"Charles L. Grant - The Pet" - читать интересную книгу автора (Grant Charles L)

The high school band members sat on their chairs, wore their red
uniforms with the black and gold piping, and played as if they were
auditioning to lead the Rose Bowl parade. They slipped through "Bolero"
as if they knew what it meant, marched through Sousa as if they'd met
him in person, and they put fireworks and rockets, Catherine wheels and
Roman candles exploding and spinning into the

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audience's imagination, into the dark autumn sky, when they bellowed and
strutted through the "1812 Overture."

At the rim of the field, back in the bushes where the lights didn't
reach, there were a few giggles, a few slaps, more than a few cans of
beer popping open.

... do you think it'll be all right?

The parents, all the relatives, the school board, and the mayor
applauded as if they'd never heard anything quite so grand in their lives.

The bandmaster beamed, and the band took a bow. There were no encores
planned, but the applause continued just the same.

... and the crow said, it'll be just fine as long as you know who your
friends really are.

In the middle of the park was an oval pond twenty feet wide, with a
concrete apron that slanted down toward the water. It wasn't very deep;
a two-year-old child could wade safely across it, but it reflected
enough of the sun, enough of the sky, more than enough of the
surrounding foliage to make it seem as if the depths of an ocean were
captured below the surface. Around it were redwood benches bolted to the
apron's outer rim. Above them were globes of pale white atop six bronze
pillars gone green with age and weather. Their light was soft, falling
in soft cowls over the quiet cold water, over the benches, over the
eleven silent children who were sitting on them now. They didn't listen
to the music, though it was audible through the trees; they ignored
applause that sounded like gunshots in the distance; instead, they
listened to the young man in pressed black denim who crouched at the
apron's lip, back to the pond, hands clasped between his knees.

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His voice was low, rasping, his eyes narrowed as he sought to draw the
children deeper into the story.

"And so the boy said, how do I know who my real friends are? Everyone
hates me, they think I'm some kind of terrible monster. And the crow, he
laughed like a crazy man and said, you'll know them when you see them.