"Leiber,.Fritz.-.Gather,.Darkness!" - читать интересную книгу автора (Leiber Fritz)

Brother Frejeris smiled and arched his eyebrows eloqently, as if to say, "Mass hysteria. I warned you."
"I said it would all seem very unreal here at Megatheopolis," asserted the first rural speaker, apologetically, yet still with a shade of stubborn defiance. "But there was a Fifth Circle priest sent down to investigate when we made our first reports. He saw what we saw. He didn't say anything. Next day he went away. If he found out anything, we haven't heard about it."
"We expect the Hierarchy to protect us!"
"We want to know what the Hierarchy's going to do!"
"They say," broke in the fellow who had mentioned witchmarks, "that there's a Black Apex, just as there's an Apex Council, so please your reverences! And a Black Hierarchy, organized as we are, but serving Sathanas, Lord of Evil!"
"Yes," echoed the first speaker, the gnarly one. "And I want to know this! What if our centuries of pretending that there's a real god have somehow -- I don't know how -- awakened a real devil? What then?"
Goniface sat up and spoke into the shiver that followed those words. His voice lacked Frejeris' music, but it had its own stony compellingness.
"Silence! Or you _will _wake a real devil. The devil of our wrath!"
He looked up and down the table. "What to do with these fools?" he asked lightly.
"Whip them!" snapped Sercival, lean jaw like a trap, small eyes glittering in their leathery sockets. "Whip them! For being such cowards in the face of the wiles and threats of Sathanas!"
The country priests stirred uneasily. Frejeris rolled his eyes upward, as if such a statement were almost unbearably barbarous. But Goniface nodded politely, though not indicating agreement. He casually wondered to what degree old Sercival and the other Fanatics actually believed in the real existence of the Great God and his eternal adversary, Sathanas, Lord of Evil. Largely a pose, of course, but there was probably a substratum of genuineness. Not stemming from the ignorant superstitions of the commoners -- those were wiped out in the First and Second Circle, or else a priest got no further -- but from a kind of self-hypnosis induced by years of contemplating the stupendous powers of the Hierarchy, until those powers actually took on a supernatural tinge. Luckily, Fanatics were very rare -- hardly worth calling a party. Only one on the Apex Council, and he only become one in his senility. Even at that, the old fool might some day prove useful. He was grim and bloody-minded enough, and would serve as a convenient scapegoat if it were ever necessary to employ extreme violence. The Fanatic Party, for that matter, was useful in counterbalancing the more numerous minority of Moderates, leaving Goniface's Realists in almost complete control.
But these poor country priests were not Fanatics. Far from it. If they had even a shadow of belief in the Great God -- in any god -- they wouldn't be so frightened. Goniface rose to reprimand them.
But there was an interruption. The high doors at the other end of the Chamber opened. A priest darted in. Goniface recognized one of Frejeris' Moderates.
The newcomer's progress toward the Council Table was nothing stately. He was almost running.
Goniface waited coolly.
The newcomer, breathing a little hard from the unaccustomed exertion, handed something to Frejeris which the latter quickly scanned.
Frejeris rose and spoke to Goniface directly, for the whole table to hear.
"I am informed that a First Circle priest is blaspheming the Hierarchy before a large crowd in the Great Square. Your servant Cousin Deth has taken charge and forbids interference. I demand you instantly explain to the Council what this madness means!"
"Who fosters mass hysteria now, Brother?" Goniface countered quickly. "Your information is incomplete. Shall I explain a subtle stratagem before those who would not understand it?" He indicated the country priests. "Or shall I finish the business before the Council?"
And before the Council had recovered from its first surprise, he was talking.
"Priests of the rural sanctuaries: You have said that your stories would seem unreal here. That is untrue. For the unreal is not, at Megatheopolis or anywhere else in the cosmos.
"The supernatural is unreal, and therefore is not.
"Have you forgotten the basic truth you learned in the First Circle? That there is only the cosmos and the electronic entities that constitute it, without soul or purpose, save so far as neuronic minds impose purpose upon it?
"No, your stories refer to real entities -- if only to the imagery of your neuronic minds.
"There are many real entities which the Finger of Wrath cannot burn. I mention only solidographs, and remind you of the shadowiness of the wolves and other creatures you claim to fear. As for mental imagery, you cannot burn that except by turning the Finger of Wrath against your own skulls.
"One of you mentioned the Witchcraft. Has that one forgotten that the Witchcraft is our fosterling?
"I should not be telling you this. You should be telling it to your novices!
"Has the Hierarchy ever failed you? Yet now do you want the Hierarchy to drop all other business and, with much outward fuss and flourishing, attend only to you, because you are frightened -- not hurt, merely frightened?
"How do you know that all this is not a test, imposed upon you by us, to determine your courage and resourcefulness? If it is a test, think how pitifully, thus far, you have failed!
"It may be a test.
"It may also be that some alien agency is striking at the Hierarchy, perhaps under cover of our fosterling the Witchcraft. And that we are holding our hand, to draw them out and learn all, before we strike in return. For the Hierarchy never strikes twice.
"If that is the case, elementary strategy forbids your being told anything, for fear of scaring off the enemy.
"This much I will tell you. The Hierarchy knew of the disturbances in your region long before you did. And it has concerned itself deeply with them.
"That is all you need to know. And you should have known it without asking!"
With cold gratification, Goniface noted that the last traces of panic had quite evaporated. The country priests stood straighter now, looked more like men. Still frightened -- but only of their superiors. As they should be.
"Priests of the rural sanctuaries, you have grievously failed the Hierarchy. Our reports show that, since the beginning of the disturbances -- or the test -- in your region, you have done little but cry to the Hierarchy for help. It has been suggested that you be whipped. I am inclined to agree. Except that I believe you have enough iron in you not to fail again.
"The Hierarchy grips the globed earth like a hand. Will it be your eternal disgrace to be remembered as the ones who sought to loosen, infinitesimally, one fingertip? I say 'sought' advisedly, because we watch over you more closely than you think, and stand ever ready if even the least of you should fail.
"Not to fail, is your affair!
"Go back to your sanctuaries.
"Do what you should have done long ago.
"Call upon your courage and resourcefulness.
"Fear is a weapon -- for you to use, not for others to use against you.
"You have been trained in its use.
"Use it!
"And as for Sathanas, also our fosterling, our Lord of Evil, our black counterpart to our Great God" -- he stole an ironic sidewise glance at Sercival, to see how the old Fanatic was taking this -- "use him, too. Whip him from your towns if that seems expedient. But never, never again, stoop so low -- low even as commoners! -- as to believe in him!"
It was then -- just as Goniface could see that the country priests had taken fire from his words and were beginning to burn with a desire to redeem themselves -- that the laughter came. The walls of the Council Chamber were thick and proof against ordinary sound, yet still it came -- evilly mirthful, uncanny peals.
It seemed to laugh at the Hierarchy -- and at anyone who dared decree what is and what is not.
The country priests paled and edged closer together. The haughty faces of the archpriests more or less successfully masked shock, apprehension, and a furious thinking as to what that noise might be and what it might portend. Frejeris looked suddenly at Goniface. Old Sercival began to tremble with what seemed a queer sort of fear and a queerer satisfaction.
But it was in Goniface's ears that the laughter thundered most shakingly and dismayingly. Thoughts flickered like wildfire across his mind. But all the while he imperturbably fought to hold the eyes of the country priests, to oppose the influence of that unnerving laughter. And he succeeded, although the eyes grew wide with doubt.
The laughter echoed off, shudderingly.