-dollar bill, carefully saved for this, and all the change he had.
Gernshon examined the coins carefully, then looked up at Harry. He said nothing. He opened the door and Harry, still trembling, sat down in his chair to wait.
Gernshon came back three hours later, pale and sweating. "My God!"
"I know just what you mean," Harry said. "A zoo out there. Have a drink."
Gernshon took the mixture Harry had ready in his toothbrush glass and gulped it down. He caught sight of the bottle, which Harry had left on the dresser: Seagram's V.O., with the cluttered, tiny-print label. He threw the glass across the room and covered his face with his hands.
"I'm sorry," Harry said apologetically. "But then it cost only $3.37 the fifth."
Gernshon didn't move.
"I'm really sorry," Harry said. He raised both hands, palms up, and dropped them helplessly. "Would you ... would you maybe like an orange?"
* * * *
Gernshon recovered faster than Harry had dared hope. Within an hour he was sitting in Harry's worn chair, asking questions about the space shuttle; within two hours taking notes; within three become again the intelligent and captivating young man of the lecture hall. Harry, answering as much as he could as patiently as he could, was impressed by the boy's resilience. It couldn't have been easy. What if he, Harry, suddenly had to skip fifty-two more years? What if he found himself in 2041? Harry shuddered.
"Do you know that a movie now costs six dollars?"
Gernshon blinked. "We were talking about the moon landing."
"Not any more, we're not. I want to ask _you_ some questions, Robert. Do you think the earth is dead, with people sliming all over it like on carrion? Is this a thought that crosses your mind?"
"I ... no." Harry nodded.
"Good, good. Do you look at your mother with contempt?"
"Of course not. Harry -"
"No, it's my turn. Do you think a woman who marries a man, and maybe the marriage doesn't work out perfect, whose does, but they raise at least one healthy child -- say a daughter -- that that woman's life has been a defeat and a failure?"
"No. I -- "
"What would you think if you saw a drawing of a woman's private parts on the cover of a magazine?"
Gernshon blushed. He looked as if the blush annoyed him, but also as if he couldn't help it.
"Better and better," Harry said. "Now, think careful on this next one -- take your time -- no hurry. Does reality seem to you to have sweetness in it as well as ugliness? Take your time."
Gernshon peered at him. Harry realized they had talked right through lunch. "But not all the time in the world, Robert."
"Yes," Gernshon said. "I think reality has more sweetness than ugliness. And more strangeness than anything else. Very much more." He looked suddenly dazed. "I'm sorry, I just -- all this has happened so -- "
"Put your head between your knees," Harry suggested. "There -- better now? Good. There's someone I want you to meet."
Manny sat in the park, on their late-afternoon bench. When he saw them coming, his face settled into long sorrowful ridges. "Harry. Where have you been for two days? I was worried, I went to your hotel -- "
"Manny," Harry said, "this is Robert."
"So I see," Manny said. He didn't hold out his hand.
"_Him_," Harry said.
"Harry. Oh, Harry."
"How do you do, sir," Gernshon said. He held out his hand. "I'm afraid I didn't get your full name. I'm Robert Gernshon."
Manny looked at him -- at the outstretched hand, the baggy suit with wide tie, the deferential smile, the golden Balden-Powell glow. Manny's lips mouthed a silent word: _sir?_
"I have a lot to tell you," Harry said. 'You can tell all of us, then," Manny said. "Here comes Jackie now."
Harry looked up. Across the park a woman in jeans strode purposefully toward them. "Manny! It's only Monday!"
"I called her to come," Manny said. "You've been gone from your room two days, Harry, nobody at your hotel could say where -- "
"But _Manny_," Harry said, while Gernshon looked, frowning, from one to the other and Jackie spotted them and waved.
She had lost more weight, Harry saw. Only two weeks, yet her cheeks had hollowed out and new, tiny lines touched her eyes. Skinny lines. They filled him with sadness. Jackie wore a blue T-shirt that said LIFE IS A BITCH -- THEN YOU DIE. She carried a magazine and a small can of mace disguised as hair spray.
"Popsy! You're here! Manny said -- "
"Manny was wrong," Harry said. "Jackie, sweetheart, you look -- it's good to see you. Jackie, I'd like you to meet somebody, darling. This is Robert. My friend. My friend Robert. Jackie Snyder."
"Hi," Jackie said. She gave Harry a hug, and then Manny one. Harry saw Gernshon gazing at her very tight jeans.
"Robert's a ... a scientist," Harry said. It was the wrong thing to say; Harry knew the moment he said it that it was the wrong thing. Science -- all science -- was, for some reason not completely clear to him, a touchy subject with Jackie. She tossed her long hair back from her eyes. "Oh, yeah? Not _chemical_, I hope?"
"I'm not actually a scientist," Gernshon said winningly. "Just a dabbler. I popularize new scientific concepts, write about them to make them intelligible."
"Like what?" Jackie said.
Gernshon opened his mouth, closed it again. A boy suddenly flashed past on a skateboard, holding a boom box. Metallica blasted the air. Overhead, a jet droned. Gernshon smiled weakly. "It's hard to explain."
"I'm capable of understanding," Jackie said coldly. "Women _can_ understand science, you know."
"Jackie, sweetheart," Harry said, "what have you got there? Is that your new book?"
"No," Jackie said, "this is the one I said I'd bring you, by my friend. It's brilliant. It's about a man whose business partner betrays him by selling out to organized crime and framing the man. In jail he meets a guy who has founded his own religion, the House of Divine Despair, and when they both get out they start a new business, Suicide Incorporated, that helps people kill themselves for a fee. The whole thing is just a brilliant denunciation of contemporary America."
Gernshon made a small sound.
"It's a comedy," Jackie added.
"It sounds ... it sounds a little depressing," Gernshon said.
Jackie looked at him. Very distinctly, she said, "It's reality."