"William Morrison - Date of Publication 2083 AD" - читать интересную книгу автора (Morrison William)

Next came a comedy act. This was even worse. A famed star of slick sophisticated comedy told
jokes and made puns of which James would have been ashamed. Carrie hid her head in her hands.
She said suddenly, "This is just too awful. Clara, please turn it off."
 Clara Munro was looking clued herself. She turned off the set and said, "What on earth happened to
them? In that first scene the hero and heroine looked like you, Carrie, and Mr. Garnber."
"Like me?"
"Like you, Clara," said Mr. Munro.
Carrie said, "I think we must all be seeing things. Anyway, they're usually so good. And tonight they
were terrible."
"There seems to be some sort of insanity abroad," said Bill. "And it almost looks as if it's catching."
That was it, she thought. It was catching. She wondered where it would strike next.
When they got home that night they found James peacefully asleep. The glass from which he had
drunk his milk was in the kitchen sink, along with the knife he had used to spread his jam. He had been a
very obedient boy, thought Carrie, and once more her heart warmed to him.
But he had his weaknesses. She realized that the next day when she was once more reminded of the
book. It happened in the afternoon, after she had read another of Barbara's letters. Barbara was writing
with a frequency little short of amazing. The basketball incident in the college was still the subject of
discussion and she just had to tell her mother how exciting things were. But behind that, felt Carrie, there
was something else. Barbara was developing a sense of responsibility. She was growing up at last.
Why, it was just a little while ago, the thought, that Barbara was a tiny infant. And now she'll be
graduating from college and getting marriedтАФand . . .
It was thus the most natural thing in the world for her to begin planning the details of Barbara's
wedding. Maybe it would be a morning wedding, she thought. How many people should they invite?
What sort of food should they serve and what arrangements should they make about a reception?
It was these questions that reminded her of the book. The Perfect Hostess would have all the
answers if anything would. But where was The Perfect Hostess hiding?
She began to make another search for it. But The Perfect Hostess seemed to be a canny book. It
was nowhere she looked, not in the parlor nor in the hallway nor in the bookcases, which she explored in
the vain hope that some spasm of neatness had struck her son.
"The little silly must have put it in his own room," she muttered finally. She climbed the stairs to look
there.
It was not on any of the shelves with his games or his other books. But when she lifted his pillow, she
saw it at last. She opened the cover, and her library card stared her in the face. Then the book opened to
the middle, apparently of its own accord, and a dirty thumbprint looked up at her. Obviously, James had
been reading The Perfect Hostess. What on earth had got into him to do it?
At that moment she heard the front door slam, and the next moment he was bouncing up the stairs.
She turned around and faced him sternly. "James, what do you mean by hiding this book? You told me
you put it in the parlor."
He said hoarsely, "Look, Mother," and made a sudden motion with his right hand. Carrie felt her
eyes glazing when suddenly the front door bell rang. That roused her. She closed her eyes and shook her
head. For a moment she had had the queerest feeling.
James said, "Mother тАФplease, mother," and made the same motion again.
This time it was a bellowing voice that saved her. "Vegetables!" it called. The voice's owner had
grown impatient of waiting and had opened the front door. "Vegetable order!"
James was about to make the motion a third time when Carrie acted. Whatever possessed her to do
such a thing she didn't know. It was as if some hidden person had given her a command and she had
misunderstood it. She slapped his face as hard as she could, and James fell back on the bed. She stood
there, horrified at herself, when for a third time the voice called, "Vegetables! Say, lady, I can't stand
here waitin' all day!"
She ran down the stairs and said breathlessly, "Put them down. I'll pay you tomorrow. I have no time