Nostromo - A Tale of the Seaboard.pdf - Planet eBook

Decoud talking publicly with Antonia in defiance of everyconvention. And he not even her novio as far as the worldknew! Though, even in that case, it would have been scandalenough. But the dignified old lady, respected and admiredby the first families, would have been still more shocked ifshe could have heard the words they were exchanging.‘Did you say I lost sight of the aim? I have only one aimin the world.’She made an almost imperceptible negative movementof her head, still staring across the street at the Avellanos’shouse, grey, marked with decay, and with iron bars like aprison.‘And it would be so easy of attainment,’ he continued,‘this aim which, whether knowingly or not, I have alwayshad in my heart—ever since the day when you snubbed meso horribly once in Paris, you remember.’A slight smile seemed to move the corner of the lip thatwas on his side.‘You know you were a very terrible person, a sort of CharlotteCorday in a schoolgirl’s dress; a ferocious patriot. Isuppose you would have stuck a knife into Guzman Bento?’She interrupted him. ‘You do me too much honour.’‘At any rate,’ he said, changing suddenly to a tone of bitterlevity, ‘you would have sent me to stab him without compunction.’‘Ah, par exemple!’ she murmured in a shocked tone.‘Well,’ he argued, mockingly, ‘you do keep me here writingdeadly nonsense. Deadly to me! It has already killed myself-respect. And you may imagine,’ he continued, his tone