"Laura Resnick - Under a Sky More Fiercely Blue" - читать интересную книгу автора (Resnick Laura)

I could see that he was no longer a young man, and he obviously wasn't
used to hiking through rough terrain, but he didn't complain or ask to rest.
Nevertheless, out of respect, I slowed my pace when I saw he was tiring. We
stayed far from the roads, of which there were very few anyhow, and
encountered no soldiers. When the sky began to darken, we decided to find
shelter. Whenever I travelled by myself, I slept outside and ate what my
mother had packed for me, since no one would want to shelter or feed a strange
boy from another village. But sheltering a man like Luciano would obviously be
another matter.
"We will stay the night with _contadini_," I said. "They will give us
something to eat."
"Peasants? Do you think they'll _have_ anything to eat?"
"For you, they will find something," I said with confidence.
Just as night descended, we stopped at a stone dwelling perched atop a
parched and stony hill. As we approached it, the door opened and a man greeted
us with a _lupara_. My blood ran cold as I looked down its barrel and thought
about how a simple movement of his finger could rip open my flesh. But the
man, whose name was Piersanto, put aside the _lupara_ when Luciano spoke. His
words revealed nothing, except that we needed food and shelter and could pay
for it. But his tone, his proud stance, his aura of command... Well, even in




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the dark, this miserable _contadino_ could see what kind of man Luciano was.
He welcomed us into his home then, silent, unsmiling, respectful, a little
afraid.
Piersanto, his pregnant wife, their three surviving children, a donkey,
a goat, and four scrawny chickens all lived together in one dark room with a
dirt floor.
"Jesus," Luciano muttered. "Jesus, I'd forgotten." I looked at him
questioningly, but he only repeated, "I'd forgotten."
The bread was brown, coarse, and dry, and the _minestrone_ was thin and
strangely bitter. And the oranges, which I had grown to hate anyhow, were
bitter, too, as if no sweetness could enter Piersanto's home. Still hungry, I
curled up in a smelly corner, with Luciano's jacket thrown over me, and fell
asleep on the hard ground as he enjoyed a cigarette with our host. When we
departed before dawn, Luciano left behind a yellow silk kerchief with a black
"L" on it, as a mark of his favor. Who knew what respect, what advantage,
Piersanto or his sons might someday gain through ownership of this souvenir?
We encountered two priests that day, and many people saw us enter
Villalba that night and approach Vizzini's home, but it didn't worry either of
us. Although we didn't wish to flaunt our presence or be seen by soldiers, we
had no fear of betrayal. Even those who hated Vizzini would cut out their own
tongues before they would reveal Sicilian matters to outsiders, strangers,
foreigners.
We were spotted by Vizzini's men long before we reached the gates of
his house, and the first man to recognize Luciano couldn't have looked more
surprised if he'd seen the Blessed Virgin standing there in the chilly night