"Kevin O'Donnel Jr. - The Journeys of McGill Feighan 04] - Cliffs" - читать интересную книгу автора (O'Donnell Jr Kevin)

"Thank you." A sudden odd congestion in his throat made it difficult to
say anything more.
"You're welcome. And now that that's settled, when are you going to
have me over? Been a long time since I had any of Oscar's alleged home
cooking."
Feighan squirmed. "Well, Walking Mule, I'm not in the penthouse any
moreтАФ"
"You sold it?"
"Well, no, it's, ahтАж" He could not meet his old friend's steady gaze.
"What it is, Walking Mule, is I'm not quite ready to go back."
 "Greystein?"
Rolling back on the pillows, Feighan closed his eyes. "Yeah." All
Greystein's stuff was still in his room. He knew he should have cleaned it
out right away, but that had proved impossible. He had gone in once,
intending to get it over with, but just could not touch a thing. He had turned
around, closed the door, and walked outтАФand had not been back since. But
how could he explain that to Walking Mule?
The director steepled his fingers and looked over their tips. "You wouldn't
be punishing yourself, would you?"
"No, of course not."
"Then I reckon you're depriving yourself of a lot of happy memories on
the grounds you might get stung by the melancholy ones."
He shook his head. "No." Happy memories? The storm wracked the beach,
flailing him with winds and cold rain. His crazed friend loomed above him
demonic, deadly. Blood ran down Feighan's arm, and still he held off, hopingтАФ
"No, but I do feel guiltyтАФstillтАФbecause if I hadn'tтАФ"
"Somebody else would have, and not with love, either." Walking Mule
sighed. "McGill, what I'm trying to say here is that all the wishing and
moping in the world won't change the past a bit. If you'd stayed out of the
whole thing, you'd still be torturing yourself, only you'd be saying, If I'd
just gone after him myself, things would have been different.' Well, they
wouldn't have been. They'd have been just the same, no matter what. The
difference is, the way things are, you know Greystein got every human
consideration possible, and then some."
Ball bearings bulleted across the sand. Greystein folded. Rain drained
through the hole in his chest and gushed out the other side pink. "Did he?" he
said quietly.
"McGill, you figure ol' Greystein would have wanted you to behave like
this? I recollect he did a few things he wasn't proud of, but he just went
ahead and made the best of what came next. Now, I ain't recommending
that you model your behavior after his, but I do think maybe you could
learn a little something from it."
There was nothing he could say in reply. "I suppose you're right."
 "I am right, and you know it."
"All right, Walking Mule, you're right, and I know it."
"You move back into that penthouse. It's gonna feel mighty strange the
first hour you're there, and you might even have to indulge in a little manly
weeping when you clean Greystein's things out of his room, but I promise
you, it'll wear off, and before you know itтАФ"
"It'll be like Greystein never lived there?" he said bitterly.