Litica koja se nadvija nad tobom

Kad se spusti dovoljno nisko, Polly primijeti da se nebu dogodilo nešto čudno. Ima ga manje. Pogleda gore i vidi da joj se litica nadvila nad glavom, gore šira nego ovdje dolje, tako da je grad na vrhu negdje iza i iznad, posve izvan pogleda.

By the time she has gone far enough down, Polly notices that something strange has happened to the sky. There is less of it. She looks up and finds the cliff hanging out over her head, wider up there than it is down here, so that the town at the top is somewhere behind and above and completely out of sight.

To more radi već jako dugo. Valovi nagrizaju podnožje litice i odnose stijenu odozdo, a stijena iznad, kad joj ne preostane ništa na čemu bi stajala, čeka. Duž ove obale more je u podnožju litica izdubilo cijele špilje, široka tamna ždrijela koja gutaju valove i vraćaju ih s tutnjavom koju Polly osjeća kroz stubu na kojoj sjedi.

This is what the sea has been doing for a very long time. Waves work at the bottom of a cliff and take the rock away from underneath, and the rock above, having nothing left to stand on, waits. Along this coast the sea has cut whole caves back into the base of the cliffs, wide dark mouths that swallow the swell and give it back with a boom she can feel through the step she is sitting on.

Na izbočinama ispod nje stoje tamnozelene ptice raširenih krila i suše ih na vjetru. To su morski vranci, a na ovim stijenama gnijezde se u broju koji nešto znači. Gotovo polovica svih morskih vranaca koji se gnijezde u cijelom Sredozemnom moru gnijezdi se uz ovaj dio obale i na otočićima iza njega.

On the ledges below her there are dark green birds standing with their wings held open, drying them in the wind. They are shags, and they nest along these rocks in numbers that matter. Close to half of all the shags breeding in the whole Mediterranean Sea nest around this stretch of coast and the little islands beyond it.

Jedan od njih bez upozorenja padne s izbočine, sklopi se i uroni u vodu tako čisto da jedva pljusne. Polly čeka. Dugo ga nema. Kad izroni, iznenađujuće je daleko, a u kljunu ima ribu.

One of them drops off its ledge without warning, folds, and goes into the water so cleanly that it barely makes a splash. Polly waits. It is gone a long time. When it surfaces it is a surprising distance away, and it has a fish.