Повелитель мух / Lord of the Flies

“All right. Who wants Jack for chief?”

With dreary obedience the choir raised their hands.

“Who wants me?”

Every hand outside the choir except Piggy’s was raised immediately. Then Piggy, too, raised his hand grudgingly into the air.

Ralph counted.

“I’m chief then.”

The circle of boys broke into applause. Even the choir applauded; and the freckles on Jack’s face disappeared under a blush of mortification. He started up, then changed his mind and sat down again while the air rang.

Ralph looked at him, eager to offer something.

“The choir belongs to you, of course.”

“They could be the army—”

“Or hunters—”

“They could be—”

The suffusion drained away from Jack’s face. Ralph waved again for silence.

“Jack’s in charge of the choir. They can be—what do you want them to be?”

“Hunters.”

Jack and Ralph smiled at each other with shy liking. The rest began to talk eagerly. Jack stood up.

“All right, choir. Take off your togs.

”

As if released from class, the choir boys stood up, chattered, piled their black cloaks on the grass. Jack laid his on the trunk by Ralph. His grey shorts were sticking to him with sweat. Ralph glanced at them admiringly, and when Jack saw his glance he explained.

“I tried to get over that hill to see if there was water all round. But your shell called us.”

Ralph smiled and held up the conch for silence.

“Listen, everybody. I’ve got to have time to think things out.

I can’t decide what to do straight off. If this isn’t an island we might be rescued straight away. So we’ve got to decide if this is an island. Everybody must stay round here and wait and not go away. Three of us—if we take more we’d get all mixed, and lose each other—three of us will go on an expedition and find out. I’ll go, and Jack, and, and …”

He looked round the circle of eager faces. There was no lack of boys to choose from.

“And Simon.”

The boys round Simon giggled, and he stood up, laughing a little.

Now that the pallor of his faint was over, he was a skinny, vivid little boy, with a glance coming up from under a hut of straight hair that hung down, black and coarse.

He nodded at Ralph.

“I’ll come.”

“And I—”

Jack snatched from behind him a sizable sheath-knife and clouted it into a trunk. The buzz rose and died away.

Piggy stirred.

“I’ll come.”

Ralph turned to him.