FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   95   96   97   98   99   100   101   102   103   104   105   106   107   108   109   110   111   112   113   114   115   116   117   118   119  
120   121   122   123   124   125   126   127   128   129   130   131   132   133   134   135   136   137   138   139   140   141   142   143   144   >>   >|  
"I have an appointment with Miss Garth. Is she ready to see me?" "Quite ready, sir." "Is she alone?" "Yes, sir." "In the room which was Mr. Vanstone's study?" "In that room, sir." The servant opened the door and Mr. Pendril went in. The governess stood alone at the study window. The morning was oppressively hot, and she threw up the lower sash to admit more air into the room, as Mr. Pendril entered it. They bowed to each other with a formal politeness, which betrayed on either side an uneasy sense of restraint. Mr. Pendril was one of the many men who appear superficially to the worst advantage, under the influence of strong mental agitation which it is necessary for them to control. Miss Garth, on her side, had not forgotten the ungraciously guarded terms in which the lawyer had replied to her letter; and the natural anxiety which she had felt on the subject of the interview was not relieved by any favorable opinion of the man who sought it. As they confronted each other in the silence of the summer's morning--both dressed in black; Miss Garth's hard features, gaunt and haggard with grief; the lawyer's cold, colorless face, void of all marked expression, suggestive of a business embarrassment and of nothing more--it would have been hard to find two persons less attractive externally to any ordinary sympathies than the two who had now met together, the one to tell, the other to hear, the secrets of the dead. "I am sincerely sorry, Miss Garth, to intrude on you at such a time as this. But circumstances, as I have already explained, leave me no other choice." "Will you take a seat, Mr. Pendril? You wished to see me in this room, I believe?" "Only in this room, because Mr. Vanstone's papers are kept here, and I may find it necessary to refer to some of them." After that formal interchange of question and answer, they sat down on either side of a table placed close under the window. One waited to speak, the other waited to bear. There was a momentary silence. Mr. Pendril broke it by referring to the young ladies, with the customary expressions of sympathy. Miss Garth answered him with the same ceremony, in the same conventional tone. There was a second pause of silence. The humming of flies among the evergreen shrubs under the window penetrated drowsily into the room; and the tramp of a heavy-footed cart-horse, plodding along the high-road beyond the garden, was as plainly audible in the stilln
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   95   96   97   98   99   100   101   102   103   104   105   106   107   108   109   110   111   112   113   114   115   116   117   118   119  
120   121   122   123   124   125   126   127   128   129   130   131   132   133   134   135   136   137   138   139   140   141   142   143   144   >>   >|  



Top keywords:
Pendril
 

window

 

silence

 

formal

 

lawyer

 
waited
 
Vanstone
 

morning

 
wished
 

papers


plainly

 

audible

 
choice
 

sincerely

 
intrude
 

stilln

 
secrets
 
interchange
 

explained

 

circumstances


conventional

 

ceremony

 

answered

 

footed

 

shrubs

 

evergreen

 

penetrated

 

drowsily

 

humming

 

sympathy


expressions

 
garden
 

answer

 

ladies

 

customary

 
plodding
 

referring

 
momentary
 

question

 
dressed

superficially
 

advantage

 
uneasy
 
restraint
 

influence

 

strong

 
forgotten
 

ungraciously

 
guarded
 

control