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

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'They seem to think it's all put on, this stiffness of mine,' he thought more than once. f Perhaps they're playing a sort of game with me. If once they find out I'm only acting—whew!' he whistled low—' the game is up at once! I must keep an eye peeled!'

Consequently he kept that eye peeled; he made more use of his private study, and so often gave the excuse of having reports to write that, had it been true, his lumber Company would have been obliged to double its staff in order to read them.

Yet, even in the study, he was not absolutely safe.

The children penetrated there too. They knocked elaborately—always; but with the knock he invariably realised a roguish pair of eyes and a sly laugh on the other side of the door. It was like knocking on his heart direct. He always said—in a bored, unnatural tone:

'Oh, come in, whoever it is I' knowing quite well who it was. And, then, in they would come—one or the other of them. They slipped in softly as shadows, like the coming of dusk, like stray puffs of wind, fragrant and summery, or like unexpected rays of light as the sun walked round the house in the afternoon. And when they were gone—swiftly, like the sun dipping behind a cloud—lo, the room seemed cold and empty again.