"Rudy Rucker - Guadalupe and Hieronymus Bosch" - читать интересную книгу автора (Rucker Rudy)

Harna flips out a long vortex of force, a tornado that fastens onto Jerome and pulls him to us. He's
hanging in the air a few feet away from me, slowly spinning—and yelling in what must be Dutch.

"Grab your fella," says Harna. "It has to be you who lands him. It's not for me to meddle in a brane's
spacetime."

The wind has flopped Bosch's hair back. His cheekbones are high, his lips are thin, his eyes are bright.
The man for me. I reach out and catch hold of his hand. It's warm.

Harna's light flows down my arm and up Jerome's. Augmerited by Harna, I'm strong as a steam-shovel. I
set Bosch down on the jelly car seat next to me.

"It's too soon," he says, clear as day. "I'm not ready."

"I'm Glenda," I say, not all that surprised he's speaking English. Another Harna miracle. "Ready or not,
I'm taking you home."

"To Hell?" exclaims Jerome. "That's quite unjust. Only yesterday I was absolved by the priest. My sins in
these last hours have been but petty ones. A touch of anger at the neighbor's dog, my usual avarice for a
truly great commission, and the accustomed fires of lust, of course—" As he mentions this last sin, he
looks down my nightgown, which I'm just loving. I press his hand against my warm thigh.

"Don't worry, sweetie. I don't live in Hell. I live in San Jose."

For the rest of the ride, Jerome is busy looking around, taking everything in. What eyes he has! So sharp
and smart and alert. What with the time-winds flapping my flimsy, he can see I'm all woman. I'm doing
my best to keep the fabric cinched in around the problem areas at my waist, and I'm trying to get his
arms around me, but he's kind of reluctant. He's uneasy about whither we're bound. I can dig it.

Finally Harna sets us down in the sunny street outside my apartment. Lucky me, the cops are gone.
Everything looks the same—the dead palm leaves, the beater cars and pickups, the dusty jasmine vines,
the broken glass on the dry clay, the 7-11 store, the university parking garage—sunny and dry.

Harna rises into the air and spreads out, layering herself across the scene like extra sunshine. No doubt
she'll be back in some more personal form pretty soon. But meanwhile I've got me a man. I smile at
Jerome and give his arm a happy squeeze.

"This is Spain?" he wonders.

"America," I tell him, which doesn't seem to ring a bell. "The new world across the Atlantic Ocean, plus
some five centuries past your time."

He shakes his head, and stares around like a bird fallen from its nest. "It's after the Second Coming?" he
asks. "Christ has dominion over the Earth?"

"The Church is doing fine," I say, not sure where this is going. We shouldn't stand around the street in our
nightgowns. "Come on inside."

I hustle him up the stairs into my apartment and first of all get us in some clothes. I dress him in my
favorite vintage red Ramones T-shirt and my yellow SJSU sweat pants. Me, I put on some nice tight