JК
Isle Of The Dead :: Zelazny Roger
Страница: 35 из 110He saw bureaucracy in the necessary evolution of all institutions, and he saw that it was good. He saw that it was necessary and good. While it may be necessary, put a comma after that word and after the last one add "God" and an exclamation point. For there comes a time in the history of all bureaucracies when they must inevitably parody their own functions. Look what the breakup of the big Austro-Hungarian machine did to poor Kafka, or the Russian one to Gogol. It drove them out of their cotton-picking minds, poor bastards, and now I was looking at a man who had survived an infinitely more inscrutable one until the end of his days was in sight. This indicated to me that he was slightly below average intelligence, emotionally handicapped, insecure, or morally suspect; or else he was an iron-willed masochist. For these neuter machines, combining as they do the worst of both father-image and mother-image--i.e., the security of the womb and the authority of an omniscient leader--always manage to attract the nebbish. And this is why, Mother Earth, I wept inwardly for thee at that moment of the immense parade called Time: the clowns were passing, and everybody knows that inside, somewhere, their hearts are broken.
"Then tell me what you would like of me and I'll answer you now," I said.
He reached into his inside pocket and withdrew a sealed envelope bearing various security stamps, which I didn't bother examining too closely, even when he handed it to me.
"Should you not consent to accompany me back to Earth, I was instructed to deliver this to you."
"If I had agreed to go along, what would you have done with it?"
"Returned it to my chief," he said.
"So that he could hand it to me?"
"Probably," he said.
I tore it open and withdrew a single sheet of paper.
I held it close and squinted through the dim light. It was a list of six names. I kept my face under control as I read them.
They were all names of people I had loved or hated, and they were each of them, somewhere, the subject of a moldering obituary.
Also, they had all figured prominently in some recent photography I had been called upon to witness.
I puffed smoke, refolded the list, replaced it in the envelope and dropped it on the table between us.
"What does it signify?" I asked, after a time.
"They are all potentially alive," he said. "I request that you destroy the list at your earliest convenience."
"Okay," I said, and, "Why are they potentially alive?"
"Because their Recall Tapes were stolen."
"How?"
"We don't know."
"Why?"
"We don't know that either.
"Then tell me what you would like of me and I'll answer you now," I said.
He reached into his inside pocket and withdrew a sealed envelope bearing various security stamps, which I didn't bother examining too closely, even when he handed it to me.
"Should you not consent to accompany me back to Earth, I was instructed to deliver this to you."
"If I had agreed to go along, what would you have done with it?"
"Returned it to my chief," he said.
"So that he could hand it to me?"
"Probably," he said.
I tore it open and withdrew a single sheet of paper.
I held it close and squinted through the dim light. It was a list of six names. I kept my face under control as I read them.
They were all names of people I had loved or hated, and they were each of them, somewhere, the subject of a moldering obituary.
Also, they had all figured prominently in some recent photography I had been called upon to witness.
I puffed smoke, refolded the list, replaced it in the envelope and dropped it on the table between us.
"What does it signify?" I asked, after a time.
"They are all potentially alive," he said. "I request that you destroy the list at your earliest convenience."
"Okay," I said, and, "Why are they potentially alive?"
"Because their Recall Tapes were stolen."
"How?"
"We don't know."
"Why?"
"We don't know that either.