"James Van Pelt - O Tannebaum" - читать интересную книгу автора (Pelt James Van)

Humphrey, but I followed Humphrey across the cratered ground to the broken lines
of barb wire in the middle.
Humphrey didn't even pause at the wire. He stepped over it, his hand out, "Merry
Christmas, old chap," he said.
"Frohliche Weihnachten mein freund," the German said back, and they shook hands.
I stood behind them, arms wrapped around me against the cold. The moon, bright
as any flare. All the way up and down the lines, as far as I could see, men were
tentatively climbing out of trenches, walking toward the enemy, embracing, pulling
out pictures to show each other.
Humphrey handed me a flask, his eyes shiny, his face alive with merriment. "It's
Shnapps," he said. "It's Christmas Schnapps."
I fell asleep that night in the trenches, and I woke up the next day, a year later on
Christmas in a hospital in London. Called Gina on the telephone. Told her I was a
friend of Humphrey's. Found out he had died in January, but she was so glad to hear
from me. Asked me if I was the "Yank" Humphrey had written to her about.
We talked a long time. It was another good day. In the hospital they brought in big
baked hams. Cut them up in the wards. Even the sickest of the sick. Even the
amputees and fellows who'd been gassed in the battle who couldn't hardly breathe,
were happy. I made sure they sang "O Christmas Tree," because I knew I'd made a
friend. For the first time in my life I could talk to one person from day to day. Gina
told me to keep in touch. With the telephone, I could. No matter where I was on
Christmas day, I could call her.
So when I woke this morning, the man in the cot next to me offered me a smoke. A
fellow from the kitchen told me that they'd be serving turkey and all the fixings in a
couple of hours. Some kids from the high school were coming over later to carol
with us. I asked him where the phone was. Yesterday--last year--Gina wasn't doing
so good. Her heart, she said, was weak. "But you're sounding good," she had said.
"Yeah," I said. "The year's have treated me well."
I made the call. She's in a nursing home in San Francisco. Moved to America in '57.
I was afraid. The phone rang for a long time. Not many nurses on Christmas
morning, and then someone answered.
I asked for Gina. Gina who, she said, and I told her. "I'm new here," she said. "I
don't know that patient." Papers shuffled around on her end. She put the phone
down, and someone mumbled to her in the background.
You've got to understand. I've never known anyone for more than a day. A day is all
I get. I don't understand why. When the morning comes, I wake up, and it's
Christmas. Sometimes I won't sleep for a couple of days, but everyone sleeps. It
can't be avoided. Maybe I vanish in the night. Maybe a year later I appear when no
one is looking. Who can tell? I always wake up in a place where a stranger could go
unremarked, an army, a hospital, a festival, a flop house and soup kitchen like this
one. I don't know if it's a curse--there's lots I don't know--but all I get is a day a
year, and I'm a stranger that no one knows.
Then Gina came on the line. It was her voice. I've heard her grow old. "Hello, old
friend," she said. "Merry Christmas."
"Merry Christmas," I said.
Each year she's been there. Each year. She's ninety-six now. I'm twenty-one today.
It's my birthday. In three-hundred and sixty-five years for you, I'll be twenty-two,
but I want to tell you something. It's important I think.
I hear rumors of bad things in the world. I hear about wars; I've even seen some, but
in my experience, human beings are good. They're generous. They share with