"Aaron Wolfe - Invasion" - читать интересную книгу автора (Wolfe Aaron)

snow тАФeach of them four inches in front of the otherтАФ parallel to a second
set of holes two feet to the right of the first line. The marks were all
identical, as if they had been stamped in the snow by a man's walking
cane. Equidistant from both sets of holes and better than a yard in front of
them, there was a pair of similar indentations, although each of these was
as large across as the bottom of a standard water glass. It looked like this:
Although I was rather well acquainted with the woods, I had never seen
anything remotely like it before. If all of that were indeed a single print,
the animal was quite large, certainly not a bird of any kind.

"What is it, Dad?" Toby asked. He squinted up at me, his eyelashes
frosted with snowflakes, his nose like a berry, the bill of his red cap fringed
with ice. He was certain that I would have the answer.

I said, "I don't really know."

For an instant his disappointment in me was all too evidentтАФthen he
quickly covered his feelings, changed his expression, broke into a tentative
smile. That made me sad, for it was an indication that he understood Dad
was still on shaky psychological ground and needed all the love and
affection he could get. Otherwise, Dad might end up in the hospital again,
staring at the walls and not talking and not at all like Dad should be.

"Can we follow it?" Toby asked.

"We ought to be getting home."

"Ahh, heck."

"Your nose is as red as a stoplight."

"I'm tough," he said.

"I know you are. I wouldn't argue about that. But your mother is
expecting us about now." I pointed to the rapidly vanishing set of prints.
"Besides, the wind and snow will have these filled in within a few minutes.
We couldn't track them very far."

He glanced back toward the trees, squinted his eyes as if he were trying
to dispel the shadows under the pine boughs. "Then, whatever it was, it
went by here just before we came out of the woods, huh Dad?"

That was true enough, although I hadn't thought about it. "When the
storm's finished, maybe we can come out and look for new tracks," I said.

"On snowshoes?"
"Have to use snowshoes if the snow's over your head."

"Great!" he said, dismissing the mystery that suddenly. If we could all
remain small boys in at least one tiny corner of our minds, we would never