All Flesh is Grass

— Завел себе девчонку! Завел себе девчонку!

He was getting excited about it and the slobber was flying all about his face.

“Cut it out,” I yelled at him. “If you don't cut it out, I'll break your God damn neck.”

He knew I wasn't fooling, so he cut it out.

Он разволновался и так и брызгал слюной.

— Хватит!  — заорал я.  — Заткнись, не то я тебе шею сверну!

Он понял, что я не шучу, и замолчал.

14

I woke in a blue and silver night and wondered, even as I woke, what had wakened me.

I was lying on my back and above me the sky was glimmering with stars. I was not confused. I knew where I was. There was no blind groping back to an old reality. I heard the faint chuckling of the river as it ran between its banks and I smelled the wood smoke that drifted from the campfire.

Я проснулся. Вокруг была ночь  — серебро и густая синева. Что меня разбудило? Я лежал на спине, надо мной мерцали частые звезды. Голова была ясная. Я хорошо помнил, где нахожусь.

Не пришлось ощупью, наугад возвращаться к действительности. Неподалеку вполголоса журчала река; от костра, от медленно тлеющих ветвей тянуло дымком.

Something had awakened me. I lay still, for it seemed important that whatever had wakened me, if it were close at hand, should not know that I was awake. There was a sense of fear, or perhaps of expectation. But if it were a sense of fear, it was neither deep nor sharp.

Slowly I twisted my head a bit and when I did I could see the moon, bright and seeming very near, swimming just above the line of scrubby trees that grew on the river bank.

Что же меня разбудило? Лежу совсем тихо: если оно рядом, не надо ему знать, что я проснулся. То ли я чего-то боюсь, то ли жду чего-то. Но если и боюсь, то не слишком.

Медленно, осторожно поворачиваю голову  — и вот она, луна: яркая, большая  — кажется, до нее рукой подать,  — всплывает над чахлыми деревцами, что растут по берегу реки.

1 was lying flat upon the ground, with nothing under me but the hard-packed earth. Tupper had crawled into his hut to sleep, curling up so his feet did not stick out. And if he were still there and sleeping, he was very quiet about it, for I heard no sound from him.

Having turned my head, I lay quietly for a time, listening for a sound to tell me that something prowled the camp. But there was no sound and finally I sat up.