London on the shores of sacramento read summary. Jack london - on the shores of sacramento
The works of D. London are familiar to every lover of adventure literature. His heroes are brave, strong-willed, decisive people who can find a way out of any situation. Such a person can be called the fourteen-year-old boy from the story "On the Shores of Sacramento." Readers' responses indicate that his act deserves the name "feat".
Acquaintance with Jerry - son and father
An excerpt from the sailors' song became the epigraph to the story. It was often sung by the main character - a boy with red hair, blue eyes and white skin covered with freckles. He had never seen the sea, but he had heard a lot about it from his father, old Jerry. Once he decided to leave the ship to look at the Sacramento River, and so he settled here. He got married, entered the Yellow Dream mine, where he continued to work to this day. His job as a cable keeper was to ferry a cart with ore to the other side.
After the death of Marguerite, he himself began to raise his son, Jerry Jr., giving him all his love. This is how the story "On the Shores of Sacramento" begins.
Remained for the owner
The meeting of baby Jerry with Hall, the cable keeper of the Yellow Dragon mine, makes it clear that his father had left for San Francisco the day before. The boy was left alone, which he was very proud of. He tries to behave like an adult in conversation and even, upon learning that Hall is going to the gorge to hunt, remarks: "It looks like it is going to rain."
The weather really turned bad, and Jerry went to the house, which he did not intend to leave today.
Synopsis "On the Shores of Sacramento": the outset
At noon there was a knock on the door, and the Spillen couple "burst into the room." They were looking for Hall, as they urgently needed to get to the other side. These services were provided to residents only by the "Yellow Dragon". Upon learning that the caretaker had gone to the gorge, they were very upset. There was an explosion across the river in a mine, and Mrs. Spillen's father was seriously injured. Now the couple had only one way out - to cross the cable, which was watched by old man Jerry.
Jack London puts his young hero in a difficult situation. There was a crisis on the shores of Sacramento, and the Yellow Dream had been inactive for quite some time. In addition, the cable was not designed to transport people. The boy does not dare to take up the ferry, since he never did it himself, without the supervision of his father. Finally, Mr. Spillen managed to convince him that there was simply no other way to get to the other side.
Jerry knew how to hook the line, but now he had to do it alone. Moreover, instead of ore, there were people in the trolley, and the downpour and wind increased incredibly.
People in danger
Jerry's job was to control the speed of the cart. To do this, you had to watch the spinning drum. Now the crossing was complicated by a strong gusty wind and a lack of visibility. It seemed that the spouses, who set off on the road, were immediately swallowed up by the abyss.
Simultaneously with the loaded trolley, an empty cabin moved from the other side, helping to maintain balance. Everything went well at first. However, at some point, the cable stopped and did not react in any way to the boy's actions. This meant one thing - the mechanism that had not worked for a long time deteriorated, and people hung somewhere in the darkness over the raging river. While the boy examined the drum in the hope of finding a fault, the clouds cleared away, and at some point he saw both raging Sacramento and Mr. and Mrs. Spillen hanging over it. What to do: leave everything as it is or try to extract people from this captivity - Jack London puts his hero in front of such a choice.
On the Shores of Sacramento: Climax
Jerry, realizing that the cause of the malfunction should be looked for on the other side, rushed to the "Yellow Dragon" ... But the kid did not find any problems in the second drum. Mr. Spillen examined his cart. Her wheels were also intact. So it’s all about the empty trolley.
The boy didn't have time to think. The executive summary "On the Shores of the Sacramento" does not include the details that preceded the dangerous "journey". Taking the necessary tools, constructing a loop that played the role of a booth for him, Jerry set off along the cable in the opposite direction. His knees were shaking with fear, everything froze inside, but he, scraping off his palms, stubbornly moved towards his goal. It took him about an hour and a half to put the jumped out wheel in place. It wasn't easy. At times it seemed that everything was hopeless, and he would never cope with the rusted mechanism. But the boy tried again and again until a solution came to his mind. An old nail helped to eliminate the breakage, miraculously lying around in my pocket.
Climbing into the trolley, tired and mentally exhausted, Jerry headed for the shore.
Interchange
Having reached the place, the boy slowly got out. Then he reinforced the cart. And only after that he fell to the ground and sobbed. Unbearable pain in tattered palms, experienced fear, incredible nervous tension, finally, joy for the saved people - all this caused tears, which he was not at all ashamed of.
Jack London
OnshoresSacramento
The Banks of the Sacramento (1903)
From the collection "For courage"
Translation by Maria Shishmareva
London D. Collection of novellas and short stories (1911-1916): M., "Prestige Book", 2011.
The winds are blowing, oh-ho-ho!
To Kali-for-no-i.
Many-- audible - gold
There in Sacramento!
He was only a boy, singing in treble the sea song that sailors all over the world sing, standing at the spire and raising the anchor to sail to the port of Frisco. It was just a little boy who had never seen the sea, but before him, two hundred feet below, was the Sacramento River. His name was young Jerry, but from his father, old Jerry, he learned this song and inherited a shock of bright red hair, blue shifty eyes and white skin with inevitable freckles. Old man Jerry was a sailor and sailed the seas for half his life, always haunted by the words of this ringing song. And once he sang it in earnest, in one Asian port, danced around the spire with twenty companions. And in San Francisco, he said goodbye to his ship and the sea and went to gaze with his own eyes on the shores of Sacramento. And he had a chance to see gold: he found a place in the Yellow Dream mine and was extremely useful in drawing large cables across the river, which passed at an altitude of two hundred feet. Then he was assigned to look after the cables, fix them and lower the trolleys. He fell in love with his job and became an integral part of the Yellow Dream mine. Soon he fell in love with the pretty Marguerite Kelly, but she left him and young Jerry as soon as he began to walk, in order to fall asleep in the last long sleep among the tall, strict pines. Old Jerry never returned to the sea. He stayed with his cables, giving them and young Jerry all his love. Hard times came for the "Yellow Dream", but he still remained in the service of the company, guarding the abandoned property. But he was not visible that morning. Only young Jerry was sitting on the edge of the hut, singing an old song. He cooked and ate his breakfast alone, and now he went out to look at the world. Twenty feet from him stood a steel gate with an endless cable running around it. There is an ore wagon attached to it at the gate. Watching the dizzy running of the cables to the opposite bank with his eyes, he could make out another gate and another trolley. The mechanism was set in motion by gravity; by its own gravity, the loaded trolley was transported across the river, and at the same time another trolley returned empty. The loaded trolley was unloaded, and the empty one was filled with ore, and the crossing was repeated, repeated tens of thousands of times since the day old Jerry became the caretaker of the cables. Young Jerry cut off his song as he heard footsteps approaching. A tall man in a blue shirt, with a gun on his shoulder, emerged from the gloom of the pine trees. It was Hall, the caretaker of the Yellow Dragon Mine, whose cables crossed Sacramento a mile higher. - Great, kid! he greeted. - What are you doing here alone? “Keeping an eye on the cable,” Jerry tried to speak casually, as if it were the most common thing. - Daddy is not there! - Where did he go? the man asked. - In San Francisco. Yesterday evening. His brother died overseas, and he went to talk with lawyers. He won't be back earlier than tomorrow night. Jerry spoke with pride that he was in charge of looking after the Yellow Dream property, living alone on a cliff above the river, and cooking his own dinner. “Well, be careful then,” said Hall, “and don't fool around with the cable. I'm going to the Lame Cow Gorge, maybe I'll pick up a deer there. “It looks like it’s going to rain,” Jerry remarked with the prudence of an adult. “I'm not really afraid of getting wet,” Hall laughed, disappearing into the trees. Jerry's prediction regarding rain was more than justified. By ten o'clock the pines swayed and groaned, the windows of the hut rattled, and rain poured down, whipped up by the wild gusts of wind. At half-past eleven the boy lit a fire and at twelve sharp he sat down to dinner. He won’t leave the house today, he decided, after washing the dishes and putting them in their place; and he wondered how Hall would get wet and if he could pick up the deer. At one o'clock there was a knock at the door, and when he opened it, a man and a woman staggered into the room, driven by a flurry. They were Mr. and Mrs. Spillan, ranchers who lived in a secluded valley about twelve miles from the river. - Where is Hall? Spillen asked; he spoke abruptly and quickly. Jerry noticed that he was nervous and his movements were harsh, and Mrs. Spillenn seemed to be very worried about something. It was a thin, faded, exhausted woman; a life filled with painful endless toil left its rough stamp on her face. And that same life bent her husband's shoulders, made his arms knobby and his hair dusty gray. “He went hunting Lame Cow,” Jerry replied. - You wanted to get over to the other side? The woman began to cry softly, and Spillen dropped some kind of curse and went to the window. Jerry joined him and looked out, where there were no cables visible behind the frequent rainstorm. The inhabitants of the forests of this part of the country used to cross Sacramento by the "Yellow Dragon" cable. They were charged a modest fee for this service, and the Yellow Dragon Company paid Hall's salary out of the money. “We need to get over to the other side, Jerry,” Spillen said, gesturing over his shoulder at his wife. “Her father was in trouble at Clover Leaf. Explosion of gunpowder. Hardly will survive. We just found out about it. Jerry felt an inner thrill. He knew that the Spillens wanted to cross the Yellow Dream cable, and in the absence of his father, he did not dare to take on such responsibility, the cable was never used to ferry passengers, and in fact, for a long time he was without any use at all. “Maybe Hall will be back soon,” he said. Spillen shook his head and asked, "Where is your father?" “In San Francisco,” Jerry said curtly. Spillen groaned and clenched his fist and slammed it savagely into the palm of his other hand. His wife cried louder, and Jerry heard her whisper: “And daddy is dying, dying! Tears clouded his eyes as well, and he hesitated, not knowing what to do. But Spiellen decided for him. “Listen, kid,” he said firmly, “my wife and I will cross this cable of yours. Will you let him in for us? Jerry recoiled slightly. He did it unconsciously, instinctively retreating in front of something undesirable. "Better see if Hall has returned?" he suggested. - And if you didn’t come back? Again Jerry hesitated. “I'll take the risk,” added Spillen. “Don’t you understand, kid, that we need to get across at all costs?” Jerry nodded reluctantly. “And there’s no point in waiting for Hall,” Spillen continued. “You know as well as I do that now he cannot return. Well, let's go! "No wonder Mrs. Spillen was completely terrified when they helped her into the ore wagon," at least Jerry thought as he looked down into the seemingly bottomless abyss. Rain and fog, billowing under the frenzied blows of the wind, obscured the opposite bank, which was seven hundred feet away; the cliff at their feet plummeted downward, lost in the swirling mist. It seemed that it was not two hundred feet to the bottom, but a good mile. -- Ready? -- he asked. - Let her go! Spillen yelled, trying to drown out the roar of the wind. He climbed into the cart next to his wife and took her hand in his. Jerry looked at this disapprovingly. - You will need your hands to hold on, the wind is tearing! The man and woman uncoupled their arms and gripped the edge of the trolley tightly, while Jerry slowly and carefully released the brake. The gate began to revolve, the endless cable began to move, and the trolley slowly slid into the abyss; her wheels ran along a fixed cable from which she was suspended. This was not the first time Jerry had launched a cable, but this was the first time he had to do it in the absence of his father. Using the brake, he regulated the speed of the trolley, but it was necessary to regulate the cargo. Thereafter, Jerry could only detect the progress of the trolley by the cable, and he watched it closely as the cable slid around the gate. “Three hundred feet,” he whispered, looking at the marks on the cable, “three hundred and fifty, four hundred, four hundred ...” The cable stopped. Jerry released the brake, but the cable did not move. Jerry grabbed it with both hands and pulled with all his might. Something went wrong. But what? He could not guess, he could not see. Looking up, he saw the dim outlines of an empty trolley crossing from the opposite bank at a speed equal to the speed of a loaded trolley. It was about two hundred and fifty feet from the shore. From this he concluded that somewhere in the gray mist, two hundred feet above the river and two hundred and fifty feet from the opposite bank, Spillen and his wife were hanging in a motionless trolley. Jerry shouted three times at the top of his lungs, but the storm did not return a cry. He could not hear them, neither could they. As he stood still for a moment and meditated, the flying clouds seemed to rise and dissipate. He caught a glimpse of the swollen waters of Sacramento below, and above, a trolley with a man and a woman. Then the clouds loomed even thicker than before. The boy examined the collar carefully and found no damage. Obviously, the gate on the other side has deteriorated. He was horrified at the thought of a man and a woman hanging over the abyss in the very whirlpool of the storm, swaying back and forth in a fragile trolley and not knowing what was happening on the shore. And he didn't want to think about them hanging there while he crossed the Yellow Dragon's cable to the other gate. But then he remembered that there were blocks and ropes in the workshop, and ran after them. He tied the rope to an endless cable and hung on it. He pulled until it seemed to him that his arms jumped out of his joints and his shoulder muscles tore. But the cable didn't move. There was no choice but to cross to the other side. He had already managed to get soaked through and, not paying attention to the rain, ran to the "Yellow Dragon". The storm rushed along with him and urged him on. But there was no Hall at the gate to watch the brake and regulate the speed of the trolley. He did it himself, passing a strong rope around the stationary cable. Halfway through, a strong gust of wind swayed the cable, whistled and roared around him, pushed and tilted the trolley, and he had a clearer picture of the state of Spillen and his wife. And this consciousness gave him strength when, having safely crossed to the other side, he made his way towards the storm, to the cable of the "Yellow Dream". With horror, he was convinced that the gate was in perfect working order. Everything was in order on both banks. Where is the lead? Undoubtedly in the middle. From this bank, the car with the Spillens was two hundred and fifty feet away. Through the puffs of steam, he could make out a man and a woman huddled at the bottom of the trolley, surrendered to the fury of wind and rain. In a quiet moment between two gusts of wind, he shouted to Spiellen to inspect the wheels of the cart. Spillen heard him; he carefully rose to his knees and felt both wheels with his hands. Then he turned to face the shore: - Everything is all right here, kid! Jerry heard these words; they sounded faint, as if they were flying from afar. But then - what's the matter? There was only another, empty trolley; he couldn’t see it, but he knew it was hanging somewhere over a precipice, two hundred feet beyond Spillen’s cart. His decision was made in one second. He was thin and wiry, and he was only fourteen years old. But his whole life was spent in the mountains, and his father taught him the basics of "sea affairs", and he was not particularly afraid of heights. In the toolbox beside the gate he found an old English key, a short iron rod, and a ring of new manila string. He searched in vain for a piece of plank from which he could build something like a "boatswain's seat". There were only large boards at hand, but he did not have the opportunity to saw them and he had to do without a saddle, at least somewhat comfortable. He arranged the saddle for himself the most simple. From the rope he made a loop, descending from a stationary rope, to which an empty trolley was suspended. When he sat in the loop, his hands were just reaching the cable, and where the rope rubbed against the cable, he put his jacket instead of an old bag, which he could use if he could find it. Having quickly finished these preparations, he hung over the abyss, sitting in a rope saddle and fingering the rope with his hands. He brought with him an English key, a short iron bar, and the few remaining feet of rope. The cable went slightly upward, and he had to pull himself up all the time, but Jerry was easier to come to terms with than with the wind. When violent gusts of wind rocked him back and forth and, at times, almost turned him over, he looked down into the gray abyss, and felt that he was seized by fear. The cable was old. What if it can't withstand its weight and wind pressure? He felt fear, real fear, felt how his stomach aches, how his knees tremble, and he could not stop this trembling. But he courageously performed his duty. The cable was old and worn, with the sharp ends of the wire sticking out of it, and by the time Jerry made his first stop and began to call Spillen, his hands were cut and oozed with blood. The cart was just below him, a few feet away, and he could explain the state of affairs and the purpose of his journey. - I wish I could help you! Spillen shouted to him as he set off again. - But the wife is completely unstuck. And you, kid, be careful! I myself got involved in this business, and you have to help me out. - Oh, I can handle it! Jerry shouted back. “Tell Mrs. Spillen that she will be on the beach at one moment. Under the lashing rain that blinded him, he swayed from side to side like a fast-moving pendulum. His torn hands hurt badly, and he nearly choked from his exercises and from the force of the wind blowing right in his face when he finally found himself at the empty trolley. At first glance, he was convinced that the dangerous journey had not been undertaken in vain. The front wheel, loosened from long wear, jumped off the cable, and now the cable was tightly pinched between the wheel and the block pulley. One thing was clear - the wheel should be removed from the block; It seemed no less clear that while he was removing the wheel, the trolley must be attached to the cable with the rope he had captured. After a quarter of an hour, he only managed to strengthen the trolley. The check that connected the wheel to the axle was rusted and bent. He began to pound on it with one hand, and with the other firmly held on to the cable, but the wind still swayed and pushed him, and the blows rarely hit the target. Nine-tenths of the strength was spent on holding on. He was afraid to drop the English key and tied it tightly to his wrist with a handkerchief. After half an hour, Jerry knocked down the pin, but he could not pull it out. Dozens of times, in despair, he was ready to give up everything, and it seemed to him that the danger that he was exposed to, and all his efforts did not lead to anything. But then a new thought struck him, and he began to rummage through his pockets with feverish haste until he found what he was looking for - a tenpenny nail. If it were not for this nail, who knows how it ended up in his pocket, he would have to repeat his journey back along the cable. He stuck a nail through the hole in the check; now he had something to grab onto, and in a second the check was withdrawn. Then he slipped an iron rod under the cable and, acting as a lever, released the wheel sandwiched between the cable and the block. Then Jerry put the wheel back in place and with the help of the rope lifted the trolley until the wheel was again in its place, on the cable. All this took time. More than an hour and a half had passed since he reached the empty cart. And only now could he get down from his saddle into the trolley. He removed the rope that held it, and the wheels began to turn slowly. The trolley began to move, and he knew that somewhere down there, the Spillenn trolley - not visible to them, was moving in the same way, but in the opposite direction. There was no need for a brake, as its weight balanced the weight of the other trolley: he soon saw a cliff rising from the cloudy depths and an old, familiar revolving gate. Jerry got out and reinforced the cart. He did it diligently and carefully, and then did not act heroically at all; he sank to the ground near the gate, ignoring the pouring rain, and burst into tears. His tears were caused by many - partly painfully aching hands, partly fatigue, partly a reaction after the nervous tension that had supported him for so long; they were largely grateful that the man and woman were saved. They weren't there to thank him; but he knew that somewhere, beyond the roaring stream, they were hurrying down the paths to Clover Leaf. Jerry staggered to the hut; when he opened the door, his hand stained the white doorknob with blood, but he ignored it. He was too proud and pleased with himself, because he knew that he had done well, and was straightforward enough to evaluate his action. But all the time he regretted only one thing: if his father could see! ..
On a high bank, two hundred feet above the Sacramento River, a father and son live in a small house: old Jerry and baby Jerry. Old Jerry, a sailor in the past, left the sea and took a job at the Golden Dreams gold mine. Here he met his future wife, but family life was short-lived: Margaret died as soon as her son learned to walk.
The old sailor was very helpful in the construction of the cable way across the Sacramento River. Ore was transported along this road in trolleys: a filled trolley moved down and at the same time up - empty: the cable car acted under the influence of gravity. Here he stayed to live with his son, working as a watchman at an already abandoned mine. A mile upstream was another mine, the Yellow Dragon, with an active cable car that was also used to ferry people across the river.
Old Jerry's brother died in the Old World, he had to leave for a few days in the city - to settle things. Baby Jerry stayed on the farm. Almost at the same time, the Yellow Dragon's watchman, Hall, went hunting, and was delayed due to bad weather.
In the midst of a downpour, the neighbors, Mr. and Mrs. Spillan, farmers who lived in seclusion about twelve miles from the river, burst into the house of little Jerry. They were informed that Mrs. Spillan's father, who worked in a mine on the opposite bank of the river, was seriously injured and was dying, and an urgent need to come to him. It was impossible to use the usual route - the Yellow Dragon's cableway: the Hall serving the road was absent. All hope was in baby Jerry.
The sawed-downs sat down in the trolley. It was with great apprehension that Jerry set out on the road: for the first time he did it without the supervision of his father. Heavy downpour, wind, swollen river waters two hundred feet under the rope - and a trolley suddenly stalled halfway through ... The Spillennes were in danger of death. Fourteen-year-old Jerry had to use a rope loop to get to the trolley swinging over the abyss and fix the breakdown (one of the two wheels on which the trolley was suspended jumped off the cable, and it jammed tightly).
The sawn off safely crossed to the other side, Jerry returned to his home. With his hands tattered with blood, he only gave vent to his nerves on solid ground, and burst into tears. He did a good deed, but he regretted only one thing: it is a pity that his father did not see it!
There are many instructive stories in the story. Jerry accomplished his little feat thanks to practical skills, a sense of human duty, the ability to make risky but necessary decisions.
Picture or drawing On the shores of Sacramento
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The works of D. London are familiar to every lover of adventure literature. His heroes are brave, strong-willed, decisive people who can find a way out of any situation. Such a person can be called the fourteen-year-old boy from the story "On the Shores of Sacramento." Readers' responses indicate that his act deserves the name "feat".
Acquaintance with Jerry - son and father
An excerpt from the sailors' song became the epigraph to the story. It was often sung by the main character - a boy with red hair and covered with freckles. He had never seen the sea, but he had heard a lot about it from his father, old Jerry. Once he decided to leave the ship to look at the Sacramento River, and so he settled here. He got married, entered the Yellow Dream mine, where he continued to work to this day. His job as a cable keeper was to ferry a cart with ore to the other side.
After the death of Marguerite, he himself began to raise his son, Jerry Jr., giving him all his love. This is how the story "On the Shores of Sacramento" begins.
Remained for the owner
The meeting of baby Jerry with Hall, the cable keeper of the Yellow Dragon mine, makes it clear that his father had left for San Francisco the day before. The boy was left alone, which he was very proud of. He tries to behave like an adult in conversation and even, upon learning that Hall is going to the gorge to hunt, remarks: "It looks like it is going to rain."
The weather really turned bad, and Jerry went to the house, which he did not intend to leave today.
Synopsis "On the Shores of Sacramento": the outset
At noon there was a knock on the door, and the Spillen couple "burst into the room." They were looking for Hall, as they urgently needed to get to the other side. These services were provided to residents only by the "Yellow Dragon". Upon learning that the caretaker had gone to the gorge, they were very upset. There was an explosion across the river in a mine, and Mrs. Spillen's father was seriously injured. Now the couple had only one way out - to cross the cable, which was watched by old man Jerry.
Jack London puts his young hero in a difficult situation. There was a crisis on the shores of Sacramento, and the Yellow Dream had been inactive for quite some time. In addition, the cable was not designed to transport people. The boy does not dare to take up the ferry, since he never did it himself, without the supervision of his father. Finally, Mr. Spillen managed to convince him that there was simply no other way to get to the other side.
Jerry knew how to hook the line, but now he had to do it alone. Moreover, instead of ore, there were people in the trolley, and the downpour and wind increased incredibly.
People in danger
Jerry's job was to control the speed of the cart. To do this, you had to watch the spinning drum. Now the crossing was complicated by a strong gusty wind and a lack of visibility. It seemed that the spouses, who set off on the road, were immediately swallowed up by the abyss.
Simultaneously with the loaded trolley, an empty cabin moved from the other side, helping to maintain balance. Everything went well at first. However, at some point, the cable stopped and did not react in any way to the boy's actions. This meant one thing - the mechanism that had not worked for a long time deteriorated, and people hung somewhere in the darkness over the raging river. While the boy examined the drum in the hope of finding a fault, the clouds cleared away, and at some point he saw both raging Sacramento and Mr. and Mrs. Spillen hanging over it. What to do: leave everything as it is or try to extract people from this captivity - Jack London puts his hero in front of such a choice.
On the Shores of Sacramento: Climax
Jerry, realizing that the cause of the malfunction should be looked for on the other side, rushed to the "Yellow Dragon" ... But the kid did not find any problems in the second drum. Mr. Spillen examined his cart. Her wheels were also intact. So it’s all about the empty trolley.
The boy didn't have time to think. The executive summary "On the Shores of the Sacramento" does not include the details that preceded the dangerous "journey". Taking the necessary tools, constructing a loop that played the role of a booth for him, Jerry set off along the cable in the opposite direction. His knees were shaking with fear, everything froze inside, but he, scraping off his palms, stubbornly moved towards his goal. It took him about an hour and a half to put the jumped out wheel in place. It wasn't easy. At times it seemed that everything was hopeless, and he would never cope with the rusted mechanism. But the boy tried again and again until a solution came to his mind. An old nail helped to eliminate the breakage, miraculously lying around in my pocket.
Climbing into the trolley, tired and mentally exhausted, Jerry headed for the shore.
Interchange
Having reached the place, the boy slowly got out. Then he reinforced the cart. And only after that he fell to the ground and sobbed. Unbearable pain in tattered palms, experienced fear, incredible nervous tension, finally, joy for the saved people - all this caused tears, which he was not at all ashamed of.
On the shores of Sacramento
Jack London. On the shores of Sacramento
—————————————————————
The wind rushes - ho-ho-hugh! -
Straight to California.
Sacramento is a rich land:
They row gold with a shovel!
A thin boy, in a thin, piercing voice, sang this sea song, which sailors bawl in all parts of the world, choosing an anchor to move to the port of Frisco. He was an ordinary little boy, he had never seen the sea in his eyes, but only two hundred feet from him - just down the cliff - the Sacramento River was seething. Little Jerry - that was his name because there was still old Jerry, his father; it was from him that the Kid heard this song and from him inherited bright red whirlwinds, perky blue eyes and very white skin covered with freckles.
Old “Jerry was a sailor, he sailed the seas for a good half of his life, and the song to the sailor itself asks to speak. But once, in some Asian port, when he was singing with twenty other sailors, exhausted over the damned anchor, the words of this song made him think seriously for the first time. Once in San Francisco, he said goodbye to his ship and the sea and went to see with his own eyes the coast of Sacramento.
It was then that he saw the gold. He took a job at the Gold Dreams mine and proved to be an eminently useful man in setting up a cableway two hundred feet above the river.
Then this road remained under his supervision. He watched the cables, kept them in good working order, loved them and soon became an indispensable worker at the Golden Dreams mine. And then he fell in love with pretty Margaret Kelly, but she very soon left him and little Jerry, who was just starting to walk, and fell asleep deeply in a small cemetery among large, harsh pine trees.
Old Jerry never returned to sea service. He lived near his cableway and gave all the love that his soul was capable of with thick steel cables and baby Jerry. Black days came for the "Golden Dream" mine, but even then the old man remained in the service of the Company to guard the abandoned enterprise.
However, something was not visible this morning. Little Jerry alone sat on the porch singing an old sailor song. He made his own breakfast and had already managed to cope with it, and now he went out to look at the white light. Nearby, about twenty paces from it, (there was a huge steel drum, on which an endless metal cable was wound. Next to the drum was a carefully fixed ore wagon. another drum and another trolley.
This structure was put into action simply by gravity: the trolley was moving, carried away by its own weight, while an empty trolley was moving from the opposite bank. When the loaded trolley was emptied and the empty one was loaded with ore, everything was repeated again, repeated many, many hundreds and thousands of times, since old Jerry became the caretaker of the cable car.
Little Jerry stopped singing when he heard footsteps approaching. A tall man in a blue shirt, with a rifle on his shoulder, came out of the pine forest. It was Hall, the watchman at the Yellow Dragon Mine, about a mile upstream of the Sacramento, where the road to the other side had also been crossed.
“Great, Kid!” He shouted. “What are you doing here alone?
- And I'm here now for the owner, - replied Little Jerry in the most careless tone, as if it was not the first time for him to be alone. - Father, you know, left. - Where did you go? Hall asked. - In San Francisco. He left last night. His brother died, somewhere in the Old World. So he went with a lawyer to talk. Will be back tomorrow night.
Jerry laid out all this with the proud consciousness that he was entrusted with a great responsibility - to personally guard the Golden Dream mine. It was evident at the same time that he was terribly glad of a wonderful adventure - the opportunity to live all alone on this cliff above the river and cook his own breakfast, lunch and dinner.
“Well, be careful,” Hall advised him. And I'm on my way to see if we can shoot a deer in the Pocky Cow Canyon.
“As if it weren't raining,” said Jerry gravely.
- What is it to me! Is it scary to get wet? - Hall laughed and, turning, disappeared among the trees.
Jerry's prediction about rain came true. By ten o'clock the pines creaked, swayed, groaned, the glass rattled in the windows, the rain swept in long slanting streams. At half past eleven, Jerry started a fire in the hearth and. as soon as twelve o'clock struck, I sat down to dinner.
“Today, of course, we won't have to go for a walk,” he decided, having thoroughly washed and removed the dishes after eating. And he thought: “How must Hall be soaked! And did he manage to shoot a deer? "
At about one in the afternoon there was a knock on the door, and when Jerry opened it, a man and a woman rushed into the room, as if they were forcibly kicked out by the wind. It was Mr. and Mrs. Spillan, farmers who lived in a secluded valley about twelve miles from the river.
- Where is Hall? - breathless, abruptly asks Spillen.
Jerry noticed that the farmer was agitated and in a hurry, and Mrs. Spillen seemed very upset.
She was a thin, completely faded woman, who had worked a lot in her lifetime; dull, hopeless labor left a heavy stamp on her face. The same hard life bent her husband's back, twisted his arms and covered his hair with dry ash of early gray hair.
- He went hunting, in the Canyon of the Piggy Cow. What do you want, on the other side?
The woman began to sob softly, and a cry escaped from Spillin, expressing extreme annoyance. He went to the window. Jerry stood next to him and also looked out the window, towards the suspended road; the cables were almost invisible behind the thick shroud of rain.
Usually the inhabitants of the surrounding villages were ferried through Sacramento on the Yellow Dragon cable car. There was a small fee for the crossing, from which the Yellow Dragon Company paid Hall's salary.
“We need to go to the other side, Jerry,” Spillen said. “Her father,” he pointed at the crying wife, “was crushed in the mine, in the mine of the Cloverleaf. There was an explosion. They say he will not survive. And they just let us know.
Jerry felt his heart skip a beat. He realized that Spillen wanted to cross the cables of the Golden Dream, but without old Jerry he could not decide to take such a step, because there were no passengers on their way, and she had been inactive for a long time.
- May be. Hall will be here soon, said the boy. Spillen shook his head. - Where's your father? - he asked.
"In San Francisco," Jerry replied shortly. With a hoarse groan, Spillen slammed his fist violently into his palm. His wife was sobbing louder and louder, and Jerry heard her wail: "Oh, we will not be in time, we will not be in time, he will die ..."
The boy felt that he himself was about to cry; he hesitated, not knowing what to do. But Spiellen decided for him.
- Listen, Kid, - he said in a tone that does not allow for objection, - my wife and I need to cross
by all means on your way. Can you help us in this case - start this thing?
Jerry involuntarily backed away, as if he had been asked to touch something forbidden.
“I'd better go see if Hall has returned,” he said timidly. - And if not? Jerry hesitated again.
- If anything happens, I am responsible for everything. You see, Kid, we really need to go to the other side. ”Jerry nodded hesitantly.“ And there’s no point in waiting for Hall, ”Spillin continued,“ you yourself understand that he will not return soon from the Canyon of the "Quivering Cow". So let's go play the drum.
“No wonder Mrs. Spillen looked so frightened when we helped her get into the cart,” Jerry thought involuntarily, looking down into the abyss, which now seemed completely bottomless. The distant shore, seven hundred feet away, could not be seen at all through the downpour, the swirling wisps of clouds, furious foam and spray. And the cliff on which they stood stretched out like a sheer wall right into the seething mist, and it seemed that from the steel cables there, down, not two hundred feet, but at least a mile. ..
“Well, is it done?” Jerry asked. “Come on!” Spillen shouted with full throat to shout down the howl of the wind. He sat down in the cart next to his wife and took her hand.
Jerry didn't like it.
- You will have to hold on with both hands: the wind hurls a lot! He shouted.
The husband and wife immediately parted their hands and gripped the edges of the trolley tightly, while Jerry carefully released the brake lever. “The drum spun slowly, the endless cable began to unwind, and the trolley slowly moved into the airy abyss, clinging to the motionless rail three stretched above with the running wheels.
This was not the first time Jerry had used the cart. But until now he had to do it only under the supervision of his father. He carefully controlled the travel speed with the brake lever. It was necessary to brake, because the trolley swayed strongly from the frenzied gusts of wind, and before completely disappearing behind the wall of rain, it tilted so much that it almost turned its live load into the abyss.
After that, Jerry could only judge the movement of the trolley by the movement of the cable. He watched very closely as the cable was unwound from the drum.
“Three hundred feet…” he whispered as the marks on the cable passed, “three hundred and fifty… four hundred… four hundred…
The cable stopped. Jerry pulled the brake lever, but the cable didn't move. The boy grabbed the cable with both hands and pulled it towards himself, trying to move it from its place. No! Somewhere it was clearly stalled. But where exactly, he could not guess, and the cart was not visible. He looked up and with difficulty made out an empty trolley in the air, which was supposed to move towards him at the same speed with which the trolley with a load was moving away. She was about two hundred and fifty feet from him. This meant that somewhere in the gray haze, two hundred feet above the boiling river and two hundred and fifty feet from the other bank, Spillen and his wife were stuck in the air, stuck in the air.
Three times Jerry called out to them with the full force of his lungs, but his voice was drowned in the furious roar of the weather. While he was frantically trying to figure out what to do, the fast-moving clouds over the river suddenly thinned and burst, and for a moment he saw a swollen Sacramento below and a trolley with people hanging in the air. Then the clouds converged again, and it got even darker over the river than before.
The boy carefully examined the drum, but did not find any problems with it. There must be something wrong with the drum on the other side. It was terrifying to imagine how these two were hanging over the abyss in the midst of a roaring storm, swinging in a fragile trolley, and did not know why it suddenly stopped. And just think that they will have to hang like that until he crosses to the other side along the cables of the "Yellow Dragon" and gets to the unfortunate drum, because of which all this happened!
But then Jerry remembered that there was a block and ropes in the closet where the tools were kept, and he rushed after them as fast as he could. He quickly attached the block to the cable and began to pull - he pulled with all his might, so that his arms were straight off his shoulders, and the muscles seemed to burst. However, the cable did not budge. Now there was nothing else to do but cross to the other side.
Jerry had already gotten wet to the bone, so now he ran headlong towards the Yellow Dragon, not even noticing the rain. The wind urged him on, and it was easy to run, although the thought that he would have to do without Hall's help and there would be no one to brake the trolley disturbed him. He made himself a brake from a strong rope, which he looped over a stationary cable.
The wind flew into him with a furious force, whistled, roared in his ears, swinging and tossing the trolley, and little Jerry imagined even more clearly what it was like for those two - Spillen and his wife. This gave him courage. Having safely crossed, he scrambled up the slope and, with difficulty keeping his feet from the gusts of wind, but still trying to run, went to the drum of the "Golden Dream".
Having examined it, the Kid was horrified to find that the drum was in perfect order. And on this and on the other end everything is in good working order. Where, then, has it stalled? Only in the middle!
The Spillen trolley was only two hundred and fifty feet away from him. Through the moving rain curtain, Jerry could make out a man and a woman, crumpled at the bottom of the trolley and as if given to be torn apart by the enraged elements. Between the two squalls, he shouted to Spiellen to check if the wheels were in order.
Spillen “apparently heard him, because Jerry saw him, carefully raising himself to his knees, felt both wheels of the trolley, then turned to face the bank. - Everything is all right here, Kid!
Jerry barely heard the words, but the meaning reached him. So what happened? Now there was no doubt that it was all about the empty trolley; it was not visible from here, but he knew that it was hanging there, in this terrible abyss, two hundred feet from Spillen's cart.
He, without hesitation, decided what to do. He was only fourteen years old, this thin, mobile little boy, but he grew up in the mountains, his father initiated him into various secrets of sailor's art, and he was not at all afraid of heights.
In a toolbox near the drum, he found an old wrench, a small iron rod, and a whole bundle of almost new Manila cable. He tried unsuccessfully to find some kind of plank in order to make for himself some kind of a sailor's cradle, but at hand there was nothing but huge gaps; there was nothing to saw them with, and he had to do without a comfortable saddle.
The saddle that Jerry had arranged for himself was as easy as shelling pears: he slung the rope over the stationary cable on which the empty trolley hung, and, tying it in a knot, made a large loop; sitting in this loop, he could easily reach the rope with his hands and hold on to it. And at the top, where the loop was supposed to rub against the metal cable, he put his jacket on, because no matter how he looked, he could not find a rag or an old bag anywhere.
Having quickly finished all these preparations, Jerry hung in his noose and moved straight into the abyss, fingering the cable with his hands. He took with him a wrench, a small iron bar, and several feet of rope. His path did not lie horizontally, but somewhat upward, but it was not the ascent that impeded him, but the terrible wind. When violent gusts of wind threw Jerry here and there and almost turned him around, he felt that his heart sank with fear. After all, the cable is quite old ... what if it cannot withstand its weight and these frenzied onslaught of wind, will not withstand and break off?
This was the most overt fear. Jerry could feel himself sucking in his stomach, and his knees tremble with a small tremor, which he could not contain.
But the Kid bravely continued on his way. The cable was dilapidated, torn apart, the sharp ends of the torn wires sticking out in all directions, tore their hands in blood. Jerry only noticed this when he decided to make the first stop and tried to shout to the Spillens. Their cart was now hanging directly below him, only a few feet away, so that he could already explain to them what had happened and why he had embarked on this journey.
“I’d be glad to help you,” Spillen shouted, “but my wife is completely out of her mind! Look, Kid, be careful! I asked for it myself, but now, besides you, there is no one to rescue us.
- Yes, so I will not leave you! Jerry shouted back at him. "Tell Mrs. Spillain that it won't be a minute before she'll be on the other side."
Under the blinding torrential rain, dangling from side to side like a pendulum that came off, feeling unbearable pain in his tattered palms, panting from the effort and from the rushing mass of air rushing into his lungs, Jerry finally reached the empty trolley.
At first glance, the boy was convinced that he had not made this terrible journey in vain. The trolley hung on two wheels; one of them was badly worn out during the long service and jumped off the cable, which was now tightly clamped between the wheel itself and its clip.
It was clear that, first of all, it was necessary to free the wheel from the holder, and during this work, the trolley must be firmly tied with a rope to a fixed cable.
After a quarter of an hour, Jerry finally managed to tie the trolley - that was all he got. The check, which held the wheel on the axis, was completely rusted and became tight. Jerry pounded it with all his might with one hand, and with the other held on as best he could, but the wind constantly swooped in and swayed him, and he very often missed and missed the check. Nine-tenths of all his efforts were spent to keep in place; fearing to drop the key, he tied it to his arm with a handkerchief.
It's already been half an hour. Jerry slid the pin out of place, but he couldn't pull it out. Dozens of times he was ready to despair, everything seemed in vain - both the danger to which he exposed himself and all his efforts. But suddenly it dawned on him. With feverish haste, he rummaged in his pockets. And he found what he needed - a long, thick nail.
If it were not for this nail, which no one knows when and how it got into his pocket, Jerry would have to return to the shore again. Putting a nail through the hole of the check, he finally grabbed it, and a minute later the check jumped out of the axis.
Then a fuss began with an iron bar, with which he tried to free the wheel that was stuck between the cable and the clip. When this was done, Jerry put the wheel in its old place and, with the help of the rope, pulled the trolley up, finally put the wheel on the metal cable.
However, all this took a long time. It's been an hour and a half since Jerry got here. And now he finally decided to get out of his "saddle" and jump into the trolley. He untied the rope that held it, and the wheels slowly slid along the rope. The trolley moved. And the boy knew that somewhere down there - although he could not see it - the cart with the Spillens also moved, only in the opposite direction.
Now he no longer needed the brake, because the weight of his body sufficiently balanced the weight of the other trolley. And soon from the mist of the clouds a high cliff and an old, familiar, confidently revolving drum appeared.
Jerry jumped to the ground and secured his cart. He did it calmly and carefully. And then suddenly — not at all like a hero — he threw himself on the ground at the very drum, in spite of the storm and downpour, and sobbed loudly.
There were many reasons for this: unbearable pain in his tattered hands, terrible fatigue and the knowledge that he had finally freed himself from the terrible nervous tension that had not let go of him for several hours, and also a hot, exciting feeling of joy that Spillen and his wife were now safe.
They were far away and, of course, could not thank him, but he knew that somewhere out there, beyond the furious, raging river, they were now hurrying along the path to the Clover Leaf mine.
Jerry staggered towards the house. The white door handle was stained with blood when he took it, but he didn't even notice it.
The boy was proud and pleased with himself, because he knew for sure that he had done the right thing; and since he did not yet know how to be cunning, he was not afraid to admit to himself that he had done a good deed. Only one small regret swarmed in his heart: oh, if his father were here and saw him!