"Richard Brautigan - in_watermelon_sugar" - читать интересную книгу автора (Brautigan Richard)

26

Margaret Again

"How's margaret taking all this?" Pauline said.
"I don't know," I said.
"Is she hurt or mad or what? Do you know how she feels?"
Pauline said. "Has she talked to you about it since you told her?
She hasn't talked to me at all. I saw her yesterday near the
Watermelon Works. I said hello but she walked past me without
saying anything. She seemed terribly upset."
"I don't know how she feels," I said.
"I thought she'd be at ideath tonight, but she wasn't there,"
Pauline said. "I don't know why I thought she'd be there. I just
had a feeling but I was wrong. Have you seen her?"
"No," I said.
"I wonder where she's staying," Pauline said.
"I think she's staying with her brother."
"} feel bad about this. Margaret and I were such good friends.
All the years we've spent together at ideath," Pauline said. "We
were almost like sisters. I'm sorry that things had to work out
this way, but there was nothing we could do about it."
"The heart is something else. Nobody knows what's going
to happen," I said.
"You're right," Pauline said.
She stopped and kissed me. Then we crossed over the bridge
to her shack.

27
Pauline's Shack

pauline's shack is made entirely of watermelon sugar, except
the door that is a good-looking grayish-stained pine with a stone
doorknob.
Even the windows are made of watermelon sugar. A lot of
windows here are made of sugar. It's very hard to tell the difference
between sugar and glass, the way sugar is used by Carl
the windowmaker. It's just a thing that depends on who is doing
it. It's a delicate art and Carl has it.
Pauline lit a lantern. It smelled fragrant burning with water-
melontrout oil. We have a way here also of mixing watermelon
and trout to make a lovely oil for our lanterns. We use it for all
our lighting purposes. It has a gentle fragrance to it, and makes
a good light.
Pauline's shack is very simple as all our shacks are simple.
Everything was in its proper place. Pauline uses the shack just
to get away from ideath for a few hours or a night if she feels
like it.
All of us who stay at ideath have shacks to visit whenever