"Nayler, Ray - Coming Out Of Nothing" - читать интересную книгу автора (Nayler Ray)

The chin-tucking expression of surprise that she gave him told him she'd never thought of it that way. People never love where they are from, he thought. He liked Iowa, with its sense of order and the bright newness of its cultivated landscape. Everything seemed orderly, everything clean.

They seemed to know that he was coming to the cafe . It was as if the girl at the counter had phoned ahead-and Hadley seemed almost small enough to make the idea reasonable. He carried his camera with him like a shield or a badge, although he knew he would shoot nothing in the grease-spotted interior of the cafe . Every eye was on him as he sat down in one of the booths.The eyes were curious and craggily friendly.

The waitress's name tag read Pauline, but when he thanked her by that name she corrected him.

"Nobody calls me that. It's Polly."

She couldn't have been over twenty, but her voice had a purring husk to it that seemed much older. She had the beauty of a scrubbed, pink-nailed movie star, reminding him of a publicity shot he had once seen of Ava Gardner standing against a haystack.

Polly lay steak and potatoes smothered in gravy in front of him.

"If here's anything else I can do for you ..."

"Actually there is."

Polly paused on the upswing.

"Yes?"

"I need someone to show me around the county. Guide me to the best spots. Do you know of anyone?"

She wiped her hands on her apron. He saw her scan the room quickly. A John Deere hat or two cocked in their direction.

"It's easy enough to find your way out here. I doubt you'll need a guide."

Laying in his motel room, he thought of Ava Gardner and tried to shape the picture in his mind. He had lost details of it, could not make her black-and-white face come alive anymore, could not remember her exact expression. The bright sun and the haystack he remembered clearly.
A double tap at the door put a stop to his efforts.

It was Polly. She would be happy to show him around. She would meet him at the motel, in the morning. She didn't have to wait tables until three. She told all of this to him in a breathless whisper, as if even the circling, darting bats overhead were listening. Then she was gone, like a girl who had crept through her bedroom window for a kiss in the night. In the tiny bathroom, he spent ten minutes cleaning minutely under his nails. He picked through several long-sleeved plaid shirts, lay one out for the next morning. He placed his glasses on the night-stand, avoiding looking at himself in the mirror after removing them. He did not like his face without the glasses. He felt it did not suit a quiet photographer. It was a violent face, planed to break the knuckles of a fist.

They lay together on the ancient, dusty couch, sweat and dirt-streaked, breathless, a cloud of bluecurling from her mouth, the red dot of cigarette floating in the cave-like room.

"This is where I always come when I want to be alone. It's my secret place."

He noticed the fish-white stripe of flesh around the ring finger of her left hand.

"You're married."

She was moving around the darkened room, finding her clothes.

"Yes. And no. We're getting divorced. Not that it matters."

"I was married once," he offered. All that he could remember of Lola now was a slender ankle and her small, perfectly even teeth.

"My husband, Shane-he and my father are more married than Shane and I ever were. They hunt together, farm together-they're like one person. One very jealous person," she said. "If they knew I was here with you, they would die."

He thought of the samelike men at the cafe , listening to every word he spoke to Polly. Thick-shouldered Iowans with heat-creased necks. They didn't seem the type to die for love.