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第16章 英文版 (6)

The iridescent bubbles were beautiful. But they were the falsest thing in the sea and the old man loved to see the big sea turtles eating them. The turtles saw them, approached them from the front, then shut their eyes so they were completely carapaced and ate them filaments and all. The old man loved to see the turtles eat them and he loved to walk on them on the beach after a storm and hear them pop when he stepped on them with the horny soles of his feet.

He loved green turtles and hawk-bills with their elegance and speed and their great value and he had a friendly contempt for the huge, stupid loggerheads, yellow in their armour-plating, strange in their love-making, and happily eating the Portuguese men-of-war with their eyes shut.

He had no mysticism about turtles although he had gone in turtle boats for many years. He was sorry for them all, even the great trunk backs that were as long as the skiff and weighed a ton. Most people are heartless about turtles because a turtle’s heart will beat for hours after he has been cut up and butchered. But the old man thought, I have such a heart too and my feet and hands are like theirs. He ate the white eggs to give himself strength. He ate them all through May to be strong in September and October for the truly big fish.

He also drank a cup of shark liver oil each day from the big drum in the shack where many of the fishermen kept their gear. It was there for all fishermen who wanted it. Most fishermen hated the taste. But it was no worse than getting up at the hours that they rose and it was very good against all colds and grippes and it was good for the eyes.

Now the old man looked up and saw that the bird was circling again.

“He’s found fish,” he said aloud. No flying fish broke the surface and there was no scattering of bait fish. But as the old man watched, a small tuna rose in the air, turned and dropped head first into the water. The tuna shone silver in the sun and after he had dropped back into the water another and another rose and they were jumping in all directions, churning the water and leaping in long jumps after the bait. They were circling it and driving it.

If they don’t travel too fast I will get into them, the old man thought, and he watched the school working the water white and the bird now dropping and dipping into the bait fish that were forced to the surface in their panic.

“The bird is a great help,” the old man said. Just then the stern line came taut under his foot, where he had kept a loop of the line, and he dropped his oars and felt tile weight of the small tuna’s shivering pull as he held the line firm and commenced to haul it in. The shivering increased as he pulled in and he could see the blue back of the fish in the water and the gold of his sides before he swung him over the side and into the boat. He lay in the stern in the sun, compact and bullet shaped, his big, unintelligent eyes staring as he thumped his life out against the planking of the boat with the quick shivering strokes of his neat, fast-moving tail. The old man hit him on the head for kindness and kicked him, his body still shuddering, under the shade of the stern.

“Albacore,” he said aloud. “He’ll make a beautiful bait. He’ll weigh ten pounds.”

He did not remember when he had first started to talk aloud when he was by himself. He had sung when he was by himself in the old days and he had sung at night sometimes when he was alone steering on his watch in the smacks or in the turtle boats. He had probably started to talk aloud, when alone, when the boy had left. But he did not remember. When he and the boy fished together they usually spoke only when it was necessary. They talked at night or when they were storm-bound by bad weather. It was considered a virtue not to talk unnecessarily at sea and the old man had always considered it so and respected it. But now he said his thoughts aloud many times since there was no one that they could annoy.

“If the others heard me talking out loud they would think that I am crazy,” he said aloud. “But since I am not crazy, I do not care. And the rich have radios to talk to them in their boats and to bring them the baseball.”

Now is no time to think of baseball, he thought. Now is the time to think of only one thing. That which I was born for. There might be a big one around that school, he thought. I picked up only a straggler from the albacore that were feeding. But they are working far out and fast. Everything that shows on the surface today travels very fast and to the north-east. Can that be the time of day? Or is it some sign of weather that I do not know?

He could not see the green of the shore now but only the tops of the blue hills that showed white as though they were snow-capped and the clouds that looked like high snow mountains above them. The sea was very dark and the light made prisms in the water. The myriad flecks of the plankton were annulled now by the high sun and it was only the great deep prisms in the blue water that the old man saw now with his lines going straight down into the water that was a mile deep.

The tuna, the fishermen called all the fish of that species tuna and only distinguished among them by their proper names when they came to sell them or to trade them for baits, were down again. The sun was hot now and the old man felt it on the back of his neck and felt the sweat trickle down his back as he rowed.

I could just drift, he thought, and sleep and put a bight of line around my toe to wake me. But today is eighty-five days and I should fish the day well.

Just then, watching his lines, he saw one of the projecting green sticks dip sharply.

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    【本文半价优惠,看完只需4块半】时尚王妃是超模,影帝老公是皇帝,不一样的穿越故事!卷一:超模古代混迹21世纪的时尚达人,超级模特,穿越了古人的生活要这个习惯高科技和新时尚的超模怎么忍受绝对无法忍受!才刚冒起个寻个短见的念头,却一不留神被马儿踢到稀里糊涂的进了将军府,这家也姓纳兰?这家的女儿也叫纳兰妍萱?这么有缘?在没有地方去的情况下,先将就一下吧…就说了古代不好玩吧------怕热,而这里没有冷气,还要穿超多的衣服懒得走路,这里的马车颠死人喜欢看电影,这里没有演员(唱戏的算吗)喜欢在海滩上晒太阳,这里没有比基尼好吧,要在这里生存下去,没办法改变自己就设法改变这个世界吧,冒险和创新,咱有的是-----迷你裙可以做,重操旧业做个代言人也OK没有电影看,自己弄个舞台剧混混时间也不错…再顺便找些美男混时间:美男一,是哥哥,还是个木头哥哥,算了……美男二,是裁缝,是个很有天赋的时装设计师,满足她的新奇需要……美男三,是个小王爷有些自负,有些清高,不过,他喜欢听她讲故事……美男四,是个怪胎,还是个绝色怪胎,难以揣测的可怕不错,她就喜欢挑战高难度,越艰险越好玩随便跳个竹竿舞(改良的钢管)就把他诱到,然后再狠心走掉……美男五,是个酷酷王爷,冷冰冰的很无趣,却老是给她惊喜……卷二:抢妃记出什么事?勾魂者无意,失魂者有心,那些莫名其妙的男人都为她失魂落魄大家纷纷来示爱,齐齐来求婚-----而且还是一个比一个大,最后,圣旨到-------进皇宫?嫁给皇帝?她可是21世纪的新女性,只可能接受一夫一妻制!!那个后宫三千佳丽的滥情鬼,坚----决----不----要!进皇宫不难,做王妃却不易,想独享皇帝更是难上加难有个挑剔到极致的恶婆婆,还有一堆爱找麻烦的刁臣日子真的不好混,还有两个苦苦纠缠的----一个是冰山王爷,一个是纯情小王爷再加上一个是绝色少年皇帝,这是个问题……到底谁可以满足她的婚前协议?谁可以让她收心忘情?卷三:回到未来时光隧道出了点问题,古代老公送错了时间……天上掉下个自称是夫君的人,是精神病人?是崇拜者?好晕……-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
  • 恶女重生

    恶女重生

    人生最奇妙的就是你永远不知道下一秒会发生什么。天之骄女的高干二代,苏诺,骄纵,叛逆,没有什么她不敢做的,一次次失望累积下来让所有疼爱她的人寒了心。以至于锒铛入狱的时候,竟没有一个人愿意帮她,甚至她的亲人。在她深刻体会到什么叫人情冷暖,什么叫人不为己,在她心灰意冷的时候,她最厌恶的人帮了她。却不想没有等到法律的制裁,她买醉丢了性命,死之前,她才发现,她欠那个人太多了,如果有来世,他要什么她都赔给他。【重生后】“方之航,你喜欢什么?”苏诺眼睛眨巴眨巴套话。“诺诺。”某只冷面资深腹黑如是说。“方之航,你最想要什么?”苏诺眼睛再眨巴眨巴继续问。“诺诺。”某只答案依旧。“方之航,再给你最后一次机会。”“永远不变,只要诺诺。”“那好吧,方之航,从今以后,本小姐就交给你了。”某女一秒钟变女王,只剩得意。方之航看着眼前的人只有宠溺,他要的从来只有苏诺而已。宠文,准CP,1V1
  • 时光里的欧洲

    时光里的欧洲

    雅典的文艺与民主,罗马的教会和共和,米兰关于信仰的扩散,巴黎经典的哥特风格,佛罗伦萨的文艺复兴,维也纳的古典主义……自公元前800年到今天,从英、法、意到西班牙、奥地利,整个欧洲的脉络在大地上勾勒。这是一本深度旅游背景书,为所有准备前往欧洲的人介绍城市的故事。
  • 我们的故事2

    我们的故事2

    以他们为那个时代的“标本”,已是茫茫40载春秋。当年的知青逐渐退出了历史舞台。,但他们以青春和生命为代价所耕耘的土地上却永远留下了印记。作者用纪实文学的方式描绘出属于一代人的图景:他们和共和国一起经历苦难,从1968年底“知识青年到农村去”的指示发表至今,一同迎来崭新的时代