JК
Bag of Bones :: Кинг Стивен
Страница: 100 из 425She’s nothing but a bag of- A shudder twisted through me at that. It was a strong one, as if someone were spinning a wire in my flesh. I didn’t want her to notice it—what a way to start a summer day, by revolting a guy so badly that he stood there shaking and grimacing in front of you—so I raised my hand and waved. I tried to smile, as well. Hello there, lady standing out by the floating bar. Hello there, you old bag of bones, you scared the living shit out of me but it doesn’t take much these days and I forgive you. How the fuck ya doin? I wondered if my smile looked as much like a gri mace to her as it felt to me.
She didn’t wave back.
Feeling quite a bit like a fooi—THERE’s NO VILLAGE IDIOT HERE, WE ALL TA: Tt3Veas—I ended my wave in a kind of half-assed salute and headed back the way I’d come. Five steps and I had to look over my shoulder; the sensation of her watching me was so strong it was like a hand pressing between my shoulderblades.
The dock where she’d been was completely deserted. I squinted my eyes, at first sure she must have just retreated deeper into the shadow thrown by the little boozehaus, but she was gone. As if she had been a ghost herself.
She stepped into the bar, hon, Jo said. You know that, don’t you? I mean… you do know it, right?
“Right, right,” I murmured, setting off north along The Street toward home. “Of course I do. Where else?” Except it didn’t seem to me that there had been time; it didn’t seem to me that she could have stepped in, even in her bare feet, without me hearing her. Not on such a quiet morning.
Jo again: Perhaps she’s stealthy.
“Yes,” I murmured. I did a lot of talking out loud before that summer was over. “Yes, perhaps she is. Perhaps she’s stealthy.” Sure. Like Mrs. Danvers.
I stopped again and looked back, but the right-of-way path had followed the lake around a little bit of cu(ve, and I could no longer see either Warrington’s or The Sunset Bar. And really, I thought, that was just as well. On my way back, I tried to list the oddities which had preceded and then surrounded my return to Sara Laughs: the repeating dreams; the sunflowers; the radio-station sticker; the weeping in the night. I supposed that my encounter with Mattie and Kyra, plus the follow-up phone-call from Mr. Pixel Easel, also qualified as passing strange… but not in the same way as a child you heard sobbing in the night.
And what about the fact that we had been in Derry instead of on Dark Score when Johanna died? Did that qualify for the list? I didn’t know.
She didn’t wave back.
Feeling quite a bit like a fooi—THERE’s NO VILLAGE IDIOT HERE, WE ALL TA: Tt3Veas—I ended my wave in a kind of half-assed salute and headed back the way I’d come. Five steps and I had to look over my shoulder; the sensation of her watching me was so strong it was like a hand pressing between my shoulderblades.
The dock where she’d been was completely deserted. I squinted my eyes, at first sure she must have just retreated deeper into the shadow thrown by the little boozehaus, but she was gone. As if she had been a ghost herself.
She stepped into the bar, hon, Jo said. You know that, don’t you? I mean… you do know it, right?
“Right, right,” I murmured, setting off north along The Street toward home. “Of course I do. Where else?” Except it didn’t seem to me that there had been time; it didn’t seem to me that she could have stepped in, even in her bare feet, without me hearing her. Not on such a quiet morning.
Jo again: Perhaps she’s stealthy.
“Yes,” I murmured. I did a lot of talking out loud before that summer was over. “Yes, perhaps she is. Perhaps she’s stealthy.” Sure. Like Mrs. Danvers.
I stopped again and looked back, but the right-of-way path had followed the lake around a little bit of cu(ve, and I could no longer see either Warrington’s or The Sunset Bar. And really, I thought, that was just as well. On my way back, I tried to list the oddities which had preceded and then surrounded my return to Sara Laughs: the repeating dreams; the sunflowers; the radio-station sticker; the weeping in the night. I supposed that my encounter with Mattie and Kyra, plus the follow-up phone-call from Mr. Pixel Easel, also qualified as passing strange… but not in the same way as a child you heard sobbing in the night.
And what about the fact that we had been in Derry instead of on Dark Score when Johanna died? Did that qualify for the list? I didn’t know.