"Mike Resnick - Song of a Dry River" - читать интересную книгу автора (Resnick Mike)

Can there be any doubt why He is the god that we fear and worship?
****

We emigrated from Kenya to the terraformed world of Kirinyaga to create a Kikuyu Utopia, a society
that mirrored the simple, pastoral life we led before our culture was corrupted by the coming of the
EuropeansтАФand for the most part we have been successful.

Still, there are times when things seem to be coming apart, and it takes everything I can do in my
capacity as themundumugu тАФthe witch doctorтАФto keep Kirinyaga functioning as it was meant to
function.

On the morning of the day that I brought the curse down upon my people, my youthful assistant, Ndemi,
had overslept again and once more forgot to feed my chickens. Then I had to make the long trek to a
neighboring village, where in direct contradition of my orders they had begun planting maize in an
overused field which I had decreed must lay fallow until after the long rains. I explained once more that
the land needed time to rest and regain its strength, but as I left I had the distinct feeling that I would be
back again the next week or the next month, giving them the same lecture.

On the way home, I had to settle a dispute between Ngona, who had diverted a small stream to irrigate
his fields, and Kamaki, who claimed that his crops were suffering because the stream no longer carried
enough water to his crops. This was the eleventh time someone had tried to divert the stream, and the
eleventh time I had angrily explained that the water belonged to the entire village.

Then Sabella, who was to pay me two fat, healthy goats for presiding at his son's wedding, delivered
two animals that were so underfed and scrawny that they didn't even look like goats. Ordinarily I might
not have lost my temper, but I was tired of people keeping their best animals and trying to pay me with
cattle and goats that looked half-dead, so I threatened to anull the marriage unless he replaced them.

Finally, Ndemi's mother told me that he was spending too much time studying to be amundumugu , and
that she needed him to tend his family's cattle, this in spite of the fact that he has three strong, healthy
brothers.

A number of the women stared at me in amusement as I walked through the village, as if they knew
some secret of which I was ignorant, and by the time I reached the long, winding path that led to the hill
where I lived, I was annoyed withall of my people. I craved only the solitude of myboma , and a gourd
ofpombe to wash away the dust of the day.

When I heard the sound of a human voice singing on my hill, I assumed that it was Ndemi, carrying out
his afternoon chores. But as I approached more closely, I realized that the voice was that of a woman.

I shaded my eyes from the sun and peered ahead, and there, halfway up my hill, a wrinkled old woman
was busily erecting a hut beneath an acacia tree, weaving the twigs and branches together to form the
walls, and singing to herself. I blinked in surprise, for it is well known that no one else may live on the
mundumugu's hill.

The woman saw me and smiled. тАЬJambo, Koriba,тАЭ she greeted me as if nothing was amiss. тАЬIs it not a
beautiful day?тАЭ

I saw now that she was Mumbi, the mother of Koinnage, who was the paramount chief of the village.
тАЬWhat are you doing here?тАЭ I demanded as I approached her.