"Smith, Wilbur - Shout At The Devil" - читать интересную книгу автора (Smith Wilbur)

"You damn right I am." Flynn sat up a little straighter, a little more
proudly.

"You'd need a British captain for the dhow," El Keb mused, and stroked
his beard thoughtfully.

"Jesus, Kebby, you didn't think I was fool enough to sail that dhow in
myself? "Flynn looked pained. "I'll find someone else to do that, and
to sail her out again through the Imperial German navy. Me, I'm going
to walk in from my base camp in Portuguese Mozambique and go out the
same way."

"Forgive me." El Keb smiled again. "I underestimated you."

He stood up quickly. The splendour of the great jewelled dagger at his
waist was somewhat spoiled by the unwashed white of his ankle-length
robe. "Mr. O'Flynn, I think I have just the man to captain your dhow
for you. But first it is necessary to alter his financial
circumstances so that he might be willing to accept employment."

The leather purse of gold sovereigns had been the pivot on which the
gentle confusion of Sebastian Oldsmith's life turned. It had been
presented to him by his father when Sebastian had announced to the
family his intention of sailing to Australia to make his fortune in the
wool trade. It had comforted him during the voyage from Liverpool to
the Cape of Good Hope where the captain had unceremoniously deposited
him after Sebastiah's misalliance with the daughter of the gentleman
who was proceeding to Sydney to take up his appointment as Governor of
New South Wales.

In gradually dwindling quantity the sovereigns had remained with him
through the series of misfortunes that ended in Zanzibar, when he awoke
from heat drugged sleep in a shoddy room to find that the leather purse
and its contents were gone, and with them were gone the letters of
introduction from his father to certain prominent wool brokers of
Sydney.

It occurred to Sebastian as he sat on the edge of his bed that the
letters had little real value in Zanzibar, and with increasing
bewilderment, he reviewed the events that had blown him so far off his
intended COUrse. Slowly his forehead creased in the effort of thought.
It was the high, intelligent forehead of a philosopher crowned by a
splendid mass of shiny black curls; his eyes were dark brown, his nose
long and straight, his jaw firm, and his mouth sensitive. In his
twenty-second year, Sebastian had the face of a young Oxford don; which
proves, perhaps, how misleading looks can be. Those who knew him well
would have been surprised that Sebastian, in setting out for Australia,
had come as close to it as Zanzibar.

Abandoning the mental exercise that was already giving him a slight