标题: 《Rim Castaway》作者： - A. Bertram Chandler【EPUB】 [打印本页] 作者: zaq 时间: 2013-9-5 19:02 标题: 《Rim Castaway》作者： - A. Bertram Chandler【EPUB】 CASTAWAY The water, that at first had been so warm, enveloped him with a cold embrace that contracted his muscles, that threatened to squeeze his heart itself to a stand-still. The salt mouthfuls that he was now swallowing with almost every stroke choked him and seared his lungs. The smarting eyes were blind, no longer staring towards the yellow line of beach that, at the beginning of it all, had seemed so close. He no longer knew or cared where he was going, no longer wondered if he would ever get there. The tired limbs automatically went through their feeble, no longer rhythmic, motions — but it was only that part of himself which must always refuse to acknowledge the ultimate defeat. Perhaps he was already drowning. Perhaps it was only his memory harking back to some happier time, some period when the world held more than this hopeless, wet misery. For it was not the whole of his past life that flashed before his inward eye as the prelude to ultimate extinction. It was only the events just prior to his present predicament. He was walking the bridge again, warm in the afternoon sunlight, dry, the heat tempered by the pleasant Pacific breeze. And he was hearing the carefree voices of the day-workers and the watch on deck as, swinging in their bos'n's chairs, they happily slapped the Company's colours — clean, fresh cream over vividly garish red lead — on to the recently scaled funnel. They were cheerful — and there was no reason why they should not have been. It was one of those days when, somehow, it is perfectly