"Grant, Charles L - Rest Is Silence, The" - читать интересную книгу автора (Grant Charles L)

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The Christmas break arrived none too soon for my rapidly decaying nerves. Though there had been no repetition of the practical jokes that had stained my doorstep, Marty's increasingly foul temper had strained our not-too-deep friendship. More' and more he sniped at me for surrendering my ideals, would then immediately laugh as if to salve the wounds he knew he was inflicting. And there was fury in the dust he raised when he left: school each night.

Since I was without a family, and Val had headed for an! aunt's, I treated myself, on Christmas Day, to a gluttonous delight at a nearby restaurant that deserved a better fate thaw; being buried in the hills. The more I ordered, the better the; service was; and when the meal finally ended, I was actually; laughing with the waitress. It was a good, rare feeling, and I drove home slowly in order to preserve it. There had been a. snowfall two days before, and the lawns and fields had not yet been all trampled by children and snowmobiles. The snow had: hardened, filmed with thin ice and contoured smooth like unbroken clouds. I grinned; I whistled; and when the telephone rang.: just as I was hanging up my overcoat, I even said "hello" instead of the usual "yeah?"

"Marty here, Ed. I just wanted to wish you a merry, and all that. Also, I have a friendly reminder of this Friday's gay, festivities. "

The measure of my good will weathered even this miserable reminder of that costume affair. "Bless you, Tiny Tim, " I said. "Having a good day?" '

"So-so. I'm at my, uh, uncle's place now. Where the party's= going to be, you know? Strange old guy, but he's teaching me a few things, and I'll put up with anything for a free meal. can't complain. You?"

"Just great, just great. But as long as you brought it up, what r are you going as?"

"Huh?"

"Oh, come on. The extravaganza, my boy. What ingenious-; rig have you devised, or is it a secret?"

"Oh, that. Nothing special. Since everyone seems on a Caesar kick"

"I wonder why," I muttered.

`-I thought I would just grab a sheet and go as the south Bayer. "
He laughed, but somehow I failed to see the joke. For all the scheming he had done, I thought the least he'd go as was the Poet himself. A soothsayer just didn't seem to fit the occasion. I told him 1 was thinking of Macbeth, but he didn't seem to care. As soon as he learned I was still going, he chatted meaninglessly for a while, then rang off, leaving me with an absolutely preposterous image of him wandering the halls of this uncle's house trailing a permanent press sheet beneath Japanese sandals and whispering "Beware the Ides of January" into everyone's ears. The image, unbidden, was immediately replaced with one equally unwelcome: of a figure in immaculate white posturing on a rounded dais while all the English Department sprawled at his cloven feet and drank hemlock laced with sulfur. The man's face was in clouds, and I couldn't tell if it were Marry or Jolliet. I held the picture as long as I could, working to eliminate its inexplicably obscene horror by trying to think of an appropriate theme for it. But the only song I could come up with was "After the Ball," in dirge time.

For the rest of the day I had the feeling that, while some entertained the ghost of Christmas Future, I was hosting the Scrooge of Hellsmas Past.

Quickly I grabbed a bottle from my private, not-very-select stock and sloshed out three quarters of a glass, most of which I finished before I'd lost my nerve. At the same time, I delved into my puny knowledge of Freud and attempted to fashion an explanation for the vision, if vision it were; but I was interrupted, gratefully, by the telephone. This time it was Wendy, slightly drunk and wishing slurred season's greetings for nearly five minutes before apologizing and hanging up. I hadn't even had the chance to say hello.

I had dreams after that, belle- forgotten, and finally came the night, the Friday evening when not even the Second Coming would have cheered me up. Feeling as ridiculous as I ever had, I climbed into my car, decked out in the closest approximation of Shakespearean Italian the local theatrical costumer could dredge up. If anyone asked, I would be Romeo, or Petruchio, or perhaps even Iago; at any rate, no one was going to get the same answer twice, and I didn't really care. For the moment all I worried about was being stopped by a local policeman and having to explain, while taking a drunkometer test, why I was dressed in tights, a scarf and a redplumed hat.

It wasn't until I reached the house and was getting out of the

car that I saw the still-red heart of a bird lying on the seat next to me. I gagged, tossed it away and leaned against the car hood, .' trying hard to breathe. I told myself to turn right around and go v on home. But I spotted Val's car and decided I'd better stick; around, although I wasn't sure why.

Originally, the house had been a development ranch which; successive owners had bastardized by splicing on additions so often that it sprawled idiotically over a full acre, if not more. I'd passed it often and had never known who'd lived there, but I 'wasn't surprised to learn that it was Marty's uncle's. Somehow it seemed to fit. At least, however, he'd tried to even things off a bit by enclosing two inner courtyards, one behind the other, with a roof of glass, thus providing his guests with green grass and: roof-high shrubbery to hide in while the snow fell and fumed the v sky white. This I discovered not two minutes after I'd rung the doorbell and had been admitted to a living-room-cum-foyer by a woman I didn't recognize and who apparently didn't know that: harem girls seldom appeared at the Globe. She was, however, friendly, and immediately guided me to the first garden, where' most of my fellow sufferers were rapidly draining the first of seemingly endless punch bowls.

Val, true to her threat, was Cleopatra, so much so that I began at once to make plans for later. Wendy and her husband struggle valiantly, and lost, as Bottom and Titanic. The others were: dressed as I was or were tripping over homemade togas. The masks we wore seemed less to hide than scream our identities, and what laughter there was seemed false.

I squirmed and was uncomfortable, and welcomed Val'&, offering of a drink with a smile and a kiss just this side of rape. She grinned.

"Down, whoever you are. We've only just begun to play."

"But, Madame Egypt," I protested, sitting gingerly-on a plaster, gingerly because the tights I was wearing were that and more. "This is too much. What are we supposed to do, sit around and drink all night? For that I could have gone to a bar. "

Val coiled beside me, hugging my arm, and we watched as the newcomers were ushered in, grabbed by Wendy and hustled away with filled glasses before we could identify them. I blinked . and shook my head. "I didn't know we had this many in the: department. "

She laughed, making quite sure I noticed she was not about to