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Classics fantasy – 4
A. Belyaev
© A. Belyaev, 2019
ISBN 978-5-0050-0983-8 (т. 4)
ISBN 978-5-0050-0936-4
Created with Ridero smart publishing system
WONDERFUL EYE
PROLOGUE
The ocean steamship was called “Leviathan” by right. It was the real floating city with “streets”, gardens, the areas, movie theaters, concert halls, fountains, pools, sports grounds, gardens greenhouses of tropical plants. On soft carpets of long corridors the drilled footmen in a uniform quietly slid. Doors of cabins, walls, panels gleamed mahogany, sparkled the polished copper. In the rooms occupied by passengers there was a peculiar smell – mix of expensive spirits, soaps, cigars, leather suitcases and still something imperceptible, the ocean brought, probably, by fresh breath.
On the main open deck, under a wide awning, having taken cover from the heated beams of the sun, passengers had a rest. Convenient wicker white chairs were placed between palm trees, bushes of the blossoming oleanders and fragrant gimanantus. Fountains murmured.
Deep blue of Gulf Stream seemed motionless. Here and there reddish islands of the seaweed brought by a current from the Sargasso Sea were seen. Flying small fishes jumped out from water and flew near the ship, shining fins. They fell on water, again flew up as if wanted to entertain passengers.
– Oh, as hot! At least the breeze blew – told, being answerable, the portly, red-cheeked passenger of years of fifty. He sat in a deep chair and fanned with a white silk scarf. Perfectly sewed white suit, a massive gold ring, a gold chain of hours on a vest and gold points gave it a type of the successful businessman.
– Nevertheless it is fine! – looking through the lowered a little eyelids in the shining distance, it continued. – “Leviathan” – the real floating palace. With comfort, it is convenient and, the main thing, absolutely safely. So? What can happen to such giant?
And the passenger raised eyes on the neighbor, the person of uncertain years, in a light gray suit. It had a pale face, a hollow breast, big thoughtful black eyes, dense eyebrows, an aquiline nose. Frenchman? Spaniard? Commission agent? Land owner? You will not sort. In any case, not the millionaire…
Looking after rings of cigar smoke, the neighbor shrugged shoulders and answered with a deaf voice:
– I heard, “Leviathan” is insured for such sum that on only one annual insurance premiums it would be possible to construct the quite good coasting steamship.
– What do you want to tell these? – the fat man pricked up the ears and breathed heavily.
– You the businessman, and it is easy to you to draw a conclusion: if there was no risk, the steamship company would not throw out a heap of money for insurance. Swisses do not insure the dwellings against floods, and Dutches – against earthquakes … – the Person with a pale face became silent, and the businessman breathed heavily even stronger.