As the man tried to swing the speedboat round, the steering wheel came away in his hands. He waved desperately to his companion, who had been water skiing for the last fifteen minutes. Both men had hardly had time to realize what was happening when they were thrown violently into the sea.

當(dāng)他試圖把快艇轉(zhuǎn)彎時(shí)，方向盤(pán)脫手了。他絕望地向他的同伴揮手，這家伙在過(guò)去15分鐘里一直在劃水。當(dāng)他們被劇烈地甩到海里時(shí)，兩個(gè)人都沒(méi)時(shí)間意識(shí)到發(fā)生了什么。

The speedboat had struck a buoy, but it continued to move very quickly across the water. Both men had just begun to swim towards the shore, when they noticed with dismay that the speedboat was moving in a circle. It now came straight towards them at tremendous speed. In less than a minute, it roared past them only a few feet away.

快艇撞上了一個(gè)浮標(biāo)，但它還在水面上快速地穿梭。兩個(gè)人開(kāi)始快速地游向岸邊，然后他們驚愕地發(fā)現(xiàn)快艇正在繞著圈行駛。它迅速地朝他們沖過(guò)來(lái)，速度很快。不到一分鐘，快艇劇烈地從他們身邊穿過(guò)，僅僅距離幾英尺遠(yuǎn)。

After it had passed, they swam on as quickly as they could because they knew that the boat would soon return. They had just had enough time to swim out of danger when the boat again completed a circle. On this occasion, however, it had slowed down considerably. The petrol had nearly all been used up. Before long, the noise dropped completely and the boat began to drift gently across the water.

在它沖過(guò)去之后，他們盡力向前游去，因?yàn)樗麄冎来R上會(huì)回來(lái)。當(dāng)船跑完一個(gè)圈后，他們有足夠的時(shí)候游出險(xiǎn)境。然而，此時(shí)此刻，船逐漸慢下來(lái)了。原來(lái)是油已經(jīng)用完了。不久之后，噪聲完全降下來(lái)，船開(kāi)始在水面上慢慢地漂流。