"Michael Ende - Momo" - читать интересную книгу автора (Ende Michael)

reduced to matchwood.
Being a research vessel, of course, the Argo had been specially designed to tackle the Travelling
Tornado. Her hull was entirely constructed of adamantium, a steel as tough and flexible as a sword blade,
and had been cast in one piece by a special process that dispensed with rivets and welded seams.
For all that, few captains and crews would have had the courage to face such incredible hazards.
Captain Gordon of the Argo had that courage. He gazed down proudly from the bridge at the men and
women of his crew, all of whom were experts in their particular field. Beside him stood his first mate, Jim
Ironside, an old salt who had already survived a hundred and twenty-seven hurricanes.
Stationed on the sun-deck further aft were Professor Eisenstein, the expedition's senior scientist,
and his assistants Moira and Sarah, who had as much information stored in their prodigious memories as
a whole reference library. All three were hunched over their precision instruments, quietly conferring in
complicated scientific jargon.
Seated cross-legged a little apart from them was Momosan, a beautiful native girl. Now and
again the professor would consult her about some special characteristic of the South Coral Sea, and she
would reply in her melodious Hula dialect, which he alone could understand.
The purpose of the expedition was to discover what caused the Travelling Tornado and, if
possible, make the sea safe for other ships by putting an end to it. So far, however, there had been no
sign of the tornado and all was quiet.
Quite suddenly, the captain's thoughts were interrupted by a shout from the lookout in the
crow's-nest. "Captain!" he called down, cupping his hands around his mouth. "Unless I'm crazy, there's a
glass island dead ahead of us!"
The captain and Jim Ironside promptly levelled their telescopes. Professor Eisenstein and his two
assistants hurried up, bursting with curiosity, but the beautiful native girl calmly remained seated. The
peculiar customs of her tribe forbade her to seem inquisitive.
When they reached the glass island, as they very soon did, the professor scrambled down a rope
ladder and gingerly stepped ashore. The surface was not only transparent but so slippery that he found it
hard to keep his footing.
The island was circular and about fifty feet across, with a sort of dome in the centre. On reaching
the summit, the professor could distinctly make out a light flashing deep in the heart of the island. He
passed this information to the others, who were eagerly lining the ship's rail.
"From what you say," said Moira, "it must be a Blancmangius viscosus."
"Perhaps," Sarah chimed in, "though it could equally be a Jelly-beania multicolorata."
Professor Eisenstein straightened up and adjusted his glasses. "In my opinion," he said, "we're
dealing with a variety of the common Chocolatus indigestibilis, but we can't be sure till we've examined
it from below."
The words were scarcely out of his mouth when three girl sailors, all of whom were
world-famous scuba divers and had already pulled on their wetsuits, plunged over the side and vanished
into the blue depths.
Nothing could be seen for a while but air bubbles. Then one of the girls, Sandra, shot to the
surface. "It's a giant jellyfish!" she gasped. "The other two are caught up in its tentacles and can't break
loose. We must save them before it's too late!" So saying, she disappeared again.
Without hesitation, a hundred frogmen led by Commander Franco, nicknamed "the Dolphin"
because of his skill and experience, dived into the sea. A tremendous battle raged beneath the surface,
which soon became covered with foam, but the gigantic creature's strength was such that not even a
hundred brave men could release the girls from its terrible embrace.
The professor turned to his assistants with a puzzled frown. "Something in these waters seems
conducive to the growth of abnormally large sea creatures," he observed. "What an interesting
phenomenon!"
Meanwhile, Captain Gordon and his first mate had come to a decision.
"Back!" shouted Jim Ironside. "All hands back on board! We'll have to slice the monster in half