"Brian Lumley - Psychomech 01 - Psychomech" - читать интересную книгу автора (Lumley Brian)

‘Oh, Willy is not a peeper.’ She splashed water in his face. And anyway, there won’t be anything worth seeing.’ She
swam swiftly away from him.
‘Vicki,’ he said, following the sound of her splashes. ‘I was thinking I might have an early night tonight.’
‘Oh?’ Her tone was casual. ‘Are you still tired, then? It must be the mountain air. Myself, I shall probably stay up
very late.’
‘Don’t take the mickey, you know what I mean.’
‘Yes I do. And L should invite, you to my room, should I? As simple as that?’
‘Well, that would be ... simple.’
‘I may not want it to be simple.’
He trapped her again, drew her close, this time kissed her full on the mouth and moved his body against hers. ‘But
you do want it,’ he said, releasing her.
‘There are twenty-four suites in the central building,’ she said, her voice at once breathless and husky. ‘At midnight,
come into my room and get into bed with me.’
‘Which is your room?’ Garrison, too, had difficulty speaking.
‘I won’t tell you. Not the room, not even the floor.’
He laughed shakily. ‘Hell’s teeth! It could be pretty embarrassing if I make a mistake.’
‘Then don’t make one.’
‘No clues?’
‘Hmm - possibly. And one rule - you mustn’t ask anyone. I don’t want it to be common knowledge.’ She broke free
and swam away. A moment later he heard her feet on the pool’s tiled surround. She was moving away, back towards
the central building.
‘Hey!’ he called after her. ‘Is that it? Is that our swim?’
‘It served its purpose,’ she called back.
Garrison stood in silence, the water making tiny wavelets against his chest. A wasp hummed out of the sun and
settled on his shoulder. He submerged, came up, swam for a further ten minutes. Time enough for his erection to
collapse...

Garrison ate only a light lunch. Several things competed to rob him of the morning’s appetite, not the least of them
being the knowledge that tomorrow would find him entering Schroeder’s mysterious building, which apparently
contained or explained the reason for Garrison’s being here.
But before then there was that army to face, and the cold efficiency with which they invaded and occupied - for
however brief a spell - his body. He was photographed a great deal. He was photographed in stills and in motion,
dressed and undressed, seated, standing, walking, speaking and shouting; with and without his dark spectacles, in
colour and in black and white, with and without sound.
His voice was taped in all its range. Talking, shouting commands in German and in English, swearing. In normal
conversation, in excitement, in anger. No slightest inflec-tion, no minor point of dialect (though he was naturally void,
or almost void, of dialectal influence), no smallest nuance or vocal idiosyncrasy was left unrecorded.
He was given the most thorough physical check-up of his entire life. The Army’s annual PULHEEMS had nothing to
compare with this. They measured, weighed, tugged at, listened to, pulled and sampled him. His organs were sounded.
His blood and urine were tested. They even dabbled with sweat, saliva and excreta. He expected they might want
semen, too, but that was not on their list.
And then he was measured again, but this time by a pair of obviously homosexual tailors, Schroeder’s personal
tailors from Kassel, come up into the Harz at the industrialist’s bidding, to perform his will. Which was to be the
manufacture of two uniforms, six suits and a full complement of casual wear, and all in accordance with Schroeder’s
impeccable taste, designed to his specifications, suggestions and instructions.
And finally there was a specialist of a very different sort.
This one, a tiny, dome-headed boffin who could only talk to Garrison through an interpreter, seemed only interested
in (strangely) his temples and his wrists. The span of the latter, left and right, the distance between the plates of the
former. Finally he made adjustments to instruments taken from a large case and placed a set of earphones on
Garrison’s head. Another dip into the case brought expanding’ wrist-bands. These were placed on Garrison’s wrists