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

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Her manner was very demure, but she looked so piercingly into the very middle of his eyes that Paul felt as though she had already discovered everything about him. They all stood quite close to him now, touching his knees; ready, there and then, to take him wholly into their confidence.

An impulse that he only just managed to control stirred in him and a curious pang accompanied it. He remembered his 'attitude,' however, and stiffened slightly.

'No, it only takes ten days roughly from where I've come,' he said, leaving the mat and dropping into a deep arm-chair a little farther off. 'The big steamers go very fast, you know, nowadays.'

Their eyes remained simply glued to his face. They switched round a few points to follow his movement, but did not leave their squares of carpet.

'Madmerzelle said'—it was Toby, née Arabella Lucy, speaking for the first time—' you knew lots of stories about deers and wolves and things, and would look like a Polar bear for us sometimes.'

'Oh yes, and beavers and Indians in snowstorms, and the roarer boryalis,' chimed in Jonah, giving a little hop of excitement that brought him still closer. 'And the songs they sing in canoes when there are rapids,' he added with intense excitement. 'Madmizelle sings them sometimes, but they're not a bit the real thing, because she hasn't enough bass in her voice.'