Time Voyage - Boxed Set. Филип Дик
Читать онлайн.| Название | Time Voyage - Boxed Set |
|---|---|
| Автор произведения | Филип Дик |
| Жанр | Языкознание |
| Серия | |
| Издательство | Языкознание |
| Год выпуска | 0 |
| isbn | 9788027248117 |
Chapter X. Beginnings of Civilization
Chapter XI. The Yankee in Search of Adventures
Chapter XIV. “Defend Thee, Lord”
Chapter XVIII. In the Queen’s Dungeons
Chapter XIX. Knight-Errantry as a Trade
Chapter XXII. The Holy Fountain
Chapter XXIII. Restoration of the Fountain
Chapter XXIV. A Rival Magician
Chapter XXV. A Competitive Examination
Chapter XXVI. The First Newspaper
Chapter XXVII. The Yankee and the King Travel Incognito
Chapter XXVIII. Drilling the King
Chapter XXIX. The Smallpox Hut
Chapter XXX. The Tragedy of the Manor-House
Chapter XXXII. Dowley’s Humiliation
Chapter XXXIII. Sixth Century Political Economy
Chapter XXXIV. The Yankee and the King Sold as Slaves
Chapter XXXV. A Pitiful Incident
Chapter XXXVI. An Encounter in the Dark
Chapter XXXVII. An Awful Predicament
Chapter XXXVIII. Sir Launcelot and Knights to the Rescue
Chapter XXXIX. The Yankee’s Fight with the Knights
Chapter XLIII. The Battle of the Sand Belt
Chapter XLIV. A Postscript by Clarence
A Word of Explanation
It was in Warwick Castle that I came across the curious stranger whom I am going to talk about. He attracted me by three things: his candid simplicity, his marvelous familiarity with ancient armor, and the restfulness of his company — for he did all the talking. We fell together, as modest people will, in the tail of the herd that was being shown through, and he at once began to say things which interested me. As he talked along, softly, pleasantly, flowingly, he seemed to drift away imperceptibly out of this world and time, and into some remote era and old forgotten country; and so he gradually wove such a spell about me that I seemed to move among the specters and shadows and dust and mold of a gray antiquity, holding speech with a relic of it! Exactly as I would speak of my nearest personal friends or enemies, or my most familiar neighbors, he spoke of Sir Bedivere, Sir Bors de Ganis, Sir Launcelot of the Lake, Sir Galahad, and all the other great names of the Table Round — and how old, old, unspeakably old and faded and dry and musty and ancient he came to look as he went on! Presently he turned to me and said, just as one might speak of the weather, or any other common matter —
“You know about transmigration of souls; do you know about transposition of epochs — and bodies?”
I said I had not heard of it. He was so little interested — just as when people speak of the weather — that he did not notice whether I made him any answer or not. There was half a moment of silence, immediately interrupted by the droning voice of the salaried cicerone:
“Ancient hauberk, date of the sixth century, time of King Arthur and the Round Table; said to have belonged to the knight Sir Sagramor le Desirous; observe the round hole through the chain-mail in the left breast; can’t be accounted for; supposed to have been done with a bullet since invention of firearms — perhaps maliciously by Cromwell’s soldiers.”
My acquaintance smiled — not a modern smile, but one that must have gone out of general use many, many centuries ago — and muttered apparently to himself:
“Wit ye well, I saw it done .” Then, after a pause, added: “I did it myself.”
By the time I had recovered from the electric surprise of this remark, he was gone.
All that evening I sat by my fire at the Warwick Arms, steeped in a dream of the olden time, while the rain beat upon the windows, and the wind roared about the eaves and corners. From time to time I dipped into old Sir Thomas Malory’s enchanting book, and fed at its rich feast of prodigies and adventures, breathed in the fragrance of its obsolete names, and dreamed again. Midnight being come at length, I read another tale, for a nightcap — this which here follows, to wit:
HOW SIR LAUNCELOT SLEW TWO GIANTS,
AND MADE A CASTLE FREE
Anon