"Walter M. Miller - The Hoofer" - читать интересную книгу автора (Miller Walter M)

the money?
Six hitches in space, and every time the promise had been the same: One more tour, baby, an
we'll have enough dough, and then I'll quit for good. One more time, and we'll have o
stakeтАФenough to open a little business, or buy a house with a mortgage and get a job.
And she had waited, but the money had never been quite enough until this time. This time t
tour had lasted nine months, and he had signed on for every run from station to moon-base
pick up the bonuses. And this time he'd made it. Two weeks ago, there had been forty-eig
hundred in the bank. And now .. .
"Why?" he groaned, striking his forehead against his forearms. His arm slipped, and his head h
the top of the fencepost, and the pain blinded him for a moment. He stag-gered back into the roa
with a low roar, wiped blood from his forehead, and savagely kicked his bag.
It rolled a couple of yards up the road. He leaped after it and kicked it again. When he h
finished with it, he stood panting and angry, but feeling better. He shouldered the bag and hik
on toward the farmhouse.
They're hoofers, that's allтАФjust an Earth-chained bunch of hoofers, even Marie. And I'm
tumbler. A born tum-bler. Know what that means? It meansтАФGod, what does it mean? It mea
out in Big Bottomless, where Earth's like a fat moon with fuzzy mold growing on it. Mold, tha
all you are, just mold.
A dog barked, and he wondered if he had been mutter-ing aloud. He came to a fence-gap an
paused in the dark-ness. The road wound around and came up the hill in front of the hous
Maybe they were sitting on the porch. Maybe they'd already heard him coming. Maybe .. .
He was trembling again. He fished the fifth of gin out of his coat pocket and sloshed it. St
over half a pint. He decided to kill it. It wouldn't do to go home with a bottle sticking out of h
pocket. He stood there in the night wind, sipping at it, and watching the reddish moon come up
the east. The moon looked as phoney as the setting sun.
He straightened in sudden determination. It had to be sometime. Get it over with, get it ov
with now. He opened the fence-gap, slipped through, and closed it firmly behind him. He retriev
his bag, and waded quietly through the tall grass until he reached the hedge which di-vided an ar
of sickly peach trees from the field. He got over the hedge somehow, and started through the tre
toward the house. He stumbled over some old boards, and they clattered.
"Shhh!" he hissed, and moved on.
The dogs were barking angrily, and he heard a screen door slam. He stopped.
"Ho there!" a male voice called experimentally from the house.
One of Marie's brothers. Hogey stood frozen in the shadow of a peach tree, waiting.
 "Anybody out there?" the man called again.
Hogey waited, then heard the man muttering, "Sic 'im, boy, sic 'im."
The hound's bark became eager. The animal came chas-ing down the slope, and stopped t
feet away to crouch and bark frantically at the shadow in the gloom. He knew the dog.
"Hookey!" he whispered. "Hookey boy тАФhere!"
The dog stopped barking, sniffed, trotted closer, andwent "RrroofJ!" Then he started sniffin
suspiciously again.
"Easy, Hookey, here boy!" he whispered.
The dog came forward silently, sniffed his hand, and whined in recognition. Then he trott
around Hogey, panting doggy affection and dancing an invitation to romp. The man whistled fro
the porch. The dog froze, then trotted quickly back up the slope.
"Nothing, eh, Hookey?" the man on the porch said. "Chasin' armadillos again, eh?"
The screen door slammed again, and the porch light went out. Hogey stood there starin
unable to think. Somewhere beyond the window lights wereтАФhis woman, his son.
What the hell was a tumbler doing with a woman and a son?
After perhaps a minute, he stepped forward again. He tripped over a shovel, and his fo