Little Drops of Water (Stories) by Kurt Vonnegut
Author:Kurt Vonnegut [Vonnegut, Kurt]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-0-440-33947-2
Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
Published: 2009-01-15T00:00:00+00:00
The telephone by my bed rang.
âThis is Larry Whiteman!â
âDrop dead, Larry Whiteman!â The clock said two in the morning.
âTell that girl to quit it, do you hear?â
âFine, glad to, you bet,â I said thickly. âWho what?â
âThat wholesale groceress, of course! That Buffalo thing. Do you hear? Sheâs got to quit it instantly. That light, that goddamned light.â
I started to drop the telephone into its cradle, hoping against hope to rupture his eardrum, when I came awake and realized that I was fascinated. Perhaps Ellen had at last unleashed her secret weapon. Larry had had a recital that night. Maybe sheâd let him have it in front of everybody. âShe blinded you with a light?â
âWorse! When the houselights went down, she lit up her fool face with one of those fool flashlights people carry on their key chains till the batteries pooh out. There she was, grinning out of the dark like death warmed over.â
âAnd she kept it up all evening? Iâd think theyâd have thrown her out.â
âShe did it until she was sure Iâd seen her, then out it went. Then came the coughs. Lord! the coughs!â
âSomebody always coughs.â
âNot the way she does it. Just as I took a breath to start each number, sheâd let goâhack hack hack. Three deliberate hacks.â
âWell, if I see her, Iâll tell her,â I said. I was rather taken by the novelty of Ellenâs campaign, but disappointed by its lack of promise of long-range results. âAn old trouper like you shouldnât have any trouble ignoring that sort of business,â which was true.
âSheâs trying to rattle me. Sheâs trying to make me crack up before my Town Hall recital,â he said bitterly. The professional high point for Larry each year is his annual Town Hall recitalâwhich is always a critical success, incidentally. Make no mistake about thatâLarry, as a singer, is very hot stuff. But now, Ellen had begun her lamp and cough campaign with the big event only two months off.
Two weeks after Larryâs frantic call, Ellen and I coincided at lunch again. She was still distinctly unfriendly, treating me as though I were a valuable spy, but not to be trusted, and distasteful to deal with. Once more she gave me the unsettling impression of hidden power, of something big about to happen. Her color was high and her movements furtive. After a few brittle amenities, she asked if Larry had said anything about the light.
âA great deal,â I said, âafter your first performance, that is. He was quite burned up.â
âBut now?â she said eagerly.
âBad news for you, Ellenâgood news for Larry. Heâs quite used to it now, after three recitals, so he has calmed down beautifully. The effect, Iâm afraid, is zero. Look, why not give up? Youâve needled him long enough, havenât you? Revenge is the most you can get, and youâve got that.â Sheâd made one basic mistake that I didnât feel was up to me to point out: All of her annoyances were regular, predictable, which made it very easy for Larry to assimilate them into the clockwork of his life and ignore them.
Download
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.
Coloring Books for Grown-Ups | Humor |
Movies | Performing Arts |
Pop Culture | Puzzles & Games |
Radio | Sheet Music & Scores |
Television | Trivia & Fun Facts |
Paper Towns by Green John(4786)
Spare by Prince Harry The Duke of Sussex(4783)
Machine Learning at Scale with H2O by Gregory Keys | David Whiting(3606)
Never by Ken Follett(3517)
Learning C# by Developing Games with Unity 2021 by Harrison Ferrone(3284)
Fairy Tale by Stephen King(2938)
Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them: Illustrated edition by J.K. Rowling & Newt Scamander(2920)
The Man Who Died Twice by Richard Osman(2803)
Reminders of Him: A Novel by Colleen Hoover(2749)
How The Mind Works by Steven Pinker(2611)
0041152001443424520 .pdf by Unknown(2592)
Will by Will Smith(2573)
Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them: The Original Screenplay by J. K. Rowling(2412)
The God delusion by Richard Dawkins(2179)
Rationality by Steven Pinker(2147)
Borders by unknow(2115)
Never Lie: An addictive psychological thriller by Freida McFadden(2094)
It Starts With Us (It Ends with Us #2) by Colleen Hoover(2028)
The Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity by David Graeber & David Wengrow(2015)
