"Gene Wolfe - The Waif" - читать интересную книгу автора (Wolfe Gene)

After that it seemed clear that the other boy had gone. Thinking about it, Bin decided that the
other boy had slipped over to the side of the bed and slid over the edge, and was hiding
under it. He took off his coat and hung it on the peg, pulled off his boots, stood them at the
foot of his bed the way Gam liked, and got under the covers. The other boy was in there, too,
small and thin and very cold. He huddled against Bin for warmth, and Bin found that he was
no longer little, as he had been all his life. He was someone large and warm, someone
strong, generous, and protecting. It felt good, but it felt serious too.

The other boy was still there when he got out of bed in the morning He washed the way he
always did, trying not to look, got dressed, and went outside to cut a twig to clean his teeth
the way you were supposed to.

When he came back in, Gam said, "Cold out?"

"Pretty cold."
"There was bread left last night. It was going to be our breakfast."

"I'll be late for school," Bin told her.

"You ate it, didn't you, Bin? You got up in the night and ate it."

"Yes'm."

"Don't cry. It wasn't no sin."

Gam held him for a minute. She was warm and smelled bad and he loved her.

"There's soup left for me, and I'll bake more bread, if I can get salt. It be spring real soon
now, Bin, and things will be easier."

Gam had been right, Bin decided as he walked to school. Yes, it was still cold. Yes, there
was still snow on the ground, a lot of it. But there w something new in the air, something that
made him think of the other boy, a promise not in words. He had straightened up his bed
because Gam had made him, and it had seemed like there was nothing in that bed, nothing
at all. Or only the promise.
The other boy could whistle like a saw-whet. He himself could whistle like a wren, and he did
as he walked to school, then fell silent as he clattered up the rickety wooden steps and
shuffled into the long gloomy room with sheets of scarred wood for walls.

When the schoolmaster arrived, Bin rose with the others to greet him. "Good morning,
Niman Pryderi!"

"Good morning, class. I trust you had a good holiday?"

Several nodded.

"You did not go to see Niman Joel burned?"

Bin, who had, said nothing.
"What about you, Shula?"