"Carol Emshwiller - Boys" - читать интересную книгу автора (Emshwiller Carol)

"Rest," she says. "We'll discuss later."

"Is it just us? Or are you saying the same thing to the enemy? They could win the war like that. It
would be your fault."

"Stop thinking."

"What if no more boys on either side, ever?"

"What if?"

She gives me more of those leaves to chew. They're bitter. I was in too much pain to notice that the
first time. I feel even sleepier right away.



┬╖┬╖┬╖┬╖┬╖



I dream I'm the last of all the boys. Ever. I have to get somewhere in a hurry, but there's a wall so high I'll
never get over it. Beside, my legs are not there at all. I'm nothing but a torso. Women watch me.
Women, off across the valley floor as far as I can see and none will help. There's nothing to do but lie
there and give the war cry.

I wake shouting and with Una holding me down. Hob is there, helping her. Other boys are in the
doorway looking worried.

I've thrown the blanket and the pillow to the floor and now I seem to be trying to throw myself out of
bed. Una has a long scratch across her cheek. I must have done that.

"Sorry. Sorry."

I'm still as if in a dream. I pull Una down against me. Hold her hard and then I reach out for Hob,
too. My poor ugly boy. I ask the unaskable. "Tell me, is Hob mine and yours together?"

Hob looks shocked that I would ask such a thing, as well he should. Una pulls away and gets up.
She answers as if she was one of the boys. "Colonel, sir, how can you, of all people, ask a thing like
that." Then she throws my own words back at me. "This is how it's always been."

"Sorry. Sorry."

"Oh, for Heaven's sake stop being so sorry!"

She shoos the boys from the doorway but she lets Hob stay. Together they rearrange the bed.
Together she and Hob make broth for me and food for themselves. Hob seems at home here. It's true,
I'm sure. This is our son.

But I suppose all this yearning, all this wondering, is due to the leaves Una had me chew. It's not the