"John Varley - Blue Champagne" - читать интересную книгу автора (Varley John)

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Blue Champagne

"Sure." He looked at his watch. "But I'm afraid it's getting late. It's almost dark, and everybody's
gone home. You'd probably better go too."

She was in agony, torn between what she was supposed to do and what she wanted. It really should
be no contest, if she was who he thought she was.

"Well... but—but I'll come back here tomorrow and you—"

He was shaking his head.

"My ship leaves in the morning," he said. "There's no time."

"Then tell me now! I can stay out. Tell me now. Please please please?"

He coyly resisted, harrumphed, protested, but in the end allowed himself to be seduced. He felt very
good. He had her like a five-pound trout on a twenty-pound line. It wasn't sporting. But, then. he
wasn't playing a game.



So at last he got to his specialty.

He sometimes wished he could claim the story for his own. but the fact was he could not make up
stories. He no longer tried to. Instead, he cribbed from every fairy tale and fantasy story he could
find. If he had a genius, it was in adapting some of the elements to fit the world she knew—while
keeping it strange enough to enthrall her—and in ad-libbing the end to personalize it.

It was a wonderful tale he told. It had enchanted castles sitting on mountains of glass, moist caverns
beneath the sea, fleets of starships, and shining riders astride horses that flew the galaxy. There were
evil alien creatures, and others with much good in them. There were drugged potions. Scaled beasts
roared out of hyperspace to devour planets.

Amid all the turmoil strode the Prince and Princess. They got into frightful jams and helped each
other out of them.

The story was never quite the same. He watched her eyes. When they wandered, he threw away
whole chunks of story. When they widened, he knew what parts to plug in later. He tailored it to her
reactions.

The child was sleepy. Sooner or later she would surrender. He needed her in a trance state, neither
awake nor asleep. That was when the story would end.