（外文电子版资料）Avram Davidson - Bumberboom.pdfVIP

Bumberboom by Avram Davidson This story copyright 1966 by Avram Davidson. Reprinted by permission of the estate of Avram Davidson. This copy was created for Jean Hardys personal use. All other rights are reserved. Thank you for honoring the copyright. Published by Seattle Book Company, . * * * Along the narrow road, marked a few times with cairns of whitewashed stones, a young man came by with a careful look and a deliberate gait and a something in his budget which went drip-a-drip red. The land showed gardens and fenced fields and flowering fruit trees. The bleating of sheep sounded faintly. The young mans somewhat large mouth became somewhat smaller as he reflected how well such a land might yield... and as he wondered who might hold the yield of it. Around the roads bend he came upon a small house of wood with an old man peering from the door with weepy eyes that gave a sudden start on seeing who it was whose feet-sounds on the road had brought him from his fusty bed. And his scrannel legs shook. Fortune for you, senior, the young man said, showing his empty palms. I do but seek a chance and place to build a fire to broil the pair of leverets which fortune has sent my way for breakfast. The old man shook his head and stubble beard. Leverets, my young, should not be seared on a naked fire. Leverets should be stewed gently in a proper pot with carrots, onions, and a leek and a leaf of laurel, to say the least. With a sigh and a smile and a shrug, the young man said, You speak as much to the wit as would my own father, who (I will conceal nothing) is High Man to the Hereditor of Land Qanaras, a land not totally without Fortunes favor, though not the puissant realm it was before the Great Gene Shift. Woe!-- and my own name, it is Mallian, son Hazelip. The old man nodded and bobbled his throat. This place, to which I m