"Kim Stanley Robinson - Sixty Days and Counting" - читать интересную книгу автора (Robinson Kim Stanley)

“Yes, the swamp. But if the swamp freezes over”—they laughed—“then maybe we
can ice-skate over the obstacles!”
Frank nodded. “Speaking of which, we were supposed to be going to try ice-skating
down here, when the river froze over.”
“That’s right, we were. But now we’ve got this so-called heat spell.”
“True. Return of the Gulf Stream.”
“That is so crazy. I bet we will get freezing spells just like before.”
“Yes. Well, until that happens maybe we can just walk the shore then, and see where
you could rent ice skates when the time comes.”
“Sure. I think the Georgetown Rowing Club is going to do it, we can go check it
out. I read they’re going to convert when the river freezes over. They’re going to put
out floodlights and boundary lines and everything.”
“Good for them! Let’s go take a look after dinner.”
And so they finished the meal cheerfully, moving from one great Levantine dish to
the next. Even the basics were exquisite: olives, hummus, dill—everything. And by
the time they were done they had split a bottle of a dry white wine. They walked
down to the Potomac arm in arm, as they had in Manhattan so very briefly; they
walked the Georgetown waterfront, where the potted shrubs lining the river wall were
lit by little white Christmas tree lights. All this had been overwhelmed in the great
flood, and they could still see the high-water mark on the buildings behind the walk,
but other than that, things were much as they had been before, the river as calm as a
sheet of black silk as it poured under the Key Bridge.
Then they came to the mouth of Rock Creek, a tiny little thing. Following it upstream
in his mind, Frank came to the park and his treehouse, standing right over a bend in
this same creek—and thus it occurred to him to think, Here you are fooling around
with another woman while your Caroline is in trouble God knows where. What
would she think if she saw you?
Which was a hard thought to recover from; and Diane saw that his mood had
changed. Quickly he suggested they warm up over drinks.
They retired to a bar overlooking the confluence of the creek and the river, on the
Georgetown side. They ordered Irish coffees. Frank warmed up again, his sudden
stab of dread dispelled by Diane’s immense calmness, by the aura of reality that
emanated from her. It was reassuring to be around her; precisely the opposite of the
feeling he had when—
But he stayed in the moment. He agreed with Diane’s comment that Irish coffee
provided the perfect compound of stimulant and relaxant, sugar and fat, hydration
and warmth. “It must have been invented by scientists,” she said. “It’s like it’s made
to a formula to hit all the receptors at once.”
Frank said, “I remember it’s what they always used to serve at the Salk Institute after
their seminars. They’ve got a patio deck overlooking the Pacific, and everyone
would go out with Irish coffees and watch the sunset.”
“Nice.”
Later, as Frank walked her back up through Georgetown to her car, she said, “I was
wondering if you’d be interested in joining my advisory staff. It would be an
extension of the work you’ve been doing at NSF. I mean, I know you’re planning to
go back to San Diego, but until then, you know…I could use your help.”
Frank had stopped walking. Diane turned and glanced up at him, shyly it seemed,
and then looked away, down M Street. The stretch they could see looked to Frank
like the Platonic form of a Midwestern main street, totally unlike the rest of D.C.
“Sure,” Frank heard himself say. He realized that in some sense he had to accept her