"T. K. F. Weisskopf & Greg Cox Ed. - Tomorrow Sucks" - читать интересную книгу автора (Weisskopf T.K.F)

"Rather late at night," said the Attendant.
"I couldn't sleep."
That was the wrong answer, too. Everybody slept in this world. Nobody had
insomnia. If you did you simply turned on a hypno-ray, and, sixty seconds later, you
were snoring. Oh, he was just full of wrong answers. First he had made the fatal
error of saving he had never been in the Incinerator before, when he knew damned
well that all children were brought here on tours, every year, from the time they were
four, to instill the idea of the clean fire death and the Incinerator in their minds. Death
was a bright fire, death was warmth and the sun. It was not a dark, shadowed thing.
That was important in their education. And he, pale thoughtless fool, had
immediately gabbled out his ignorance.
And another thing, this paleness of his. He looked at his hands and realised with
growing terror that a pale man also was non-existent in this world. They would
suspect his paleness. That was why the first Attendant had asked, "Are you one of
those men newly returned from Mars?" Here, now, this new Attendant was clean and
bright as a copper penny, his cheeks red with health and energy. Lantry hid his pale
hands in his pockets. But he was hilly aware of the searching the Attendant did on
his face.
"I mean to say," said Lantry, "I didn't want to sleep. I wanted to think."
"Was there a service held here a moment ago?" asked the Attendant, looking
about.
"I don't know, I just came in."
"I thought I heard the fire lock open and shut."
"I don't know," said Lantry.
The man pressed a wall button. "Anderson?"
A voice replied. "Yes."
"Locate Saul for me, will you?"
"I'll ring the corridors." A pause. "Can't find him."
"Thanks." The Attendant was puzzled. He was beginning to make little sniffing
motions with his nose. "Do you—smell anything?"
Lantry sniffed. "No. Why?"
"I smell something."
Lantry took hold of the knife in his pocket. He waited.
"I remember once when I was a kid," said the man. "And we found a cow lying
dead in the field. It had been there two days in the not sun. That's what this smell is.
I wonder what it's from?"
"Oh, I know what it is," said Lantry quietly. He held out his hand. "Here."
"What?"
"Me, of course."
"You?"
"Dead several hundred years."
"You're an odd joker." The Attendant was puzzled!
"Very." Lantry took out the knife. "Do you know what this is?"
"A knife."
"Do you ever use knives on people any more?"
 "How do you mean?"
"I mean—killing them, with knives or guns or poison?"
"You are an odd joker!" The man giggled awkwardly.
"I'm going to kill you," said Lantry.
"Nobody kills anybody," said the man.