"Thomas A. Easton - Down on the Truck Farm" - читать интересную книгу автора (Easton Thomas A)

job. And you're drinking far too much honeysuckle wine.”

“Yessir,” said Jimmy. He stared at the carpet between his feet, preferring its clean, fresh neutrality to the
disapproval of his parents, or the glee of his little brother.

“If this keeps up,” said Dad. “If this goes on, you'll be just another honey-suckin’ bum.”
Caleb managed to get out a single snicker before squeaking a muffled, “Ouch!”

Dad slapped his thigh. “So,” he said. “Tomorrow, I'm taking you out to the Daisy Hill Truck Farm.”

****

It was a sad fact that the morning after tanking up on honeysuckle wine, antidote or no antidote, one had
a headache, not the blinding sort, but a sullen, throbbing thing that would respond only to a nip of honey.
The aspirins Jimmy found beside his breakfast plate were no help at all.

After breakfast, Dad led the way to the elevator that occupied the center of the beanstalk's supporting
pillar. He did not let Jimmy have a moment on the deck to grab a honeysuckle blossom, and when they
reached the ground, his hand on his son's shoulder kept Jimmy from stepping off the path.

“C'mon,” he said. “You have your license.” He steered Jimmy toward the door on the driver's side of the
family Armadon and held it open. It revealed the bucket seats and control panels that occupied the space
grown in the genimal's back, and when Jimmy climbed in, it closed with a solid “Chunkk!”

“But you still need practice. So you drive. I'll tell you when to turn.”

The Armadon was a gengineered armadillo. Somewhat larger than a panel truck of the last century, it had
no tail. The lower portion of its rigid hide swelled out to form four wheels, each one wearing a black
rubber tire. The genimal's legs were mounted high, above the wheels, their joints reversed; as they ran,
they pushed against the tires, spun the wheels on their bony hubs, and propelled the vehicle down the
grassy greenways that had replaced paved roads early in the Biological Revolution.

Obediently, Jimmy toggled the genimal out of its night-time dormancy and took the tiller in his hand. He
didn't have much to say. He knew about the truck farm, and he could guess why his Dad wanted to take
him there-Dad hoped he would get inspired, discover a vocation, swear off the honey forevermore, and
straighten out. Fat chance, he thought.

Fortunately, the trip would not take long. There was not far from their neighborhood an entrance to the
major highway that led traffic away from the city and toward the countryside where the land was
available for truck farms and other agricultural operations. At this time of day, most of the traffic was
city-bound commuters in wheeled Armadons and Roachsters, legged Hoppers, Tortoises, and Beetles,
and grand Mack trucks hauling pods and trailers full of goods, chrome eighteen-wheelers dangling from
collars beneath their bulldog jowls. An occasional police Hawk hovered overhead. A construction site
featured long-legged Cranes and earth-moving Box-turtles. An Alitalia Cardinal and an American Bald
Eagle circled above the local jetport. Shovel-jawed litterbugs patrolled the shoulder, darting at every
break in the traffic onto the greenway to retrieve the wastes inevitably left behind the vehicles.

Honeysuckle vines covered the embankments beyond the shoulder, and in the shadows beneath an
overpass, Jimmy noticed several full-time honey-suckers. Jimmy read the papers and knew that they died
of malnutrition and disease and exposure and then fell prey to the omnipresent litterbugs, but he was not