第38章
《THE CATCHER IN THE RYE(麦田里的守望者英文版)》章节:第38章,宠文网网友提供全文无弹窗免费在线阅读。!
Or would it be too much trouble?" She
was a pretty spooky kid. Even with that little bitty voice she had, she could sort of scare
you a little bit. If she'd been a big old prostitute, with a lot of makeup on her face and all,
she wouldn't have been half as spooky.
I went and got her dress for her. She put it on and all, and then she picked up her
polo coat off the bed. "So long, crumb-bum," she said.
"So long," I said. I didn't thank her or anything. I'm glad I didn't.
14
After Old Sunny was gone, I sat in the chair for a while and smoked a couple of
cigarettes. It was getting daylight outside. Boy, I felt miserable. I felt so depressed, you
can't imagine. What I did, I started talking, sort of out loud, to Allie. I do that sometimes
when I get very depressed. I keep telling him to go home and get his bike and meet me in
front of Bobby Fallon's house. Bobby Fallon used to live quite near us in Maine--this is,
years ago. Anyway, what happened was, one day Bobby and I were going over to Lake
Sedebego on our bikes. We were going to take our lunches and all, and our BB guns--we
were kids and all, and we thought we could shoot something with our BB guns. Anyway,
Allie heard us talking about it, and he wanted to go, and I wouldn't let him. I told him he
was a child. So once in a while, now, when I get very depressed, I keep saying to him,
"Okay. Go home and get your bike and meet me in front of Bobby's house. Hurry up." It
wasn't that I didn't use to take him with me when I went somewhere. I did. But that one
day, I didn't. He didn't get sore about it--he never got sore about anything-- but I keep
thinking about it anyway, when I get very depressed.
Finally, though, I got undressed and got in bed. I felt like praying or something,
when I was in bed, but I couldn't do it. I can't always pray when I feel like it. In the first
place, I'm sort of an atheist. I like Jesus and all, but I don't care too much for most of the
other stuff in the Bible. Take the Disciples, for instance. They annoy the hell out of me, if
you want to know the truth. They were all right after Jesus was dead and all, but while He
was alive, they were about as much use to Him as a hole in the head. All they did was
keep letting Him down. I like almost anybody in the Bible better than the Disciples. If
you want to know the truth, the guy I like best in the Bible, next to Jesus, was that lunatic
and all, that lived in the tombs and kept cutting himself with stones. I like him ten times
as much as the Disciples, that poor bastard. I used to get in quite a few arguments about
it, when I was at Whooton School, with this boy that lived down the corridor, Arthur
Childs. Old Childs was a Quaker and all, and he read the Bible all the time. He was a
very nice kid, and I liked him, but I could never see eye to eye with him on a lot of stuff
in the Bible, especially the Disciples. He kept telling me if I didn't like the Disciples, then
I didn't like Jesus and all. He said that because Jesus picked the Disciples, you were
supposed to like them. I said I knew He picked them, but that He picked them at random.
I said He didn't have time to go around analyzing everybody. I said I wasn't blaming
Jesus or anything. It wasn't His fault that He didn't have any time. I remember I asked old
Childs if he thought Judas, the one that betrayed Jesus and all, went to Hell after he
committed suicide. Childs said certainly. That's exactly where I disagreed with him. I
said I'd bet a thousand bucks that Jesus never sent old Judas to Hell. I still would, too, if I
had a thousand bucks. I think any one of the Disciples would've sent him to Hell and all--
and fast, too--but I'll bet anything Jesus didn't do it. Old Childs said the trouble with me
was that I didn't go to church or anything. He was right about that, in a way. I don't. In
the first place, my parents are different religions, and all the children in our family are
atheists. If you want to know the truth, I can't even stand ministers. The ones they've had
at every school I've gone to, they all have these Holy Joe voices when they start giving
their sermons. God, I hate that. I don't see why the hell they can't talk in their natural
voice. They sound so phony when they talk.
Anyway, when I was in bed, I couldn't pray worth a damn. Every time I got
started, I kept picturing old Sunny calling me a crumb-bum. Finally, I sat up in bed and
smoked another cigarette. It tasted lousy. I must've smoked around two packs since I left
Pencey.
All of a sudden, while I was laying there smoking, somebody knocked on the
door. I kept hoping it wasn't my door they were knocking on, but I knew damn well it
was. I don't know how I knew, but I knew. I knew who it was, too. I'm psychic.
"Who's there?"