"Arthur Tofte - Walls within Walls" - читать интересную книгу автора (Tofte Arthur)

It seemed that walls were all we saw of our world. They held us in. They
also held out the strangeness of the other world, the outside world.

Our father had tried one day to explain it to us. He said we'd
understand it better as we grew older. Ralf and I had often discussed what
he had told us, trying to get meaning out of his words.

We here, he said, were fortunate. Our area, like the whole country, had
been completely laid waste in the nuclear-radiation war of seventy years
before. Most of the cities had no survivors. Here, although the city itself
had been destroyed, about one per cent of the population of two million
had lived through it.

In struggling up from the great disaster, a few strong leaders had
secluded themselves to work out a plan for survival. It was a hard, rigid,
tight plan they developed. But it seemed to work.

First rule had been that all offspring of the survivors who showed signs
of being affected by the radiation would be killed. The only hope for the
race, the new rulers had decreed, was to keep alive only those who were
defect-free.

The few pieces of old buildings still standing were pulled down. The
whole metropolitan area was then brought to the same level with huge
earth-moving equipment saved from the old city. Over the central part of
this was laid a thick layer of soil carried in from outside the city. On top of
the soil-covered area was built Resurrection City as it now existed.

Each family, after proving it was free of radiation effects, was given a
plot of land. Also, because there were still vast quantities of brick and
building stone to be disposed of, each family was given a quota for
building a home and a high wall around it. Crews erected the homes. The
individual head of the family was responsible for using the remainder of
his alloted brick for the walls. The more bricks he used on his wall, the
more space he had within the wall.

All this our father had tried to explain to us. It seemed to make sense
when he told it to us. Afterward, Ralf and I admitted to each other that it
was not clear at all.

We had made almost the complete circuit of the yard when our father
came out of the house and motioned for us to come back in.

Our mother was in the front room, weeping softly. Father, we could see,
was equally disturbed but trying not to show his feelings to us.

"The time has come," he said to Ralf as he put his hand on my twin's
tousled fair head.