"LeGuin-Olders" - читать интересную книгу автора (Le Guin Ursula K)

"You don't need it boiling?" she asked, and he said, "This is what I want."

She was quick and steady, relieved to have a duty, to be of use. When he bared
the great sword-wound across her husband's abdomen he glanced up at her to see
how she took it. Compressed lips, a steady gaze.

"This," he said, his fingers above the long, dark, unhealed gash, "looks the
worst; but this, here, is the worst. That is superficial, a mere slash as the
sword withdrew. But here, it went in, and deep." He probed the wound. There was
no shrinking or quiver in the man's body; he lay insensible. "The sword
withdrew," Hamid went on, "as the swordsman died. Your husband killed him even
as he struck. And took the sword from him. When his men came around him he was
holding it in his left hand and his own sword in his right, though he could not
rise from his knees. . . . Both those swords came here with us. . . . There, you
see? That was a deep thrust. And a wide blade. That was nearly a deathblow. But
not quite, not quite. Though to be sure, it took its toll." He looked up at her
openly, hoping she would meet his eyes, hoping to receive from her the glance of
acceptance, intelligence, recognition that he had seen in this face and that
among Sandry's people. But her eyes were on the purple and livid wound, and her
face was simply intent.

"Was it wise to move him, carry him so far?" she asked, not questioning his
judgment, but in wonder.

"The Doctor said it would do him no harm," Hamid said. "And it has done none.
The fever is gone, as it has been for nine days now." She nodded, for she had
felt how cool Farre's skin was. "The inflammation of the wound is, if anything,
less than it was two days ago. The pulse and breath are strong and steady. This
was the place for him to be, dema."

"Yes," she said. "Thank you. Thank you, Hamiddem." Her clear eyes looked into
his for a moment before returning to the wound, the motionless, muscular body,
the silent face, the closed eyelids.

Surely, Hamid thought, surely if it were true she'd know it! She couldn't have
married the man not knowing! But she says nothing. So it's not true, it's only a
story. . . . But this thought, which gave him a tremendous relief for a moment,
gave way to another: She knows and is hiding from the knowledge. Shutting the
shadow into the locked room. Closing her ears in case the word is spoken.

He found he had taken a deep breath and was holding it. He wished the Farmwife
were older, tougher, that she loved her farmer less. He wished he knew what the
truth was, and that he need not be the one to speak it.

But on an utterly unexpected impulse, he spoke: "It is not death," he said, very
low, almost pleading.

She merely nodded, watching. When he reached for a clean cloth, she had it ready
to his hand.