"Arkady & Boris Strugatsky - Hard to be a god" - читать интересную книгу автора (Strugatski Arkady)

with a
worried expression. "I dropped a cup--and suddenly I heard steps
in the
corridor. Probably old maid Katja; she's on duty today. I had to jump
out of
the window into a flower bed. Guess what kind of flowers grow
there,
Toshka?"
Anton frowned.
"Under your window? I don't know, what kind?"
"Pretty tough flowers. No wind can rock them, no storm can
break them.
You can jump around in them and trample on them and it won't harm
them."
"That's interesting," said Anton in a serious voice. He
remembered that
he also had a flower bed under his window, with flowers that were
neither
rocked by wind nor broken by storm. But actually he had never
paid any
attention to it.
Anka stopped and waited until Anton had caught up with her.
She held
her hand out to him. It was full of strawberries. With the tip
of his
fingers, Anton seized exactly three berries.
"Go ahead. Take some more," said Anka.
"No, thanks," said Anton. "I like to pick them myself.-- But
listen,

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Arkadi and Boris Strugatski. Hard to be a god

Anka, it must be easy to get along with old maid Katja, isn't it?"
"That all depends," said Anka. "Just imagine somebody telling
you every
night how dirty and dusty your feet are--"
She fell silent. It was good to walk with her through the
woods,
shoulder to shoulder, and their bare elbows touching now and then.
And it
felt good to look at her--how pretty she was, so nimble, so
friendly--and
how big and gray her eyes were, and what dark lashes she had.
"Sure," said Anton, and stretched out his hand to grasp a
spider web
that glistened in the sun. "Her feet wouldn't get dirty. If somebody
carried
you through every puddle, then you wouldn't get dirty either."
"Who carries her?"