Bardo or Not Bardo

Начало книги

The hens were chattering peacefully behind the wire fence, as usual, when the first gunshot rang out. Some of them shook their crests, others paused their graceless march, freezing a grayish leg off the ground, unable to make up their mind about stepping in grain and excrement, others still continued clucking blithely. Pistols were of no concern to them. Knives, yes, maybe, but Makarovs and Brownings, no. Then a second detonation rattled the quiet of the afternoon. Someone came running and collapsed against the henhouse’s fence, whose structure was poorly suited to such a trial and so quickly deformed. The posts bent, a row of perches fell apart, and, this time, the whole brood of poultry was overcome with hysteria. The disorderly hens — mostly reds and whites, but two or three black ones as well — dispersed loudly. The injured man was clinging to the wire web. He wanted both to move forward and remain vertical, but that wasn’t quite happening. He hobbled slantwise, indifferent to the cackling, primarily preoccupied with what sounded like approaching steps. His pursuer was catching up to him, a fast-walking man, preceded en route by a zigzagging hen, all helter-skelter, wing stumps akimbo. The killer reached the wounded man and wordlessly stared at him for an instant, as if he was wondering what he was doing there with a target that was already hit — quite hit, even — then he shot him a third time, barely even aiming, before setting off again and disappearing.

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