"Mike Resnick & Martin Greenberg - Christmas Ghosts" - читать интересную книгу автора (Resnick Mike)

Of course, it wasn't Christmas like here, and there wasn't any tree, and there certainly wasn't much in the
way of presentsтАФI got more than anyone elseтАФbut it was happy enough, until she came to the window
of the dining room. The place we stayed, it was a big houseтАФa friend of my dad's owned it, but I don't
remember him well. It had lots of servants and lots of land, and huge rooms. I ran about in it for days; I
thought I could get lost.

Well, I saw her at the windows of the house while we were eating. She was thin and scrawny, with
sun-darkened skin and these wide, night eyes that seemed to open up forever. Her fingers were bony; I
remember that because she lifted her hand and touched the glass as if she wanted to reach through it. I
called out to her, but she was gone, and I grabbed my mother's hand and dragged her from the table to
the window.

"It's nothing," my mother said, and drew me back. But I knew better.

"She's hungry," I said. "It's Christmas." As if those two words meant something, meant anything. I didn't
understand the glance that my mother gave my father, but he shook his head: No.

They didn't have doorbells hi that huge, old house; they had something that you banged instead, hard. So
I knew it was her at the door when I heard that grand brass gong start to hum. I slipped out from under
my mother and ran toward the door. Because I knew she was hungry, you see, and it was Christmas,
and of course we would feed her.

The servants didn't see it that way though. Neither did our host. To them, she was just another one of the
countless beggars that came at inopportune moments. And I even understand it, sometimesтАФyou don't
see me giving away all my hard-earned money to every little street urchin with a hand held out.

But whether I understand it or not doesn't matter.

Because I feel it with a five-year-old's shock and anger, after all these years. They drove her away. I
didn't understand what she was saying, of course, because I didn't know any Spanish back then. But I
know now, because I learned enough to try to speak to her later.

I'm hungry. Please. I'm hungry. Like a prayer or a litany. She had a thin, raspy voice: she coughed once
or twice although it wasn't cold. I could see her ribs. I could see the manservant shove her, hard, from
the open door. Well, I was five and I wasn't too smart then, so I picked up the nearest thing and started
hitting him with it and hollering a lot. It was an umbrella, and a five-year-old can't damage more than
pride.

And I just kept shouting, "It's Christmas! It's Christmas!" until my mother came to take me away. My
father was furious. The host was embarrassed, and made a show of remonstrating the servants, who
were only doing their job.

I went back to the table like a mutinous prisoner, and I was stubborn enough that I didn't eat a thing. Not
that night, anyway. My mother was angry at my father, that much I remember. Dinner kind of lost its
momentum that night because of the tantrum of one half-spoiled boy.

And Christmas lost its magic for that boy.

Maybe it wouldn't have, had she stayed away. Maybe the toys and the food and the lights on the trees
would have sucked him right back into family comfort. Maybe Santa's lap and Santa's ear would have