"The Giver Quartet" - читать интересную книгу автора (Lowry, Lois)

Lily considered, and shook her head. “I don’t know. They acted like . . . like ...”



“Animals?” Jonas suggested. He laughed.



“That’s right,” Lily said, laughing too. “Like animals.” Neither child knew what the word meant, exactly, but it was often used to describe someone uneducated or clumsy, someone who didn’t fit in.



“Where were the visitors from?” Father asked.



Lily frowned, trying to remember. “Our leader told us, when he made the welcome speech, but I can’t remember. I guess I wasn’t paying attention. It was from another community. They had to leave very early, and they had their midday meal on the bus.”



Mother nodded. “Do you think it’s possible that their rules may be different? And so they simply didn’t know what your play area rules were?”



Lily shrugged, and nodded. “I suppose.”



“You’ve visited other communities, haven’t you?” Jonas asked. “My group has, often.”



Lily nodded again. “When we were Sixes, we went and shared a whole school day with a group of Sixes in their community.”



“How did you feel when you were there?”



Lily frowned. “I felt strange. Because their methods were different. They were learning usages that my group hadn’t learned yet, so we felt stupid.”



Father was listening with interest. “I’m thinking, Lily,” he said, “about the boy who didn’t obey the rules today. Do you think it’s possible that he felt strange and stupid, being in a new place with rules that he didn’t know about?”



Lily pondered that. “Yes,” she said, finally.