"MD Spenser - Humano Morphs 4 Air Morph One" - читать интересную книгу автора (Spenser M D)

"Listen, son," the mayor said. "That plant doesn't produce poison. It makes milk, for cryin' out loud."
"But Dr. Cumberton told me ..."
The mayor held up his hand to cut me off. He leaned forward and spoke to me in a confidential tone.
"Son, I don't care what that crazy professor told you. But between you and me, I think scientists are all a little nutty. I've never understood a word they said, and I'm not sure they understand what they're saying, either. Now, if you'll excuse me..."
He stood up and showed me out the door.
I tried to call the governor, but I only got through to an assistant. He said someone would call me back, but no one ever did.
I called both of Nebraska's senators and I got nowhere. On one of the calls, I heard the secretary cover the phone with her hand, giggle, and say to someone else, "This is so cute! It's some kid calling who thinks he's got a problem for the senator to solve."
That made me mad. I don't understand why people don't pay more attention to what kids have to say. They might learn something.
I finally decided that the only person who could help, the only person who could stop millions of people from dying, was the president of the United States.
I called information in Washington, D.C., and asked for the number for the White House. When I dialed, I got some man on the phone who said, "White House?" as if it were a question.
I told him I needed to speak to the president.
"I'm sorry, but the president does not take calls from members of the public," the man said in a voice as sweet and gooey as syrup. "If you tell me what you are calling about, your concern will be recorded and tabulated for our records."
"There's a milk factory in Atkinson, Nebraska, that's not really a milk factory but a biological weapons factory," I said. "And it's raining, and the river's rising, and if that stuff gets into the Elkhorn River it will flow into the Mississippi River and millions of people will die."
On the other end of the line, I heard the clicking of a computer keyboard. The man muttered as he typed: "Milk ... weapons ... flow into Mississippi.. . millions ... die," he said. "OK, thank you very much for your comments, sir. I want you to know that the president appreciates your call very much."
Click. The line went dead.
I realized then that no one would help prevent this disaster from happening. Public officials didn't believe me, or else they didn't care.
The mayor was not going to act. Neither was the governor, and neither were our senators, and neither was the president.
If anything was going to be done to avoid this tragedy Ч if anything could be done Ч I had to be the one to do it.
At least I knew the score. It was all up to me.


Chapter Eighteen

Something happened to me in those few days. Something that changed me so much I didn't even feel like the same person.
I got angry. Really, really mad.
A disaster was bearing down on us, and nobody was going to do a darn thing. The mayor worried more about keeping taxes low than about doing the right thing, more about his silly little political career than about saving lives.
And the governor and the senators and the president of the United States all kept themselves so isolated from ordinary people that you couldn't get messages through to them even if the messages were incredibly important.
What good did it do to have those people in those jobs if they weren't going to do anything when it really counted?
White-hot anger burned inside my chest until I couldn't stand it. I was so mad I could hardly see. I slammed my fist into the wall of my room in frustration.
Then the anger drained away.
I saw clearly now that being angry did no good. Pounding my fist into the wall was about as much help as the mayor talking about low taxes, or some idiot at the White House telling me that the president appreciated my call.
Only action would help. But what could I do?
I sat on my bed and tried to think as carefully as I could. I felt willing at that point to do whatever I could, no matter how difficult.
My thoughts were interrupted by a noise in the outside in the distance. It sounded tinny and metallic, like a voice coming from inside a can of sardines, and I could hear it coming closer and closer. The noise blared louder and louder.
Finally, I realized it must be a loudspeaker mounted on top of a car or a van. As it came closer still, I was able at last to make out the words.
"Attention, please! Attention, please!" the voice said, echoing loudly through the street in front of my house. "The Elkhorn is rising. More rain is forecast. All able-bodied citizens are asked to report at once to the riverside to help fill sandbags and build dikes. Please, help save our town. The Elkhorn is rising. The Elkhorn is rising."


Chapter Nineteen

I met Freddy down by the riverside.
I had run down to the Elkhorn at once, of course. Building walls of sandbags to hold back the water didn't seem like a permanent solution to me. But if that was what was needed right now, I was willing to pitch in.
Besides, I couldn't think of anything better at the moment.
Hundreds of people had already arrived at the banks of the river, and more were coming every minute. One thing you could say for the people who lived around Atkinson: They would pull together and fight to save their town.
The river ran rough and angry between its banks, and much higher than usual. I could not believe the force of it. It looked powerful enough to uproot trees and tear down bridges.
And it was dangerously close to spilling over its banks and spreading over the flat lands beyond, flooding everything around Ч including the grounds of the Nacirema Dairy Production and Research Center, and, of course, the lagoon.
The area was buzzing with activity. Fire trucks pulled up, their lights flashing, and so did police cars.
In one area, one dump truck after another pulled up and poured out load after load of sand. People grabbed burlap bags and held them open while other people shoveled them full of sand. People heaved the full sandbags hand-to-hand-to-hand along a line of people that stretched from the mountain of sand the dump trucks had created all the way to the banks of the river.
There, people laid the sandbags one on top of another like bricks to build a big wall to hold the river within its banks.
I picked up a shovel and prepared to do my part. By helping to keep the river out of Atkinson, I thought, maybe I could help save the lives of countless people downstream.