"Jack Williamson - The Firefly Tree" - читать интересную книгу автора (Williamson Jack)

the city. They lit his way to the orchard, and he heard the fireflies before he came to the tree.
Their buzz rose and fell like the sound of the surf the time they went to visit his aunt who
lived by the sea. Twinkling brighter than the stars, they filled the branches. One of them came to
meet him. It hovered in front of his face and lit on the tip of his trembling finger, smiling at him
with eyes as blue and bright as the flowers.
He had never seen a firefly close up. It was as big as a bumblebee. It had tiny hands that
gripped his fingernail, and one blue eye squinted a little to study his face. The light came from a
round topknot on its head. It flickered like something electric, from red to green, yellow to blue,
maybe red again. The flashes were sometimes slower than his breath, sometimes so fast they
blurred. He thought the flicker was meant to tell him something, but he had no way to
understand.
Barefoot and finally shivering with cold, he stood there till the flickering stopped. The firefly
shook its crystal wings and flew away. The stars were fading into the dawn, and the tree was dark
and silent when he looked. He was back in bed before he heard his mother rattling dishes in the
kitchen, making breakfast.
The next night he dreamed that he was back under the tree, with the firefly perched again on
his finger. Its tiny face seemed almost human in the dream, and he understood its winking voice.
It told him how the tree had grown from a sharp-pointed acorn that came from the stars and
planted itself when it struck the ground.
It told him about the firefly planet, far off in the sky. The fireflies belonged to a great
republic spread across the stars. Thousands of different peoples lived in peace on thousands of
different worlds. The acorn ship had come to invite the people of Earth to join their republic.
They were ready to teach the Earth-people how to talk across space and travel to visit the stars.
The dream seemed so wonderful that he tried to tell about it at breakfast.
"What did I tell you?" His father turned red and shouted at his mother. "His brain's been
addled by the stink of that poison weed. I ought to cut it down and burn it."
"Don't!" He was frightened and screaming. "I love it. I'll die if you kill it."
"I'm afraid he would." His mother made a sad little frown. "Leave the plant where it is, and
I'll take him to Dr. Wong."
"Okay." His father finally nodded, and frowned at him sternly. "If you'll promise to do your
chores and stay out of the garden."
Trying to keep the promise, he washed the dishes after his mother was gone to work. He
made the beds and swept the floors. He tried to do his lessons, though the stories in the reader
seemed stupid to him now.
He did stay out of the garden, but the fireflies came again in his dreams. They carried him to
see the shining forests on their own wonderful world. They took him to visit the planets of other
peoples, people who lived under their seas, people who lived high in their skies, people as small
as ants, people larger than the elephants he had seen in a circus parade and queerer than the
octopus in the side show. He saw ships that could fly faster than light from star to star, and huge
machines he never understood, and cities more magical than fairyland.
He said no more about the dreams till the day his mother came home from work to take him
to Dr. Wong. The nurse put a thermometer under his tongue and squeezed his arm with a rubber
gadget and left him to wait with his mother for Dr. Wong. Dr. Wong was a friendly man who
listened to his chest and looked at the nurse's chart and asked him about the fireflies.
"They're wonderful!" He thought the doctor would believe him. "You must come at night to
see them, sir. They love us. They came to show us the way to the stars."
"Listen to him!" His mother had never been out at night to see the fireflies shining. "That
ugly weed has driven him out of his head!"
"An interesting case." The doctor smiled and patted his shoulder in a friendly way and turned
to speak to his mother. "One for the books. The boy should see a psychiatrist."