"Hemingway, Ernest - Green Hills of Africa" - читать интересную книгу автора (Hemingway Ernest)

I was so surprised by the way he had rolled over dead from the shot
after we had been prepared for a charge, for heroics, and for drama, that I
felt more let down than pleased. It was our first lion and we were very
ignorant and this was not what we had paid to see. Charo and M'Cola both
shook P.O.M.'s hand and then Charo came over and shook hands with me.
'Good shot, B'wana,' he said in Swahili. {'Piga m'uzuri.'}
'Did you shoot, Karl?' I asked.
'No. I was just going to when you shot.'
'You didn't shoot him, Pop?'
'No. You'd have heard it.' He opened the breech and took out the two
big 450 No. 2's.
'I'm sure I missed him,' P.O.M. said.
'I was sure you hit him.. I still think you hit him,' I said.
'Mama hit,' M'Cola said.
'Where?' Charo asked.
'Hit,' said M'Cola. 'Hit.'
'You rolled him over,' Pop said to me. 'God, he went over like a
rabbit.'
'I couldn't believe it.'
'Mama {piga,'} M'Cola said. {''Piga Simba.'}
As we saw the camp fire in the dark ahead of us, coming in that night,
M'Cola suddenly commenced to shout a stream of high-pitched, rapid, singing
words in Wakamba ending in the word {'Simb}a{'}. Someone at the camp shouted
back one word. D 47
'Mama!' M'Cola shouted. Then another long stream. Then 'Mama! Mama!'
Through the dark came all the porters, the cook, the skinner, the boys,
and the headman.
'Mama!' M'Cola shouted. 'Mama {piga Simba.'}
The boys came dancing, crowing, and beating time and chanting something
from down in their chests that started like a cough and sounded like {'Hey
la Mama! Hay la Mama! Hey la Mama!'}
The rolling-eyed skinner picked P.O.M. up, the big cook and the boys
held her, and the others pressing forward to lift and if not to lift to
touch and hold, they danced and sang through the dark around the fire and to
our tent.
{'Hey la Mama! huh! huh! huh! Hay la Mama! huh! huh! huh!'} they sang
the lion dance with that deep, lion asthmatic cough in it. Then at the tent
they put her down and everyone, very shyly, shook hands, the boys saying
{'m'uzuri, Memsahib,''} and M'Cola and the porters all saying {''m'uzuri},
Mama' with much feeling in the accenting of the word 'Mama'.
Afterwards in the chairs in front of the fire, sitting with the drinks,
Pop said, 'You shot it. M'Cola would kill anyone who said you didn't.'
'You know, I feel as though I did shoot it,' P.O.M. said. 'I don't
believe I'd be able to stand it if I really had shot it. I'd be too proud.
Isn't triumph marvellous?'
'Good old Mama,' Karl said.
'I believe you did shoot him,' I said.
'Oh, let's not go into that,' P.O.M. said. 'I feel so wonderful about
just being supposed to have killed him. You know people never used to carry
me on their shoulders much at home.'