The Road. Аудирование на 50000+ английских слов с текстовым сопровождением

Just let him walk along the roof of a jolting, lurching car, with nothing to hold on to but the black and empty air, and when he comes to the down-curving end of the roof, all wet and slippery with dew, let him accelerate his speed so as to step across to the next roof, down-curving and wet and slippery. Believe me, he will learn whether his heart is weak or his head is giddy.

As the train slows down for a stop, half a dozen platforms from where I had decked her I come down. No one is on the platform.

When the train comes to a standstill, I slip off to the ground. Ahead, and between me and the engine, are two moving lanterns.

The shacks are looking for me on the roofs of the cars. I note that the car beside which I am standing is a «four-wheeler» – by which is meant that it has only four wheels to each truck. (When you go underneath on the rods, be sure to avoid the «six-wheelers,» – they lead to disasters.)

I duck under the train and make for the rods, and I can tell you I am mighty glad that the train is standing still.

It is the first time I have ever gone underneath on the Canadian Pacific, and the internal arrangements are new to me. I try to crawl over the top of the truck, between the truck and the bottom of the car. But the space is not large enough for me to squeeze through.

This is new to me. Down in the United States I am accustomed to going underneath on rapidly moving trains, seizing a gunnel and swinging my feet under to the brake-beam, and from there crawling over the top of the truck and down inside the truck to a seat on the cross-rod.

Feeling with my hands in the darkness, I learn that there is room between the brake-beam and the ground. It is a tight squeeze. I have to lie flat and worm my way through. Once inside the truck, I take my seat on the rod and wonder what the shacks are thinking has become of me. The train gets under way. They have given me up at last.

But have they? At the very next stop, I see a lantern thrust under the next truck to mine at the other end of the car.

They are searching the rods for me. I must make my get-away pretty lively. I crawl on my stomach under the brake-beam.

They see me and run for me, but I crawl on hands and knees across the rail on the opposite side and gain my feet. Then away I go for the head of the train. I run past the engine and hide in the sheltering darkness. It is the same old situation.