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

We have to cross the dam first. There's just a narrow walkway with a railing only on the side where the
water comes down. You wouldn't last long if you went over the dam here, even with the water this low.
There's a lot of spray, too. I'm shaky and I grip the railing so hard I can hardly make myself let go when I
take another step. Amos A. strides along as if it was a perfectly ordinary path and doesn't look back until
he's on the other side and here I am, only half way. It's not even that long a dam. All the water is funneled
through this narrow gap. It's hardly as far as our little bridge in town, but here the water leaps towards
me as though to pull me down into it. Globs fly up as though it had hands.

He smiles. (I never would have thought, all these years, that he'd smile a smile so like a child.) He comes
back for me. Holds my hand the last few steps.

At the far end we start up the cliff above the lake. I watch him ahead of me. Nobody should wear such
tight pants when their legs are as skinny as his are.

It's much steeper than the climb I climbed to get up here. I'm breathless, not only from that, but from
Amos Acularius right here in front of me. He's a nimble man. He'd be at the top by now if not for me and
he's not even breathing hard. He reaches back now and then to help me. When he does, I look up under
his hat again. Even if I had something to say, his eyes wash the words right out of me. All I want to say is,
"Your eyes are blue."

We follow where a little foot wide waterfall used to be but now it's dry. He points at it with his thumb and
says, "I can't help this."

At the top we turn around and there's the whole lake below us. The view is even more spectacular than
when I first came upon it. Mainly because we can see more snow capped mountains in the distance. The
white sets off the gold. There's still fog lower down where the trail from town comes up. It feels as if
we're on an island in the sky, and there's no outside world at all. I wish it were true.

Here at the lookout point, there's a gnarled limber pine. Reminds me of him. We sit under it. He's not
even out of breath.

Sit and look. Except I'm more conscious of his knobby knees and his muddy worn out pants right next to
me than I am of the view. I wonder how long this silence should go on. I wonder if I should say
something but I can't think what.

Sit and look. Then he says, "They always blame the Water Master."

They. That's usтАФus townspeople. Probably even me though I never needed much water. Is that why
he's hardly ever looked at us or talked to us? He knows already how we blame everything on him.
Especially anything bad. Maybe he knew that one of these days we'd hate him.

"Just because I control the dam, they think I can control the clouds."

I want to answer that I don't think that, and maybe I don't now, but I did. Even though I didn't think
about it, I blamed himтАФeven before there was anything to blame him for.

We sit quietly again. There are so many things I want to ask, as: Did you notice how I didn't need your
water? Did you notice how I didn't need a ditch? And: What about all those scars? But what I really
want to ask is if he's married, so instead I say, "Where are the children? Are they safe?"