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

Inglesi’—the engineers (he was a famous cook, though thekitchen was a dark place)—he was, as it were, under the eyeof the great man who had led him in a glorious strugglewhere, under the walls of Gaeta, tyranny would have expiredfor ever had it not been for that accursed Piedmonteserace of kings and ministers. When sometimes a frying-pancaught fire during a delicate operation with some shreddedonions, and the old man was seen backing out of thedoorway, swearing and coughing violently in an acrid cloudof smoke, the name of Cavour—the arch intriguer sold tokings and tyrants—could be heard involved in imprecationsagainst the China girls, cooking in general, and thebrute of a country where he was reduced to live for the loveof liberty that traitor had strangled.Then Signora Teresa, all in black, issuing from anotherdoor, advanced, portly and anxious, inclining her fine,black-browed head, opening her arms, and crying in aprofound tone—‘Giorgio! thou passionate man! Misericordia Divina! Inthe sun like this! He will make himself ill.’At her feet the hens made off in all directions, with immensestrides; if there were any engineers from up the linestaying in Sulaco, a young English face or two would appearat the billiard-room occupying one end of the house; butat the other end, in the cafe, Luis, the mulatto, took goodcare not to show himself. The Indian girls, with hair likeflowing black manes, and dressed only in a shift and shortpetticoat, stared dully from under the square-cut fringes ontheir foreheads; the noisy frizzling of fat had stopped, the