"Zenna Henderson - Holding Wonder" - читать интересную книгу автора (Henderson Zenna)

Then I nearly died! It was so wild and wonderful and impossible and I'm scared
to death of heights! We scurried about getting me a jacket. Getting Kipper's
forgotten jacket out of the cloak room for Vincent who had come off without
his. Taking one of my blankets, just in case. I paused a moment in the mad
scramble, hand poised over my Russian-English, English-Russian pocket
dictionary. Then left it. The man might not be Russian at all. And even if
was, people like Vincent's seemed to have little need such aids to
communication.

A door opened in the craft. I looked at it, thinking blankly, Ohmy! Ohmy! We
had started across the yard toward the craft when I gasped, "The-the door! I
have to lock the door!"

I dashed back to the schoolhouse and into the darkness of the teacherage. And
foolishly, childishly, there in the dark, I got awfully hungry! I yanked a
cupboard door open and scrabbled briefly. Peanut butter-slippery, glassy
cylinder-crackers-square cornered, waxy carton. I slammed the cupboard shut,
snatched up my purse as though I were on the way to the MONSTER MERCANTILE,
staggered out of the door, and juggled my burdens until I could manipulate the
key. Then I hesitated on the porch, one foot lifting, all ready to go to the
craft, and silently gasped my travel prayer. "Dear God, go with me to my
destination. Don't let me imperil anyone or be imperiled by anyone. Amen." I
started down the steps, paused, and cried softly, "To my destination and back!
Oh, please! And back!"

Have you, oh, have you ever watched space reach down to surround you as your
hands would reach down to surround a minnow? Have you ever seen Earth, a
separate thing, apart from you, and see-almost-all-able? Have you ever watched
color deepen and run until it blared into blaze and blackness? Have you ever
stepped out of the context in which your identity is established and floated
un-anyone beyond the steady pulse of night and day and accustomed being? Have
you ever, for even a fleeting second, shared God's eyes? I have! I have!

And Mrs. Kroginold and Vincent were with me in all the awesome wonder of our
going. You couldn't have seen us go even if you had known where to look. We
were wrapped, in unlight again, and the craft was flowed again to make it a
nothing to any detection device.

"I wish I could space walk!" said Vincent, finally, turning his shoulders but
not his eyes away from the window. "Daddy-"

"No." Mr. Kroginold's tone left no loophole for further argument.

"Well, it would be fun," Vincent sighed. Then he said in very small voice.
"Mother, I'm hungry."

"So sorry!" Mrs. Kroginold hugged him to her briefly. Nearest hamburger
joint's a far piece down the road!"