"Carol Emshwiller - Mrs Jones" - читать интересную книгу автора (Emshwiller Carol)

Mrs. Jones
by Carol Emshwiller
****
CORA IS A MORNING PERSON. Her sister, Janice, hardly feels conscious till late
afternoon. Janice nibbles fruit and berries and complains of her stomach. Cora eats
potatoes with butter and sour cream. She likes being fat. It makes her feel powerful
and hides her wrinkles. Janice thinks being thin and willowy makes her look young,
though she would admit that--and even though Cora spends more time outside doing
the yard and farm work--CoraтАЩs skin does look smoother. Janice has a slight stutter.
Normally she speaks rapidly and in a kind of shorthand so as not to take up
anyoneтАЩs precious time, but with her stutter, she can hold peopleтАЩs attention for a
moment longer than she would otherwise dare. Cora, on the other hand, speaks
slowly and if she had ever stuttered would have seen to it that she learned not to.
Cora bought a genuine kilim rug to offset, she said, the bad taste of the
flowery chintz covers Janice got for the couch and chairs. The rug and chairs look
terrible in the same room, but Cora insists that her rug be there. Janice retaliated by
pawning MotherтАЩs silver candelabras. Cora had never liked them, but she made a
fuss anyway, and she left JaniceтАЩs favorite silver spoon in the mayonnaise jar until,
polish as she would, Janice could never get rid of the blackish look. Janice punched
a hole in each of FatherтАЩs rubber boots. Cora wears them anyway. She hasnтАЩt said a
single word about it, but she hangs her wet socks up conspicuously in the kitchen.
They wish theyтАЩd gotten married and moved away from their parentтАЩs old
farm house. They wish . . . desperately that theyтАЩd had children, though they know
nothing of children--or husbands for that matter. As girls they worked hard at
domestic things: canning, baking bread and pies, sewing . . . waiting to be good
wives to almost anybody, but nobody came to claim them.
Janice is the one who worries. SheтАЩs worried right now because she saw a
light out in the far corner of the orchard--a tiny, flickering light. She can just barely
make it out through the misty rain. Cora says, тАЬNonsense.тАЭ (SheтАЩs angry because
itтАЩs just the sort of thing Janice would notice first.) Cora laughs as Janice goes
around checking and re-checking all the windows and doors to see that theyтАЩre
securely locked. When Janice has finished, and stands staring out at the rain, she has
a change of heart. тАЬWhoeverтАЩs out there must be cold and wet. Maybe hungry.тАЭ
тАЬNonsense,тАЭ Cora says again. тАЬBesides, whoeverтАЩs out there probably
deserves it.тАЭ
Later, as Cora watches the light from her bedroom window, she thinks
whoever it is whoтАЩs camping out down there is probably eating her apples and
making a mess. Cora likes to sleep with the windows open a crack even in weather
like this, and she prides herself on her courage, but, quietly, so that Janice, in the
next room, wonтАЩt hear, she eases her windows shut and locks them.
 In the morning the rain has stopped though itтАЩs foggy. Cora goes out (with
FatherтАЩs walking stick, and wearing FatherтАЩs boots and battered canvas hat) to the
far end of the orchard. Something has certainly been there. It had pulled down
perfectly good, live, apple branches to make the nests. Cora doesnтАЩt like the way it
ate apples, either, one or two bites out of lots of them, and then it looks as if it had
made itself sick and threw up not far from the fire. Cora cleans everything so it looks
like no one has been there. She doesnтАЩt want Janice to have the satisfaction of
knowing anything about it.
That afternoon, when Cora has gone off to have their pickup truck greased,
Janice goes out to take a look. She, also, takes FatherтАЩs walking stick, but she wears