"Энди Макнаб. Немедленная операция (engl) " - читать интересную книгу автора

didn't really know me. One time when he was home on leave, though, he
noticed that my reading was crap and he started teaching me.
I must have been about eight or nine, and I still didn't know my
alphabet. He sat me down and made me go through it. It made me feel special
that he was spending time with me. However, the short lesson wasn't enough
to change me. When I got to secondary school, I had a rearing age of seven.
I came into school late one day and was walking down the corridor.
The housemaster collared me and said, "Where are you going?"
"To my classroom."
"Where are your shoes?"
I looked down at my plimsolls. I didn't understand what he meant.
Then it dawned on me.
"I haven't had any shoes this year."
I had to go and get a form for my parents to sign for grants. I was on
a free bus pass, free school dinners. I even had to stand in a special "free
dinners" queue in the school canteen. It wasn't just me; the main catchment
areas were Brixton and Peckham, so a lot of kids were in the same boat. But
all the same, it was one particular gang I wanted out of.
The thieving got stupid. We started by nicking pens from Woolworth's
for our own use, and soon we were stealing stuff for selling. We walked past
a secondhand furniture shop with a few new bits and pieces among the display
on the pavement. A small, round wine table caught my eye; we ran past and
picked it up, then went down to another secondhand place and sold it for ten
bob. We spent it straightaway in Ross's car on cheese rolls and frothy
coffees.
I stole money one day off my aunty Nell's neighbor. I took the pound
note to the sweet shop, and my aunty Nell was behind me without me knowing.
She didn't say anything at the time but phoned up the school.
The headmistress summoned me to her office and said, "What were you
doing with all that money?"
"I found this old mirror," I said. "I got some varnish, done it up,
sold it, and got two quid for it."
I got away with it. I thought I was so clever; everybody else was a mug
for letting me steal from them.
Because my mum and dad were working hard, I had a lot of freedom.
I repaid them by being a complete shit.
My mum had broken her leg and was sitting in the front room one night
watching Peyton Place. She said, "Don't eat the last orange, Andy, I'm going
to have it for my dinner later on."
I knew she couldn't get up and hit me, so I picked it up and started
peeling it, throwing the peel out of the window. My mum went ApeShit, but I
ate the orange in front of her, then ran out of the house when my father
appeared. I slipped on the orange peel and broke my wrist.
After school, and sometimes instead of school, we used to go thieving
in places like Dulwich Village and Penge, areas that we reckoned deserved to
be robbed.
We'd saunter past people sitting on park benches, grab their handbags,
and do a runner. Or they'd be leaving their cars unattended for a minute or
two while they bought their children an ice cream; we'd lean through the
window and help ourselves to their belongings. If a p car was hired or had a