"Jack Dann - A Quiet Revolution for Death" - читать интересную книгу автора (Dann Jack)

A QUIET
REVOLUTION FOR
DEATH
Jack Dann

No other epoch has laid so much stress as the expiring Middle Ages on the
thought of death.
—]. HUIZINGA




It is a lovely day for a drive and a picnic. There is not a hint of rain in
the cerulean sky, and the superhighway snakes out ahead like a cement
canal. The cars are moving in slow motion like gondolas skiffing through
God’s magical city.
“What a day,” says Roger as he leans back in his cushioned seat.
Although the car is on automatic, he holds the steering stick lightly
between his thumb and forefinger. His green Chevrolet shifts lanes and
accelerates to 130 miles an hour. “This is what God intended when he
made Sunday,” Roger says as he lets go of the steering stick to wave his
arms in a stylized way. He dreams that he is an angel of God guiding the
eyeless through His realms.
The children are in the back seat where they can fight and squeal and
spill their makeup until Sandra becomes frustrated enough to give them
some Easy-Sleep to make the trip go faster. But the monotony of the
beautiful countryside and the hiss of air pushing past rubber and glass
must have lulled Sandra to sleep. She is sitting beside Roger. Her head
lolls, beautiful blonde hair hiding her beautiful face.
“I’m practicing to be an angel,” shouts Bennie, Roger’s oldest and
favorite son. The other children giggle and make muffled shushing noises.
 Roger turns around and sees that his son has painted his face and
smeared it with ashes. He’s done a fair job, Roger thinks. Blue and grey
rings of makeup circle Bennie’s wide brown eyes. “That’s very good,
indeed,” Roger says. “Your face is even more impressive than your
costume.”
“I could do better if I wanted to,” says Rose Marie, who is seven and
dressed in a mock crinoline gown with great cloth roses sewn across the
bodice.
But Bennie is nonplused. He beams at his father and says, “You said
that everyone,—even kids,—must have their own special vision of death.
Well, my vision is just like yours.” Bennie is twelve. He’s the little man of
the family, and next year, with God’s help, he will be bar mitzvahed, since
Sandra is half-Jewish and believes that children need even more ceremony
than adults.
Rose Marie primps herself and says “ha” over and over. Samson and
Lilly, ages five and six respectively, are quietly playing “feelie” together.
But Samson—who will be the spitting image of his father, same cleft in his
chin, same nose—is naked and shivering. Roger raises the car’s
temperature to 79 degrees and then turns back to Bennie.