"Gene Wolfe - Bea and Her Bird Brother" - читать интересную книгу автора (Wolfe Gene)

But I got her to eat, and she felt a little better afterward, a little stronger, and I got her to climb up a
ways. Not far, but we were off the ground, and that was safer."

Bea nodded, wondering whether he had always been--like this. Was this what he had been hiding so
long, this irrationality?

"Pretty soon we climbed way, way up, the two of us. We built a nest up there--a better one than the
flying ones did, because I knew more about building. I had more patience, too. By then I knew she was
going to lay. She'd told me, part by signs. But part by song, because I'd got to where I could understand
a little, and even sing back a bit myself. It always made her laugh, but I didn't mind."

"Elsie used to laugh at you, too," Bea said. "That was the only time I felt sorry for you. You were so
good, so competent. But you'd try to explain baseball to her, and you never seemed to understand that
she didn't want to know."

"I never did understand people who don't want to know, Bea." The distant flute was humble now,
apologetic for a fault found only in the instruments of music. "Now, well, maybe you don't want to know
this. About Ava and me. But it's about you, too, so you ought to."

"And it's been tearing you up for years, keeping it in." Bea sighed, and wondered whether her flowers
were starting to droop, just as she was. "So go on. Please go on. I want to know." How long would the
knowledge that her father had died insane tear her up?

"She laid, and it was two eggs like I knew it would be. When the women laid, it was always two. I asked
about it one time and she showed me her breasts--one child for each nipple is what she said, and I still
think it makes more sense than what we do."

For the rest of her life, probably.

"The eggs are pretty. Not just white or brown like hens' eggs. Big blue eggs with white and gold
speckles. The way they usually do is for the woman to warm them while the man gets something to eat,
and him to while she does. But I was better at finding food than Ava was, and a better climber, so I'd get
enough for us both and bring it back to the nest, and we'd eat it there together."

Trying to be brave, Bea nodded. "That's nice."

"It was. It sure was. I think back, and...."

She did not know what to say.

"And I wish all over again that they'd never ended. Well, they did. Not because Ava died--she didn't, not
then--but because her eggs hatched. It's just about always a boy and a girl. Have I said that?"

"No, Dad. Not till now."

"Not always, but nearly. That's what it was for us. The girl...."

"Oh, Dad!" She squeezed his hand.

"The boy had wings. At first I thought he wasn't mine. He was just a little bit of a thing. You both were.