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Tarnsman of Gor :: Норман Джон
Страница: 61 из 145She had sunk to her waist in the marsh water. She had slipped into a pocket of quicksand. She cried out hysterically. Cautiously I tried to approach her, but felt the ooze slipping away beneath my feet. I tried to reach her with my sword belt, but it was too short. The tarn-goad, which had been thrust in the belt, dropped into the water, and I lost it.
The girl sank deeper in the mire, the surface of the water circling her armpits. She was screaming wildly, all control lost in the face of the slow, ugly death awaiting her. "Don't struggle!" I cried. But her movements were hysterical, like those of a mad animal. "The veil!" I cried. "Unwind it, throw it to me!" Her hands tried to tear at the veil, but she was unable to unwind it, in her terror and in the moment of time left to her. Then the muck crept upward to her horrified eyes, and her head slipped under the greenish waters, her hands clutching wildly at the air.
I frantically looked about, caught sight of a half-submerged log some yards away, protruding upward out of the marsh water. Regardless of the possible danger, not feeling my way, I splashed to the log, jerking on it, hauling on it with all my might. In what seemed like hours but must have been a matter of only a few seconds, it gave, leaping upward out of the mud. I half-carried, half-floated it, shoving it toward the place where the daughter of the Ubar had slipped under the water. I clung to the log, floating in the shallow water over the quicksand, and reached down again and again into the mire.
At last my hand clutched something — the girl's wrist and I drew her slowly upward out of the sand. My heart leaped with joy as I heard her whimpering, choking gasps, her lungs spasmodically sucking in the fetid but vivifying air. I shoved the log back and finally, carrying the filthy body soaked in its absurd garments, made my way to a ledge of green, dry land at the edge of the swamp.
I set her down on a bed of green clover. Beyond it, some hundred yards away, I could see the border of a. yellow field of Sa-Tarna and a yellow thicket of Ka-la-na, trees. I sat beside the girl, exhausted. I smiled to myself; the proud daughter of the Ubar in all her imperial regalia quite literally stank, stank of the swamps and the mud and of the perspiration exuded beneath that heavy covering, stank of heat and fear.
"You have saved my life again," said the daughter of the Ubar.
I nodded, not wanting to talk about anything.
"Are we out of the swamp?" she asked.
I assented.
This seemed to please her.
The girl sank deeper in the mire, the surface of the water circling her armpits. She was screaming wildly, all control lost in the face of the slow, ugly death awaiting her. "Don't struggle!" I cried. But her movements were hysterical, like those of a mad animal. "The veil!" I cried. "Unwind it, throw it to me!" Her hands tried to tear at the veil, but she was unable to unwind it, in her terror and in the moment of time left to her. Then the muck crept upward to her horrified eyes, and her head slipped under the greenish waters, her hands clutching wildly at the air.
I frantically looked about, caught sight of a half-submerged log some yards away, protruding upward out of the marsh water. Regardless of the possible danger, not feeling my way, I splashed to the log, jerking on it, hauling on it with all my might. In what seemed like hours but must have been a matter of only a few seconds, it gave, leaping upward out of the mud. I half-carried, half-floated it, shoving it toward the place where the daughter of the Ubar had slipped under the water. I clung to the log, floating in the shallow water over the quicksand, and reached down again and again into the mire.
At last my hand clutched something — the girl's wrist and I drew her slowly upward out of the sand. My heart leaped with joy as I heard her whimpering, choking gasps, her lungs spasmodically sucking in the fetid but vivifying air. I shoved the log back and finally, carrying the filthy body soaked in its absurd garments, made my way to a ledge of green, dry land at the edge of the swamp.
I set her down on a bed of green clover. Beyond it, some hundred yards away, I could see the border of a. yellow field of Sa-Tarna and a yellow thicket of Ka-la-na, trees. I sat beside the girl, exhausted. I smiled to myself; the proud daughter of the Ubar in all her imperial regalia quite literally stank, stank of the swamps and the mud and of the perspiration exuded beneath that heavy covering, stank of heat and fear.
"You have saved my life again," said the daughter of the Ubar.
I nodded, not wanting to talk about anything.
"Are we out of the swamp?" she asked.
I assented.
This seemed to please her.