Читать книгу Farewell Summer - Рэй Брэдбери, Ray Bradbury, Ray Bradbury Philip K. Dick Isaac Asimov - Страница 9

CHAPTER FOUR

There was a great rushing sliding iron sound like a guillotine blade slicing the sky. The blow fell. The town shuddered. But it was just the wind from the north.

And down in the center of the ravine, the boys listened for that great stroke of wind to come again.

They stood on the creek–bank making water in the cool sunlight and among them, preoccupied, stood Douglas. They all smiled as they spelled their names in the creek sand with the steaming lemon water. CHARLIE, wrote one. WILL, another. And then: BO, PETE, SAM, HENRY, RALPH, and TOM.

Doug inscribed his initials with flourishes, took a deep breath, and added a postscript: WAR.

Tom squinted at the sand. ‘What?’

‘War of course, dummy. War!’

‘Who’s the enemy?’

Douglas Spaulding glanced up at the green slopes above their great and secret ravine.

Instantly, like clockwork, in four ancient gray–flaked mansion houses, four old men, shaped from leaf–mold and yellowed dry wicker, showed their mummy faces from porches or in coffin–shaped windows.

‘Them,’ whispered Doug. ‘Oh, them!’

Doug whirled and shrieked, ‘Charge!’

‘Who do we kill?’ said Tom.