The Food of the Gods / Пища богов. Книга для чтения на английском языке

His horse was as trustworthy as himself, and one does not wonder that he dozed…

You know that intermittent drowsing as one sits, the drooping of the head, the nodding to the rhythm of the wheels then chin upon the breast, and at once the sudden start up again.

Pitter, Pitter, patter.

“What was that?”

It seemed to the doctor he had heard a thin shrill squeal close at hand[40 - close at hand – (разг.) поблизости]. For a moment he was quite awake. He said a word or two of undeserved rebuke to his horse, and looked about him.

He tried to persuade himself that he had heard the distant squeal of a fox – or perhaps a young rabbit gripped by a ferret.

Swish, swish, swish, pitter, patter, swish – …

What was that?

He felt he was getting fanciful. He shook his shoulders and told his horse to get on. He listened, and heard nothing.

Or was it nothing?

He had the queerest impression that something had just peeped over the hedge at him, a queer big head.

With round ears! He peered hard, but he could see nothing.

“Nonsense,” said he.

He sat up with an idea that he had dropped into a nightmare, gave his horse the slightest touch of the whip, spoke to it and peered again over the hedge. The glare of his lamp, however, together with the mist, rendered things indistinct, and he could distinguish nothing. It came into his head, he says, that there could be nothing there, because if there was his horse would have shied at it.

Yet for all that his senses remained nervously awake.

Then he heard quite distinctly a soft pattering of feet in pursuit along the road.

He would not believe his ears about that. He could not look round, for the road had a sinuous curve just there. He whipped up his horse and glanced sideways again. And then he saw quite distinctly where a ray from his lamp leapt a low stretch of hedge, the curved back of – some big animal, he couldn’t tell what, going along in quick convulsive leaps.

He says he thought of the old tales of witchcraft – the thing was so utterly unlike any animal he knew, and he tightened his hold on the reins for fear of the fear of his horse[41 - for fear of the fear of his horse – (разг.) боясь напугать свою лошадь]. Educated man as he was, he admits he asked himself if this could be something that his horse could not see.