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

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      'Why, Johanna,' she said, 'you so seldom call upon me now, that I suppose I must esteem it as a very special act of grace and favour to see you.

      'Arabella,' said Johanna, 'I do not know what you will say to me when I tell you that my present visit to you is because I am in a difficulty, and want your advice.'

      'Then you could not have come to a better person, for I have read all the novels in London, and know all the difficulties that anybody can possibly get into, and, what is more important, I know all the means of getting out of them, let them be what they may.'

      'And yet, Arabella, scarcely in your novel reading will you find anything so strange and so eventful as the circumstances, I grieve to say, it is in my power to record to you. Sit down, and listen to me, dear Arabella, and you shall know all.'

      'You surprise and alarm me by the serious countenance, Johanna.'

      'The subject is a serious one. I love.'

      'Oh! is that all? So do I; there's young Captain Desbrook in the King's Guards. He comes here to buy his gloves; and if you did but hear him sigh as he leans over the counter, you would be astonished.'

      'Ah! but, Arabella, I know you well. Yours is one of those fleeting passions that, like the forked lightning, appear for a moment, and ere you can say behold is gone again. Mine is deeper in my heart, so deep, that to divorce it from it would be to destroy its home for ever.'

      'But why so serious, Johanna? You do not mean to tell me that it is possible for you to love any man without his loving you in return?'

      'You are right there, Arabella. I do not come to speak to you of a hopeless passion - far from it; but you shall hear. Lend me, my dear friend, your serious attention, and you shall hear of such mysterious matters.'

      'Mysterious? then I shall be in my very element. For know that I quite live and exult in mystery, and you could not possibly have come to anyone who would more welcomely receive such a commission from you; I am all impatience.'

      Johanna then, with great earnestness, related to her friend the whole of the particulars connected with her deep and sincere attachment to Mark Ingestrie. She told her how, in spite of all circumstances which appeared to have a tendency to cast a shadow and a blight upon their young affection, they had loved and loved truly; how Ingestrie, disliking, both from principle and distaste, the study of the law, had quarrelled with his uncle, Mr Grant, and then how, as a bold adventurer, he had gone to seek his fortunes in the Indian seas, fortunes which promised to be splendid; but which might end in disappointment and defeat, and they had ended in such calamities most deeply and truly did she mourn to be compelled to state. And now she concluded by saying,-

      'And now, Arabella, you know all I have to tell you. You know how truly I have loved, and how after teaching myself to expect happiness, I have met with nothing but despair; and you may judge for yourself, how sadly the fate of Mark Ingestrie must deeply affect me, and how lost my mind must be in all kinds of conjecture concerning him.'

      The hilarity of spirits which had characterised Arabella, in the earlier part of their interview, entirely left her, as Johanna proceeded in her mournful narration, and by the time she had concluded, tears of the most genuine sympathy stood in her eyes.

      She took the hands of Johanna in both her own, and said to her,-

      'Why, my dear Johanna, I never expected to hear from your lips so sad a tale. This is most mournful, indeed very mournful; and although I was half inclined before to quarrel with you for this tardy confidence - for you must recollect that it is the first I have heard of this whole affair - but now the misfortunes that oppress you are quite sufficient, Heaven knows, without me adding to them by the shadow of a reproach.'

      'They are indeed, Arabella, and believe me if the course of my love ran smoothly, instead of being, as it has been, full of misadventure, you should have had nothing to complain of on the score of want of confidence; but I will own I did hesitate to inflict upon you my miseries, for miseries they have been and alas! miseries they seem destined to remain.'

      'Johanna, you could not have used an argument more delusive than that. It is not one which should have come from your lips to me.'

      'But surely it was a good motive, to spare you pain?'

      'And did you think so lightly of my friendship that it was to be entrusted with nothing but what were a pleasant aspect? True friendship is surely best shown in the encounter of difficulty and distress. I grieve, Johanna, indeed, that you have so much mistaken me.'

      'Nay, now you do me an injustice: it was not that I doubted your friendship for one moment, but that I did indeed shrink from casting the shadow of my sorrows over what should be, and what I hope is, the sunshine of your heart. That was the respect which deterred me from making you aware of what I suppose I must call this ill-fated passion.'

      'No, not ill-fated, Johanna. Let us believe that the time will come when it will be far otherwise than ill-fated.'

      'But what do you think of all that I have told you? Can you gather from it any hope?'

      'Abundance of hope, Johanna. You have no certainty of the death of Ingestrie.'

      'I certainly have not, as far as regards the loss of him in the Indian sea; but, Arabella, there is one supposition which, from the moment it found a home in my breast, has been growing stronger and stronger, and that supposition is, that this Mr Thornhill was no other than Mark Ingestrie himself.'

      'Indeed! Think you so? That would be a strange supposition. Have you any special reasons for such a thought?'

      'None - further than a something which seemed ever to tell my heart from the first moment that such was the case, and a consideration of the improbability of the story related by Thornhill. Why should Mark Ingestrie have given him the string of pearls and the message to me, trusting to the preservation of this Thornhill, and assuming, for some strange reason, that he himself must fall?'

      'There is good argument in that, Joanna.'

      'And moreover, Mark Ingestrie told me he intended altering his name upon the expedition.'

      'It is strange; but now you mention such a supposition, it appears, do you know, Johanna, each moment more probable to me. Oh, that fatal string of pearls.'

      'Fatal, indeed! for if Mark Ingestrie and Thornhill be one and the same person, the possession of those pearls has been the temptation to destroy him.'

      'There cannot be a doubt upon that point, Johanna, and so you will find in all the tales of love and romance, that jealousy and wealth have been the sources of all the abundant evils which fond and attached hearts have from time to time suffered.'

      'It is so; I believe, it is so, Arabella; but advise me what to do, for truly I am myself incapable of action. Tell me what you think it is possible to do, under these disastrous circumstances, for there is nothing which I will not dare attempt.'

      'Why, my dear Johanna, you must perceive that all the evidence you have regarding this Thornhill follows him up to that barber's shop in Fleet-street, and no farther.'

      'It does, indeed.'

      'Can you not imagine, then, that there lies the mystery of his fate, and, from what you have yourself seen of that man, Todd, do you think he is one who would hesitate even at a murder?'

      'Oh, horror! СКАЧАТЬ