"Shadow On The Hearth" - читать интересную книгу автора (Merril Judith)

trying to blow the house up with a basement lab, and now you've got us running
rings around a batch of baby sitters. Who started that club anyhow? And why in
the name of all that's holy do baby sitters need white jackets?"
"I did," Barbie said defiantly. "And I already collected the money for the
jackets, so I don't see what good it does to argue about that. I've just got to
have them, that's all."
"Well, I ought to do the laundry anyhow. I think I can manage if you drive them
to school. . . ." Gladys looked inquiringly at her husband. "You could take the
car right into town. Barbie'll have to come straight home from school anyhow, so
she could bring Ginny home on the bus."
"Okay." Jon nodded and went back to his paper. The headlines jumped at him,
bearing threats of war and disaster; in the shaded room the warnings were
ludicrous. He half heard Ginny babbling something about a loose tooth, and
Barbara assuring her that she would have to wait at least another year. The news
the paper spoke of existed in another world, not in his home. Gladys never even
read the front page; maybe she had the right idea. He gulped his coffee and
called to the girls to hurry up if they were going with him.
"Mommy . . . Mommy, I can't find Pallo." Ginny stood in the center of the living
room, fighting back tears, and waiting, apparently, for the favorite horse to
detach itself from the surroundings and walk up to her.
Gladys rescued the battered blue plush pony from behind the armchair. "If you'd
ever remember where you put things—any of you!"
She pressed the toy into her daughter's arms, wiped away a lonely tear track,
kissed the dry cheek, and propelled the child gently toward the door.
Jon's hat and brief case waited, as always, on the hall table, but she
forestalled the inevitable question and held them ready for him as he strode
through the dining room, shrugging into his jacket and straightening his tie.
"Busybody!" He grinned at her, planting a quick kiss to stop her retort. By the
time she caught her breath and opened her mouth he was out the front door,
racing Ginny to the gate. Barbara, sedate with a new ladylike pace she had read
about in a magazine the week before, trailed after them. Gladys watched from the
open window, torn by her older daughter's desperate reaching for maturity, and
warmed again with tenderness as Jon slowed to let Ginny reach the car first.
"I won, Daddy—I'm the leader, I won, I won!" Then the car door slammed to shut
out their voices.
She ought to get the laundry started, first thing, if she was going to make that
luncheon. The bedrooms could wait, but, surveying the damage wreaked by the
family tornado on its way out, she decided she'd have to tidy up downstairs
first.
In the living room she made do with a swift straightening up: a pile of things
to be taken upstairs later and put away—Ginny's toys . . . Jon's necktie, pulled
off last night . . . Barbie's "Sit-Kit," designed to take a baby sitter through
any emergency, small or large, just finished last night and brought down for
display, and of course never put away again. The dust rag and broom took care of
the more conspicuous spots; she could vacuum later, or if she missed it
altogether today it wouldn't matter so much. The room looked clean, whether it
really was or not. The dining room was littered with the breakfast dishes, last
night's newspapers, some of Barbie's schoolbooks. The girl was getting more
careless every day. She was so busy telling other people how to take care of
other people's babies and get along in other people's houses that she didn't