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

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Mr. Brennan looked at his children with surprise, whenever he saw them. He was delighted to discover that he had such charming children, and this discovery was fresh every new day. Mrs. Brennan was, as Phyllis again recorded, 'the mother facile princeps.' To see her move with her children along the village street was a sight never to be forgotten.

Three days after the arrival of the Cromwells, the children had just finished tea, and Lucy, the maid of all possible and impossible work, was clearing away the tea, which she did with a great deal of banging and clashing as though she were a Salvation Army girl and the china were timbrels. At the same time she steamed through her nose as though her inside were a kettle. But she was a good girl and a warm-hearted.

When Lucy was gone Gilbert suddenly said:

'I want something frightfully.'

Dorothy, who was gulping down Chicot the Jester as though he were a life-restorer, and turning one ear to Simon who was telling a story both to her and himself, said, rather impatiently, 'What do you want?' She knew that in five minutes' time they must go down to the drawing-room to spend half an hour with their mother, and she wanted to reach the end of her chapter.