Читать книгу Michael’s Ark - Alex Nuller - Страница 6

Mike climbed up on the sofa and said:

“We’re taking a trip around the world!”

“And what about me?” Moosie asked. “Will I have to stay home all alone?”

“No”, Mike said, “We’ll build a ship and we’ll sail on it all together. Me, you and Dreamer.”

“You wish to involve me in a trip around the world on a ship?” Camel asked. “But let me inform you that the camel is a terrestrial animal. We don’t swim and we have no affinity22 for it. Sometimes they call me a ship, but they mean a ship of the desert, as opposed to a typical oceangoing vessel.”

“Don’t worry, Dreamer,” Mike said “we’ll go on a ship. You won’t have to swim…”

“Until such time as we suffer a shipwreck”, Camel concluded to Mike, “an intriguing prospect, don’t you agree? In any case,” he continued, “I am not refusing, I am merely giving a timely warning, and I strongly urge you to take it into consideration.23”

“So you agree, Dreamer? Hooray!” Mike cried.

“And what about me” Moosie said. “I can’t swim either. I could fall in the water, get waterlogged and drown!”

“It’s okay, Moosie, don’t worry, I’ll save you, I promise!” Mike said.

“Moosie will have to have his horns fastened to an unsinkable object, such as a life saver. It will improve his buoyancy24,” Camel added.

“No”, Moosie said, “that’s a bad idea. If I fall in the water with a life saver on my horns, my nose will be underwater, and I’ll drown.”

“It would appear that our antlered friend is showing a germ of intelligence,25” murmured Camel.

“Germs? What germs? You see germs on me?” Moosie said frightened, turning his head around and trying to look at himself from every angle.

“He means that you’ve started thinking smarter,” Mike said for Camel, “but let’s get to work on the ship!”

“But what are we going to build the ship out of?” Moosie asked.

“Out of the sofa,” Mike answered quickly, “and we’ll make masts out of hockey sticks. We’ll have a sailing ship!”

“While you are planning the construction of the ship, it would behove you to carefully consider the material side,” Camel looked attentively at Mike and added “we must know what it will consist of.”

“Of course,” Mike said. “I’ve got a big book about sailing ships, and it’s got everything in it.” Mike ran to his room and brought the book. The book really was quite big. Mike put the book on the carpet and started flipping through it. Moosie and Camel moved closer to him.

“Here it is!” Mike cried. The chapter on “Types of Sailing Ships’. What kind of ship will we have?”

“Seeing as we have only two hockey sticks,” Dreamer said, “it will have to be a two-master. So what is left to determine is whether it will be a schooner, a brig or a brigantine.”

“And how do we find out?” Mike asked.

“Look carefully in the book, my young friend,” said Camel, “it says here,” Dreamer pointed at the page with his hoof, “that a brig is square-rigged, a schooner is gaff-rigged and a brigantine is mixed26, which is to say that it has various types of rigging.”

Mike lay on the carpet and began examining the pictures attentively. Then he got up and stuck the two hockey sticks into the sofa with the blades facing up, one at the sofa’s “stern” and the other at its “bow”.

“I can hang a t-shirt on each stick,” Mike said, “so then it will be square rigged. So the ship will be a brig!”

Dreamer looked at the sticks sticking out of the sofa and shook his head.

“I would advise you, my young friend,” he said, “to use some other material for the masts. Hockey sticks will hardly hold square rigging.27”

“But what else can we put there instead?”

“I have an idea,” Dreamer said, “but I am not prepared to share responsibility for the consequences of its implementation.28”

Moosie, who by this point had lost the thread of the conversation, raised his head and asked:

“I don’t understand. What aren’t you prepared to share with who?

Camel turned his head to Moosie and said:

“My antlered friend, allow me to give you a small piece of advice, so that you will – how can I put it gently? – appear… a bit smarter.

“What advice?”

“If you don’t understand some word, then don’t ask display your ignorance by asking naive questions. Just say ‘Uh-huh’. I will try to explain to you.”

“And what if I don’t understand two or three words?” Moosie asked next.

“Then say ‘uh-huh uh-huh’ or uh-huh uh-huh uh-huh!” Dreamer explained. “Agreed?”

“Uh-huh,” Moosie said.

“So what don’t you understand now?” Camel inquired.

“I understand everything,” Moosie said, “I just said “uh-huh’ because I understand everything.

Camel sighed deeply, and then continued:

Very well, I propose the use of the mop that we use to wash the floors as the foremast, and for the mainmast the big broom we use for sweeping. But if the application of these measures results in an altercation29 with your parents, I would not wish to suffer any complaints and accusations.”

“Uh-huh,” said Moosie.

“I understand,” Mike added, “don’t worry, nobody will blame you!”

“I merely wished to say,” Dreamer concluded, “that all must be shipshape before we cast off.”

“Of course,” Mike said, “We’ll settle everything ashore, before we’re on the high seas.”