"Madeline L' Engle - Time Quartet 01 - A Wrinkle in Time" - читать интересную книгу автора (L'Engle Madeleine)

file:///C|/2590%20Sci-Fi%20and%20Fantasy%20E-books/Madelein%20...le%20-%20Time%20Quartet%2001%20-%20A%20Wrinkle%20in%20Time.txt

A Wrinkle in Time
Madelein LтАЩEngle


1 Mrs. Whatsit

It was a dark and stormy night.
In her attic bedroom Margaret Murry, wrapped in an old patchwork quilt, sat on the foot of her
bed and watched the trees tossing in the frenzied lashing of the wind. Behind the trees clouds
scudded frantically across the sky. Every few moments the moon ripped through them, creating
wraith- like shadows that raced along the ground.
The house shook.
Wrapped in her quilt, Meg shook.
She wasn't usually afraid of weather. тАФIt's not just the weather, she thought. тАФIt's the
weather on top of everything else. On top of me. On top of Meg Murry doing everything wrong.
School. School was all wrong. She'd been dropped down to the lowest section in her grade. That
morning one of her teachers had said crossly, "Really, Meg, I don't understand how a child with
parents as brilliant as yours are supposed to be can be such a poor student. If you don't manage
to do a little better you'll have to stay back next year."
During lunch she'd rough-housed a little to try to make herself feel better, and one of the
girls said scornfully, "After all, Meg, we aren't grammar-school kids any more. Why do you always
act like such a baby?"
And on the way home from school, walking up the road with her arms full of books, one of the
boys had said something about her "dumb baby brother." At this she'd thrown die books on the side
of the road and tackled him with every ounce of strength she had, and arrived home with her blouse
torn and a big bruise under one eye.
Sandy and Dennys, her ten-year-old twin brothers, who got home from school an hour earlier
than she did, were disgusted. "Let us do the fighting when it's necessary," they told her.
тАФA delinquent, that's what I am, she thought grimly. тАФ That's what they'll be saying next. Not
Mother. But Them. Everybody Else. I wish FatherтАФ
But it was still not possible to think about her father without the danger of tears. Only her
mother could talk about him in a natural way, saying, "When your father gets backтАФ"
Gets back from where? And when? Surely her mother must know what people were saying, must be
aware of the smugly vicious gossip. Surely it must hurt her as it did Meg. But if it did she gave
no outward sign. Nothing ruffled the serenity other expression.
тАФWhy can't I hide it, too? Meg thought. Why do I always have to show everything?
The window rattled madly in the wind, and she pulled the quilt dose about her. Curled up on
one of her pillows a gray fluff of kitten yawned, showing its pink tongue, tucked its head under
again, and went back to sleep.
Everybody was asleep. Everybody except Meg. Even Charles Wallace, the "dumb baby brother," who
had an uncanny way of knowing when she was awake and unhappy, and who would come, so many nights,
tiptoeing up the attic stairs to herтАФeven Charles Wallace was asleep.
How could they sleep? All day on the radio there had been hurricane warnings. How could they
leave her up in the attic in the rickety brass bed, knowing that the roof might be blown right off
the house, and she tossed out into the wild night sky to land who knows where?
Her shivering grew uncontrollable.
тАФYou asked to have the attic bedroom, she told herself savagely. тАФMother let you have it
because you're the oldest. ItтАЩs a privilege, not a punishment.