" Perry Rhodan 0062 - (54) The Blue Dwarfs" - читать интересную книгу автора (Perry Rhodan)

If I leap up and into the bushes, maybe it wonтАЩt be able to follow me, Freddy considered. Or, better yet,
if I let myself fall backwards into the water. Can snakes swim?

Of course they can swim, you stupid girl! You saw a grass snake swimming in a pond on Earth not 6
months ago.

Whatever! IтАЩve got to do something!

Slowly, ever so slowly, so that no movement could be seen, Freddy tried to put her weight on her right
leg. A stab of pain shot through her foot and Freddy came within a hair of crying out.

With numb feet I wonтАЩt get half a yard, she thought. Alright then, IтАЩll have to go backwards into the
water.

She hesitated momentarilyтАФlike someone who clings to the hope that, the apparently inevitable may yet
be avoided by a miracle at the last moment.

And then the miracledid happen!

Freddy suddenly heard a burst of odd noises from the bushes, sounding like the shouting of a small child.

The snakeтАЩs pendulations slowed as it heard. After the series of noises had been repeated a few times,
Freddy heard crackling and rustling in the brush and then she noticed the shadows of some sort of
movement. The temptation to turn her head and look was great.

But Freddy remained unmoving. Her heart began to beat faster as she saw the snake completely stop
swaying, let its forebody sink back to the ground and slither away off to the left.

Freddy waited until she could no longer hear the rustling of the snake.

Then she simply allowed herself to fall to the side. The blood flowed back into her numb feet and legs,
causing pain almost unbearable. Moaning, she rolled over and looked in the direction in which the snake
had disappeared.

What she saw was extraordinary. A small, light-grey creature, rather resembling an Earthly Rhesus
monkey, crouched on the low-hanging branch of one of the huge trees at the waterтАЩs edge and watched
curiously the snake crawling through the grass towards the treeтАЩs trunk.

When the snake reached the trunk and began to wind its way up, the little monkey let forth a
mocking-sounding "Guhr-guhr-guhr!", leaped down from the branch and landed on the ground little more
than a yard behind the snake.

The snake noticed that it had been fooled and turned. The monkey sat motionless in the grass. The
snake, nearsighted as it was, raised its forebody into the air and began to sway in search of its victim.

The monkey sprang out of the way. The snakeтАЩs ugly head moved for it like lightning but the monkey
was agile enough to dodge the attack. It leaped a bit closer to the shore. The snake followed and the
game repeated itself. Once again the monkey sat motionless for awhile, then suddenly sprang up,
avoiding the pouncing snakeтАЩs head with an unbelievably skilful turning manoeuvre and leaping closer to
the waterтАЩs edge.