- Libros en formato ePub -  

 Red Money
“Gypsies! How very delightful! I really must have my fortune told. The dear things know all about the future.”
As Mrs. Belgrove spoke she peered through her lorgnette to see if anyone at the breakfast-table was smiling. The scrutiny was necessary, since she was the oldest person present, and there did not appear to be any future for her, save that very certain one connected with a funeral. But a society lady of sixty, made up to look like one of forty (her maid could do no more), with an excellent digestion and a constant desire, like the Athenians of old, for “Something New!” can scarcely be expected to dwell upon such a disagreeable subject as death. Nevertheless, Mrs. Belgrove could not disguise from herself that her demise could not be postponed for many more years, and examined the faces of the other guests to see if they thought so too. If anyone did, he and she politely suppressed a doubtful look and applauded the suggestion of a fortune-telling expedition.
“Let us make up a party and go,” said the hostess, only too thankful to find something to amuse the house-party for a few hours. “Where did you say the gypsies were, Garvington?”
“In the Abbot’s Wood,” replied her husband, a fat, small round-faced man, who was methodically devouring a large breakfast.
“That’s only three miles away. We can drive or ride.”...
 

 A Son of Perdition
“How can any one hope to transfer that to canvas?” asked the artist, surveying the many-coloured earth and sky and sea with despairing eyes.
“Easily enough,” replied the girl at his elbow, “those who see twice as vividly as others, can make others see once as vividly as they do. That is what we call genius.”
“A large word for my small capabilities, Miss Enistor. Am I a genius?”
“Ask yourself, Mr. Hardwick, for none other than yourself can answer truly.”
Outside his special gift the artist was not over clever, so he lounged on the yielding turf of the slope to turn the speech over in his mind and wait results. This tall solidly built Saxon only arrived at conclusions by slow degrees of laborious reflection. With his straight athletic figure, closely clipped fair hair and a bronzed complexion, against which his moustache looked almost white, he resembled a soldier rather than a painter. Yet a painter he was of some trifling fame, but being only moderately creative, he strove to supply what was wanting by toilsome work. He had not so much the steady fire of genius as the crackling combustion of talent. Thus the grim Cornish country and the far-stretching Atlantic waters, so magically beautiful under an opalescent sunset, baffled him for the moment...