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

‘Ah, you are going to meet the escort. I shall be on thebalcony at five o’clock to see you pass. Till then, good-bye.’Charles Gould walked rapidly round the table, and, seizingher hands, bent down, pressing them both to his lips.Before he straightened himself up again to his full heightshe had disengaged one to smooth his cheek with a lighttouch, as if he were a little boy.‘Try to get some rest for a couple of hours,’ she murmured,with a glance at a hammock stretched in a distantpart of the room. Her long train swished softly after her onthe red tiles. At the door she looked back.Two big lamps with unpolished glass globes bathed ina soft and abundant light the four white walls of the room,with a glass case of arms, the brass hilt of Henry Gould’scavalry sabre on its square of velvet, and the water-coloursketch of the San Tome gorge. And Mrs. Gould, gazing atthe last in its black wooden frame, sighed out—‘Ah, if we had left it alone, Charley!’‘No,’ Charles Gould said, moodily; ‘it was impossible toleave it alone.’‘Perhaps it was impossible,’ Mrs. Gould admitted, slowly.Her lips quivered a little, but she smiled with an air of daintybravado. ‘We have disturbed a good many snakes in thatParadise, Charley, haven’t we?’‘Yes, I remember,’ said Charles Gould, ‘it was Don Pepewho called the gorge the Paradise of snakes. No doubt wehave disturbed a great many. But remember, my dear, that itis not now as it was when you made that sketch.’ He wavedhis hand towards the small water-colour hanging alone