"Andre Norton - Here Abide Monsters" - читать интересную книгу автора (Norton Andre)

"What's out there, Rufus? Something out of a UFO?"
The cat's attention was manifestly so engaged that it made Nick a little U
neasy. Then suddenly Rufus yawned widely, relaxed. Whatever had intrigued
him so was gone.
He returned to the counter. There was a paperback turned upside down open
, to mark the reader's place. Nick turned it around to read the title-Our
Haunted Planet- by somebody named Keel. And there was another book pushe
d to one side-More "Things" by Sanderson. That one he knew, he had read i
t himself, urged by Ham to do so.
Ham Hodges had a whole library of that type of reading, starting with Cha
rles Fort's collections of unexplainable happenings. They made you wonder
all right. And Ham had a good reason for wondering-his cousin and the Co
mmer Cut-Off.
"Got you a loaf of whole wheat, a raisin one, and a half-dozen rolls," Ham
announced coming into sight again, "Amy says give the rolls a warm-up, they
're a day old."
"They could be two weeks old and still be good if they're hers. I'm lucky s
he can spare so much a day ahead of baking."
"Well, we had some company who was going to come and didn't, so she was ov
erstocked in the bread box this week. Funny about that." Ham thudded the b
read and rolls down in a plastic bag before Nick. "This fellow called up l
ast Friday-just a week ago. He said he was from the Hasentine Institute an
d they were gathering material about the Cut-Off. Wanted to come out here
and ask around about Ted and Ben-" Ham paused. "Hard to think of it being
all this time since they disappeared. At least it scared people off from t
rying that road for a while. Only somebody's taken the Wilson place for th
e summer and, since the new highway to Shockton went in, the Cut-Off's the
only road to reach that side of the lake now. So it's getting traveled again.
"Anyway, this fellow said he was doing research and asked about a place to
stay. We've that cabin, so we said we'd put him up. Only he never showed
up or called again."
"How long has it been, Ham?"
"Since July 24, 1955. Why, you and your Dad and Mom were up here at the lak
e that summer. I remember your Dad was out with the search party. I was jus
t home from Korea, right out of the army. We sure gave that land a going ov
er-Ted was a good guy and he knew the country like it was his own backyard.
Ben was no fool either, he'd buddied with Ted in the Navy and came up for
some fishing. No, they just disappeared like all the others-that Caldwell a
nd his wife and two kids in 1946, and before them there were Latimer and Jo
hnson. I made it my business to look it all up. Got out my notebook and rea
d it through this week so I could answer any questions the fellow from the
Institute might want to ask. You know, going as far back as the newspapers
had any mention of it, there's been about thirty people just up and disappe
ared on the Cut-Off. Even before it was ever a road, they disappeared in th
at section. It's like that Bermuda Triangle thing. Only not so often as to
get people all excited about it. There's always a good long stretch of time
between disappearances so people sort of forget in between. But they shoul
d never have opened up that road again. Jim Samuels tried to talk the new p
eople out of it. Heard they didn't quite laugh in his face, but I guess the
y took it as some superstition us local yokels believe in."