Любимые рассказы на английском / Best Short Stories

‘“Yes, yes, yes,” the Northman assented, hurriedly – then added an unexpected and dreamy-voiced “Perhaps.”

‘Was he pretending to be drunk, or only trying to appear sober? His glance was straight, but it was somewhat glazed. His lips outlined themselves firmly under his yellow moustache. But they twitched. Did they twitch? And why was he drooping like this in his attitude?

‘“There’s no perhaps about it,” pronounced the commanding officer sternly.

‘The Northman had straightened himself. And unexpectedly he looked stern, too.

‘“No. But what about the tempters? Better kill that lot off. There’s about four, five, six million of them,” he said, grimly; but in a moment changed into a whining key. “But I had better hold my tongue. You have some suspicions.”

‘“No, I’ve no suspicions,” declared the commanding officer.

‘He never faltered. At that moment he had the certitude. The air of the chart-room was thick with guilt and falsehood braving the discovery, defying simple right, common decency, all humanity of feeling, every scruple of conduct.

‘The Northman drew a long breath. “Well, we know that you English are gentlemen. But let us speak the truth. Why should we love you so very much? You haven’t done anything to be loved. We don’t love the other people, of course. They haven’t done anything for that either. A fellow comes along with a bag of gold… I haven’t been in Rotterdam[15 - Rotterdam – Роттердам, город и крупнейший европейский порт в Нидерландах; впервые упоминается в 1283 г.] my last voyage for nothing.”

‘“You may be able to tell something interesting, then, to our people when you come into port,” interjected the officer.

‘“I might. But you keep some people in your pay at Rotterdam. Let them report. I am a neutral – am I not?… Have you ever seen a poor man on one side and a bag of gold on the other? Of course, I couldn’t be tempted. I haven’t the nerve for it. Really I haven’t. It’s nothing to me. I am just talking openly for once.”

‘“Yes. And I am listening to you,” said the commanding officer, quietly.

‘The Northman leaned forward over the table. “Now that I know you have no suspicions, I talk. You don’t know what a poor man is. I do. I am poor myself. This old ship, she isn’t much, and she is mortgaged, too. Bare living, no more. Of course, I wouldn’t have the nerve. But a man who has nerve! See. The stuff he takes aboard looks like any other cargo – packages, barrels, tins, copper tubes – what not. He doesn’t see it work. It isn’t real to him. But he sees the gold. That’s real. Of course, nothing could induce me. I suffer from an internal disease. I would either go crazy from anxiety – or – or – take to drink or something. The risk is too great. Why – ruin!”

‘“It should be death.” The commanding officer got up, after this curt declaration, which the other received with a hard stare oddly combined with an uncertain smile. The officer’s gorge rose at the atmosphere of murderous complicity which surrounded him, denser, more impenetrable, more acrid than the fog outside.

‘“It’s nothing to me,” murmured the Northman, swaying visibly.

‘“Of course not,” assented the commanding officer, with a great effort to keep his voice calm and low. The certitude was strong within him. “But I am going to clear all you fellows off this coast at once. And I will begin with you. You must leave in half an hour.”

‘By that time the officer was walking along the deck with the Northman at his elbow.

‘“What! In this fog?” the latter cried out, huskily.

‘“Yes, you will have to go in this fog.”

‘“But I don’t know where I am. I really don’t.”

‘The commanding officer turned round. A sort of fury possessed him. The eyes of the two men met. Those of the Northman expressed a profound amazement.

‘“Oh, you don’t know how to get out.” The commanding officer spoke with composure, but his heart was beating with anger and dread. “I will give you your course. Steer south-by-east-half-east for about four miles and then you will be clear to haul to the eastward for your port. The weather will clear up before very long.”

‘“Must I? What could induce me? I haven’t the nerve.”

‘“And yet you must go. Unless you want to – ”

‘“I don’t want to,” panted the Northman. “I’ve enough of it.”

‘The commanding officer got over the side. The Northman remained still as if rooted to the deck. Before his boat reached his ship the commanding officer heard the steamer beginning to pick up her anchor. Then, shadowy in the fog, she steamed out on the given course.

‘“Yes,” he said to his officers, “I let him go.”’

The narrator bent forward towards the couch, where no movement betrayed the presence of a living person.

‘Listen,’ he said, forcibly. ‘That course would lead the Northman straight on a deadly ledge of rock. And the commanding officer gave it to him. He steamed out – ran on it – and went down. So he had spoken the truth. He did not know where he was. But it proves nothing. Nothing either way. It may have been the only truth in all his story. And yet… He seems to have been driven out by a menacing stare – nothing more.’

He abandoned all pretence.

‘Yes, I gave that course to him. It seemed to me a supreme test. I believe – no, I don’t believe. I don’t know. At the time I was certain. They all went down; and I don’t know whether I have done stern retribution – or murder; whether I have added to the corpses that litter the bed of the unreadable sea the bodies of men completely innocent or basely guilty. I don’t know. I shall never know.’

He rose. The woman on the couch got up and threw her arms round his neck. Her eyes put two gleams in the deep shadow of the room. She knew his passion for truth, his horror of deceit, his humanity.

‘Oh, my poor, poor – ’

‘I shall never know,’ he repeated, sternly, disengaged himself, pressed her hands to his lips, and went out.

Bret Harte

The Outcasts of Poker Flat

As Mr. John Oakhurst, gambler, stepped into the main street of Poker Flat on the morning of the twenty-third of November, 1850, he was conscious of a change in its moral atmosphere since the preceding night. Two or three men, conversing earnestly together, ceased as he approached, and exchanged significant glances. There was a Sabbath[16 - Sabbath – день отдыха (воскресенье у христиан, суббота у иудеев).] lull in the air which, in a settlement unused to Sabbath influences, looked ominous.

Mr. Oakhurst’s calm, handsome face betrayed small concern in these indications. Whether he was conscious of any predisposing cause was another question. ‘I reckon they’re after somebody,’ he reflected; ‘likely it’s me.’ He returned to his pocket the handkerchief with which he had been whipping away the red dust of Poker Flat from his neat boots, and quietly discharged his mind of any further conjecture.

In point of fact, Poker Flat was ‘after somebody.’ It had lately suffered the loss of several thousand dollars, two valuable horses, and a prominent citizen. It was experiencing a spasm of virtuous reaction, quite as lawless and ungovernable as any of the acts that had provoked it. A secret committee had determined to rid the town of all improper persons. This was done permanently in regard of two men who were then hanging from the boughs of a sycamore in the gulch, and temporarily in the banishment of certain other objectionable characters. I regret to say that some of these were ladies. It is but due to the sex, however, to state that their impropriety was professional, and it was only in such easily established standards of evil that Poker Flat ventured to sit in judgment.

Mr. Oakhurst was right in supposing that he was included in this category. A few of the committee had urged hanging him as a possible example, and a sure method of reimbursing themselves from his pockets of the sums he had won from them. ‘It’s agin justice,’ said Jim Wheeler, ‘to let this yer young man from Roaring Camp – an entire stranger – carry away our money.’ But a crude sentiment of equity residing in the breasts of those who had been fortunate enough to win from Mr. Oakhurst overruled this narrower local prejudice.

Mr. Oakhurst received his sentence with philosophic calmness, none the less coolly that he was aware of the hesitation of his judges. He was too much of a gambler not to accept Fate. With him life was at best an uncertain game, and he recognized the usual percentage in favor of the dealer.

A body of armed men accompanied the deported wickedness of Poker Flat to the outskirts of the settlement. Besides Mr. Oakhurst, who was known to be a coolly desperate man, and for whose intimidation the armed escort was intended, the expatriated party consisted of a young woman familiarly known as the ‘Duchess’; another, who had won the title of ‘Mother Shipton’; and ‘Uncle Billy,’ a suspected sluice-robber and confirmed drunkard. The cavalcade provoked no comments from the spectators, nor was any word uttered by the escort. Only, when the gulch which marked the uttermost limit of Poker Flat was reached, the leader spoke briefly and to the point. The exiles were forbidden to return at the peril of their lives.

As the escort disappeared, their pent-up feelings found vent in a few hysterical tears from the Duchess, some bad language from Mother Shipton, and a Parthian volley[17 - Parthian volley – производное от Parthian shot – «парфянская стрела». Это выражение обозначает враждебное высказывание или действие, приуроченное к моменту ухода (здесь – целый залп таких высказываний).] of expletives from Uncle Billy. The philosophic Oakhurst alone remained silent. He listened calmly to Mother Shipton’s desire to cut somebody’s heart out, to the repeated statements of the Duchess that she would die in the road, and to the alarming oaths that seemed to be bumped out of Uncle Billy as he rode forward. With the easy good humor characteristic of his class, he insisted upon exchanging his own riding horse, ‘Five Spot,’ for the sorry mule which the Duchess rode. But even this act did not draw the party into any closer sympathy. The young woman readjusted her somewhat draggled plumes with a feeble, faded coquetry; Mother Shipton eyed the possessor of ‘Five Spot’ with malevolence, and Uncle Billy included the whole party in one sweeping anathema.[18 - Anathema – анафема, отлучение от церкви, изгнание, проклятие.]

The road to Sandy Bar – a camp that, not having as yet experienced the regenerating influences of Poker Flat, consequently seemed to offer some invitation to the emigrants – lay over a steep mountain range. It was distant a day’s severe travel. In that advanced season, the party soon passed out of the moist, temperate regions of the foothills into the dry, cold, bracing air of the Sierras.[19 - The Sierras – Сьерра-Невада, горный хребет на западе Северной Америки.] The trail was narrow and difficult. At noon the Duchess, rolling out of her saddle upon the ground, declared her intention of going no farther, and the party halted.

The spot was singularly wild and impressive. A wooded amphitheater, surrounded on three sides by precipitous cliffs of naked granite, sloped gently toward the crest of another precipice that overlooked the valley. It was, undoubtedly, the most suitable spot for a camp, had camping been advisable. But Mr. Oakhurst knew that scarcely half the journey to Sandy Bar was accomplished, and the party were not equipped or provisioned for delay. This fact he pointed out to his companions curtly, with a philosophic commentary on the folly of ‘throwing up their hand before the game was played out.’ But they were furnished with liquor, which in this emergency stood them in place of food, fuel, rest, and prescience. In spite of his remonstrances, it was not long before they were more or less under its influence. Uncle Billy passed rapidly from a bellicose state into one of stupor, the Duchess became maudlin, and Mother Shipton snored. Mr. Oakhurst alone remained erect, leaning against a rock, calmly surveying them.

Mr. Oakhurst did not drink. It interfered with a profession which required coolness, impassiveness, and presence of mind, and, in his own language, he ‘couldn’t afford it.’ As he gazed at his recumbent fellow exiles, the loneliness begotten of his pariah trade, his habits of life, his very vices, for the first time seriously oppressed him. He bestirred himself in dusting his black clothes, washing his hands and face, and other acts characteristic of his studiously neat habits, and for a moment forgot his annoyance. The thought of deserting his weaker and more pitiable companions never perhaps occurred to him. Yet he could not help feeling the want of that excitement which, singularly enough, was most conducive to that calm equanimity for which he was notorious. He looked at the gloomy walls that rose a thousand feet sheer above the circling pines around him; at the sky, ominously clouded; at the valley below, already deepening into shadow. And, doing so, suddenly he heard his own name called.

A horseman slowly ascended the trail. In the fresh, open face of the newcomer Mr. Oakhurst recognized Tom Simson, otherwise known as the ‘Innocent’ of Sandy Bar. He had met him some months before over a ‘little game,’ and had, with perfect equanimity, won the entire fortune – amounting to some forty dollars – of that guileless youth. After the game was finished, Mr. Oakhurst drew the youthful speculator behind the door and thus addressed him: ‘Tommy, you’re a good little man, but you can’t gamble worth a cent. Don’t try it over again.’ He then handed him his money back, pushed him gently from the room, and so made a devoted slave of Tom Simson.

There was a remembrance of this in his boyish and enthusiastic greeting of Mr. Oakhurst. He had started, he said, to go to Poker Flat to seek his fortune. ‘Alone?’ No, not exactly alone; in fact (a giggle), he had run away with Piney Woods. Didn’t Mr. Oakhurst remember Piney? She that used to wait on the table at the Temperance House? They had been engaged a long time, but old Jake Woods had objected, and so they had run away, and were going to Poker Flat to be married, and here they were. And they were tired out, and how lucky it was they had found a place to camp and company. All this the Innocent delivered rapidly, while Piney, a stout, comely damsel of fifteen, emerged from behind the pine tree, where she had been blushing unseen, and rode to the side of her lover.

Mr. Oakhurst seldom troubled himself with sentiment, still less with propriety; but he had a vague idea that the situation was not fortunate. He retained, however, his presence of mind sufficiently to kick Uncle Billy, who was about to say something, and Uncle Billy was sober enough to recognize in Mr. Oakhurst’s kick a superior power that would not bear trifling. He then endeavored to dissuade Tom Simson from delaying further, but in vain. He even pointed out the fact that there was no provision, nor means of making a camp. But, unluckily, the Innocent met this objection by assuring the party that he was provided with an extra mule loaded with provisions and by the discovery of a rude attempt at a log house near the trail. ‘Piney can stay with Mrs. Oakhurst,’ said the Innocent, pointing to the Duchess, ‘and I can shift for myself.’

Nothing but Mr. Oakhurst’s admonishing foot saved Uncle Billy from bursting into a roar of laughter. As it was, he felt compelled to retire up the canyon until he could recover his gravity. There he confided the joke to the tall pine trees, with many slaps of his leg, contortions of his face, and the usual profanity. But when he returned to the party, he found them seated by a fire – for the air had grown strangely chill and the sky overcast – in apparently amicable conversation. Piney was actually talking in an impulsive, girlish fashion to the Duchess, who was listening with an interest and animation she had not shown for many days. The Innocent was holding forth, apparently with equal effect, to Mr. Oakhurst and Mother Shipton, who was actually relaxing into amiability. ‘Is this yer a damned picnic?’ said Uncle Billy with inward scorn as he surveyed the sylvan group, the glancing firelight, and the tethered animals in the foreground. Suddenly an idea mingled with the alcoholic fumes that disturbed his brain. It was apparently of a jocular nature, for he felt impelled to slap his leg again and cram his fist into his mouth.

As the shadows crept slowly up the mountain, a slight breeze rocked the tops of the pine trees, and moaned through their long and gloomy aisles. The ruined cabin, patched and covered with pine boughs, was set apart for the ladies. As the lovers parted, they unaffectedly exchanged a kiss, so honest and sincere that it might have been heard above the swaying pines. The frail Duchess and the malevolent Mother Shipton were probably too stunned to remark upon this last evidence of simplicity, and so turned without a word to the hut. The fire was replenished, the men lay down before the door, and in a few minutes were asleep.