"Diana Wynne Jones - The Game" - читать интересную книгу автора (Jones Diana Wynne)

the doorbell, and Grandma opened the door. It hardly bore thinking
of. No, she had to get back to the garden somehow.
She pushed her way dubiously in among the laurels. And pushed
and rustled and plunged and rattled, and for a while wondered if
she was going to have to just stand there and yell for help, or even
stay in the bushes forever. Then she was quite suddenly through
them and into the garden, almost treading on her rock garden. She
was about to kick it moodily to bits—it was only a heap of stones
with wilting ferns stuck in it, and that nice boy was being ripped
apart by his own dogs—when she heard Grandma calling her. At
which Hayley forgot that she was not supposed to run and rushed
frantically up the path to the garden door.
“I think Flute is an ancient supernatural being,” she panted
unwisely to Grandma.
“Oh, just look at you!” Grandma exclaimed. “How did you get so
untidy?”
“In the bushes. Flute is just what I call him because I don’t know
his real name,” Hayley babbled. “He has a green scarf and hair like
Martya’s.”
Grandma stiffened. “Will you stop romancing this instant,
Hayley! Uncle Jolyon’s here. He wants to see you for tea in the
parlour. If it wasn’t for that, I’d send you to bed without supper for
telling stories. Go and comb your hair and put on a clean dress this
moment. I want you back downstairs and looking respectable in ten
minutes! So hurry!”
Hayley sobered up. She saw she had been stupid to mention Flute
to Grandma. Flute was—if ever anyone was—a person who
overflowed Grandma’s boundaries. Flute didn’t do walls. And
Grandma did walls all the time, Hayley thought as she scurried
away down the passage to the stairs. She was halfway up the stairs
when she heard Grandad and Uncle Jolyon coming out of the map
room, arguing. It was funny, she thought, peeping over the
bannisters, the way unusual things always seemed to happen in
clusters. Uncle Jolyon only visited here about once a year and when
he did, Grandad was always very, very polite to him. But now
Grandad was shouting at him.
“You just watch yourself!” Grandad bellowed. “Any more of this
control-freak nonsense and I shall walk away! Then where will you
be?”
As Hayley scudded on upwards, Uncle Jolyon was making
peace-keeping sort of noises. She took another peep at them on the
next turn of the stairs. They were both big, stout men, but where
Grandad was grey, Uncle Jolyon had a fine head of curly white hair
and a white beard and moustache to go with it. He backed away as
Grandad positively roared, “ Oh yes, I can do it ! I did it before and
you didn’t like it one bit, did you?”
“Hayley!” Grandma called. “Are you changed yet?”
Hayley called out, “Nearly, Grandma!” and pelted on up to her
room. There she flung off her grubby dress, flung on a new one and
managed to make her hair lie flat by pasting it down with the