"Robert F. Young - The Moon of Advanced Learning" - читать интересную книгу автора (Young Robert F)

can go; then I put Betty to bed. I have never seen her drunk before. It makes me sad, particularly
because I know why she got drunk.

My father's house has a big lawn in front and an even bigger lawn in back. Last year he had an
in-ground swimming pool put in. The house is white-shingled and looks larger than it really is. There is a
tiny porch in front and a big patio in back. The patio overlooks the swimming pool. All of the trees in the
yard are young. Some of them are Schwedler's maples; some of them are silver birches. There are two
dogwoods in the front yard. He cuts the grass twice each week from late spring to early fall; he has a
riding mower. There is an inbuilt double garage, although he has only one car. In the backyard he has
built a special shed to keep his tools in and covered it with shingles to match those on the house. I have
never told him so, but despite its shingles it looks like an outhouse.
The minute we get there Sunday afternoon Janet starts hollering that she wants to go swimming, and
Little Chuck joins her. My mother gets both kids into their suits, gets into hers, and soon Janet and Little
Chuck are splashing gleefully in the shallow part of the pool under my mother's watchful eye. My father
gets a sixpack out of the refrigerator in the kitchen, and he and I and Betty sit at the rustic wooden table
he built for the patio. Betty refuses a bottle of beer—she is still sick from last night. My father and I drink
our beer from the bottle. He is a couple of inches shorter than I, and stockily built. His barrel chest is no
longer distinguishable from his belly. His hairline is receding, and his brown hair has flecks of gray in it.
But despite the grayness and the lines in his face he does not look his forty-nine years.
Usually when we get together we talk shop. Today he does not even mention the mill. At the mill he
works in Two Shop and I work in Three, and we seldom see each other at work. The last time Betty and
I and the kids were out to his house he was depressed and said next to nothing all the while we were
there. My mother reflected his mood. Today he is in excellent spirits, and my mother seems to be having
as much fun as Janet and Little Chuck are as she monitors them in the pool.
I am determined to talk about the mill whether my father wants to or not. Its forthcoming shut-down
is a fact that has to be faced. He is soon going to be among the unemployed, and if he remains among
them, he is going to lose his house. Some way, somehow, he is going to have to find another job, and a
good one.
But I do not bring up the subject of the mill directly. Instead I ask him how many more years his
mortgage still has to go. "Twenty-five," he says. "Hell, you know when I bought the house."
"I didn't know you took a thirty-year mortgage."
"Everybody does these days."
"Young people do. How in hell are you going to pay it off?"
"You're worried about the mill, aren't you."
"Not on my account."
"Well, don't worry about it on mine."
"You owe for your car too. Not to mention the swimming pool."
"They haven't pulled out yet."
"They're going to."
"They only said they were going to. Things can change."
"There are two things that never change. Profit and loss. If they figure they can make more money or
lose less money by pulling out they'll pull out."
"When they pull out is when I'll start to worry," my father says He takes a big swallow of beer.
Betty looks at him. "You believe, don't you?"
"You bet your life I do."
"I don't," Betty says. "But I keep trying."
I stare at her and then at him. "Believe what?"
 Neither answers me.
I finish my beer and set the bottle on the table. "I'm going for a swim," I tell them.