Power Lines
- Автор: Маккефри Энн, Скарборо Элизабет
- Серия: Petaybee #2
- Язык: английский
- Жанр: Научная фантастика
Электронная книга - «Power Lines». Краткое содержание книги:
Only solid evidence would convince the company to leave the planet alone, and for all its sentience, Petaybee's communications were highly subjective; indeed, some outsiders seemed entirely immune to its voice. So Yana and her friends would have to find some other way to prove that the planet was worth more to the company alive than dead...
Matthew Luzon looked as if someone had just given him a gift and opened his mouth to speak, but Loncie had returned to her new charge. "Never mind, pobrecita, you are safe here with Lonciana Ondelacy."
Johnny didn't want Loncie to take a wily bastard like Luzon too lightly, and flashed her a rather urgent glance, which she caught and immediately understood. Turning to Luzon, she radiated her own considerable charm.
"Do be seated, most gracious Senior Luzon and rescuer of this little scrap of humanity. Pablo, have you not brought the wine? Carmelita, you and Isabella see to the needs of this little one."
She put the child on her feet and gently pushed her toward two daughters who would undoubtedly rival their mother for size and beauty. They smiled winningly at the child, who was nearly catatonic with such unwarranted treatment.
"And how is the nina called, Juanito?" she asked Johnny.
It took him a long moment to answer, but with Loncie looking at him so hard, he had no escape.
"She says her name is Goat-dung!"
"Ay, de mio!" And Lonciana's hands went heavenward. "Tsering did say that they name their young in such a way, to shame and humiliate them, but it is beyond my lips to form such a name in front of the innocent ears of my own children "
"But, mamacita, we know that goats make dung," Carmelita said, giggling.
"Goats do not make los ninos wear such names. Pobrecita we will call you, little one. Take her, bathe her, and see what of your sisters' clothing will clad her decently. I will come and see to her injuries while-Pablo, where is the wine? Ah, here, and biscuits. Oh, you are so clever, mi esposo!" And she beamed on the wiry little man who was entering the room, carrying yet another beautiful artifact to astound Luzon.
This was a silver tray, some of its fine etching cleaned to the copper below the plating, covered with a fine white lace cloth, with a glass decanter and some very plebeian shot glasses of the type to be seen in any Intergal bar.
Senior Pablo, whose last name Johnny didn't catch-it probably wasn't Ondelacy, since that was the name he had known Loncie by when she was a senior chief-was a perfect foil for his wife. He was as quiet as Loncie was verbose, and he showed to Matthew Luzon the deference and respect due to any sneaky and poisonous creature. Pablo gravely insisted that Don Matthew must take the heavy armchair, so incongruous among the rest of the utilitarian furnishings, and gave him first pick of the refreshments.
In his turn, Matthew seemed intrigued by Pablo, who sported a distinguished silvered goatee and sideburns. He was reminded of an extremely valuable painting that he had seen once in a museum on old Terra.
Though Matthew sipped suspiciously at the beverage served him, Johnny enjoyed the resinous flavor that was minor fire in his mouth and left a not-unpleasant after taste.
The biscuits were lighter than Johnny had expected, and sort of cheesy in flavor, which made sense, since there were goats in a pen in the back of the house.
He saw Luzon's gaze roving around the room, taking in a number of uncommon objects, like the flute and the beribboned guitar hung over a fine white fur: both well above the reach of small hands. Another object, that Johnny at first assumed to be a goat skin drinking bag with various lengths of pipe stuck from it, was actually a musical instrument, too, as Pablo explained when he caught Johnny's curious gaze: the Basque bagpipes.
However, none of them said much, since the noise of Goat-dung's attendants made any conversation difficult, even if Senior Pablo had been so inclined. Braddock looked better after his first sip of the liquor and was casting a judicious eye on the furs that covered the walls and floor. Lonciana kept exclaiming over this and that, arguing over items of clothing and demanding others until Matthew began to wonder just how long it took to clean one scrawny child and dab ointment on a few scratches. He was totally unprepared for Lonciana's dramatic re-entrance with the clean and not only neatly but flatteringly clothed child.
Johnny Greene sat bolt upright in his chair as if he were seeing a ghost.
"This nina," declared Lonciana, fists planted on her broad hips, "has been constantly beaten with rods. Her ribs have been cracked on several occasions and I distinctly feel the thickening of several bones in both arms and legs where she has had fractures. She has obviously been starved all her life-if she has had the misfortune to live in that Vale of Tears"-Loncie spat to one side-"that is not unlikely."
Washed and attractively clothed, the child looked even more wan and under nourished.
"Now we eat," Lonciana stated. At a clap of her hands, more children appeared from the unseen regions of this incredible house, each bearing elements of the meal and the utensils with which to eat it. Seating La Pobrecita beside her, Lonciana herself fed the child, who did not seem to know what to do with either spoon or fork.
Loncie's maternal presence was too overwhelming not to be threatening to Luzon, who began coaxing the girl into describing her home and her companions.
"Don Matthew, perhaps it is not wise to remind the nina of such matters," Pablo ventured deferentially, but Luzon swept aside his objections.
"Nonsense, my dear man. Do you know nothing of psychotherapy? Why, the very best thing for the child is to discuss her traumas and her feelings about them, to speak out fully of everything which disturbed her. Only then can she be purged of her fears. Confrontation is the very best medicine in cases like this."
Lonciana and the daughters who had tended the child were stunned as she fairly blossomed under his interrogation. Black eyes snapped with concern as Luzon deftly elicited information from the girl. On his side of the table, among the Ondelacy boys, Johnny lost his appetite watching Luzon, who, despite all of his protests of horror and sympathy, obviously was being fed exactly the kind of dirt he had hoped to dredge up. The man's ill-concealed relish of the child's story turned Loncie's savory meal into bile in his mouth.
Well, he'd done what he could and found the child safe harbor. Luzon could question all he wanted, but he wouldn't be able to force the child away from Loncie and her family any more easily than he would be able to force her away from Johnny. Johnny was tempted to pick the kid up and take her back north with him anyway, but he figured he would do better to high tail himself back north and make his report to Dr. Fiske, collect Sean and Yana, and fully cover his own ass. But he did want them to see this kid. There was something about her-something he couldn't quite put his finger on. Anyway, if he was to do any real good, he would need reinforcements.
He stood, bowed elaborately to his former chief petty officer, her spouse and brood, gave the child a bit of a salute-which Luzon returned, the ass, with a sharp dismissive one-and returned to his copter. He didn't enjoy flying it half as much on the way back as he expected. Quite aside from the lingering stench of Braddock's puke, it felt contaminated.
Although this southern continent should have been deep into the autumnal season and its ground surfaces well frozen up for smooth snocling, the Big Freeze had not yet occurred, a matter which caused considerable concern among the Sierra Padreans. This bunch were of very mixed ethnic origins; some, like Loncie, were of Central and South American origin, mainly from the Andes, and over time they had mixed with the few volatile high-mountain Basques, the combination tempered by a great many of the imperturbable Sherpas. Pablo, despite his resemblance to one of the characters in a painting by Goya, was half Sherpa, half Basque. While Loncie, as a retired corps member, kept her birth name of Ondelacy, the family name was actually Chompas.
All of this information Matthew Luzon and Braddock skillfully extracted from the family after the meal was over and Johnny Greene had departed, a very good thing since his presence definitely interfered with the rapport Matthew wished to establish with this family and, in particular, the girl they now called 'Cita.