Читать книгу The Brothers - A Story - H.G. Wells - Страница 6

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Bolaris lifted his glass to his departing guest. "I am sorry you have to return to your quarters downstairs. They are far from perfect—but civil war is always uncivilized. A class war more particularly so. No chivalry. Later on maybe I may have to shoot you. But I do hope that before then we may have a chance to resume what I have found a very agreeable conversation indeed. War would be intolerable without such occasional interludes.... The prisoner was led out. Directly the door had closed upon Ratzel, Bolanris's manner changed.

"Get outside," he said to the remaining guards, and Catherine and Handon shifted closer to him because they felt that what he had to say would not be said too loudly. Catherine's expression was one of anticipatory appreciation; Handon's intimated a hopeless curiosity struggling against complete stupefaction.

"Now," said Bolaris. "You have been a little puzzled by—what shall I call it—the untimely refinement—the cultured irrelevance of our conversation. But I had to talk about something — or rather I had to talk about nothing. I wanted to look at him. I wanted to look him over. And I didn't want him to talk to me. I wanted to draw out our resemblances and differences. I wanted to note any distinctive mannerisms he had—for a good reason. I wanted time to think about what to do next—with him in front of me. And the curious thing is that he came more than half-way to meet me. He took my point very quickly. He was quite ready to play the man of culture, reluctantly at war. Just as I might have done. I couldn't catch him saying anything or moving in any way that was distinctive between us. Could you? I'd heard we have a resemblance. But this is a Double."

"It is incredible that—" Catherine was beginning, and then she caught a warning glance in his eyes. "What do you think of it, Handon?" she asked.

"I don't like him," said Handon compactly. "I disagree."

"One thing I noted," said Catherine. "His accent is American."

"And I?"

"You have no accent. Why should you have?"

"You don't like him, Handon?"

"He's sinister."

"But my double?"

"He looks like you," said Handon, and paused before he added, "but, mind you—he isn't you."

"Yes," said Bolaris slowly, with an air of receiving a very important statement. "I think that is... probably... correct."

"He is completely different," said Handon. "I can see through him."

"And you see?"

"A Red. Everything we are fighting against. Everything you stand against."

"That may well be," said Bolaris deliberately. "All the same there is something about him, some possibility, some opportunity. It is well you sent for me as you did. Your instincts, Handon, are always sound. I feel—what do I feel: Handon, I feel that I haven't got it—and yet that it's just at my fingers' ends. If he is like me, I am like him. That opens—possibilities. For example—away there, nineteen miles as the crow flies, like all the secrets of the defence."

"But what do you mean?"

"To talk to those fellows! To see it from their side! That would be something."

"You mustn't dream of impersonating him!" cried Handon. "If you leave us — even for a day—

"You would carry on. I could trust the Five."

"But if something new arose? And if they spotted it and got you? They wouldn't hesitate to shoot. Think how they shot Mand. And with everything—as things are."

"I'm not going to do it. But I want to turn all these possibilities over in my mind. You must trust me to do that. I want to see him some more—worm things out of him.... Anyhow I want to stay here.... And all the time things are happening at the château." He lowered his voice.

"There is a particular thing, Handon, I want said to the representative of a certain foreign power about those new tanks. I'm a little doubtful about that slim youngster, the new assistant secretary. I want it brought home to our friends that if they will insist on keeping their own men in those tanks —who don't know the language, who can't question a peasant, who can't find their way about, who don't care a damn for our cause—they are bound to keep bunched up, and if they bunch up they can be laid for. As they were today. Very gently but very firmly I want that said. Between ourselves it wasn't really Gammet's fault. So far as the loss of the tanks goes. But that's another question. Until our men are in those tanks, Handon, the confounded contraptions are part of a potential army of occupation. The King would as soon be nursed by a foreign army as nursed by us. I want someone who has this in mind to be at the château when our good friends ring through. And at the same time I've got this sense of something immensely important here. I want to be here."

"I could go back," said Handon.

"Take the cars and send them back for me."

"But I don't like leaving you."

"I know. When you're not about nowadays, Handon, it's like leaving one's right hand upstairs."

"You'll do nothing rash with that fellow?"

"Really, Handon!"

"Forgive a loyal anxiety. In my instincts, in my bones, I distrust him."

"I stretch out my right hand where it is most needed." Bolaris got up and, clapping his hand affectionately upon his adherent's shoulder-blades, steered him towards the door.