The Fourth Bear полностью

“Yes,” he replied mournfully. “Life is full of little misunderstandings. I’m now an expert on Sterne and Keats, when a small investment in a Snickers bar and a can of soda would have at least got me a cheery thank-you and a peck on the cheek.”

At that moment Pandora walked back into the living room in a state of high dudgeon.

“No, no and no,” she said. “We won’t be having any live animal sacrifices.”

“Oh, come on,” said Prometheus, who had entered after her.

“It’s traditional.”

“So was the Black Death,” she retorted, “but I’m not having it at my wedding.”

“Just one teensy-weensy bull—barely a seven-hundred-pounder. You’ll hardly even notice it.”

“No!” said Pandora, putting her foot down. “I’m not having any animals put to death at my wedding. You’ll be inviting Zeus next.”

There was silence.

“You’ve invited him, haven’t you?”

Prometheus shrugged. “I had to. Hera called and said the God of Gods was down in the dumps when he didn’t get an invite. He was right off his smoting and hasn’t even looked at a pretty handmaiden to ravish for over a week.”

“This is because I invited Aunt Beryl and you don’t like her, isn’t it?”

“I have no problem with your Aunt Beryl,” replied the Titan.

“It’s that dog of hers that gets right on my nerves.”

“What’s wrong with Frubbles?”

“What’s right with Frubbles? That’s not a dog—it’s a skeleton with hair. And why does it shiver all the time?”

Pandora thought for a moment. The shivering annoyed her, too.

“I’ll speak to Beryl and tell her that Frubbles shouldn’t attend because… because Cerberus will be part of the wedding procession, okay?”

“Okay,” said Prometheus sulkily.

“But no Zeus, no sacrifices and definitely no Sirens. Dad, will you back me up?”

“I’m with you on this one, sweetpea.”

“Very well,” said Prometheus, who regarded Jack’s word as law, “but Zeus will only cause trouble. Forget reason—he acts like a three-year-old in charge of the U.S. Marine Corps.”

Jack bathed Stevie and put everyone to bed after dinner, telling the kids when they asked that Madeleine “wasn’t feeling well.” He tapped on the bedroom door, but there was no answer, so he went to bed in the spare room. After tossing fitfully for an hour, he finally fell asleep, only to wake with a start. He patted the bedside table for his watch but couldn’t find it, so he got up and tiptoed down the hall to the bathroom. He looked in on Megan, who was wrapped up in her duvet like a dormouse huddled in a knot of straw. Jerome was asleep on the floor of his room next door, surrounded by Lego and Meccano.

Jack was just pondering whether to knock gently on Madeleine’s door when a movement on the edge of his vision made him stop. He turned slowly, the hairs on his neck rising. At the far end of the corridor, staring at a large, gold-painted vase that was sitting atop an occasional table, was the small, apelike creature he had seen yesterday in the closet under the stairs. It was not more than two feet high and covered with a smattering of brown hair. It couldn’t reach the vase and looked around for something to stand on. As it turned, the moonlight caught its features, and Jack shivered. A large snout surrounded a mouth filled with brown teeth that were anything but straight. Small eyes stood below a wrinkled brow, and its ears, pixielike, stuck out at odd angles from the side of its potato-shaped head. This, Jack knew, was Caliban.

He disappeared around the corner and reappeared a moment later pulling Stevie’s trike. He placed it under the table and stood precariously on top, the trike wobbling dangerously. Caliban put out two hands, picked up the shiny vase and looked at it admiringly. He stepped off the trike with some difficulty, as the vase was large and he couldn’t see around it, then took several uncertain steps toward where Jack was watching. Jack waited until the little ape was underneath him and then plucked the vase from his grip.

“Aha!” said Jack with a triumphant cry.

But Caliban wasn’t so easily dispossessed of his property, and with an “AHA!” he jumped up and grabbed it back, then ran off as fast as his short legs would carry him. Jack yelled, “Stop!” and ran after the small figure. The farce could end in only one way. The creature tripped over a fold in the carpet, fell flat on his face and dropped the vase, which then rolled toward the head of the stairs. Caliban put a paw to his mouth as he watched the vase escape him, and Jack, more concerned now for the vase than with capturing the ugly little ape, raced past the creature, took a running leap, fell headlong on the carpet and just managed to touch the vase as it rolled out into space, bounced on the second stair, smashed on the fifth and scattered pieces of gold-painted porcelain all over the hall downstairs. Jack lay on his stomach at the top of the stairs and watched the pieces settle on the floor below.

“Crap,” he muttered. The vase was Madeleine’s, and it had been until very recently a priceless and much-loved family heirloom.