Читать книгу The Complete Works of Algernon Blackwood. Novels, Short Stories, Horror Classics, Occult & Supernatural Tales, Plays онлайн

224 страница из 1552

'By Jove!' he said, as he thundered along the stuffy passages of the rolling vessel, and 'By Gad!'

He emerged on the upper deck in the sunlight, having nearly injured several persons in his impetuous journey, and, taking a great gulp of the salt air with keen satisfaction, he crossed to the side in a couple of strides, the shoe-laces clicking against the deck as he went.

'Twenty years ago,' he muttered, 'when I was barely out of my teens. And now!'

The big man was distinctly excited, though 'moved' perhaps is the better word, seeing that the emotion was a little too searching, too tinged with sadness, to include elation. He plunged both hands into his coat pockets with a violence that threatened to tear the bottoms out, and leaned over the railing.

Far away a faint blue line, tinged delicately with green, rose out of the sea. He saw it instantly, and his throat tightened unexpectedly, almost like a reflex action. For, about that simple little blue line on the distant horizon there was something strangely seizing, something absolutely arresting. The sight of it was a hundred times more poignant than he had imagined it would be; it touched a thousand springs of secret life in him, and a mist rose faintly before his eyes.