Читать книгу Little Ship of Fools. Sixteen Rowers, One Improbable Boat, Seven Tumultuous Weeks on the Atlantic онлайн

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“It looks big, but it’ll be very small on the ocean,” growled a low voice behind me. I turned and a man a few years older than myself was looking at me with drooping but animated eyes. He said, “You must be Charlie; I’m Tom Butscher.” He was one of Steve’s would-be recruits, as yet undecided, who had traveled by train from his home on Toronto Island in order to mingle with the crew, take a trial row, and make up his mind. (The following morning he said to me quietly, “Ya know, I don’t think I’ll bother making up my mind—too much pressure. I’ll just go.” And he committed to the journey then and there.)

In all, meeting the crew was like encountering the characters out of a novel I’d been reading for weeks: Ernst from Vienna; Sunshine Liz from the north side of the island; Aleksa the firefighter from Deer Park; Rowboat Ryan from Chattanooga; Louise from bluegrass country; Sylvain from Gatineau; Paul from Shelter Island.

Paul was not a rower but had our respect and attention because he had worked on the boat, as had the pair of Georgian expats, relentless smokers, who shook hands dutifully and went back to building the rudders.