"MacAvoy,.R.A.-.Black.Dragon.2.-.Twisting.The.Rope.e-txt" - читать интересную книгу автора (Dragon Stories)

Almost everyone looked away from St. Ives. Many sighed. Marty wiggled.
If he noticed this lack of enthusiasm, it only made him more determined to
speak. "Not that the music we play is in any sense correct by Celtic traditional
standards: how could it be, with Pozzy on a Spanish guitar, Sully with his
nineteenth-century German transverse flute, and then of course the squeeze-box:
a factory-made sealed package of Victorian origin, which one can neither tune
nor repairЕ" St. Ives paused in sorrowful consideration of the weaknesses of the
button accordion. "But hey! We don't have to court the modern audience with
bizarre clothing."
Martha scratched her scalp with both hands until her gray hair hobbled up and
down. She looked very bothered. "George, if we followed your ideas of what was
traditional, there would be no one up there but you on the pipes."
He appeared to consider that. "No. I'm willing to. grant that the harp is
traditional to Celtic music."
"Thanks, George, but I doubt I have the strength to endure your approval,"
drawled Elen. She put the instrument in question protectively onto her shoulder
and continued tuning.
"Then be at ease, Miss Evans. I said the harp, not the harp player. There is
nothing more traditional in your musicianship than in, say, Ravel." He rubbed
one heavy-knuckled hand over his eyes and winced at some private ache.
With an unnaturally innocent expression, Elen Evans looked around her. "La! Ah
believe Ah have been insulted!" She met Pсdraig's eye.
Perhaps her glance was merely languid, and it was Pсdraig's own hurt he read
into it. But ╙ S·illeabhсin, who had stood miserably silent in his twisted
sweater, now went from red to white and lunged for the piper, hands balled into
fists. He did not touch him, however, for he came up against the afflicted Mr.
Long. That gentleman had somehow wandered between the two in search of fresh
Kleenex. Pсdraig's arm was softly circled by a dark hand, which he could not
remove. "Bэ c·ramach, a Phсdraig,"; said Long very quietly, and then he turned
away.
The tissue box was on the table beside St. Ives. Long brushed the stocky piper
as he reached around him, and St. Ives staggered.
With the first signs of real temper, St. Ives pushed back, succeeding only in
pushing himself backward onto the mattress, which swayed beneath his weight.
"Take a walk, George. Cool off." Martha spoke quietly, but all in the room
turned to her in surprise, even
George. He pursed the mouth that was hidden in his curly, bisonlike beard. He
swelled beneath his layers of sweaters. He rose to his feet, but appeared to
reject the soft suggestion that had really been a command.
Long was beside him, shoulders almost touching. He blew his nose again,
discreetly. "Lovely afternoon for a walk in Santa Cruz, St. Ives," he said, with
a genteel enthusiasm. "Blue sky, ocean breezes. A good way to regain a flagging
inspiration. To reflect, perhaps, on the death of old arts. If one doesn't fancy
a nap, of course.
"I myselfЧand he tossed the tissue into the bedside basketЧ"am going to nap." He
looked significantly from the bed to St. Ives.
Much to the surprise of most in the room, the piper walked out without another
word. They heard his feet echoing down the hall and out the back door of the
motel, for St. Ives stayed in a place apart from the rest of them.
Elen glanced at Long with exaggerated respect. "The big lady's muscleman?"