Skala, ki je odšla

Še globlje spodaj Polly pride dovolj daleč, da spozna soseda. V vodi, tako blizu, da se ji zdi, da bi lahko do njega odjadrala, stoji osamljen stolp bledega kamna, okoli njegovega vznožja pa se morje lomi v belo peno. Imenuje se Zrno peska, kar je šala, saj je velik približno kot majhna cerkev.

Further down still, Polly comes down far enough to meet a neighbor. Standing out in the water, close enough that she feels she could glide to it, is a single tower of pale rock with the sea breaking white around its foot. It is called the Grain of Sand, which is a joke, because it is roughly the size of a small church.

Ni bil vedno tam zunaj. Pred približno osemsto leti je bil del te pečine, z njo zraščen, čisto navaden. Potem so valovi dokončali delo, ki so ga opravljali pod njim, vezna skala je izginila in stolp je ostal sam sredi morja. Polly ga nekaj časa opazuje. Spodaj je tanjši kot zgoraj. Morje še vedno dela.

It has not always been out there. About eight hundred years ago it was part of this cliff, joined on, ordinary. Then the waves finished the job they had been working at underneath it, and the connecting rock went, and the tower was left standing alone in the sea. Polly looks at it for a while. It is thinner at the bottom than at the top. The sea is still working.

Mimo v višini njenih oči prileti galeb, in tega se splača opazovati. Ni eden od glasnih, ki sledijo ladjam in ob pristaniškem zidu kradejo krompirček. To je Audouinov galeb in ta se sploh ne hrani z odpadki. Preživlja se na odprtem morju z lovom na ribe, kar je za galeba skoraj stvar načela.

A gull comes past at eye level, and this one is worth watching. It is not one of the loud ones that follow boats and steal chips from the harbor wall. This is an Audouin's gull, and it does not scavenge at all. It makes its living out at sea, hunting fish, which for a gull is almost a matter of principle.

S svetlobo za hrbtom odleti čez preliv, dokler ga Polly ne izgubi izpred oči. Spet pogleda samotno skalo in vrzel med njo in pečino ter pomisli, da je bila ta vrzel nekoč trden kamen, po katerem bi kdo lahko peš prišel na drugo stran.

It goes out over the strait with the light behind it until Polly loses it. She looks back at the standing rock, and at the gap between it and the cliff, and thinks about how that gap was once solid stone that somebody could have walked across.