"Suzette Haden Elgin - What The EPA Don't Know Won't Hurt Them" - читать интересную книгу автора (Elgin Suzette Haden)

Please God, he thought, don't let her mash it or twist it or break
anything off it! Gently, carefully, so as not to make her suspicious or
alarm her in any way, he held out his hand.
"Here, Miz Bridges," he said in his best church voice. "You let me have
that, and I'll put it away somewhere where none of the kids can get
hurt
on it; I promise." And he added, "Careful you don't cut yourself,
ma'am.
That's a wicked-looking thing!"
It was that. Stretched out flat, it would have been thirteen inches
long.
It had seven turns in it, and each of them had seven turns of its own.
And
there was a good deal more to it, all of it promising. He could have
wept,
he was so scared the city woman would damage it somehow.
Only after he had it safely in his own hand did his heart settle down
again. Behind him in the house, he could hear the Granny calling,
demanding to know what in the world was going on on her front porch,
for
heaven's sakes, and he called back to reassure her.
"I'll be there in just a minute, Granny!" he yelled. "And I've got
something to show you!" And then he stood there patiently yes-ma'aming
a
good five minutes more while Hannah Bridges told him what a disgrace it
was the way Ozarkers left sharp, rusty metal around where innocent
children could get hurt on it - and he tolerated her in silence and did
not interrupt to tell her that Ozark children were taught not to play
anywhere that there was sharp, rusty metal, and had sense enough to do
as
 they were told, while city children went roaming the streets looking
for
soft white drugs to play with. Warming to her subject, she explained to
him how he was going to rue the day one of these days, and how it was
just
plain blind luck that Amanda wasn't in an emergency room this very
minute.
And eventually she did run down.
"Thank you, Miz Bridges," he said when that happened, feeling he'd
stood
there a week.
"You're very welcome, I'm sure!" she said, and went stalking off across
the street to her own house, rubbing her hands together as if she'd
accomplished a good deal.
Except, halfway down the walk, she turned and looked back at him. "One
more thing!" she called to him.
"Yes, ma'am?"
"If you must leave junk lying around on your property, you could at
least
keep the ground cleaned off all around it, so that it wouldn't be a