"Oswald Bastable - 03 - The Steel Tsar" - читать интересную книгу автора (Moorcock Michael)

drifting just out of my reach. I had seen blood-red devils with fiery pitchforks
piercing my skin.
I had seen enemy airships, which popped like bubbles just as they were about
to release their bombs on me. I
had seen orange-sailed schooners as tall as the Empire State Building. I had
seen schools of tiny black whales. I
had seen rose-colored coral atolls on which lounged beautiful young women whose
faces turned into the faces of
Japanese soldiers as I came closer and who then slid beneath the waves where I
was sure they were trying to
capsize my boat. But this mirage retained its clarity no matter how hard I
stared and it was so much more detailed
than the others.
The engine fired after the tenth attempt to start it. There was hardly any
fuel left. The screw squealed, rasped
and began to turn. The water foamed. The boat moved reluctantly across a flat
sea of burnished steel, beneath a
swollen and throbbing disc of fire, which was the sun, my enemy.
I straightened up, squatting like a desiccated old toad on the floor of the
boat, whimpering as I gripped the tiller, for
its touch sent shards of fire through my hand and into my body.
Still the hallucination did not waver; it even appeared to grow larger as I
approached it. I completely forgot my pain
as I allowed myself to be deceived by this splendid mirage.
I steered under brooding gray cliffs, which fell sheer into the sea. I came
to the lower slopes of the island and saw
palms, their trunks bowed as if in prayer, swaying over sharp rocks washed by
white surf. There was even a brown crab
scuttling across a rock; there was weed and lichen of several varieties;
seabirds diving in the shallows and darting
upwards with shining fish in their long beaks. Perhaps the island was real,
after all . . .?
But then I had rounded a coral outcrop and at once discovered the final
confirmation of my complete madness. For
here was a high concrete wall: a harbor wall encrusted above the water line with
barnacles and coral and tiny plants. It
had been built to follow the natural curve of a small bay. And over the top of
the wall I saw the roofs and upper stories
of houses, which might have belonged to a town on any part of the English coast.
And as a superb last touch there was a
flagpole at which flew a torn and weather-stained Union Jack! My fantasy was
complete. I had created an English
fishing port in the middle of the Indian Ocean.
I smiled again. The movement caused the blistered skin of my lips to crack
still more. I ignored the discomfort. Now
all I had to do was enter the harbor, step off onto what I believed to be dry
land - and drown. It was a fine way to die. I
gave another hoarse, mad chuckle, full of self-admiration, and I abandoned
myself to the world of my mind.
Guiding my boat round the wall I found the harbor mouth. It was partly