The Cider House Rules by John Irving Read Free Book Online Page B

and rescue him if he was getting into real trouble. The trick to that was not letting the man know he was being observed. At night—when the fool fell asleep and drifted farther out to sea—the Winkles would cautiously tow him toward shore, But in the morning— once, even within sight of land—the man always found a way to get lost again. They finally had to rescue him when they caught him drinking salt water; he'd been so disappointed, he gave them several bad checks before he finally paid his adventure fee.
    'Adventure fee' was Billy's name for it.
    Homer thought it might make his would-be adoptive parents self-conscious if he told them any stories about life at St. Cloud's—or worse, about Thanksgiving in Waterville. He felt he had to contribute something to the campfire spirit of this present adventure, but the only good stories he knew were Great Expectations and David Copperfield. Dr. Larch had let him take the copy of Great Expectations with him; it was Homer's favorite of the two. Homer asked the Winkles if he could read them a little of his favorite story. Of course, they said, they'd love it; they'd never been read to, not that they could remember. Homer was a little nervous; as many times as he'd read Great Expectations, he'd never read aloud to an audience before.
    But he was wonderful! He even mastered what he guessed was Joe Gargery's accent, and by the time he got to the part where Mr. Wopsle cries out, ' “No!” with the feeble malice of a tired man,' Homer sensed he had found the proper voice for the whole tale—he felt he might also have discovered his first talent. Unfortunately, talented though he was, his reading put the Winkles fast asleep. {50} Homer kept reading by himself, through the end of Chapter 7. Maybe it's not my reading, Homer thought; maybe it's the Winkles—all her sit-ups, all his trout-catching, all the fierce rigor of the indisputably great outdoors.
    Homer attempted to arrange the Winkles' sleeping bag—a huge, single bag—comfortably around them. He blew out the lamps. He went to his own room in the vast tent and crawled into his own sleeping bag. He lay with his head by the open tent flap; he could see the stars; he could hear the nearby crashing water. It did not remind him of Three Mile Falls, because the stream here was so different from that river. It was just as fast, but it ran through a deep, narrow gorge—sparkling clean, roundbouldered, with glossy pools where Grant had caught the trout. It was not unpleasant imagining further adventures with the Winkles, but Homer had more trouble imagining a moose. Exactly how big would a moose be? Bigger than the Winkles?
    Homer exhibited no mistrust, and certainly no fear, of the Winkles. He felt for them only a detached wariness —he was sure they weren't dangerous but they were of a slightly altered species. He fell asleep confusing the Winkles, in his child's mind, with moose. In the morning he woke up to the sound of what he was sure were moose —only to discover that it was the Winkles in the tent room next to his. The Winkles appeared to greet the morning vigorously. Although Homer had never heard human beings make love, or moose mate, he knew perfectly well that the Winkles were mating. If Dr. Larch had been present, he might have drawn new conclusions concerning the Winkles' inability to produce offspring. He would have concluded that the violent athleticism of their coupling simply destroyed, or scared to death, every available egg and sperm.
    Homer politely feigned sleep. The Winkles then roused him playfully. Like large dogs, they burst into his room on all fours, tugging at his sleeping bag with their teeth. They were going to swim! they told him. They were such {51} large people, Homer wondered at the sheer abundance of their active flesh. He also wondered how they intended to swim in the raging stream without being bashed against the boulders and swept away. Homer didn't know how to swim—not even in calm