"Walter M. Miller - The Lost Masters - Volume 01" - читать интересную книгу автора (Miller Walter M)

seemed too frail and lame to be a successful practitioner of ogre-ism or highwaymanship. Nevertheless,
Francis slunk quietly out of the pilgrimтАЩs line of sight and crouched behind a heap of rubbled stone where
he could watch without being seen. Encounters between strangers in the desert, while rare, were
occasions of mutual suspicion, and masked by initial preparations on both sides for an incident that might
prove either cordial or warlike. Seldom more than thrice annually did any layman or stranger travel the
old road that passed the abbey, in spite of the oasis which permitted that abbeyтАЩs existence and which
would have made the monastery a natural inn for wayfarers if the road were not a road from nowhere,
leading nowhere, in terms of the modes of travel in those times. Perhaps, in earlier ages, the road had
been a portion of the shortest route from the Great Salt Lake to Old El Paso; south of the abbey it
intersected a similar strip of broken stone that stretched east-and westward. The crossing was worn by
time, but not by Man, of late.
The pilgrim approached within hailing distance, but the novice stayed behind his mound of rubble.
The pilgrimтАЩs loins were truly girded with a piece of dirty burlap, his only clothing except for hat and
sandals. Doggedly he plodded ahead with a mechanical limp while assisting his crippled leg with the
heavy staff. His rhythmic gait was that of a man with a long road behind him and a long way yet to go.
But, upon entering the area of the ancient ruins, he broke his stride and paused to reconnoiter.
Francis ducked low.
There was no shade amid the cluster of mounds where a group of age-old buildings once had been,
but some of the larger stones could, nevertheless, provide cooling refreshment to select portions of the
anatomy for travelers as wise in the way of the desert as the pilgrim soon proved himself to be. He
searched briefly for a rock of suitable proportions. Approvingly, Brother Francis noted that he did not
grasp the stone and rashly tug, but instead, stood at a safe distance from it and, using his staff as a lever
and a smaller rock for a fulcrum, he jostled the weightier one until the inevitable buzzing creature crawled
forth from below. Dispassionately the traveler killed the snake with his staff and flipped the still wriggling
carcass aside. Having dispatched the occupant of the cool cranny beneath the stone, the pilgrim availed
himself of the cool crannyтАЩs ceiling by the usual method of overturning the stone. Thereupon, he pulled up
the back of his loincloth, sat with his withered buttocks against the stoneтАЩs relatively chilly underside,
kicked off his sandals, and pressed the soles of his feet against what had been the sandy floor of the cool
cranny. Thus refreshed, he wiggled his toes, smiled toothlessly and began to hum a tune. Soon he was
singing a kind of crooning chant in a dialect not known to the novice. Weary of crouching, Brother
Francis shifted restlessly.
While he sang, the pilgrim unwrapped a biscuit and a bit of cheese. Then his singing paused, and he
stood for a moment to cry out softly in the vernacular of the region: тАЬBlest be Adonoi Elohim, King of
All, who maketh bread to spring forth from the earth,тАЭ in a sort of nasal bleat. The bleat being finished, he
sat again, and commenced eating.
The Wanderer had come a long way indeed, thought Brother Francis, who knew of no adjacent
realm governed by a monarch with such an unfamiliar name and such strange pretensions. The old man
was making a penitential pilgrimage, hazarded Brother FrancisтАУperhaps to the тАЬshrineтАЭ at the abbey,
although the тАЬshrineтАЭ was not yet officially a shrine, nor was its тАЬsaintтАЭ yet officially a saint. Brother
Francis could think of no alternate explanation of the presence of an old wanderer on this road leading to
nowhere.
The pilgrim was taking his time with the bread and cheese, and the novice grew increasingly restless
as his own anxiety waned. The rule of silence for the Lenten fast days did not permit him to converse
voluntarily with the old man, but if he left his hiding place behind the rubble heap before the old man
departed, he was certain to be seen or heard by the pilgrim, for he had been forbidden to leave the
vicinity of his hermitage before the end of Lent.
Still slightly hesitant, Brother Francis loudly cleared his throat, then straightened into view.
тАЬWhup!тАЭ
The pilgrimтАЩs bread and cheese went flying. The old man grabbed his staff and bounded to his feet.
тАЬCreep up on me, will you!тАЭ