JК
The Lovers :: Фармер Филип Хосе
Страница: 100 из 127He is still with us, traveling down the fields of presentation, skipping here and there, now to the past,now to the future. Always, whereever he is needed to turn pseudotime into real time, he is there.'
'Ah, yes,' Fobo smiled. 'That was the reason you went to the ruins, was it not? To check up on a mural which hinted that the Ozagen humans had once been visited by a man from another star? You thought it might have been the Forerunner, didn't you?'
'I still think so,' said Hal. 'But my report showed that though the man resembled Sigmen somewhat, the evidence was too inconclusive. The Forerunner may or may not have visited this planet a thousand years ago.'
'Be that as it may, I maintain your theses are meaningless. You claim that his prophecies came true. I say, first, that they were ambiguously stated. Second, if they have been realized it is because your powerful state-church – which you economically term the Sturch – has made strenuous efforts to fulfill them.
'Furthermore, this pyramidal society of yours – this guardian-angel administration – where every twenty-five families have a gapt to supervise their most intimate and minute details, and every twenty-five family-gapts have a block- gapt at their head, and every fifty block- gapts are directed by a supervisor- gapt , and so on – this society is based on fear and ignorance and suppression.'
Hal, shaken, angered, shocked, would get up to leave. Fobo would call him back and ask him to disprove what he'd said. Hal would let loose a flood of wrath. Sometimes, when he had finished, he would be asked to sit down and continue the discussion. Sometimes, Fobo would lose his temper; they would shout and scream insults. Twice, they fought with fists; Hal got a bloody nose, and Fobo a black eye. Then the wog, weeping, would embrace Hal and ask for his forgiveness, and they would sit down and drink some more until their nerves were calmed.
Hal knew that he should not listen to Fobo, should not allow himself to be in a situation where he could hear such unrealism. But he could not stay away. And, though he hated Fobo for what he said, he derived a strange satisfaction and fascination from the relationship. He could not cut himself off from this being whose tongue cut and flayed him far more painfully than Pornsen's whip ever had.
He told Jeannette of these incidents. She encouraged him to tell them over and over again until he had talked away the stress and strain of grief and hate and doubt. Afterward, there was always love such as he had never thought possible. For the first time, he knew that man and woman could become one flesh.
'Ah, yes,' Fobo smiled. 'That was the reason you went to the ruins, was it not? To check up on a mural which hinted that the Ozagen humans had once been visited by a man from another star? You thought it might have been the Forerunner, didn't you?'
'I still think so,' said Hal. 'But my report showed that though the man resembled Sigmen somewhat, the evidence was too inconclusive. The Forerunner may or may not have visited this planet a thousand years ago.'
'Be that as it may, I maintain your theses are meaningless. You claim that his prophecies came true. I say, first, that they were ambiguously stated. Second, if they have been realized it is because your powerful state-church – which you economically term the Sturch – has made strenuous efforts to fulfill them.
'Furthermore, this pyramidal society of yours – this guardian-angel administration – where every twenty-five families have a gapt to supervise their most intimate and minute details, and every twenty-five family-gapts have a block- gapt at their head, and every fifty block- gapts are directed by a supervisor- gapt , and so on – this society is based on fear and ignorance and suppression.'
Hal, shaken, angered, shocked, would get up to leave. Fobo would call him back and ask him to disprove what he'd said. Hal would let loose a flood of wrath. Sometimes, when he had finished, he would be asked to sit down and continue the discussion. Sometimes, Fobo would lose his temper; they would shout and scream insults. Twice, they fought with fists; Hal got a bloody nose, and Fobo a black eye. Then the wog, weeping, would embrace Hal and ask for his forgiveness, and they would sit down and drink some more until their nerves were calmed.
Hal knew that he should not listen to Fobo, should not allow himself to be in a situation where he could hear such unrealism. But he could not stay away. And, though he hated Fobo for what he said, he derived a strange satisfaction and fascination from the relationship. He could not cut himself off from this being whose tongue cut and flayed him far more painfully than Pornsen's whip ever had.
He told Jeannette of these incidents. She encouraged him to tell them over and over again until he had talked away the stress and strain of grief and hate and doubt. Afterward, there was always love such as he had never thought possible. For the first time, he knew that man and woman could become one flesh.