"Wilkie Collins - The New Magdalen" - читать интересную книгу автора (Collins Wilkie)

case at Solferino once more. You shall hold the candle again, my good boy; stand
there, and look with all your eyes. I am going to try if I can save the life and
the reason too this time."
He tucked up the cuffs of his coat and began the operation. As his fearful
instruments touched Grace's head, the voice of the sentinel at the nearest
outpost was heard, giving the word in German which permitted Mercy to take the
first step on her journey to England:
"Pass the English lady!"
The operation proceeded. The voice of the sentinel at the next post was heard
more faintly, in its turn: " Pass the English lady!"
The operation ended. Ignatius Wetzel held up his hand for silence and put his
ear close to the patient's mouth.
The first trembling breath of returning life fluttered over Grace Roseberry's
lips and touched the old man's wrinkled cheek. "Aha!" he cried. "Good girl! you
breathe--you live!" As he spoke, the voice of the sentinel at the final limit of
the German lines (barely audible in the distance) gave the word for the last
time:
"Pass the English lady!"



SECOND SCENE.
Mablethorpe House.



PREAMBLE.
THE place is England.
The time is winter, in the year eighteen hundred and seventy.
The persons are, Julian Gray, Horace Holmcroft, Lady Janet Roy, Grace Roseberry,
and Mercy Merrick.



CHAPTER VI.
LADY JANET'S COMPANION.
IT is a glorious winter's day. The sky is clear, the frost is hard, the ice
bears for skating.
The dining-room of the ancient mansion called Mablethorpe House, situated in the
London suburb of Kensington, is famous among artists and other persons of taste
for the carved wood-work, of Italian origin, which covers the walls on three
sides. On the fourth side the march of modern improvement has broken in, and has
varied and brightened the scene by means of a conservatory, forming an entrance
to the room through a winter-garden of rare plants and flowers. On your right
hand, as you stand fronting the conservatory, the monotony of the paneled wall
is relieved by a quaintly patterned door of old inlaid wood, leading into the
library, and thence, across the great hall, to the other reception-rooms of the
house. A corresponding door on the left hand gives access to the billiard-room,
to the smoking-room next to it, and to a smaller hall commanding one of the
secondary entrances to the building. On the left side also is the ample