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

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Thus, in a flash of vision, the truth came to him. It was with himself and not with her that he was disappointed. He recalled scraps of the conversation. It was, after all, nothing Joan Nicholson had said; it was something Nixie had said. Nixie, his little blue-eyed guide and teacher, had been up to her wizard tricks again, all unconsciously.

'Cousin Joan has a real Society in London, you know—a Society that picks up real lost children?

That was the sentence that had done it. He felt certain. Combined with the spiritual presentment of the woman, this apparently stray remark had dropped down into his heart with almost startling effect—like the grain of powder a chemist adds to his test tube that suddenly changes the colour and nature of its contents. As yet he could not determine quite what the change meant; he felt only that it was there—disappointment, dissatisfaction with himself.

'Cousin Joan has a real Society.' She was in earnest.

'Real lost children'—perhaps potential Nixies, Jonahs, Tobys, all waiting to be 'picked up.'