Читать книгу Сердце тьмы. Уровень 2 / Heart of Darkness - Джозеф Конрад, Ford Madox Hueffer - Страница 4

I got my appointment – of course. I got it very quick. One of the captains was killed in a scuffle with the natives. This was my chance. It was only months and months afterwards, when I recovered his body. The original quarrel arose from a misunderstanding about some hens. Yes, two black hens. Fresleven – that was the fellow’s name, a Dane – thought himself wronged somehow in the bargain[10]. He went ashore and started to hammer the chief of the village with a stick. Oh, it didn’t surprise me to hear this, although Fresleven was the gentlest, quietest creature that ever walked on two legs. No doubt he was. But, you know, he probably wanted to assert his self-respect in some way. Therefore he whacked the old negro mercilessly. A big crowd of his people watched him, thunderstruck. And some man made jab with a spear at the white man. Of course it went quite easy between the shoulder-blades. Then the whole population cleared into the forest. They were expecting all kinds of calamities.

On the other hand, the steamer left also in a bad panic, in charge of the engineer, I believe. Afterwards nobody troubled much about Fresleven’s remains, till I appeared. When I met my predecessor, the grass through his ribs was tall enough to hide his bones. They were all there. Nobody touched the supernatural creature after he fell. And the village was deserted, the huts were rotting. A calamity came to it. The people vanished. Mad terror scattered them, men, women, and children, through the bush, and they never returned. What became of the hens I don’t know either. However, through this glorious affair I got my appointment.

I ran like mad. Before forty-eight hours I was crossing the Channel to show myself to my employers, and sign the contract. In a very few hours I arrived in a city that always makes me think of a sepulchre. Prejudice no doubt. I found the Company’s offices easily. It was the biggest thing in the town, and everybody I knew it. The Company wanted to grab the over-sea empire.