INGLESE RIASSUNTO

[Lg1234]

RIASSUNTO :The Italian boat-keeper started the motor with a yanked string, asking Dickie if he knew how to work it, and Dickie said yes. And there was an oar, a single oar in the bottom of the boat, Tom saw. Dickie took the tiller. They headed straight out from the town.
"Cool!" Dickie yelled, smiling. His hair was blowing.
Tom looked to right and left. A vertical cliff on one side, very much like Mongibello, and on the other a flatfish length of land fuzzing out in the mist that hovered over the water. Offhand he couldn't say in which direction it was better to go.
"Do you know the land around here?" Tom shouted over the roar of the motor.
"Nope!" Dickie said cheerfully. He was enjoying the ride.
"Is that thing hard to steer?"
"Not a bit! Want to try it?"
Tom hesitated. Dickie was still steering straight out to the open sea. "No, thanks." He looked to right and left. There was a sailboat off to the left. "Where're you going?" Tom shouted.
"Does it matter?" Dickie smiled.
No, it didn't.
Dickie swerved suddenly to the right, so suddenly that they both had to duck and lean to keep the boat righted. A wall of white spray rose up on Tom's left, then gradually fell to show the empty horizon. They were streaking across the empty water again, towards nothing. Dickie was trying the speed, smiling, his blue eyes smiling at the emptiness.
"In a little boat it always feels so much faster than it is!" Dickie yelled.
Tom nodded, letting his understanding smile speak for him.
Actually, he was terrified. God only knew how deep the water was here. If something happened to the boat suddenly, there wasn't a chance in the world that they could get back to shore, or at least that he could. But neither was there a chance that anybody could see anything that they did here. Dickie was swerving very slightly towards the right again, towards the long spit of fuzzy grey land, but he could have hit Dickie, sprung on him, or kissed him, or thrown him overboard, and nobody could have seen him at this distance. Tom was sweating, hot under his clothes, cold on his forehead. He felt afraid, but it was not of the water, it was of Dickie. He knew that he was going to do it, that he would not stop himself now, maybe couldn't stop himself, and that he might not succeed.
"You dare me to jump in?" Tom yelled, beginning to unbutton his jacket.
Dickie only laughed at this proposal from him, opening his mouth wide, keeping his eyes fixed on the distance in front of the boat. Tom kept on undressing. He had his shoes and socks off. Under his trousers he wore his swimming trunks, like Dickie. "I'll go in if you will!" Tom shouted. "Will you?" He wanted Dickie to slow down.
"Will I? Sure!" Dickie slowed the motor abruptly. He released the tiller and took off his jacket. The boat bobbed, losing its momentum.
"Come on," Dickie said, nodding at Tom's trousers that were still on.
Tom glanced at the land. San Remo was a blur of chalky white and pink. He picked up the oar, as casually as if he were playing with it between his knees, and when Dickie was shoving his trousers down, Tom lifted the oar and came down with it on the top of Dickie's head.
"Hey!" Dickie yelled, scowling, sliding half off the wooden seat. His pale brows lifted in groggy surprise.
Tom stood up and brought the oar down again, sharply, all his strength released like the snap of a rubber band.
"For God's sake!" Dickie mumbled, glowering, fierce, though the blue eyes wobbled, losing consciousness.
Tom swung a left-handed blow with the oar against the side of Dickie's head. The edge of the oar cut a dull gash that filled with a line of blood as Tom watched. Dickie was on the bottom of the boat, twisted, twisting. Dickie gave a groaning roar of protest that frightened Tom with its loudness and its strength. Tom hit him in the side of the neck, three times, chopping strokes with the edge of the oar, as if the oar were an axe and Dickie's neck a tree. The boat rocked, and water splashed over his foot that was braced on the gunwale. He sliced at Dickie's forehead, and a broad patch of blood came slowly where the oar had scraped. For an instant Tom was aware of tiring as he raised and swung, and still Dickie's hands slid towards him on the bottom of the boat. Dickie's long legs straightened to thrust him forward. Tom got a bayonet grip on the oar and plunged its handle into Dickie's side.
Then the prostrate body relaxed, limp and still. Tom straightened, getting his breath back painfully. He looked around him. There were no boats, nothing, except far, far away a little white spot creeping from right to left a speeding motor-boat heading for the shore.