"Philip Jose Farmer - The Empire of the Nine omnibus" - читать интересную книгу автора (Farmer Phillip Jose)

green of the bush jungle.

There was no time or desire to think ironic thoughts then, of course. But if there
had been, I would have thought how ironic it was that I was going to die only a
few miles from my birthplace. If I had thought I was going to die, that is. I was still
living, and until the final moment itself that is what I will always tell myself. I live.

I must have fallen about two hundred feet when I succeeded in spreading out my
legs and arms. I have done much sky diving for fun and for survival value. It was
this that enabled me to flatten out and gain a stable attitude. I was slowing down
my rate of descent somewhat by presenting as wide an area as possible to the
air, acting as my own parachute. And then I slipped into the vertical position
during the last fifty feet, and I entered the water like a knife with my hands
forming the knife's tip.

I struck exactly right. Even so, the impact knocked me out. I awoke coughing
saltwater out of my nose and mouth. But I was on the surface, and if I had any
broken bones or torn muscles, I did not feel them.

There was no sign of the killer plane or of my craft. The sky had swallowed one
and the sea the other.

The shore was about a mile away. Between it and me were the fins of at least
two sharks.

There wasn't much use trying to swim around the sharks. They would hear and
smell me even if I made a wide detour. So I swam toward them, though not
before I had assured myself that I had a knife. Most of my clothing had been
ripped off, but my belt with its sheathed knife was still attached to me. This was
an American knife with a five-inch blade, excellent for throwing. I left it in the
sheath until I saw one of the fins swerve and drive toward me. Then I drew it out
and placed it between my teeth.

The other fin continued to move southward.

The shark may have just happened to turn toward me in the beginning, but an
increase of speed showed that it had detected me. The fin stayed on the surface,
however, and turned to my right to circle me. I swam on, casting glances behind
me. It was a great white shark, a species noted for attacking men. This one was
wary; it circled me three times before deciding to rush me. I turned when it was
about twenty feet from me. The surface water just ahead of it boiled, and it turned
on its side just before trying to seize my leg. Or perhaps it only intended to make
a dry run to get a closer look at what might be a dangerous prey.

I pulled my legs up and stabbed at it with both hands holding the hilt of the knife.
The skin of the shark is as tough as cured hippo hide and covered with little jags
- placoid scales - that can tear the skin off a man if he so much as rubs lightly
against it. My only experience in fighting sharks was during World War II when
my boat was sunk in the waters of the East Indian Ocean. The encounter with a
freshwater shark in an African lake is fictional, the result of the sometimes over-