"Michaela Roessner - Ah, Sweet Mystery Of Life" - читать интересную книгу автора (Roessner Michaela)

. . from my last name," he finished lamely. He couldn't keep up with the
youngster's verbal flair.
Whitey didn't seem to notice. He had turned back to the drawings with
shining eyes. "How, how . . . ? To conjure these up while I juggled, to
draw so fast, so exactly right . . . it has all the appearances of magic."

Mac shrugged. "No more so than your performance." He blushed. "It just
comes from working at it all the time. I can't remember a time when I
didn't draw. I can't stop myself. Eventually all that practice adds up to
a kind of skill. That's all it is."
The boy smiled shyly and sat down again. "Just so myself. I taught myself
to juggle by trial and error, mostly error. Working away on it over and
over and over. I could show you scars on my feet from trying to catch a
double cigar box back drop with my toes. My whole act too is nothing but
years and years of practice."
He signalled to the barkeep with a raised index finger. The mustached man
nodded and slid him a ginger beer. Whitey caught it deftly and winked at
Mac, the cynical showman sliding back into place behind his eyes. "Not a
bad bargain, eh? A chance to perform, extra publicity for the troupe, and
a free drink and food in the bargain."
But Mac was thinking about what the boy had said before. Years and years?
"Excuse me for asking, but how old are you?"
"Sixteen," the boy replied. "I'll turn seventeen next month. Been juggling
professionally for nigh on five years. My first engagement was for a
churchful of Methodists at the tender age of eleven. The scoundrels didn't
pay me afterwards, so I had to whip around to the back of the church and
reimburse myself from their collection plate."
Mac smiled. "Your proficiency speaks of more experience than five short
years."
Whitey nodded. "Throwing things around while keeping up a line of patter
goes back farther than I can remember. Pater Familia hawked produce on the
street. He owned a ramshackle cart and a broken down old horse called
White Swan. He started taking me around with him to help out when I was
three. My first memories are of lofting oranges, apples and quince."
Mac fondly recalled the costermongers of his childhood; the vendor's
colorful cries and antics drawing attention to their wares. "Housewives
must have been drawn like flies to a cute little tyke with an act like
that," he said. "You must have been quite an asset."
"Yes and no," Whitely said drily. "I'd get bored with the standard cries
that honestly described our merchandise. I was far more attracted by the
rococo alliteration possible with more exotic fare." He began to sing in a
soft falsetto that indicated that his voice had not always been so
ruinously raspy:
"Hey-o, hey-o
Come for our fine fruit-o.
Nothing nicer
Than our fine spices.
You've never seen
The likes of our greens Ч
Basil, borage and burnett