"Blackwater - 06 - Rain" - читать интересную книгу автора (McDowell Michael)

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"That was two years ago, wasn't it? Two years ago last May."
"Yes, ma'am."
"I'm surprised he's not married yet."
"Married? Who would Daddy get married to?" asked Lilah in all surprise.
Sister looked closely at Lilah, and then looked significantly at the door.
Lilah followed that gaze uncomprehendingly.
"Who?" she asked again.
Sister nodded, but wouldn't speak.
"You mean Daddy might marry Miriam?"
"Who else?"
"Daddy's not gone marry Miriam," exclaimed Lilah. "Who told you that?"
"Nobody told me. Nobody had to tell me. Y'all think just because I'm confined to my bed of pain that I don't know anything, that I don't see anything. Well, I do. Queenie tells me everything I need to hear. I have visitors. I have my own eyes, looking out this window. And I have the leisure to figure things out. I am gone be real surprised if you don't have a new mama before long."
"Sister," said Lilah, "I cain't believe it. I'm gone ask Miriam."
"If you do, she'll deny it. She won't give me the satisfaction of saying I was right. But one of these days you're gone walk in from the school, and your Daddy is gone say, 'Lilah, honey, Miriam and I have just run off and gotten ourselves married.' You see if he doesn't."
"I still don't think so."
"Don't you want those earrings?" Sister flicked a bony finger against the bob on Lilah's left ear. Lilah winced.
"Yes, ma'am. Course I do."
"If Miriam becomes your mama, you'll get those when she dies. You'll be heiress to a fortune in gems."
Lilah looked very doubtful about Sister's predictions. Miriam called out again.
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"I got to go," said Lilah, pulling away.
Sister smiled knowingly and let go of Lilah's arm. Lilah ran out of the room. Miriam waited in the hallway and snatched the bobs from Lilah's ears and dropped them into her pocket. "Elinor's gone kill us," she said to Lilah, "so let's get a move on."
In Perdido's opinion, Billy Bronze had insufficiently mourned the death of his wife. Frances Caskey drowned in the Perdido one stormy night in the spring of 1956. Billy had been away at the time. Desultorily, the Perdido was dragged, above and below the junction, but Frances's body was not recovered. Elinor had told Billy of her daughter Frances's death: "She went out, Billy, the way she always did. But this time she just didn't come back."
Billy said, "It certainly wasn't like Frances to go off and drown herself. I never knew anybody who could swim better than she could. It stormed that night, you said. Maybe she got hit by lightning."
Billy's grief was quiet. He went to work as usual, his routines were unaltered, his appetite was unaffected, he never seemed distracted at odd moments. He slept alone at night now, and that seemed the main difference in his life. Perdido saw this apparent unfeelingness in Billy, and thought ill of him for it. Yet the Caskeys stood up for Billy. With a quiet word or two here and there, Elinor and Queenie reminded the town just how distant Frances had been in the last few years of her life, how she had begun to ignore both husband and daughter, how she had seemed to care for nothing but the river.
Billy, though he may have been alienated from his wife, certainly remained on good terms with the rest of the family. That relationship was unchanged by his wife's death. He remained in the house with his mother- and father-in-law, Elinor and Oscar, and gave no thought to moving anywhere else. When Oscar pointed out that some trouble might arise from
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the problem of Frances's body never having been found, Billy only asked, "What sort of trouble?"
"Well," said Oscar uncomfortably, "in case you wanted to get married again..."
"Married!" laughed Billy. "Who on earth am I supposed to get married to, Oscar?"
"I don't know," said Oscar, "but there might be somebody, someday. I don't see it, I admit, but it might come about. Someday."
Billy laughed again. "Elinor wouldn't let me." And he shrugged an intelligible shrug, signifying, and I wouldn't want her to, either.
Billy's relationship with Miriam in these first two years of his widowerhood was the same as it always had been. They were as friendly, as intimate, and as businesslike as ever. It had never occurred to anyone, until it occurred to Sister, that there might be the possibility of a marriage between Billy Bronze and his sister-in-law. Lilah had no strong feelings about what the consequences of such a union might be, but had vague thoughts that they might be bad. So she went to her grandmother, and said, "Is Daddy gone marry Miriam? And if he marries her, does that mean I automatically get her jewels when she dies?"
"Where on earth did you get such an idea?" Elinor asked her granddaughter.
"From Sister. Sister says it's just a matter of time before Daddy and Miriam run off together. Are they gone live over here, or are they gone live next door?"
Elinor said, "I don't want to hear another word about this. It's not polite."
"Not polite?" asked Lilah, bewildered.
"Not polite," Elinor repeated, and for a time that was an end to the question for Lilah.
But not for Elinor. Elinor went to Oscar, and asked, "Have you heard anything about Billy marrying Miriam?"
Oscar hadn't heard of it. Neither had Queenie, or Lucille, or Grace, or Zaddie, or Ivey. Elinor called
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on Sister, and said, "Where did you get such an idea, Sister?"
Sister leaned importantly back on her pillows, and said with an air of mystery, "I know what I know..."
"Oscar," said Elinor, unsatisfied, "talk to Miriam. You're the only one in this family she'll listen to."
"What difference does it make whether Billy marries Miriam or not?" Oscar asked.
"I'm not sure," Elinor conceded, "but we ought to see if we can find out one way or the other."
That evening, then, at the dinner table, while Zad-die was clearing before dessert, Oscar cleared his throat, and said, "Miriam, can I ask you a question without your jumping down my throat?"
"I don't know," said Miriam, not one to be trapped as easily as that. "Maybe. Maybe not. What's the question?"
"Well..." said Oscar hesitantly, "maybe I should ask Billy instead."