Зеленая миля / The Green Mile

Yet the idea would not leave my mind, and it again occurred to me that most of us would feel that small when approaching God’s judgment seat after our lives were over, but very few of us would be able to look so unafraid.

“Well, I swear,” Old Toot-Toot said. “There he sits, big as Billy-Be-Frigged.”

“You ain’t seen nothing yet, Toot,” Harry said. “Watch this.” He reached into his breast pocket and came out with a slice of cinnamon apple wrapped in waxed paper. He broke off the end and tossed it on the floor.

It was dry and hard and I thought it would bounce right past the mouse, but it reached out one paw, as carelessly as a man swatting at a fly to pass the time, and batted it flat. We all laughed in admiration and surprise, an outburst of sound that should have sent the mouse skittering, but it barely twitched. It picked up the piece of dried apple in its paws, gave it a couple of licks, then dropped it and looked up at us as if to say, Not bad, what else do you have?

Toot-Toot opened his cart, took out a sandwich, unwrapped it, and tore off a scrap of bologna.

“Don’t bother,” Dean said.

“What do you mean?” Toot-Toot asked. “Ain’t a mouse alive’d pass up bologna if he could get it. You a crazy guy!”

But I knew Dean was right, and I could see by Harry’s face that he knew it, too. There were floaters and there were regulars. Somehow, that mouse seemed to know the difference. Nuts, but true.

Old Toot-Toot tossed the scrap of bologna down, and sure enough, the mouse wouldn’t have a thing to do with it; sniffed it once and then backed off a pace.

“I’ll be a goddamned son of a bitch,” Old Toot-Toot said, sounding offended.

I held out my hand. “Give it to me.”

“What—same sammitch?”

“Same one. I’ll pay for it.”

Toot-Toot handed it over. I lifted the top slice of bread, tore off another sliver of meat, and dropped it over the front of the duty desk.

The mouse came forward at once, picked it up in its paws, and began to eat. The bologna was gone before you could say Jack Robinson.

“I’ll be goddamned!” Toot-Toot cried. “Bloody hell! Gimme dat!”

He snatched back the sandwich, tore off a much larger piece of meat—not a scrap this time but a flap—and dropped it so close to the mouse that Steamboat Willy almost ended up wearing it for a hat.