"(ss) The Pipes of Pan" - читать интересную книгу автора (Del Rey Lester)

Pan took courage, and the old bluff laughter fell from his lips. He lifted the syrinx again and began a wild quick air on the spur of the moment, letting the music roam through the notes as it would. There was no set tempo, but his feet tapped lightly on the graveled path, and the bird fell in step.

Bailey looked up quickly, his fingers twitching at the irregular rhythm. There was a wildness to it, a primitiveness that barely escaped savagery, and groped out toward man's first awareness of the fierce wild joy of living. Now the notes formed into a regular cadence that could be followed, and Bailey whistled an impromptu harmony. The squirrel swayed lightly from side to side, twitching his tail.

"Jitterbug, isn't he?" Bob asked, as Pan paused. "I've never seen music hit an animal that way before. Where'd you learn the piece?"

"Learn it?" Pan shook his head. "Music isn't learned—it's something that comes from inside."

"You mean you made thai up as you went along? Whew! Bul you can play a regular tune, can't you?" \

"I never tried." \

"Uh. Well, here's one." He pursed his lips and began whistling one of the swingy popular things his orchestra played at, but never hit. Pan listened to it carefully, only half sure he liked it, then put the syrinx to his lips, beat his foot for time, and repeated it. But there were minor variations that somehow lifted it and set the rhythm bouncing along, reaching out to the squirrel and making its tail twitch frenziedly.

Bailey slapped him on the back, grinning. "Old-timer," he chuckled, "you've got the corniest instrument there is, but you can roll it down the groove. I'd like to have the boys hear what a real hepeat can do to a piece."

Pan's face was blank, though the voice seemed approving. "Can't you speak English?"

"Sure. I'm telling you you're hot. Give the jitterbugs an earful of that and top-billing would follow after. Come on!""

Pan followed him, uncertain. "Where?"

"Over to the boys. If you can wrap your lips around a clarinet the way you do hat thing, our worries are over. And I'm betting you can."

It was their last night's engagement at the Grotto a month later, and Pan stood up, roaring out the doggerel words in a deep rich basso that caught and lifted the song. Strictly speaking, his voice was a little too true for swing, but the boisterous jaganism in it was like a beat note from a tuba, something that refused to permit 7eet to be still. Then it ended, and the usual clamor followed. His singing was a •ecent experiment, but it went over.

Bob shook hands with himself and grinned. "Great, Pan! You're hot tonight." [Tien he stepped to the microphone. "And now, for our last number, folks, I'd ike to present a new tune for the first time over played. It's called 'The Gods Got Rhythm,' and we think you'll like it. Words and music by Tin Pan Faunus, the dol of the Jitterbugs. O.K., Tin Pan, take it!"

Pan cuddled the clarinet in his mouth and watched the crowd stampede out onto he floor. Bob winked at him, and he opened up, watching the dancers. This was ike the rest, a wild ecstasy that refused to let them stay still. Primitive, vital, :very nerve alive to the music. Even the nymphs of old had danced less savagely o his piping.

One of the boys passed a note over to his knee, and he glanced at it as he >layed. "Boys, we're set. Peterson just gave Bob the signal, and that means three nonths at the Crystal Palace. Good-by blues."

Pan opened up, letting the other instruments idle in the background, and went n for a private jam session of his own. Out on the floor were his worshipers, ;very step an act of homage to him. Homage that paid dividends, and was as real n its way as the sacrifices of old; but that was a minor detail. Right now he was

lOt.

He lifted the instrument higher, drawing out the last wild ecsiasy from it. Under his clothes, his tail twitched sharply, but the dancers couldn't see that, and wouldn't have cared if they had. Tin Pan Faunus, Idol of the Jitterbugs, was playing, and that was enough.