"Chad Oliver - The Winds of Time" - читать интересную книгу автора (Oliver Chad)

Ahead of them, naked and gaping in the driven sand, waited the thing that had once been a city, the
thing that men had once called home.
How do you describe the sadness of centuries? What epitaph do you inscribe on the tombstone of
man?
Arvon looked at Nlesine and at Lajor. What lines would they scribble in their notebooks, what words
could they find to tell what they were seeing here, on a world that was less than a name back home?
All the words had already been used so many times.
And he looked, too, at Derryoc, at the plump figure plodding through ruin. How could he see only
problems here, in this city where even the dead had gone away? How could he, see only house types and
power sources, city plans and technological levels? What sort of eyes did it take so that you saw no
ghosts? What kind of ears did a man need not to hear the whispers, the grief, the music lost and faraway?
Even as they were walking now, other men had walked, down this very street. No sand then, no
jagged concrete ruptures, no decay and collapse and fire scar. Trees, perhaps. Green grass. A buzz of
commerce. A blur of faces: happy, sad, handsome, ugly. A news screen: words and pictures from around
the world. What had been news to them, so near the end? What could they have been thinking about,
talking about, joking about?
The weather tomorrow will be fair and cloudy, with light rain in the afternoon … The Greens
won the Silver Trophy today, on a sensational play by—A man went berserk on his way home
from the office; he knifed three dogs before he was apprehended, and explained to police that
barking kept him awake at night … The situation in Oceania appears to be more serious than at
first supposed, but the Council says there is no cause for alarm … We repeat that the weather
tomorrow will be fair and cloudy, with light rain in the afternoon …
Voices, faces, laughter.
Arvon stepped around a fallen wall and followed Derryoc toward the center of the ruin. Oh yes, he
was imagining things, imagining the phantoms that walked by his side, imagining the shadows that passed
behind gaping holes that once were windows. But the ghosts were real, ghosts were always real in these
graveyards of civilizations, as real as the men and women he had known at home on Lortas, and as
unseeing—
Cry for them, for they can sorrow no more. Cry for them, for they laughed and loved, and are
gone.
"Here's the library," called Derryoc.
"What's left of it," said Nlesine.
"What a mess," said Tsriga.
Lajor snapped a picture. "Chapter Umpteen," he muttered. "For summary see Chapter One."
They climbed inside, their flashlight beams sending little tunnels of pale light into the gloom. Their
footsteps echoed down silent corridors. Sand was everywhere, and dust rose before them in puffs and
clouds.
"No sign of fire here," Derryoc said, pleased. "Look for periodicals; they may have survived if it's
been this dry for long. What do you think, Tsriga?"
Tsriga shrugged. "Not much sign of moisture. Probably dry since the blast."
"A good haul," Derryoc said. "Never mind the novels—see if you can find history books; check by
the pictures. We'll just have to take tapes at random."
"Me, I'll take novels," 'Nlesine said. "Who knows, some poor guy probably thought his stuff would
live forever."
For the first time Arvon felt some warmth for Nlesine.
 What should you take from one library from one city from one more world of the dead? What words
should you select for the linguists to analyze, for the computers to buzz over, for the newspapers to
sensationalize? What lines could you find that would add up to one more footnote in one more history of
man?
Arvon picked more or less as fancy dictated from the vacuum-sealed cases that preserved the old