Цитаты из книги Никогде

нам не нужен телохранитель, мистер круп. не нас увечат, мы сами увечим.

Ричард опустился на одно колено. Граф легонько коснулся ножом сначала одного его плеча, потом другого.

- Это воспоминания, - объяснила Дверь. - Стены все впитывают.

Крысы, занятые тем, чем заняты крысы, когда на них никто не смотрит

Испытание начинается с чашки хорошего чая. Тебе с сахаром?

– Я леди Дверь, – сказала Дверь, – дочь Портико из Дома Арков.
– Я Охотница, – сказала Охотница, – ее телохранитель.
– Я Ричард Мэхью, – сказал Ричард, – весь мокрый.

- Как он, кстати?

• Умер.

• Вот видишь. Как и следовало ожидать.

- Простите, - проговорил он, - я понимаю, такое спрашивать неприлично, но всё же. Вы в своём уме?

Наконец они добрались до конца Даун-стрит. Улица упиралась в гигантские ворота, сложенные из огромных серых камней. Их построили великаны, подумал Ричард. Ему вспомнились легендарные короли минувших времен, вспомнился Бран[52], вспомнились братья Гог и Магог[53], у которых руки были как столетние дубы, а головы размером с утес.

Richard leaned against a wall and listened to their footsteps, echoing away, and to the rush of the water running past on its way to the pumping stations of East London, and the sewage works. "Shit," he said. And then, to his surprise, for the first time since his father died, alone in the dark, Richard Mayhew began to cry.

The marquis scratched the side of his nose. "Young man," he said, "understand this: there are two Londons. There's London Above-that's where you lived-and then there's London Below-the Underside-inhabited by the people who fell through the cracks in the world. Now you're one of them. Good night."

Her skin was the color of burnt caramel, and her smile would have stopped a revolution. She was dressed entirely in soft mottled gray and brown leathers. Richard recognized her immediately.

"That's her," Richard whispered to Door. "The hooker."

Door's odd-colored eyes were filled with tears. "Can you… can you just give me a sec? I'll be fine." He nodded and walked to the far end of the room. When he looked back she was still standing there, on her own, silhouetted in the white entrance chamber filled with pictures of rooms, and she was hugging herself, and shuddering, and crying like a little girl.

She had washed herself while he was gone, and her layers of clothes looked like she had at least made an effort to get the worst of the filth and the blood off them. The grime was gone from her face and hands. Her hair, when washed, was a dark shade of auburn, with copper and bronze highlights. Richard wondered how old she was: fifteen? Sixteen? Older? He still couldn't tell.

"Mine, I believe," said the marquis de Carabas. He wore a huge dandyish black coat that was not quite a frock coat nor exactly a trench coat, and high black boots, and, beneath his coat, raggedy clothes. His eyes burned white in an extremely dark face. And he grinned white teeth, momentarily, as if at a private joke of his own, and bowed to Richard, and said, "De Carabas, at your service, and you are…?"

It occurred to Richard then that her skin was very white, now that some of the dirt and blood had been removed. He wondered if she were pale from illness, or from loss of blood, or if she simply didn't get out much, or was anemic. Maybe she'd been in prison, although she looked a bit too young for that.

Her cheek was grazed, and her dirty reddish hair was tangled; tangled, but not matted. And her eyes… Richard realized that he could not tell what color her eyes were. They were not blue, or green, or brown, or gray; they reminded him of fire opals: there were burning greens and blues, and even reds and yellows that vanished and glinted as she moved.