"14 - Flood Tide" - читать интересную книгу автора (Cussler Clive)

"You lost a dog." Hui abruptly sat up. "You lost a dog?" he repeated. "I lost the heart and soul of my country-" He paused and went into a coughing spasm. Misery etched his face, despair clouded his eyes. He looked like a man whose life had lost all meaning. "I have failed in my duty. I must die."

"Don't be stupid, man," said Gallagher. "We'll come through. Just hang in a little longer."

Hui appeared not to hear him. He seemed to wither and give up. Katie was gazing into the general's eyes. It was as if a light behind them had suddenly switched off. They took on a glazed, unseeing look.

"I think he's dead," Katie murmured.

Gallagher checked to be sure. "Move over against his body and use it as a shield from the wind and spray. I'll lie on the other side of you."

It seemed ghoulish to her, but Katie found that she could hardly feel Hui's cadaver through the bulk of her clothing. The loss of her faithful little dog, the ship plunging under the black water, the insane wind and crazed waters all seemed unreal to her. She hoped that it was all a nightmare and soon she would wake up. She burrowed deeper between the two men, one alive, the other dead.

Through the rest of the day and following night the intensity of the storm had slowly abated, but they were still exposed to a murderous windchill factor. Katie could no longer feel her hands and feet. She began to slip in and out of consciousness. Fantasies ran through her mind. Oddly, she found it macabre that she might have eaten her last meal. She thought she saw a sandy beach beneath swaying palm trees. She imagined Fritz running across the sand, barking as he came toward her. She talked to Gallagher as though they were sitting at a table at a restaurant, ordering dinner. Her dead father appeared to her, dressed in his captain's uniform. He stood in the raft, looked down and smiled.

He told her she would live and not to worry. Land was only a short distance away. And then he was gone.

"What time is it?" she asked hoarsely.

"Sometime late in the afternoon, I should judge," answered Gallagher. "My watch stopped soon after we abandoned the Princess."

"How long have we been adrift?"

"A rough guess would put it about thirty-eight hours since the Princess went down."

"We're near land," she muttered abruptly.

"What makes you say that, darlin'?"

"My father told me."

"He did, did he?" He smiled at her compassionately under a mustache and eyebrows caked white with ice. Icicles hanging from whatever hair was exposed, gave Gallagher the appearance of a monster risen from the depths of the South Pole in a science-fiction movie. Except for her lack of facial hair, Katie wondered if she looked the same.

"Can't you see it?"

Dreadfully stiff from the cold, Gallagher struggled to a sitting position and scanned the horizons of his restricted world. His view was blurred by the driving sleet, but he kept trying. Then he thought his eyes were deceiving him. He could just make out large boulders scattered along a shoreline. A short distance beyond, no more than fifty yards, snow blanketed trees swaying in the wind. He spotted what looked like the dark shape of a small cabin amid the trees.

His joints numb and unresponsive, Gallagher removed one boot and used it as a paddle. After a few minutes, the exertion seemed to warm his body and the effort became less arduous. "Take heart, darlin'. We'll be on dry land soon."

The current was working parallel to the shore, and Gallagher fought to break out of its clutches. He felt as if he was struggling against a stream filled with molasses. The gap narrowed with agonizing slowness. The trees seemed so close he could reach out and shake them, but they were still a good sixty yards away.

Just when Gallagher had reached the end of his endurance and was about to collapse from exhaustion, he could feel the raft bumping against underwater boulders. He looked down at Katie. She was shivering uncontrollably from the damp and chill. She could not last much longer.

He shoved his frozen foot back inside the boot. Then, sucking in his breath, he prayed that the water would not close over his head and jumped in. It was a hazard he had to risk. Thankfully, the soles of his boots struck hard rock before the water level reached his crotch.

"Katie!" he shouted in happy delirium. "We've made it. We're on land."

"That's nice," Katie murmured, too paralyzed and oblivious to care.

Gallagher dragged the raft onto a shore covered with wave-smoothed rocks and pebbles. The exhausting effort took the last of his strength, and he sagged like a lifeless rag doll and dropped onto the cold, wet rocks. He never knew how long he lay there, but when he finally recovered enough to crawl up to the life raft and peer over the side, he saw that Katie's skin was blue and mottled. Fearful, he reached in and pulled her toward him. He wasn't sure whether she was alive or dead. Then he noticed a wisp of vapor coming from her nose. He felt for a pulse in her neck. It was faint and slow; her strong heart was still pumping, but death was very close to her.