16 The Wine-Dark Sea - Libro della tutto

Patrick O'Brian The Wine-Dark Sea
lists, and he was still with the descendants of
Huascar Inca when a barefoot friar came in
with a charcoal brazier and asked him
whether he was awake, because if he was, the
Prior thought he might like to join them in a
novena addressed to Saint Isidore of Seville,
begging for his intercession in favour of all
travellers.
Returning to his now warmer room from this
exercise Stephen fell into a dreaming sleep:
Diana, sentenced to death for some unquestioned
murder, stood before the judge in an
informal court, guarded by a civil but reserved
jaileress. She was wearing a nightgown, and
the judge, a well-bred man obviously embarrassed
by the situation and by his task, was
slowly tying a hangman's knot in a fine new
piece of white cordage. Diana's distress increased
as the knot reached completion; she
looked at Stephen, her eyes darkening with