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Show -298 "I'm willing to take him," Jacob said. "But are you sure he'll want to come? And what about Alice?" "Leave all that to me. I'll take him for a little walk when we get there. Once he agrees what can Alice say?" My little brother, seen from the back, had a strong slender neck, with a decided valley between the two defined muscles that hold and swing the head; under the close-cropped fine feathery black hair the skull was well-shaped, aristocratic. He was smaller, more finely molded than Jacob and I, brighter too, but consequently closer to craziness, loss of control. He was not well grounded in reality, even by lenient Skinner standards. He needed protection. "He has to go with you," I said. We sped around a curve in the road and Jacob leaned toward me at the same time as I tilted away. Like Morgan, Alice always drove too quickly, faster than the road would allow. The little Falcon roared and rattled, straining to go faster yet; through the windshield I could see the light-colored twisting highway rushing at us like a future from which there was no escape. The day I left Fancy for good I had to sit for a long time in the front car of the subway train, watching the gleaming rails, the tunnel walls, the incandescent lights coming at me, with the same sensation of being carried along toward the inevitable. Faster and faster went that grimy snaking machine of immense weight, clacking |
