89
" And running, Will thought, Boy, it’s the same old thing. I talk. Jim runs. I tilt stones, Jim grabs the cold junk under the stones and—lickety-split! I climb hills. Jim yells off church steeples. I got a bank account. Jim’s got the hair on his head, the yell in his mouth, the shirt on his back and the tennis shoes on his feet. How come I think he’s richer? Because, Will thought, I sit on a rock in the sun and old Jim, he prickles his arm-hairs by moonlight and dances with hoptoads. I tend cows. Jim tames Gila monsters. Fool! I yell at Jim. Coward! he yells back. And here we—go! "
― Ray Bradbury , Something Wicked This Way Comes (Green Town, #2)
90
" Way late at night Will had heard—how often?—train whistles jetting steam along the rim of sleep, forlorn, alone and far, no matter how near they came. Sometimes he woke to find tears on his cheek, asked why, lay back, listened and thought, Yes! they make me cry, going east, going west, the trains of far gone in country deeps they drown in tides of sleep that escape the towns. "
― Ray Bradbury , Something Wicked This Way Comes (Green Town, #2)
93
" For some, autumn comes early, stays late through life where October follows September and November touches October and then instead of December and Christ’s birth, there is no Bethlehem Star, no rejoicing, but September comes again and old October and so on down the years, with no winter, spring, or revivifying summer. For these beings, fall is the ever normal season, the only weather, there be no choice beyond. Where do they come from? The dust. Where do they go? The grave. Does blood stir their veins? No: the night wind. What ticks in their head? The worm. What speaks from their mouth? The toad. What sees from their eye? The snake. What hears with their ear? The abyss between the stars. They sift the human storm for souls, eat flesh of reason, fill tombs with sinners. They "
― Ray Bradbury , Something Wicked This Way Comes (Green Town, #2)
94
" I suppose one night hundreds of thousands of years ago in a cave by a night fire when one of those shaggy men wakened to gaze over the banked coals at his woman, his children, and thought of their being cold, dead, gone forever. Then he must have wept. And he put out his hand in the night to the woman who must die some day and to the children who must follow her. And for a little bit next morning, he treated them somewhat better, for he saw that they, like himself, had the seed of night in them. "
― Ray Bradbury , Something Wicked This Way Comes (Green Town, #2)
97
" Per alcuni, l'autunno viene presto, e permane per tutta la vita, quando ottobre segue settembre, e novembre tocca ottobre, e poi, invece di dicembre e del natale, non c'è la stella di Betlemme, non c'è letizia, ma ritorna settembre e il vecchio ottobre, e così via, per tutti gli anni, senza inverno, senza primavera, senza estate vivificatrice. Per questi esseri, l'autunno è la stagione normale, l'unica stagione, e non c'è per loro altra scelta. Da dove vengono? Dalla polvere. Dove vanno? Verso la tomba. È sangue che scorre nelle loro vene? No: è il vento della notte. Che cosa pulsa nella loro testa? Il verme. Che cosa parla attraverso le loro bocche? Il rospo. Che cosa guarda attraverso i loro occhi? Il serpente. Che cosa ode attraverso le loro orecchie? L'abisso tra le stelle. Scatenano il temporale umano per le anime, divorano la carne della ragione, riempiono le tombe di peccatori. Si agitano freneticamente. Corrono come scarafaggi, strisciano, tessono, filtrano, si agitano, fanno oscurare tutte le lune, e rannuvolano le acque chiare. La ragnatela li ode, trema.. si spezza. Questo è il popolo dell'autunno. Guardatevi da loro. "
― Ray Bradbury , Something Wicked This Way Comes (Green Town, #2)
99
" Dad, will they ever come back?"
"No. And yes." Dad tucked away his harmonica. "No not them. But yes, other people like them. Not in a carnival. God knows what shape they'll come in next. But sunrise, noon, or at the latest, sunset tomorrow they'll show. They're on the road."
"Oh, no," said Will.
"Oh, yes, said Dad. "We got to watch out the rest of our lives. The fight's just begun."
They moved around the carousel slowly.
"What will they look like? How will we know them?"
"Why," said Dad, quietly, "maybe they're already here."
Both boys looked around swiftly.
But there was only the meadow, the machine, and themselves.
Will looked at Jim, at his father, and then down at his own body and hands. He glanced up at Dad.
Dad nodded, once, gravely, and then nodded at the carousel, and stepped up on it, and touched a brass pole.
Will stepped up beside him. Jim stepped up beside Will.
Jim stroked a horse's mane. Will patted a horse's shoulders.
The great machine softly tilted in the tides of night.
Just three times around, ahead, thought Will. Hey.
Just four times around, ahead, thought Jim. Boy.
Just ten times around, back, thought Charles Halloway. Lord.
Each read the thoughts in the other's eyes.
How easy, thought Will.
Just this once, thought Jim.
But then, thought Charles Halloway, once you start, you'd always come back. One more ride and one more ride. And, after awhile, you'd offer rides to friends, and more friends until finally...
The thought hit them all in the same quiet moment.
...finally you wind up owner of the carousel, keeper of the freaks...
proprietor for some small part of eternity of the traveling dark carnival shows....
Maybe, said their eyes, they're already here. "
― Ray Bradbury , Something Wicked This Way Comes (Green Town, #2)
100
" Some boys walk by and you cry, seeing them. They feel good, they look good, they are good. Oh, they're not above peeing off a bridge, or stealing an occasional dime-store pencil sharpener; it's not that. It's just, you know, seeing them pass, that's how they'll be all their life; they'll get hit, hurt, cut, bruised, and always wonder why, why does it happen? how can it happen to them? "
― Ray Bradbury , Something Wicked This Way Comes (Green Town, #2)