This site uses cookies.
Some of these cookies are essential to the operation of the site,
while others help to improve your experience by providing insights into how the site is being used.
For more information, please see the ProZ.com privacy policy.
This person has a SecurePRO™ card. Because this person is not a ProZ.com Plus subscriber, to view his or her SecurePRO™ card you must be a ProZ.com Business member or Plus subscriber.
Affiliations
This person is not affiliated with any business or Blue Board record at ProZ.com.
Source text - English On the nineteenth day of April in the year of Our Lord 1704, the Pélican, a recently captured Dutch vessel of some six hundred tons, weighed anchor and headed for the open sea. Elisabeth stood on the main deck with several of the other girls, her hand raised to shade her eyes as the spires and towers of La Rochelle dwindled against the horizon. It was a fine day, unseasonably warm, the storms of the past weeks washed clean from the sky. Above her the men hauled on ropes or hung like spiders from the rigging, shouting to one another above the sharp slap and crack of the sails, but for once none of the girls spoke, though Marie-Françoise de Boisrenaud reached out and took the hand of little Renée Gilbert, who swayed a little, lettuce pale. Though exorbitantly overloaded, the heavy-hipped ship slid smoothly through the unruffled water, her company of twelve attending gunboats fanned out behind her, the creamy wake unfolding from her stern like a wedding veil.
It should have been over by now, her fate decided. With October barely a week old and a ship readied in Rochefort, the bishop had declared it probable that most of the girls would be settled by the new year. On the day that her godfather was to take her to Paris to meet the coach, she had stood in her attic bedroom, her hand on the iron latch of the window, gazing out through the rain-speckled glass at the crumpled clutter of roofs and chimneys heaped up against the smoke-grimed sky, and she had thought, When the leaves return I shall be married. Beyond the barricades of the weaving mills and the dyehouses, the bare trees ran through the sky like cracks in ice. The window frame was old and warped, the paint peeling in scabs. She ran her finger along the cold loop of the latch as the wind rattled the loose panes, and the draught made her shiver.
From the shop her aunt called her name, her voice wilting on the last syllable. Elisabeth turned away from the window, holding her arms tight across her chest for warmth, but she did not answer. It seemed to her that though she was not yet gone, the room had accustomed itself already to her absence. The bed in the corner of the room had been stripped of its sheets and rugs, its drapes knotted up so that the mattress might be aired. The door to the press hung open, its shelves and compartments empty but for a few yellowed sheets of the paper her aunt insisted upon to prevent the stained wood from spoiling the linens. The ewer and basin with their pattern of faded forget-me-nots had been rinsed and wrapped and put away in the kitchen, and there was no fire laid in the small grate. Even the old writing desk was bare, its curved legs buckling as though they might give way without the steadying disorder of books and pamphlets and catalogues and papers that habitually crowded its surface. Elisabeth stroked its scarred top, tracing the grain of the wood with her finger. Though elaborately carved at the feet, the desk was the work of an unskilled woodsmith, its table insufficiently deep for its breadth, its fragile legs ill-suited to so sturdy a piece. Beside them the squat legs of the ladder-backed kitchen chair straddled the floor with the stolidity of a taverner on market day.
Again Elisabeth heard her aunt calling for her and again she did not answer. Instead she pulled out the chair and sat down. The frayed rush seat had always been too high and it comforted her to feel the familiar press of the desk’s underside against her thighs. Sometimes, on those too few occasions when she contrived to sit here all day, she had undressed at night to find the shape of it printed in secret lines on her skin. The desk was shabby, ink-stained and scabbed with candle wax, its single splintery drawer split with age and clumsily nailed together, but she was filled with a sudden longing to take it. It was impossible, of course. Even if her aunt had agreed to such a notion, each of the twenty-three girls was permitted only a single trunk.
Elisabeth had packed the books herself, taking out some of the heavier linens her aunt had selected from the shop. She did not tell her aunt. Her aunt thought like most women and considered a tablecloth or a set of handkerchiefs of considerably greater value than the words of La Rochefoucauld or Racine. If it had not been for her godfather, she would never have managed to accumulate even her own modest library. A respected merchant, Plomier Deseluse was no bibliophile, considering books a pitiable proxy for the pleasures of company and of cards, but he was both prosperous and goodhearted. When Elisabeth’s uncle had died, he had settled upon her a small allowance from which she might purchase what he referred to as the necessary niceties. It would, he said, serve her until she was of an age to be wed.
'Elisabeth!’
Elisabeth set her palms flat on the desk. There was an ink stain on the longest finger of her right hand, a pattern of freckles on the back of her left like the five on a die. Her hands at least she might take with her. She closed her eyes. Then she lowered her head and set her cheek upon the desk, inhaling its faint smells of old varnish and ink powder. The King would buy her books from henceforth. The arrangements had been brokered by the bishop, whose diocese of Quebec had recently been extended to contain the new settlement in Louisiana. In addition to her trousseau, each girl would receive a small stipend from His Majesty’s Ministry of the Marine to support her until she was married, for a period not to exceed one year. Deseluse considered the bargain to be more than reasonable. There were perhaps one hundred unmarried men in Louisiana, many in a position to support a wife. The girls would have their pick of them.
Downstairs a door slammed.
For the love of peace, Niece, must I shout myself hoarse?’
Without opening her eyes, Elisabeth raised her head a little. Her nose brushed the desk as, very lightly, she pressed her lips against its waxy surface. Then, unsettled by her own foolishness, she rose and walked quickly across the room. She did not turn round as she closed the door behind her and descended the stairs towards her aunt.
Deseluse had been late. As her aunt hastened to greet him, her hands smoothing invisible creases from her skirts, Elisabeth watched the dark shape of his carriage beyond the swirled glass of the windows, heard the impatient jangle and slap of a horse shifting in its traces, the raised voice of a man objecting angrily to the obstruction. The afternoon had darkened, though it was hardly three o’clock, and the lamps were already lit, bright as coins in their buttery brass sconces. In their glow the long polished counter gleamed like a thoroughbred. Elisabeth leaned against the brass measure that ran the length of the counter, feeling its sharp edge press against her belly.
She had loved this shop when first she had come to live here. Accustomed to the frugal plainness of her father’s home, she had thought herself awoken in a jewel box. She had gazed in wonder as her aunt took down the heavy bolts of silk and velvet and gossamer mousseline, billowing them out so that her customers might appreciate their fineness, the grace of their fall. Along one wall of the shop were tiny drawers containing buttons of every shape and hue, buttons of shell and bone and polished metal and every shade of coloured glass that flashed like firecrackers when you held them in the light. She had not known there were so many colours in the world. Sometimes, when she was supposed to be working on her sewing, she had crept into the shop and hidden beneath the counter, aching to dip her hands into the rattling drawers of buttons and throw them into the air, to pull great spools of colour from the reels of ribbons and trimmings and threads so that she might fill the air with their brilliant patterns. She had not thought then that it was possible to be oppressed by the ceaseless cram of colour and stuff, that sometimes, when the day was ended, she would desire only to slip into the lane behind the shop and tip her head back, restored to herself by the grimy grey pallor of approaching dusk.
‘Elisabeth, my dear.’
Plomier Deseluse stepped into the shop, shaking the wet from his shoulders like a dog. His wig, bulky and horned in the old-fashioned style, glinted with rain. Elisabeth bobbed a curtsy, inclining her head.
‘Sir.’
‘Come out from behind there and let me kiss you. It is not every day that I despatch a ward of mine to be married.’
Elisabeth’s smile stiffened as, obediently, she stepped out into the shop and allowed her godfather to embrace her. He smelled of claret and wet wool.
‘Officially I suppose you are now a ward of the King or some such, but we should not let such formalities prevent a fond farewell.’ He took a large handkerchief from his pocket and blew his nose loudly into it. ‘This is your box?’ Leaning out into the damp lane, he gestured at the coachman to load the trunk onto the back of the carriage. When the door clicked shut behind him he shivered. ‘Wretched miserable weather.’
‘Please, come warm yourself by the fire,’ Elisabeth’s aunt said hastily. ‘May I bring you some tea? A little port wine?’
Deseluse shook his head.
‘We should leave directly.’ He nodded at Elisabeth. ‘You are ready?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Then let us be off. The roads are hardly safe in darkness.’ He bowed to Elisabeth’s aunt. ‘Good day, Madame. My wife wished me to tell you that she shall call on you tomorrow. It seems a woman can never have enough dresses.’
Elisabeth’s aunt bared her teeth in a smile. Her teeth were yellow, a slightly darker shade than her complexion.
‘I hope, sir, that you too shall come back and see us, though Elisabeth is gone. We should be most obliged.’
‘Yes, yes, well, I am sure,’ Deseluse said and he gave his shoulders another brisk shake. ‘Now, Elisabeth, you are ready?’
Elisabeth looked at the smooth gleam of the counter, at the bolts of cloth stacked on their deep shelves, and she thought of the long afternoons when she had thought she might die of the dullness of it. On the wall her shears hung from their blue ribbon, their blades slightly parted. Her fingers twined together, the tips hard against the points of her knuckles.
‘Come along, now,’ urged her aunt.
Slowly Elisabeth turned. The door was open and outside the rain flurried in petulant squalls. Pulling up the hood of her cape, she touched her lips to her aunt’s yellow cheek.
‘Godspeed, Niece, and may God bless you.’
‘Farewell, Aunt.’
‘Write and tell us how you find things. Your cousins shall be curious. Louisiana. Imagine.’ ‘Imagine,’ Elisabeth echoed, and she rolled up her mind like a length of ribbon so that she might not.
Of the twenty-three girls, seventeen would be travelling from Paris. Some of the girls had connections to the convents and missions of Paris; others, like Elisabeth, had been proposed to the bishop by patrons of his acquaintance. Twenty-three girls between the ages of fourteen and eighteen, girls of high moral character, not all of them well-born, but all raised in virtue and in piety, fine stock from which to breed a new France in the New World.
Twenty-three girls who might otherwise never be wed.
She knew only that the men of Louisiana were mostly soldiers or civilian officials in the pay of the King. Some were Canadian, the rest French. One of these men would become her husband. She had signed a contract to make it so. For fifteen sols a day and a trunk of linen and lace, she had sold herself into exile, property of the King of France until, in a savage land on the other side of the world, a man she had never met might take her in marriage, a man of whom she knew nothing, not even his name.
If such a fate was preferable to the future that had beckoned her in Saint-Denis, married according to the arrangements of her aunt or confined to repeat forever the same dreary day behind the counter of the mercer’s shop, there was poor comfort in it. It was miserable to be a grown woman, more miserable still to be a grown woman with neither the funds nor the affections a grown woman must have at her disposal if she was to contrive her own future. As a child Elisabeth had liked to lie on her belly beneath the table in the kitchen, a book on the floor before her. It was warm in the kitchen and friendly. She had lain beneath the table and the words in the book and the hiss of the fire and the grunts and slaps above her as Madeleine kneaded the dough for bread had wrapped themselves around her like a blanket, muffling time. When it was dinner the old servant had been obliged to bend over, her breath coming in short puffs as she threatened to sweep Elisabeth from her hiding place with her sharpbristled broom. Elisabeth had laughed then and tickled Madeleine behind her fat knees and thought how, when she was a woman, she would make her home under a table where the world was all stories and swollen ankles.
Then her father had died and Madeleine had gone and Elisabeth had been sent to live with her father’s sister in Saint-Denis. In her aunt’s house there were boys and wooden crates under the kitchen table where her aunt kept the china, wrapped carefully against breakage. Elisabeth was ten then and hardly a girl at all. Her aunt required her to work in the shop during the day, or to help with the house. Elisabeth read at night beneath a candle that guttered in the midnight draught from the window. Sometimes, when she lay down to sleep, the night sky had already begun to curl up at the edges, exposing the grey-pink linings of the day, and she could hear the heavy wheels of the vegetable wagons as they rumbled down the lane. Her aunt complained about the candles and rebuked Elisabeth for yawning in the shop, but the old woman was weary too and her heart was not in it.
A husband was another matter. When she was married, Elisabeth thought, even the nights would not be her own.
Translation - Chinese 1704年4月19日，鵜鶘鳥號 啟航。這艘船是法國近日俘獲的荷蘭船艦，船重約六百噸。伊莉莎伯和幾個女孩一起站在主甲板上。她用手遮擋太陽，望着拉羅歇爾海港的座座高塔在海平線上越縮越小。前幾周的暴風雨把天空一刷而新。現在晴空萬里，暖和得不合時節。船上幹活的男人在伊莉莎伯的上方用力拉緊繩索；有些則攀在上面，活像一隻隻蜘蛛。他們大聲呼喚對方，力圖壓過海浪拍打船隻的巨大聲響。反之，這群女孩卻異常安靜。瑪麗•芳斯娃•芭蓮諾小姐見小蕾妮•嬌貝臉色蒼白，且有點站不穩，便伸手牽着她。這艘船船尾寬大，雖已明顯超載，但仍能平穩駛過平靜的海面。後面緊跟着十二艘炮艇，成扇形排開。船尾捲起的浪花徐徐散開，白白的像襲嫁衣裳。
Translation - Chinese Da-ga-la, da-ga-la, da-ga-la…
Da-ga-la, da-ga-la, da-ga-la…
On the great roaring desert of Xinjiang, sand dust was kicked up into the sky. Among the dust came two horses, galloping one after the other. In the front was a white horse with long legs and a long torso. A young woman was riding on it with a little girl aged seven or eight in her arm. Behind was a brown horse. And on it rode a tall slim man, with his body leaning forward.
The man had a long arrow sticking out of his vest in the left. Blood was streaming down the horseback, dripping onto the ground and into the yellow sand. He dared not to pluck out the arrow for fear that he would die on the spot. Death was indeed nothing to him, for he knew every man has his death. But then who would take care of his wife and his daughter if he died? Those vicious and cruel enemies were very close behind.
The brown horse had galloped a long way and had been exhausted. It could hardly breathe under the wisps and kicks of its master. White foam was all round its mouth. All of a sudden, it lost strength in its front legs and fell to the ground. The man pulled the rein forcefully. But the brown horse emitted a sorrow cry, convulsed a bit and died in exhaustion.
The young woman heard the cry. She looked back and saw the collapsed body of the brown horse.
“San, what… what’s happened?” She was shocked.
The man frowned and shook his head. He judged from the billowing sand not far behind and knew that their enemies were already near.
The young woman turned and galloped to her husband’s side. It was then when she noticed the long arrow sticking out of his blood-soaked vest. The scene was too much shock for her that she nearly fainted. The daughter also cried in fright.
“Dad, Dad, there is an arrow in your back!”
“I’m okay!”
The man smiled bitterly. He jumped lightly onto the horseback and sat behind his wife. He was still agile despite seriously injured. The young woman turned to look at him, with care and sympathy all over her face.
“San, you…” she said gently.
The man kicked the horse and pulled the rein, and off the white horse ran.
Although the white horse was a steed one, it was getting tired for running such a long journey, not to mention it was now carrying three people on its back. However, as if the horse understood that it was now a matter of life and death to its masters, it galloped with its life even without wisps and kicks.
But after several more kilometres, it eventually slowed down.
The enemies behind were closer and closer. Among them were sixty-three bandits. But they had brought around one hundred and ninety tough horses for switching in case any got tired. It was a must for the gang to catch them three.
The man looked back. He could already see the figures of their enemies among the sand cloud. And before long, even their faces came into picture as well. He gritted.
“Hong, can you promise me one thing?”
The young woman smiled at her husband tenderly.
“I’ve never once disobeyed you in my life, you know that.”
“Good. Then run for life with our baby. Protect her and keep this Map to Gaochang Maze safe.”
He was determined, as if giving an order.
“My dear, let them have the map. It’s okay to lose it. You… you are way more important,” she quivered.
The man lowered his head and kissed her in the left cheek, then said in a loving voice.
“We have overcome a lot of dangers together, and perhaps we might live through this time as well. But the Big Three of Lüliang want not only the map, they… they want you as well.”
“Maybe… he will think of the past days when we learnt wu-gong together,” said the woman. “Perhaps, I can beg…”
“No way should we beg for others’ mercy.” The man said harshly. “This horse cannot carry us three. Go! Be quick!” He emitted a cry and jumped off the horse.
The woman reined in the horse at once and tried to get her husband. But the man was very angry. “Go!” he rapped out.
She had always obeyed her husband and so she smacked the horse in the rump and rode away. But deep inside, her heart had turned icebound, even the blood all over her body had frozen.
The enemies behind saw the man got off the horse. “White Horse Li San is down! White Horse Li San is down!” they cheered. Ten or more of them rode near Li San, surrounding him. The other forty or so carried on chasing the young woman.
Li San was lying on the ground in a curl-up position, still, like a corpse. A man raised a long spear and stabbed Li San in the right shoulder. Blood gushed out as the man pulled the weapon out. But Li San’s body remained as still as before.
“Already dead,” said the leader in a curly beard. “Nothing to fear anymore. Search him!”
Two men get off their horses and tried to roll over Li San’s body. But out of nowhere, something flashed in the air. The long sword of White Horse Li San came swiftly, slashing off the two men’s heads as it flew through the air in a curve.
No one knew that Li San’s death was a fake, especially after he was stabbed by the spear. But now he was fighting back unexpectedly. Six or seven men were scared by this sudden attack and immediately reined back their horses. But the man in curly beard took out his quill-shaped sword and cried, “Li San, you are really a tough guy!” Then he slashed down the sword towards Li San from the top. Li San held up his own sword in defence. But because his shoulders were both injured, he could not exert force in his arms. He backed off three steps and coughed out a gush of blood. Ten men or so rode near and swung their weapons down on him.
White Horse Li San remained a hero till his death. He had never succumbed to anyone throughout his life. He even killed two more enemies in his last minute.
His last roar tore his wife’s heart apart.
“He’s now dead. What am I still living for?”
She took out a piece of wool handkerchief from her bosom and stuffed inside her daughter’s clothes and said, “Baby, take good care of yourself!” She whipped the white horse in the rump and jumped off. As its load was much lighter, the horse speeded up greatly, carrying the little girl away.
The woman was comforted as she watched the horse went, “No other horse in the world can compete with this spirited one. And with my girl being so light, they can never catch her.”
In front, her daughter’s cry “Mama, mama” was dying down gradually as the horse went far and farther. But behind, the clatter of the hooves came louder and clearer. She prayed in her heart, “Good god, please help my girl find a good husband as mine when she grows up. Though life is tough, it is full of happiness!” She tidied her clothes and hair a bit and before long, arrived ten or so horses, one after the other, with Shi Zhongjun—the second brother among the Big Three of Lüliang—came up first.
The Big Three of Lüliang were sworn brothers. The eldest one, Huo Yuanlong, titled “First Swordsman of the West Gate”, was the beard man who killed White Horse Li San. The second brother, Shi Zhongjun, was a tall, thin man. People called him “Spearman Shi”. And the youngest one was a short but smart guy called Chen Dahai, with the title “Green Python”. He was once a gangster in Liaodong province, but settled down later in Shanxi where he first met First Swordsman and Green Python. Together they set up Jun-Wei Goods Safeguard Agency in Taigu County there.
Li San’s wife, Lady San, was called Shangguan Hong. She and Spearman Shi was originally from the same sect. They had learnt wu-gong together since they were kids.
Spearman Shi had always loved this tender girl since the very first beginning. Even their master had intended to match them up. So at that time, their fellow apprentices believed that they were an engaged couple. No one could predict that Shangguan Hong and White Horse Li San would later fall in love with each other at first sight. She even disregarded her family’s disapproval towards their marriage and eloped with Li San.
Spearman Shi was then left heart-broken and seriously ill. Since then, his temperament totally changed. But his love for Shangguan Hong remained as it was. And he remained single ever since.
Today, the Big Three of Lüliang and the Li San couple finally came together after ten years, but none of them could have thought of meeting here in Gansu Province, fighting for a map. All the way from Gansu to Xinjiang, the sixty-odd gang had been trying to hunt the Li couple down. But driven by jealousy and hatred, Spearman Shi was the fiercest one among the bandits. The arrow in Li San’s back was indeed shot from his bow.
Li San finally died in the desert. But when Spearman Shi rode near Lady San and saw her standing alone on this flat land, he felt a bit guilty about killing Li San.
“Her husband died in our hands. From this day onwards, I swear to take good care of her till I die,” he thought.
As the wind blew through the desert, the ribbons on her clothes danced in the air as they had on the day he saw her in their master’s wu-gong practice ground. Lady San’s weapons were a pair of daggers—a gold-hilted one and a silver-hilted one—which had gained her the title “Lady San of the Gold and Silver Daggers”. Now, she was standing here, smiling faintly, but with none of those daggers in her hands.
A sense of hope suddenly welled up from Spearman Shi’s heart, fringing a blush to his pale face. He could feel warmth in the chest. He then put down his spear on the saddle and dismounted from his horse.
“My little Hong!”
“Li San is dead!” Lady San told him.
He nodded.
“Hong, I—I’ve never let you out of my mind in all these ten years”.
“I don’t believe it,” she smiled.
The same tender smile and the exact loving voice that belonged to the girl ten years back then were now fluttering in his stomach. Nothing had changed all these years.
“Stay with me, my little Hong. I will never let anything bad happen to you from today onwards,” he said to her gently.
There was a strange flash of light in Lady San’s eyes.
“How kind of you!”
She spread out her arms and rushed into his tight embrace. He was ecstatic.
First Swordsman and Green Python also smiled at each other. “Brother Shi’s dream finally comes true after ten years of lovesickness” they thought.
Spearman Shi felt so unreal. His head was spinning. All he could sense was her light fragrance. And when he realised that she was still holding him, he could not believe this was really happening.
Then all of a sudden, he felt a great pain in his abdomen, as if something sharp had stabbed inside. He let out a cry and tried to push Lady San away with force. But she did not let go and held him even tighter instead, until together, they both eventually fell down.
First Swordsman and Green Python were shocked by this unexpected turn of events. They immediately got off their horses and dashed for aid. When they pulled Lady San away from their brother, they found blood all over her chest, with a gold-handled dagger stabbed inside. They also found another dagger with a silver handle in Spearman Shi’s abdomen. It turned out that Lady San had made up her mind to die with her husband. She hid her two daggers inside her clothes, with one facing inwards and one outwards. So when Spearman Shi held her, they were both stabbed.
Lady San died on the spot, but Spearman Shi was still lingering on. When he thought of how his little Hong wanted to kill him, he found the pain in his heart much more killing than his wound.
“End me, brother. I don’t want to bear this pain any longer”.
Green Python knew that he could hardly get healed with such a serious injury. He looked at his big brother, First Swordsman, and saw him nodded. Green Python then gritted, raised his sword and pierced through Spearman Shi’s heart.
“I’ve never thought Lady San that fierce,” First Swordsman sighed.
At this time, a head guard of his agency arrived on horse.
“We’ve searched through Li San again. But still no map”.
First Swordsman pointed at Lady San.
“Then it must be on her”.
After a thorough search, nothing was found except some money and a few clothes. First Swordsman and Green Python looked at each other in dismay. But they both found that strange as well. Their men had watched the couple closely all the way from Gansu to Xinjiang. The map could not have been given to others in midway without being noticed. And from the way the couple would rather die than losing the map, there was no way they would easily hand it to others.
Once again, Green Python searched Lady San’s belongings exhaustively. When suddenly he came across a little girl’s clothing, an idea struck him.
“Brother, catch that little girl!”
“Ah!” exclaimed First Swordsman, “But don’t worry, a little girl like her cannot escape in this big desert”.
He waved to his men, “Two remain here and bury Sir Shi. The rest of you, come with me!” He pulled the rein and galloped forward. His men, and a hundred or so horses, followed in thundering hooves and shouts.
The girl had ridden off for some time and was already way ahead of them. But since the boundless desert hid nothing, the gang had a fairly vast view in front. It was just a matter of time for them to catch up with the girl.
They chased and chased until dusk, when at last Green Python cheered, “There she is!” They finally saw a tiny black spot at the far end of the world, moving between the sky and the land.
No matter how strong the white horse was, it finally lost its usual speed after running for the whole day. So when First Swordsman and Green Python kept switching horses, they managed to come close to the girl gradually.
The little girl, Li Wenxiu, was exhausted. She was now lying on the horseback, asleep. Under the enervating sun, she had had no food or water in the desert for whole day long. Her lips had cracked. Luckily the white horse was very clever. It knew that the crowd chasing behind would harm its little master, so it ran with all its strength towards the bloody sunset ahead. But all of a sudden, it kicked up its fore legs and neighed with a hint of danger. It could sense an uncanny feeling hovering in the air.
First Swordsman and Green Python were both strong and well-trained. Long-distance rides and chases were nothing to them. But right now, they too, found it difficult to breathe and were feeling pain in the chest.
“Brother, something’s wrong!” First Swordsman said.
Green Python looked around, trying to figure out what was happening. He noticed something yellowish clouding up beside the blood red sun in the north-west. And among the yellow cloud there flashed some purple light. It was the most spectacular view he had ever seen in his entire life. But he also realized how rapid the cloud was stretching over the sky, veiling half of it. Many in the gang were dripping sweats and were short of breath.
“Brother, it seems like a dust storm is coming,” Green Python said.
“Right. Hurry up then. Catch the girl, and find shelt—”
A blast of wind struck them. Sand rolled inside First Swordsman’s mouth and nose, cutting off his sentence.
Sand storms in deserts can never be predicted. Seven or so men were knocked down their horses by this sudden attack.
“Get down your horses and gather here!” First Swordsman yelled.
They all stayed together to fight against the storm. But standing among such great a gale in the desert, they were just like a little boat drifting over the ocean. Nothing was in their control.
As the storm rumbled fiercer and fiercer, the yellow sand on the men and their horses piled up thicker and thicker…
More
Less
Translation education
Master's degree - The Chinese University of Hong Kong
Experience
Years of experience: 12. Registered at ProZ.com: May 2012.
Portfolio