"Nancy Springer - Snickerdoodles" - читать интересную книгу автора (Springer Nancy)

тАЬNo, I donтАЩt mind. Have some gin-gersnaps.тАЭ

He took several, to thank and please her. All of the dark spicy cookies were
marked with hex signs: star hexes, swirl hexes, compass hexes. Come to think of it,
this was odd, that she should have started decorating with hex signs. Blake had seen
his mother spend hours inscribing the distelfink, the luck bird, by hand on the
cookies she gave to ac-quaintances, but he had never known her to use these other
hexes before.

He ate the things. They burned in his mouth and throat, as gingersnaps will.
He noticed that his mother ate several too.
The black cat sat under his window again that night, and was still there in the
morning, and though it welcomed no familiarities it walked to school with him,
stalking at his side like a comrade to combat.

That day things stopped going well.

First thing, during homeroom period, Blake was called to the principalтАЩs
of-fice, where the latter, Mr. Lipschitz, awaited him with compressed lips. Mr.
Lipschitz was a big man, an ex-Marine whose excess weight had not affected his
confidence in himself. Even the jocks were a little afraid of him.

тАЬBlake Bloodsworth. You stand there and tell me exactly what you have done
to Dane Orwig.тАЭ

To his chagrin, Blake could do no bet-ter than to squeak, тАЬNothing!тАЭ

тАЬListen, you punk.тАЭ Mr. Lipschitz moved closer. тАЬIтАЩve known the Orwig
family for a long time.тАЭ The look Mr. Lipschitz was giving Blake quite clearly
expressed the principalтАЩs opinion of BlakeтАЩs lack of such a family. тАЬThey are solid
people, not the sort to get upset about nothing. So when I get a phone call from
them in the middle of the night and they say you did something to Dane, I believe
them.тАЭ

тАЬWhat am I supposed to have done? WhatтАЩs the matter with him?тАЭ

тАЬYou tell me, Bloodsworth!тАЭ

Blake wondered briefly if he had ac-tually done something to Dane besides
worry him. No, that was nonsense. He did not believe in magic, as a future scientist
he could not believe such rot, he had to be logical. One of two things must have
happened: Dane had worried himself sick, or Dane was smarter than Blake had
thought, smart enough to outfox him. Because the Orwigs were indeed not the sort
to get excited, he decided on the latter. Dane had to be a better actor than anyone
knew.

тАЬIs he saying he has AIDS, or what?тАЭ

School administrators in steel towns are not often heavily committed to
mod-ern educational ethics. Therefore it was nothing new when Mr. Lipschitz