"Tanya Huff - When The Student Is Ready" - читать интересную книгу автора (Huff Tanya)

"I don't think so, bird." Stepping back, she slammed the door in its face.

It stopped, glared up at her, ruffled its feathers into place, and saidтАж well, it didn't say anything exactly.
It cawed like crows did, but for a moment, Isabel was certainтАФalmost certainтАФit had called her a stuck-
up bitch.

"Okay. Low blood sugar. Definitely time for a snack."

Wherever she'd been, Mrs. G. had to be back in the kitchen by now.

She wasn't. But this time, Isabel saw the note.

Bella: Mr. Gerfinleo called from the emergency so I have to leave early. There was an accident with the
forklift. Don't worry, he's okay if you don't count the broken leg. Your supper is in the refrigerator in the
stone casserole. Ninety minutes at 350 degrees, then grate some of the parmesan on top. Tell your
father, I'll call him later when I know.

Well, that explained why the condo seemed so empty. It was.

About to peer into the casserole, Isabel paused. If Mrs. G. had left early, who'd picked up her clothes?

Clothing didn't pick itself up.

She saw him the second time on her way to Gregg's Ice Cream. Seven o'clock, her dad still wasn't home,
and half a dozen questions kept chasing themselves around in her head. If anything could take the place
of answers, it was sweet cream on a sugar cone with sprinkles.

Her streeter was standing outside the Royal Ontario Museum, inside the security fence, inside the garden
for that matter, both hands pressed flat against a floor-to-ceiling window, staring in at the Asian temple.
His wardrobe had grown by the addition of a mostly shiny black jacket with the logo for Andrew Lloyd
Webber's CATS embroidered across the back. Nobody but her seemed to have noticed him, but he did
have the whole poor-and-homeless cloak of invisibility thing going.

About to cross to the southwest side of Queen's ParkтАФ the museum's cornerтАФIsabel stepped back up
onto the curb and crossed to the north side of Bloor instead. When she then crossed west, four lanes of
Bloor Street were between them.


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It didn't matter.

As she drew level with him, her streeter turned and looked directly at her.

"Time is not an illusion, no matter what they say. Spare some change for a cup of coffee, miss. We need
to start soon." He didn't shout, he didn't bellow, he just made his declaration in a quiet conversational
voice.

She shouldn't have been able to hear him.