"Kress, Nancy - Wetlands Preserve" - читать интересную книгу автора (Kress Nancy)

"Do what?" he said.

"Get Carlo used to you, enjoying you, then disappear again."

"Isn't that what 'uncles' do?" Danilo said, and they were facing each other, bristling like cats.

"Danilo, what are you really doing here? I looked up EarthAction on the web. They're suspected in half a dozen environmental bombings. A pesticide factory in Mexico, a supermarket in Germany that refused to remove genetically modified foods from its shelves, a Monsanto distributor in South Africa, a whaling operation in Japan."

"Nothing proven whatsoever," Danilo said.

"Mostly because you haven't hit anything in the United States. God, Danilo, a supermarket?"

"Do you know how dangerous those genetically modified foods are? The growers use two to five times the pesticides that regular farmers use. Worse, nobody knows the long-term effects of introducing organisms into the environment that didn't develop there naturally. We could be looking at global disaster down the road, just so the agri-industrial complex can boost its profits now."

"You used to believe that violence was descending to the level of the enemy!"

"And all that peaceful confrontation failed, didn't it? Did you breast-feed Carlo, Lisa? You probably had toxic organochlorines in your breast milk. Do you read the newspaper when you're not in that swampy ivory tower of yours? Did you read about the fish depletion on the Grand Banks because of overfishing? The drought in Africa because of climate shifts due to the actions of industrial countries? The destruction of sustainable, diverse agriculture because of one-crop genetically engineered planting with God-knows-what side effects? The ninety-six people in ManilaЧ" He stopped, breathing hard.

Lisa said quietly, "What about the people in Manila, Danilo? Which people?"

"Nothing. Forget it."

"It was the garbage dump, wasn't it? I saw it on the news. A dump collapsed outside Manila, burying the shanties of people who lived by scavenging in the garbage."

"Men, women, children," Danilo said. "Buried under huge mounds of rotten garbage. Burned when fires broke out from the pathetic makeshift stoves they used to cook their food in the shanties. Cooking food there. Rescue people couldn't even get the bodies out right away because of the stench."

Lisa waited.

"My family owns that dump, Lisa. Just like they own most of that Manila suburb."

"Danilo, youЧ"

"Come out of your bog once in a while and see what's going on with the planet. Which we're not going to have indefinitely unless somebody gets through to the people exploiting it for profit."

He was right, she knew he was right. And yet all she could think was, He talks like a propaganda leaflet. Was Danilo still in there somewhere, a real person?

"See you," Danilo said, picking up his knapsack. "Tell Carlo I said good-bye."




╖ ╖ ╖ ╖ ╖


Lisa was the first one in at Kenton the next day, a miracle. She couldn't sleep, and when she saw Mrs. Belling's light go on at 4:00 A.M., she took a chance and asked her if she could take Carlo this early. An emergency at work, Lisa babbled, they'd just phoned, she hated to ask, wouldn't let it happen again.Е
Mrs. Belling, blinking in either sleep or surprise, agreed. Lisa carried the unconscious Carlo next door. In Mrs. Belling's shabby, comfortable kitchen she noted on the counter a jar of peanut butter, plastic food containers, a receipt for dry cleaning. Genetically modified foodstuffs, persistent organic pollutants, environmental toxins. That's what Danilo would have said.

Screw Danilo.