"Henry Kuttner - See You Later" - читать интересную книгу автора (Kuttner Henry)

"He stepped on your corn?" Paw asked. "That's all be done?"

"Yup. I was likkered up at the time, but I recollect I went down some stairs to where a lot of trains was
rushing around under the ground."

"You was drunk."

"I sure was," Yancey said. "Couldn't be no sech thingтАФtrains running underground! But I sure as
shooting wasn't dreaming 'bout the feller what stepped on my corn. Why, I kin still feel it. I got mad. It
was so crowded I couldn't even move for a mite, and I never even got a good look at the feller what
stepped on me.

"By the time I hit out with my stick, he must of got away. Never knew what he looked like. Might have
been a female, but that don't signify. I just ain't a-gonna die till I pay my debts and git even with
everybody what ever done me dirt. I allus got even with every dang soul what done me wrong, and most
everybody I ever met did."

Riled up a whole lot was Yancey Tarbell. He went right on from there:

"So I figgered, since I never found out just who this feller was what stepped on my corn, I better make
downright sure and take a lick at everybody, man, woman, and child."

"Now you hold your hosses," I said. "Ain't no children could have been alive thutty years ago, an' you
know it."

"Makes no difference," Yancey snapped. "I was a-think-ing, and I got an awful idea: suppose that feller
went and died. Thutty years is a long time. But then I figgered, even if he did up and die, chances are he
got married and had kids fust. Ifn I can't git even with him, I kin get even with his children. The sins of the
fatherтАФthat's Scripture. If'n I hit everybody in the world, I can't go fur wrong."

"You ain't hitting no Hogbens," Maw said. "None of us been in New York since afore you was born. I
mean, we ain't never been there. So you kin just leave us out of it. How'd you like to git a million dollars
instead? Or maybe you want to git young again or something like that? We kin fix that for you instead, if
you'll give up this here wicked idea."

"I ain't a-gonna," Yancey said, stubborn. "You give your gospel word to help me."

"Well, we ain't bound to keep a promise like that," Maw said, but then Grandpaw chimed in from the
attic.

"The Hogben word is sacred," he told us. "It's our bond. We must keep our promise to this booby. But,
having kept it, we are not bound further."

"Oh?" I said, sort of gitting a thought. "That being the caseтАФMr. Yancey, just what did we promise,
exact?"

He waved the monkey wrench at me.

"I'm a-gonna git split up into as many people as they are people in the world, and I'm a-gonna be