Читать книгу The Complete Works of Algernon Blackwood. Novels, Short Stories, Horror Classics, Occult & Supernatural Tales, Plays онлайн

1441 страница из 1552

Jimbo kept silence mostly, his instinct ever being to conceal his ignorance; but Monkey talked fifteen to the dozen, filling the pauses with long 'ohs' and bursts of laughter and impudent observations. Yet her cheeky insolence never crossed the frontier where it could be resented. Her audacity stopped short of impertinence.

'There's a point beyond which—' her cousin would say gravely, when she grew more daring than usual; and, while answering 'It'll stick into you, then, not into me,' she yet withdrew from the borders of impertinence at once.

'What is star-stuff really then?' she asked.

'The primordial substance of the universe,' he answered solemnly, no whit ashamed of his inaccuracy.

'Ah yes!' piped Jimbo, quietly. Ecole primaire he understood. This must be something similar.

'But what does it do, I mean, and why is it good for people to have it in them—on them—whatever it is?' she inquired.

'It gives sympathy and insight; it's so awfully subtle and delicate,' he answered. 'A little of it travels down on every ray and soaks down into you. It makes you feel inclined to stick to other people and understand them. That's sympathy.'