Читать книгу Who Could That Be at This Hour? - Lemony Snicket - Страница 33

the slits at Theodora, who blinked back.

“Is the mask working?” she asked me.

“How can I tell?”

“If you can breathe, then it’s working.”

I did not say that I had been breathing previ­ously. Something more interesting had attracted my attention. Out the window of the roadster I saw a line of big barrels, round and old, squat­ting uncovered next to some odd, enormous machines. The machines looked like huge hypodermic needles, as if a doctor were plan­ning on giving several shots to a giant. Here and there were people—men or women, it was impos­sible to tell in their masks—checking on the needles to make sure they were working prop­erly. They were. With a swinging of hinges and a turning of gears, the needles plunged deep into holes in the shell-covered ground and then rose up again, full of a black liquid. The needles deposited the liquid, with a quiet black splash,