"Carol Emshwiller - Water Master" - читать интересную книгу автора (Emshwiller Carol)

age would be shy anymore, but I suppose he's not used to people.) The cup is тАж hard to believe here
with all this mud, but the cup is fine china, translucent and gold rimmed. Just the sort of cup all of us
thought would be up here in the big fancy house.

He does look as if he has a secret. A happy secret. There's an odd smile twitching at the corners of his
mouth. As if there is a fancy house somewhere up here, complete with orchard and mirrors, and I just
haven't been able to find it. It's not just his look, but his elegance. Mud along the bottoms of his pants but
he sits, and on the edge of his table, as if in some fancy living room and holds his cup (tea for goodness
sake! Who would be drinking tea up here?) holds his cup as if it was the finest china. Mine is, but his is
coarse stoneware, thick and chipped.

Down there we always say nobody ever hears him laugh or even sees him smile, but right now he's
smiling a little V shaped grin and looks as if he really means it. Why has he kept this smile of his secret all
this time?

I should warn him a posse is coming up, and people are angry. But I don't want to spoil his smile. I don't
want to say how angry people are. Instead I say, "I suppose there's nothing you can do." Of course he
stops grinning, anyway. I might as well tell him. It isn't fair not to. "They're angry. A posse's coming up. I
think they have a bomb. I came to warn you."

Of course I didn't. I just wanted to see what would happen up here when they came, and to see for
myself if all the water was going down the other side.

"Nobody has seen you for a week, and the water is less and less."

"What is there to do? Did you see how low the lake is?"

He grabs his fringy jacket and tells me to put on my sweater. "I have a look-out spot up on that ridge."

He doesn't take his pistols. Should I remind him?

"Is your poetry book with the metal cover in the pocket over your heart? It should be."

"What poetry book? I haven't time for poetry. Except maybe to look out at it everyday. There's a lot to
do even when the gates are shut. Now that the water is low, I've been clearing out the dam."

Is nothing they told us down there true, neither poetry book nor big house? Not even one single thing? It
seems that what we believed was true isn't and what we believed isn't might well be.



┬╖┬╖┬╖┬╖┬╖



We go out into the shine and sparkle of the lake and the gold of the aspen. Everything numinous. He's
right about looking out at poetry, though I'd call it тАж I don't know, looking at religion maybe. I almost
drop to my knees again, though why should a good view be any more religious than a bad one?

(I wonder what it would be like to live here and see this every day? Maybe it's worth the mud.)