Читать книгу The Blind Man's House. A Quiet Story онлайн

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'Everything all right?'

'Oh yes, sir. Very satisfactory indeed.'

He turned to his wife, who was close to him, put his arm around her waist and began slowly to mount the stairs.

'I was only in this house once. I came with my mother one time. I was about ten. Yet I remember it all. Is that oak chest still there? They told me a story that someone was caught in it once and couldn't get out. One of those stories. It's Italian. I told them to buy some of the old things that had belonged to the Trenchards, but for the most part you'll find everything you had at Bramgrove, darling. And of course you can arrange things just as you please. The drawing-room, now. It's here on the left. Everything ought to be just as it was at Bramgrove. Only of course the room isn't quite the same shape.'

They stood in the drawing-room. It was flooded with sunlight. Celia gave a little cry, for the view from the windows was enchanting. Beyond the old stone wall that bordered the garden, fields ran down the hill to a straggling wood, then slightly up again to a level horizon, and above this was a line of sea, now one stroke of trembling gold. In the fields were old trees, set deep into the soil, and under their cool soft shadow cows were lying. The windows were open and the sea breeze blew, very delicately, the fawn-coloured curtains.