CHAPTER TWO JILL IS GIVEN A TASK（第3/3页）

Suddenly from her left（for the wind was in the south）a great white cloud came rushing towards her，this time on the same level as herself. And before she knew where she was，she had shot right into the middle of its cold，wet fogginess. That took her breath away，but she was in it only for a moment. She came out blinking in the sunlight and found her clothes wet. （She had on a blazer and sweater and shorts and stockings and pretty thick shoes；it had been a muddy sort of day in England.）She came out lower than she had gone in；and as soon as she did so she noticed something which，I suppose，she ought to have been expecting， but which came as a surprise and a shock. It was Noises. Up till then she had travelled in total silence. Now，for the first time， she heard the noise of waves and the crying of seagulls. And now， too，she smelled the smell of the sea. There was no mistake about her speed now. She saw two waves meet with a smack and a spout of foam go up between them；but she had hardly seen it before it was a hundred yards behind her. The land was getting nearer at a great pace. She could see mountains far inland，and other nearer mountains on her left. She could see bays and headlands，woods and fields，stretches of sandy beach. The sound of waves breaking on the shore was growing louder every second and drowning the other sea noises.

Suddenly the land opened right ahead of her. She was coming to the mouth of a river. She was very low now，only a few feet above the water. A wave-top came against her toe and a great splash of foam spurted up，drenching her nearly to the waist. Now she was losing speed. Instead of being carried up the river she was gliding in to the river bank on her left. There were so many things to notice that she could hardly take them all in；a smooth，green lawn，a ship so brightly coloured that it looked like an enormous piece of jewellery，towers and battlements，banners fluttering in the air，a crowd，gay clothes，armour，gold，swords，a sound of music. But this was all jumbled. The first thing that she knew clearly was that she had alighted and was standing under a thicket of trees close by the river side，and there，only a few feet away from her，was Scrubb.

The first thing she thought was how very grubby and untidy and generally unimpressive he looked. And the second was“How wet I am ！”