"Robert Reed - To Church With Mr. Multhiford" - читать интересную книгу автора (Reed Robert)

time for early service."

Shit, it was Sunday morning, wasn't it? Glancing at my watch, I saw that it was
past midnight. Even if I escaped now, I couldn't beat my one A.M. curfew.

But there wasn't any escape. Side by side, we stepped from the corn, the air
turning cool and dry. I could breathe easier. Sounds felt sharper. Multhiford
broke open his shotgun, two empty shells flying. He hadn't reloaded after firing
at the moon, and realizing it made me feel even more defeated. Moonlight showed
me that face that I remembered, the smile too big and happy, and his baling-wire
body was dressed in ordinary farmer's clothes -- jeans and comfortable boots and
a simple shirt. "My truck's down this way." We walked together, him carrying his
shotgun broken open, and after a little while he said, "It's a perfect night."

I said nothing.

"Perfect, perfect, perfect," he was saying.

I didn't offer any opinions.

"They'll come tonight, John." He took a deep breath, then said, "In a little
while. Soon."

I looked at my feet, watching them move on the graveled road.

"Who's coming, John? Who do I mean?"

We reached his pickup -- a big new Chevy; a rich farmer's toy -- and I heard
myself answering him. "Aliens in a flying hubcap," I said.

Multhiford looked at me, and he laughed, telling me, "How much you know is so
close to zero, son." He shook his narrow head, enjoying himself. "So close we
might as well call it nothing. And how do you like that ?"

Here's a certain book in the Pelican City library. I've never checked it out; I
sneak it into a back corner, reading it when no one will notice. It's about crop
circles, and it's got pictures from around the world. Half a dozen pictures show
local circles, always from the air and mostly on Multhiford's land. I won't
admit it to anyone, but I like looking at them. I don't believe in UFOs. Aliens
have better places to be, I think. It's just that the circles and the other
marks are kind of pretty, obvious and orderly against the bright green crops.
I've even secretly admired Multhiford for his skill, working by moonlight, or
less light, working by himself and making Pelican County into the crop circle
capital of this hemisphere.
"Investigators" come through every spring and summer -- wrong-looking,
wrong-sounding people from California and the shadows of Stonehenge. It's not
enough to say that we watch them with a certain suspicion. But to his credit,
Multhiford won't have anything to do with them. I know this: If he was making
circles and acting as a tour guide, then I think something bad would have
happened to him long ago. If you know what I mean. I mean, if you keep your