Читать книгу Boy Giant - Michael Morpurgo - Страница 14

I must have fallen into sleep, because next thing I knew, I found myself waking up.

The storm had passed. There was the warmth of sunlight on my face, and I could hear a sound of chattering and whispering, like the murmuring of a flock of birds flying about me. But I could see no birds. I realised then that I was no longer lying in the boat at all, that the sea was no longer surging beneath me. I was on land, dry land. I could feel it under me. I tried to move my head, to discover where I was, but I could not move it. My arms would not move either, nor my legs. All I could move were my fingers. I clutched at the ground beneath them. It felt as if I was clawing at sand. I must be on a beach somewhere. But I had no idea where I was. I did not care. I was alive! I had survived.

I discovered I could wriggle my toes. But try as I did, I could not find the strength even to lift my head to see them. I could swivel my eyes, but my neck I could not move however hard I tried. I was overwhelmed by terror, and I was shivering uncontrollably, yet I did not feel cold. I did not feel anything. This was what the beginning of dying was like, I thought.

In my panic, I cried out, calling for help, louder and louder, until my throat ached with it. Hearing myself at least lifted my spirits. If my voice worked and my throat ached, then that must be good. I was still alive. There was hope. But I knew I needed help. I could hear the waves tumbling on to the sand not too far away, they were rushing up towards me, every wave coming closer. I feared the worst. Sooner or later the sea would reach me, and then cover me. I had to find a way to move or I would drown. I shouted for help again, and again. But no one came.

I did hear that strange whispering again, and a chirruping and a chattering like a flock of thousands of birds gathering to roost at sunset. It was a sound that reminded me of evenings at home when we were out playing cricket in the last of the daylight. My hearing worked, and my memory worked. I could see the sun, and the sky. My seeing worked too. And there was more feeling now in my legs and feet. Every new sign of life in me gave me hope.

I felt something tickling my toe, then crawling up my leg. An insect, I thought, a scorpion maybe and it might sting me. But I didn’t mind. I could feel it. I could feel it.

I heard that whispering sound again. It wasn’t bird noise after all, but voices, small voices. I thought at first in my muddled head that these might be scorpions talking. I tried again to lift my head to see, and still could not move it. Then I was drifting away, down into a deep sleep. It was a comfortable sleep, a warm sleep. There was no more shivering. If this was dying then I did not mind a bit, not any more.

I woke to more whispering and murmuring. It was certainly not birds, I decided, nor was it the hush of waves washing back over the sand into the sea. It was not birds. It was not waves. It was people, lots of them, and they were speaking in small voices, voices that were all around me. When I tried to lift my head now, I found to my surprise I could do it, just a little, just enough.

Then I felt something on the forefinger of my right hand. I looked down, expecting to see a scorpion. Instead, there was a little man there, standing on my finger. Minute he was, too small to be real, I thought. He was wearing a three-cornered hat, a long coat, and he had buckles on his shoes. I never saw anyone dressed like this before. I imagined at first I must be dreaming. But then I knew I wasn’t asleep. I could smell the sea, and there were clouds in the sky, and birds, white birds flying above me, crying and cawing. I could feel the breeze on my face. None of this was imagined, none of this was a dream, and nor were the crowds of little people I could now see all over the beach, nor were the horses and carts imagined, nor were the little coloured blankets that I saw covering me like patchwork from my ankles up to my chest. The little man standing now in the palm of my open hand might have been no bigger than my little finger. But he was real. I was not imagining him. This was not a dream.

He was helping a little old lady up on to my hand, and then they were both making their way slowly up my arm and over my shoulder and across my chest, towards the point of my chin. The little old lady was walking with a stick and wore a long blue dress and feathers in her hat. They stood there together side by side, peering down in silence at me for a long while.

And when she spoke it was in a thin tremulous voice, which reminded me at once of how my grandmother’s voice had been. There was hushed silence all around me. Everyone was listening. I had no idea to begin with what she was saying to me. But then I began to recognise a word here, and a word there. The sound of the language was oddly familiar. It was how the aid workers in the camp used to speak. The little old lady was definitely speaking English. Her tone was warm, and hospitable, so I presumed this must be a speech of greeting, like an elder back home in my town might have given to a visitor. I could tell that she was assuming I understood every word she was saying, which I was not.