JК
Bullet Park :: Cheever John
Страница: 121 из 131Hammer," the secretary said, "lives on Powder Hill and seems to be the sort of man who would fit into the company all right but when we asked about his experience he said that he'd been the member of a fire department ina place called Ashburnham. It's outside Cleveland. So we wrote for his papers and the letter was returned. There isn't any fire department in Ashburnham. There never was. I don't like to accuse a man of lying but at the same time we don't want any phonies in the outfit, do we?"
"How do we know there isn't a fire department in Ashburnham," Nailles asked.
"The letter was returned."
"It could have been a slipup in the post office.
Why don't we take him in? The roster isn't full and even if he doesn't have any experience he could help with the truck wash."
"Do you want to put that in the form of a motion?"
"I move that Paul Hammer be elected a member of the fire department."
"I second the motion."
"All those in favor say aye."
"Aye."
"Contrary-minded?"
"Everything's been ready for twenty minutes," Charlie Maddux shouted up the stairs, "and if you don't get your arses down here now it will all be spoiled. I don't mind cooking but I don't like to see everything get cold."
The meeting was adjourned. Eliot joined Hammer at the bar and asked if he was a fisherman. He was motivated entirely by kindness. Hammer said that he was. "There's a little stream in Venable that I sometimes go to on Saturday morning," Eliot said. "If you'd like to try it I'll pick you up at around eight o'clock. This time of year I use bait."
On Saturday morning Eliot, with Tessie in the back seat, picked up Hammer and they started north on Route 61. Route 61 was one of the most dangerous and in appearance one of the most inhuman of the new highways. It had basically changed the nature of the Eastern landscape like some seismological disturbance, forcing it to conform, it seemed, to some parts of Montana. At least fifty men and women died on its reaches each year. On a Saturday morning the mixture of domestic and industrial traffic was catastrophic. Trucks as massive and towering as the land castles of the barbarians roared triumphantly downhill and labored uphill at a walking pace. Passing them and repass-ing them made this simple journey seem warlike. Nailles remembered the roads of his young manhood. They followed the contours of the land. It was cool in the valleys, warm on the hilltops. One could measure distances with one's nose. There was the smell of eucalyptus, maples, sweet grass, manure from a cow barn and, as one got into the mountains, the smell of pine. There were landmarks-abandoned farms-a stone tower and a blue lake. In the windows of the houses one passed one saw a cat, an array of geraniums, the face of a child or an old man.
"How do we know there isn't a fire department in Ashburnham," Nailles asked.
"The letter was returned."
"It could have been a slipup in the post office.
Why don't we take him in? The roster isn't full and even if he doesn't have any experience he could help with the truck wash."
"Do you want to put that in the form of a motion?"
"I move that Paul Hammer be elected a member of the fire department."
"I second the motion."
"All those in favor say aye."
"Aye."
"Contrary-minded?"
"Everything's been ready for twenty minutes," Charlie Maddux shouted up the stairs, "and if you don't get your arses down here now it will all be spoiled. I don't mind cooking but I don't like to see everything get cold."
The meeting was adjourned. Eliot joined Hammer at the bar and asked if he was a fisherman. He was motivated entirely by kindness. Hammer said that he was. "There's a little stream in Venable that I sometimes go to on Saturday morning," Eliot said. "If you'd like to try it I'll pick you up at around eight o'clock. This time of year I use bait."
On Saturday morning Eliot, with Tessie in the back seat, picked up Hammer and they started north on Route 61. Route 61 was one of the most dangerous and in appearance one of the most inhuman of the new highways. It had basically changed the nature of the Eastern landscape like some seismological disturbance, forcing it to conform, it seemed, to some parts of Montana. At least fifty men and women died on its reaches each year. On a Saturday morning the mixture of domestic and industrial traffic was catastrophic. Trucks as massive and towering as the land castles of the barbarians roared triumphantly downhill and labored uphill at a walking pace. Passing them and repass-ing them made this simple journey seem warlike. Nailles remembered the roads of his young manhood. They followed the contours of the land. It was cool in the valleys, warm on the hilltops. One could measure distances with one's nose. There was the smell of eucalyptus, maples, sweet grass, manure from a cow barn and, as one got into the mountains, the smell of pine. There were landmarks-abandoned farms-a stone tower and a blue lake. In the windows of the houses one passed one saw a cat, an array of geraniums, the face of a child or an old man.