All Flesh is Grass

Tupper had begun to snore—great wet, slobbering snores, the very kind of snores that one might guess he'd make. He was lying on his back inside the hut, on a bed of leaves, but the hut was so small that his feet stuck out the doorway. They rested on his calloused heels and his spraddled toes pointed at the sky and they had a raw and vulgar look about them.

Таппер захрапел  — в носу и в глотке у него громко бурлило, булькало, храп был под стать всему его облику. Он лежал в шалаше навзничь на куче листьев, но шалаш был так мал, что ноги Таппера высовывались наружу.

I picked up the plates and spoons from where they rested on the ground and tucked the bowl in which Tupper had cooked our meal underneath my arm. I found the trail that led down to the water's edge and followed it. Tupper had cooked the food; the least I could do, I told myself; was to wash the dishes.

Я подобрал тарелки и ложки, сунул под мышку горшок, в котором Таппер варил похлебку. Отыскал взглядом тропинку, сбегавшую к реке, и стал спускаться. Таппер стряпал еду, так должен же я хотя бы перемыть посуду.

I squatted by the river's edge and washed the awkward plates and pot, sluiced off the spoons and rubbed them clean between my fingers. I was careful with the plates, for I had the feeling they'd not survive much wetting. On both of them and on the pot there still were the marks of Tupper's great splayed fingers, where he had pressed them into shape.

Я присел на корточки у самой воды, вымыл кривобокие тарелки и горшок, ополоснул ложки и старательно протер их пальцами. С тарелками я обращался бережно: еще размокнут! На глине виднелись отпечатки неуклюжих тапперовых пальцев, вылепивших эту корявую утварь."

"For ten years he had lived and been happy here, happy with the purple flowers that had become his friends, secure at last from the unkindness and the cruelty of the world into which he was born.

Он живет здесь уже десять лет, и он счастлив, ему хорошо среди лиловых цветов, они стали ему друзьями, наконец-то он защищен от злобы и жестокости мира, в котором родился.