"Howard Waldrop - Us" - читать интересную книгу автора (Waldrop Howard)

section, then he looked at Charles Jr.
тАЬHowтАЩd you like to take a little ride?тАЭ he asked.
тАЬYippee yahoo!тАЭ
тАЬAs many times as youтАЩve seen things I built turn into firecrackers?тАЭ
тАЬYou didnтАЩt build this one. The Germans did.тАЭ
тАЬAt White Sands, theyтАЩre maybe kinda going to send up mice and monkeys.тАЭ
тАЬPhooey!тАЭ said Charles Jr.
тАЬDouble phooey,тАЭ said Uncle Robert.


On March 13, 1946, Charles Jr. went for a little ride. They hadnтАЩt told his mother or
father, and no one else either, until after the fact.
The front section separated and fired some JATO units as retro rockets, and
the surplus cargo parachute opened, and the thing came down sixty-eight miles
away, within two miles of where Goddard and the crew were waiting.
The trucks drove up. Charles Jr. was sitting in the shade of the parachute
can-opy.
Uncle Robert jumped out of the truck and ran up to him.
There was a small cut above his eye.
тАЬShe rides a little rough,тАЭ he said, and smiled.


On July 4th, 1963, The Great Speckled Bird came down on the surface of the
Moon, backwards, rockets firing, and settled to the lunar dust.
The commander was Col. Chuck Yeager. The pilot was Lt. Col. David
Simons, M.D., the navigator was Maj. Joe Kittinger, and the civilian mission
specialist was Charles Lindbergh, Jr.
After a few hours of yammer and instrument readings that were hunky-dory,
Charles Jr. suited up in one of the big bulky space suits the navy had built for them.
Yeager checked him over, then said, тАЬYouтАЩre on, kid.тАЭ
It was being carried live by all the radios in the world; theyтАЩd have to wait till
they got back to see it, as both Early Bird and Echo III satellites werenтАЩt
cooper-ating.
The big ladder came out from the ship and Charles Jr. backed down it, unable
to see well behind him because of the size of the oxygen equipment on the suit.
He paused just as he got to the bottom, looked up at Kittinger who was
filming him with an Eymo camera (besides the official one on the side of the airlock),
and stretched his foot out, inches above the dust.
He swung one foot out in a small circle, almost touching, then the other.
He said, тАЬHereтАЩs one for Mom, and one for Pop, and one for Uncle Robert
andтАЭ тАФhe jumped onto the ground with both feetтАФтАЭone for the good old USA.тАЭ

****

TWO: тАЬCALL ME CHUCKYтАЭ

He could say heтАЩd been around since Pluto was a pup. Disney made the first cartoon
with MickeyтАЩs mutt a few months after he was born.
When he was twenty months old he was kidnapped. It was the most
sensational story of the decade. After much police activity and several copycat