"Madeline L' Engle - Time Quartet 02 - A Wind in the Door" - читать интересную книгу автора (L'Engle Madeleine)

broccoli. The twins were justly proud of their organic produce, which they sold around the village for
pocket money.
"A dragon could make a real mess of this garden," Charles Wallace said, and led Meg through rows of
vegetables. "I think he realized that, because suddenly he sort of wasn't there." "What do you mean, he
sort of wasn't there? Either he was there, or he wasn't." "He was there, and then when I went to look
closer, he wasn't there, and I followed him—not really him, because he was much faster than I, and I
only followed where he'd been. And he went to the big glacial rocks in the north pasture." Meg looked
scowlingly at the garden. Never before had Charles Wallace sounded as implausible as this.
He said, "Come on," and moved past the tall sheaves of corn, which had only a few scraggly ears left.
Beyond the corn the sunflowers caught the slanting rays of the afternoon sun, then* golden faces
reflecting brilliance.
"Charles, are you all right?" Meg asked. It was not like Charles to lose touch with reality. Then she
noticed that he was breathing heavily, as if he had been running, though they had not been walking
rapidly. His face was pale, his forehead beaded with perspiration, as though from over-exertion.
She did not like the way he looked, and she turned her mind back to the unlikely tale of dragons,
picking her way around the luxuriant pumpkin vines, "Charles, when did you see these—dragons?" "A
dollop of dragons, a drove of dragons, a drive of dragons," Charles Wallace panted. "After I got home
from school. Mother was all upset because I looked such a mess. My nose was still very bloody." "I get
upset, too." "Meg, Mother thinks it's more than the bigger kids punching me." "What's more?" Charles
Wallace scrambled with unusual clumsiness and difficulty over the low stone wall which edged the
orchard. "I get out of breath." Meg said sharply, "Why? What did Mother say?" Charles walked slowly
through the high grass in the orchard. "She hasn't said. But it's sort of like radar blipping at me." Meg
walked beside him. She was tall for her age, and Charles Wallace small for his. "There are times when I
wish you didn't pick up radar signals quite so well." "I can't help it, Meg. I don't try to. It just happens.
Mother thinks something is wrong with me." "But what?" she almost shouted.
Charles Wallace spoke very quietly. "I don't know. Something bad enough so her worry blips loud and
clear. And I know there's something wrong. Just to walk across the orchard like this is an effort, and it
shouldn't be. It never has been before." "When did this start?" she asked sharply. "You were all right last
weekend when we went walking in the woods." "I know. I've been sort of tired all autumn, but it's been
worse this week, and much worse today than it was yesterday. Hey, Meg! Stop blaming yourself because
you didn't notice." She had been doing precisely that. Her hands felt cold with panic. She tried to push
her fear away, because Charles Wallace could read his sister even more easily than he could their mother.
He picked up a windfall apple, looked it over for worms, and bit into it. His end-of-summer tan could not
disguise his extreme pallor, nor his shadowed eyes; why hadn't she noticed this? Because she hadn't
wanted to. It was easier to blame Charles Wallace's paleness and lethargy on his problems at school.
"Why doesn't Mother have a doctor look at you, then? I mean a real doctor?" "She has." "When?"
"Today." "Why didn't you tell me before?" "I was more interested in dragons." "Charles!" "It was before
you got home from school. Dr. Louise came to have lunch with Mother—she does, quite often,
anyhow—" "I know. Go on." "So when I got home from school she went over me, from top to toe."
"What did she say?" "Nothing much. I can't read her the way I can read Mother. She's like a little bird,
twittering away, and all the time you know that sharp mind of hers is thinking along on another level.
She's very good at blocking me. All I could gather was that she thought Mother might be right about—
about whatever it is. And she'd keep in touch." They had finished crossing the orchard and Charles

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 W-in-Time - Wind in the Door, A

Wallace climbed up onto the wall again and stood there, looking across an unused pasture where there
were two large out-croppings of glacial rock. "They're gone," he said. "My dragons are gone." Meg stood