"Robert Charles Wilson - Julian- A Christmas Story" - читать интересную книгу автора (Wilson Robert Charles)

cinnamon buns. The sweet, yeasty smell filled the northwest end of town like an intoxicating fog, for there
was no wind to carry it away. The day was dawning blue and still.

Signs of Christmas were everywhereтАФas they ought to be, for today was the Eve of that universal
holidayтАФbut so was evidence of the conscription drive. The Reservists were already awake, passing like
shadows in their scruffy uniforms, and a crowd of them had gathered by the hardware store. They had
hung out a faded flag and posted a sign, which I could not read, because I was determined to keep a
distance between myself and the soldiers; but I knew a recruiting-post when I saw one. I did not doubt
that the main ways in and out of town had been put under close observation.

I took a back way to the Estate, the same riverside road Julian and I had traveled the night before.
Because of the lack of wind, our tracks were undisturbed. We were the only ones who had recently
passed this way. Rapture was revisiting his own hoof-prints.

Close to the Estate, but still within a concealing grove of pines, I lashed the horse to a sapling and
proceeded on foot.

The Duncan-Crowley Estate was not fenced, for there was no real demarcation of its boundaries;
under the Leasing System, everything in Williams Ford was owned (in the legal sense) by the two great
families. I approached from the western side, which was half-wooded and used by the aristos for casual
riding and hunting. This morning the copse was not inhabited, and I saw no one until I had passed the
snow-mounded hedges which marked the beginning of the formal gardens. Here, in summer, apple and
cherry trees blossomed and produced fruit; flowerbeds gave forth symphonies of color and scent; bees
nursed in languid ecstasies. But now it was barren, the paths quilted with snow, and there was no one
visible but the senior groundskeeper, sweeping the wooden portico of the nearest of the Estate's several
Great Houses.

The Houses were dressed for Christmas. Christmas was a grander event at the Estate than in the
town proper, as might be expected. The winter population of the Duncan-Crowley Estate was not as
large as its summer population, but there was still a number of both families, plus whatever cousins and
hangers-on had elected to hibernate over the cold season. Sam Godwin, as Julian's tutor, was not
permitted to sleep in either of the two most luxurious buildings, but bunked among the elite staff in a
white-pillared house that would have passed for a mansion anywhere but here. This was where he had
conducted classes for Julian and me, and I knew the building intimately. It, too, was dressed for
Christmas; a holly wreath hung on the door; pine boughs were suspended over the lintels; a Banner of the
Cross dangled from the eaves. The door was not locked, and I let myself in quietly.

It was still early in the morning, at least as the aristos and their elite helpers calculated time. The tiled
entranceway was empty and still. I went straight for the rooms where Sam Godwin slept and conducted
his classes, down an oaken corridor lit only by the dawn filtering through a window at the long end. The
floor was carpeted and gave no sound, though my shoes left damp footprints behind me.

At Sam's particular door, I was confronted with a dilemma. I could not knock, for fear of alerting
others. My mission as I saw it was to deliver Julian's message as discreetly as possible. But neither could
I walk in on a sleeping manтАФcould I?

I tried the handle of the door. It moved freely. I opened the door a fraction of an inch, meaning to
whisper, "Sam?"тАФand give him some warning.

But I could hear Sam's voice, low and muttering, as if he were talking to himself. I listened more