"MacLean, Alistair - The Golden Rendezvous" - читать интересную книгу автора (Maclean Alistair)

back towards the side of the ship, the two men on the guide rope still
hanging on desperately. I caught a glimpse of the stevedores on the
quayside below, their faces twisted into expressions of frozen panic: in
the new people's democracy, where all men were free and equal, the
penalty for this sort of carelessness was probably the firing squad;
nothing else could have accounted for their otherwise inexplicably
genuine terror. The crate began to swing back over the hold. I yelled
to the men beneath to run clear and simultaneously gave the signal for
emergency lowering. The winchman, fortunately, was as quick-witted as
he was experienced, and as the wildly careening crate swung jerkily back
to dead centre he lowered away at two or three times the normal speed,
braking just seconds before the lowermost corner of the crate crunched
and splintered against the floor of the hold. Moments later the entire
length of the crate was resting on the bottom. Captain Bullen fished a
handkerchief from his drills, removed his gold-braided cap, and slowly
mopped his sandy hair and sweating brow. He appeared to be communing
with himself. "This," he said finally, "is the bloody end. Captain
Bullen in the doghouse. The crew sore as hell. The passengers hopping
mad. Two days behind schedule. Searched by the Americans from truck to
keelson like a contraband runner. Now probably carrying contraband. No
sign of the latest bunch of passengers. Got to clear the harbour bar by
six. And now this band of madmen trying to send us to the bottom. A
man can stand so much, First, just so much." he replaced his cap.
"Shakespeare had something to say about this, First."
"A sea of troubles, sir?"
"No, something else. But apt enough." he sighed. "Get the second
officer to relieve you. Third's checking stores. Get the fourth o, not
that blithering nincompoop get the bo'sun-he talks spanish like a native
anyway to take over on the shore side. Any objections and that's the
last piece of cargo we load. Then you and I are having lunch, First."
"I told Miss Beresford that I wouldn't "if you think," captain
Bullen interrupted heavily, "that i'm going to listen to that bunch
jangling their moneybags and bemoaning their hard lot from hors
d'oeuvres right through to coffee, you must be out of your mind. We'll
have it in my cabin." and so we had it in his cabin. It was the usual
Campari meal, something for even the most blase epicure to dream about,
and captain Bullen, for once and understandably, made an exception to
his rule that neither he nor his officers should drink with lunch. By
the time the meal was over he was feeling almost human again and once
went so far as to call me "Johnny-me-boy." it wouldn't last. But it
was all pleasant enough, and it was with reluctance that I finally quit
the air-conditioned coolness of the captain's day cabin for the blazing
sunshine outside to relieve the second officer. He smiled widely as I
approached number four hold. Tommy wilson was always smiling. He was a
dark, wiry welshman of middle height, with an infectious grin and an
immense zest for life, no matter what came his way. Nothing was too
much trouble for tommy and nothing ever got him down. Nothing, that is,
except mathematics: his weakness in that department had already cost him
his master's ticket. But he was that rare combination of an outstanding
seaman and a tremendous social asset on a passenger ship, and it was for