Pumpkins' Glow: 200+ Eerie Tales for Halloween. Джек Лондон

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СКАЧАТЬ same purpose that she encountered poor Johanna, who had just let herself in at the private door.

      'Oh! you have come home, have you?' said Mrs Oakley, 'I wonder where you have been to, gallivanting; but I suppose I may wonder long enough before you will tell me. Go into the parlour, I want to speak to you.'

      Now poor Johanna had quite forgotten the very existence of Mr Lupin - so, rather than explain to her mother, which would beget more questions, she wished to go to bed at once, notwithstanding it was an hour before the usual time for so doing. She walked unsuspectingly into the parlour, and as Mr Lupin was sitting, the slightest movement of his chair closed the door, so she could not escape. Under any other circumstances probably Johanna would have insisted upon leaving the apartment; but a glance at the countenance of the pious individual was quite sufficient to convince her he had been sacrificing sufficiently to Bacchus to be capable of any amount of effrontery, so that she dreaded passing him, more especially as he swayed his arms about like the sails of a windmill.

      She thought at least that when her mother returned she would rescue her; but in that hope she was mistaken, and Johanna had no more idea of the extent to which religious fanaticism will carry its victim, than she had of the manners and customs of the inhabitants of the moon. When Mrs Oakley did return, she had some difficulty in getting into the apartment, inasmuch as Mr Lupin's chair occupied so large a o portion of it; but when she did obtain admission, and Johanna said, 'Mother, I beg of you to protect me against this man, and allow me a free passage from the apartment,' Mrs Oakley affected to lift up her hands in amazement as she said,-

      'How dare you speak so disrespectfully of a chosen vessel. How dare you, I say, do such a thing - it's enough to drive anyone mad to see young girls nowadays!'

      'Don't snub her - don't snub the virgin,' said Mr Lupin; 'she don't know the honour yet that's intended her.'

      'She don't deserve it,' said Mrs Oakley, 'she don't deserve it.'

      'Never mind, madam - never mind; we - we - we don't get all what we deserve in this world.'

      'Take a drop of something, Mr Lupin; you have got the hiccups.'

      'Yes; I - I rather think I have a little. Isn't it a shame that anybody so intimate with the lord should have the hiccups? What a lot of lights you have got burning, Mrs Oakley!'

      'A lot of lights, Mr Lupin! Why, there is only one; but perhaps you allude to the lights of the gospel?'

      'No; I - I don't, just at present; damn the lights of the gospel - that is, I mean damn all backsliders! But there is a lot of lights, and no mistake, Mrs Oakley. Give us a drop of something, I'm as dry as dust.'

      'There is some more mulled wine, Mr Lupin; but I am surprised that you think there is more than one light.'

      'It's a miracle, madam, in consequence of my great faith. I have faith in s-s-s-six lights, and here they are.'

      'Do you see that, Johanna,' exclaimed Mrs Oakley, 'are you not convinced now of the holiness of Mr Lupin?'

      'I am convinced of his drunkenness, mother, and entreat of you to let me leave the room at once.

      'Tell her of the honour,' said Mr Lupin - 'tell her of the honour.'

      'I don't know, Mr Lupin; but don't you think it would be better to take some other opportunity?'

      'Very well, then, this is the opportunity.'

      'If it's your pleasure, Mr Lupin, I will. You must know, then, Johanna, that Mr Lupin has been kind enough to consent to save my soul on condition that you marry him, and I am quite sure you can have no reasonable objection; indeed, I think it's the least you can do, whether you have any objection or not.

      'Well put,' said Mr Lupin, 'excellently well put.'

      'Mother,' said Johanna, 'if you are so far gone in superstition as to believe this miserable drunkard ought to come between you and heaven, I am not so lost as not to be able to reject the offer with more scorn and contempt than ever I thought I could have entertained for any human being; but hypocrisy never, to my mind, wears so disgusting a garb as when it attires itself in the outward show of religion.'

      'This conduct is unbearable,' cried Mrs Oakley; 'am I to have one of the Lord's saints insulted under my own roof?'

      'If he were ten times a saint, mother, instead of being nothing but a miserable drunken profligate, it would be better that he should be insulted ten times over, than that you should permit your own child to have passed through the indignity of having to reject such a proposition as that which has just been made. I must claim the protection of my father; he will not suffer one, towards whom he has ever shown his affection, the remembrance of which sinks deep into my heart, to meet with so cruel an insult beneath his roof.'

      'That's right, my dear,' cried Mr Oakley, at that moment pushing open the parlour door. 'That's right, my dear; you never spoke truer words in your life.'

      A faint scream came from Mrs Oakley, and the Rev Mr Lupin immediately seized upon the fresh jug of mulled wine, and finished it at a draught.

      'Get behind me, Satan,' he said. 'Mr Oakley, you will be damned if you say a word to me.'

      'It's all the same, then,' said Mr Oakley; 'for I'll be damned if I don't. Then, Ben, Ben, come - come in, Ben.'

      'I'm coming,' said a deep voice, and a man about six feet four inches in height, and nearly two-thirds of that amount in width, entered the parlour. 'I'm a-coming, Oakley, my boy. Put on your blessed spectacles, and tell me which is the fellow.'

      'I could have sworn,' said Mrs Oakley, as she gave the table a knock, with her fist - 'I could have sworn, sworn when you came in, Oakley - I could have sworn, you little snivelling, shrivelled-up wretch. You'd no more have dared to come into this parlour as never was with those words in your mouth than you'd have dared to have flown, if you hadn't had your cousin, Big Ben, the beef-eater from the Tower, with you.

      'Take it easy, ma'am,' said Ben, as he sat down in a chair, which immediately broke all to pieces with his weight. 'Take it easy, ma'am; the devil - what's this?'

      'Never mind, Ben,' said Mr Oakley; 'it's only a chair; get up.'

      'A cheer,' said Ben; 'do you call that a cheer? but never mind - take it easy.'

      'Why, you big, bullying, idle, swilling and guttling ruffian!'

      'Go on, ma'am, go on.

      'You good-for-nothing lump of carrion; a dog wears his own coat, but you wear your master's, you great stupid overgrown, lurking hound. You parish brought-up wild beast, go and mind your lions and elephants in the Tower, and don't come into honest people's houses, you cutthroat, bullying, pickpocketing wretch.'

      'Go on, ma'am, go on.'

      This was a kind of dialogue that could not last, and Mrs Oakley sat down exhausted, and then Ben said, 'I tell you what, ma'am, I considers you - I looks upon you, ma'am, as a female variety of that 'ere animal as is very useful and sagacious, ma'am.'

      There was no mistake in this allusion, and Mrs Oakley was about to make some reply, when the Rev Mr Lupin rose from his chair, saying,-

      'Bless you all! I think I'll go home.'

      'Not yet, Mr Tulip,' said Ben; 'you had better sit down again - we've СКАЧАТЬ