The Monster Trilogy. Brian Aldiss

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ the gas mantle seemed to flare yellow and mauve as the room swayed.

      ‘These are my own manufacture,’ said Stoker and then, catching sight of Bodenland’s face, ‘What’s the matter, old boy? Cigar smoke getting to you?’

      Recovering his voice, Bodenland spoke. ‘Mr Stoker, you may be right about dark forces ranged against civilization, and I may have proof of it. What do you make of this?’

      He brought forth from his jacket pocket the article he had retrieved from Clift’s ancient grave in the Escalante Desert. In his palm lay a silver bullet, its nose dented, but otherwise identical to the ones in Stoker’s cigar-box.

      ‘This was found,’ he said, unsteadily, ‘in a grave certified scientifically to be sixty-five point five million years old.’

      Stoker was less impressed than Bodenland had expected. He stroked his beard and puffed at his cigar before saying, ‘There’s not that much time in the universe, my friend. Sixty-five point five million years? I have to say I think you’re talking nonsense. Lord Kelvin’s calculations have shown that, according to rigid mathematics, the entire limit of the time the sun is able to emit heat is not greater than twenty-five million years. Admittedly the computations are not exact.’

      ‘You speak of rigid mathematics. More flexible mathematical systems have been developed, giving us much new understanding of the universe. What once seemed certain has become less certain, more open to subjective interpretation.’

      ‘That doesn’t sound like progress to me.’

      Bodenland considered deeply before speaking again. He then summoned tact to his argument. ‘The remarkable progress of science in your lifetime will be built on by succeeding generations, sir. I should remind you of what you undoubtedly know, that only three generations before yours, at the end of the eighteenth century, claims that the solar system was more than a mere six thousand years old were met with scorn.

      ‘Time has been expanding ever since. In light of later perspectives, sixty-five million years is no great length of time. We understand better than Lord Kelvin the source of the energies that power the sun.’

      ‘Possibly you Americans might be mistaken? Do you allow that?’

      With a short laugh, Bodenland said, ‘Well, to some extent, certainly. This bullet, for instance, proves how little we have really been able to piece together the evolution of various forms of life in the distant past.’

      Turning the bullet over in his palm, Stoker said, ‘I would swear it is one of my manufacture, of course. You’d better tell me about this extraordinary grave, and I’ll strive to take you at your word.’

      ‘It’s pretty astonishing – though no more so than that I should be here talking to you.’

      He ran through the details of Clift’s discovery, explaining how the dating of the skeleton was arrived at.

      During this account, Stoker remained impassive, listening and smoking. Only when Bodenland began to describe the coffin in which the skeleton was buried did he become excited. He demanded to know what the sign on the coffin looked like, and thrust a carpenter’s pencil and paper into Bodenland’s hand. Bodenland drew the two fangs with the wings above them.

      ‘That’s it! That’s it, sure enough – Lord Dracula’s sign,’ said Stoker in triumph. He seized Bodenland’s hand and shook it. ‘You’re a man after my own heart, so you are. At last someone who believes, who has proof! Listen, this house has drawn evil to it, and you brought more evil with this feller in my tool shed, but we can fight it together. We must fight it together. We’ll be heroes, the heroes we dreamed of —’

      ‘You’re a great man, Mr Stoker, but this battle’s not for me. I don’t belong here. I have to get back home. Though I certainly invite you to see the vehicle I use, parked down in your woodlands.’

      ‘Listen, stay another day.’ He grabbed Bodenland’s arm lest he escape at that very minute, and breathed smoke like an Irish dragon. ‘Just one more day, because tomorrow’s a special one. Come on, we’ll join that old fool van Helsing and have a glass or two of port and talk filth – if the wife’s not about. Tomorrow, that great actor whom I serve as manager, Henry Irving, bless his cotton socks, is to receive a knighthood from Her Majesty Queen Victoria at Windsor Palace. It’s the first time any actor has been so honoured. Now what do you think of that? Come along too – it’ll do your republican Yankee heart good to witness such a deed. After that you can high-tail it back to Utah or wherever you want. What do you say?’

      Bodenland could not help being affected by the enthusiasm of the man.

      ‘Very well. It’s a deal.’

      ‘Excellent, excellent. Let’s go and toast ourselves in some port. And I want to hear more about your adventures.’

       8

      Lethargy was a deep snow drift, chill yet at the same time warm, comforting, inviting you down into even more luxurious depths of helplessness, down, to a place before birth, after death.

      Mina saw her own death like the snow drift. When she opened her eyes, there were long muslin curtains billowing in the draught from the window. She was too weak to rise. She saw the curtains as her life – the gauzy life that was to be, after the consummation of death.

      Dreamily, she recalled remote times, remembered the name of Joe, her Joe. But now there was another lover, the dream lover of legend. He was come again, he was in the chamber, advancing towards the bed.

      She tried to rouse herself, to lift her head from the pillow. Her hair spilled about her but there was no strength in her neck. He was bending over her, elegant, powerful, distilling an aroma she drew in through her nostrils like a narcotic. When he opened his red mouth, she found strength enough to open her legs, but his attention was on the flesh of her throat. She felt the lechery of it, breathed deeper, swooned, fidgeted with desire to experience again the bite of those fangs, that sweet evacuation of life.

      He in his black garb was something different. The insanity of his fantasy spilled over through their linked alleyways of blood. She saw, felt, lived the secret world of the Undead to which she would soon belong.

      It was being transferred, his bridal gift to her —

      The great sweltering herbivorous beast dashed from the river bank, sounding alarm to other hadrosaurs grazing nearby. It was a mottled green in coloration, yellow and white on the tender belly, with an elaborate headcomb. It balanced its ponderous body on graceful legs, and gave its melancholy call as it ran. Mina heard herself scream, saw her companions scatter, and white birds sail up in alarm from the Cretaceous marshes.

      She took evasive action, running from side to side, yet still hearing the hot breath of pursuit.

      ‘What’s your name, and where’s Joe gone?’

      ‘You must forget Joe. You now have an immortal lover.’

      Indeed, she heard his footsteps close. Thud thud thud. Screaming, she ran into a gingko grove, thinking to evade the heavier predator that way. Behind her, too near her tail, the wretched sound of branches being snapped like teeth breaking from a bottom jaw.

      ‘Where did you come СКАЧАТЬ