"GL2" - читать интересную книгу автора (vol07)

an edraith ammen!(24)
The account of the descent remains distinctively different from the
story in FR, and closer to the original (VI.426 - 7), despite the fact that
Trotter was there still a hobbit, and Gimli and Legolas not present.

'The sooner we make a move and get down again the better,'
said Gandalf. 'There is more snow still to come up here.'
Much as they all desired to get down again, it was easier said
than done. Beyond their refuge the snow was already some feet
deep, and in places was piled into great wind-drifts; and it was
wet and soft. Gandalf could only get forward with great labour,
and had only gone a few yards on the downward path when he
was floundering in snow above his waist. Their plight looked
desperate.
Boromir was the tallest of the Company, being above six feet
and very broad-shouldered as well. 'I am going on down, if I
can,' he said. 'As far as I can make out our course of last night,
the path turns right round that shoulder of rock down there.
And if I remember rightly, a furlong or so beyond the turn there
was a flat space at the top of a long steep slope - very heavy

going it was as we came up. From that point I might be able to
get a view, and some idea of how the snow lies further down.'
He struggled slowly forward, plunging in snow that was
everywhere above his knees, and in places rose almost shoulder-
high. Often he seemed to be swimming or burrowing with his
great arms rather than walking. At last he vanished from sight
and passed round the turn. He was long gone, and they began to
be anxious, fearing that he had been engulfed in some drift or
snow-filled hollow, or had fallen over the hidden brink into the
ravine.
When more than an hour had passed they heard him call. He
had reappeared round the bend in the path and was labouring
back towards them, 'I am weary,' he said; 'but I have brought
back some hope. There is a deep wind-drift just round the turn,
and I was nearly buried in it, but fortunately it is not wide.
Beyond it the snow suddenly gets less. At the top of the slope it
is barely a foot deep, and further down, white though it looks,
it seems to be but a light coverlet: only a sprinkling in places.'
'It is the ill will of Caradras,' muttered Gimli. 'He does not
love dwarves, or elves. He has cast his snow at us with special
intent. That drift was devised to cut off our descent.'
'Then Caradras happily has forgotten that we have with us a
mountaineer who knows his far kindred, the peaks of the Black
Mountains,' said Gandalf. 'It was a good fortune that gave us
Boromir as a member of our Company.'
'But how are we to get through this drift, even if we ever get
as far as the turn?' asked Pippin, voicing the thoughts of all the
hobbits.
'It is a pity,' said Legolas, 'that Gandalf cannot go before us