2666

[yakov_a_jerkov]

Еще отрывок. Я перечитываю разные отрывки, когда вспоминаю их. Замечательно написано, по-моему. И, по-моему, эти отрывки вполне можно читать вне контекста книги.

One night, as he was reading George Steiner, he got a call from someone he at first couldn't identify. a very agitated voice with a foreign accent said it's all a lie, it's all a con, not as if this were the start of a conversation but as if they'd been talking for half an hour. What do you want? he asked, who is this? Is that Sergio Gonzalez? asked the voice. Speaking. Well, then, you son of a bitch, how are you? said the voice. It sounded as if it came from very far away, thought Sergio. Who is this? he asked. What the fuck, you don't recognize me? asked the voice with a hint of astonishment. Klaus Haas? asked Sergio. At the other end of the line he heard a laugh and then a kind of metallic wind, the sound of the desert and of prisons at night. That's right, I see you haven't forgotten me. No, said Sergio. How could I forget you? I don't have much time, said Haas. I just wanted to tell you that the bullshit about how I paid off the Bisontes isn't true. I'd need serious cake to cover all those deaths. Cake? asked Sergio. Money, said Haas. I'm friends with a crazy bastard everybody calls El Tequila, and one of the Bisontes is El Tequila's brother. But that's all. There's nothing else, I swear, said the voice with the foreign accent. Tell it to your lawyer, said Sergio, I don't write about the killings in Santa Teresa anymore. At the other end of the line Haas laughed. That's what everybody says. Tell this person, tell that person. My lawyer already knows, he said. I can't do anything for you, said Sergio. Well, I'm telling you, I think you can, said Haas. Again Sergio heard the sound of pipes, scratches, a hurricane wind that came in gusts. What would I do if I were locked up? Sergio wondered. Would I hide in a corner, wrapped in my blanket, like a child? Would I shake? Would I beg for help, cry, try to kill myself? They want to destroy me, said Haas. They're postponing the trial. They're afraid of me. They want to destroy me. Then Sergio heard the sound of the desert and something like the tread of an animal. We're all losing our minds, he thought. Haas? Are you still there? No one answered.