"Alexander Green - Crimson Sails" - читать интересную книгу автора (Green Alexander)

the wildly splashing water and untied his boat; then, standing upright in
it he began moving towards the shore, pulling himself along from one pile
to the next. He had forgotten his oars, and as he stumbled and missed his
hold on the next pile, a strong gust of wind pulled the prow of his boat
away from the pier and towards the ocean. Now Menners could not have
reached the nearest pile even if he had stretched out to his full length. The
wind and the waves, rocking the boat, were carrying it off into the
distance and doom. Menners realized his predicament and wanted to dive
into the water and swim ashore, but this decision was too late in coming,
for the boat was now spinning about near the end of the pier where the
considerable depth and raging waves promised imminent death. There
were only about twenty metres between Longren and Menners, who was
being swept off into the stormy distance, and a rescue was still possible,
for a coiled rope with a weighted end hung on the pier beside Longren.
The rope was there for any boat that might land during a storm and was
thrown to the boat from the pier.
"Longren!" Menners cried in terror. "Don't just stand there! Can't you
see I'm being carried away? Throw me the line!"
Longren said nothing as he gazed calmly upon the frantic man,
although he puffed harder on his pipe and then, to have a better view of
what was happening, removed it from his mouth.
"Longren!" Menners pleaded. "I know you can hear me. I'll be drowned!
Save me!"
But Longren said not a word; it seemed as though he had not heard the
frantic wail. He did not even shift his weight until the boat had been
carried so far out to sea that Menners' word-cries were barely audible.
Menners sobbed in terror, he begged the sailor to run to the fishermen
for help; he promised him a reward, he threatened and cursed him, but all
Longren did was walk to the very edge of the pier so as not to loose the
leaping, spinning boat from view too soon.
"Longren, save me!" The words came to him as they would to someone
inside a house from someone on the roof.
Then, filling his lungs with air and taking a deep breath so that not a
single word would be carried away by the wind, Longren shouted: "That's
how she pleaded with you! Think of it, Menners, while you're still alive,
and don't forget!"
Then the cries stopped, and Longren went home. Assol awakened to see
her rather sitting lost in thought before the lamp that was now burning
low. Hearing the child's voice calling to him, he went over to her, kissed
her affectionately and fixed the tumbled blanket.
"Go to sleep, dear. It's still a long way till morning," he said.
"What are you doing?"
"I've made a black toy, Assol. Now go to sleep."
 The next day the village buzzed with the news of Menners'
disappearance. Five days later he was brought back, dying and full of
malice. His story soon reached every village in the vicinity. Menners had
been in the open sea until evening; he had been battered against the sides
and bottom of the boat during his terrible battle with the crashing waves
that constantly threatened to toss the raving shopkeeper into the sea and
was picked up by the Lucretia, plying towards Kasset. Exposure and the