"Dunsany, Lord - collection - Tales of Three Hemispheres" - читать интересную книгу автора (Dunsany Lord)

I should no doubt have interfered; and yet the three men meant no harm to
the wayfarer, but resented the reticence that he displayed to them though
they had given him beer; it was to them as though a master key had failed to
open a cupboard. And, as for me, curiosity held me down to my chair and
forbade me to interfere on behalf of the sack; for the old man's furtive
ways, and the night out of which he came, and the hour of his coming, and
the look of his sack, all made me long as much to know what he had, as even
the blacksith, the carpenter and the postman's son.
And then they found the emeralds. They were all bigger than hazel nuts,
hundreds and hundreds of them: and the old man screamed.
"Come, come, we're not thieves," said the blacksmith.
"We're not thieves," said the carpenter.
"We're not thieves," said the postman's son.
And with awful fear on his face the wayfarer closed his sack, whimpering
over his emeralds and furtively glancing round as though the loss of his
secret were and utterly deadly thing. And then they asked him to give them
just one each, just one huge emerald each, because they had given him a
glass of beer. Then to see the wayfarer shrink against his sack and guard it
with clutching fingers one would have said that he was a selfish man, were
it not for the terror that was freezing his face. I have seen men look sheer
at Death with far less fear.
And they took their emerald all three, one enormous emerald each, while the
old man hopelessly struggled till he saw his three emeralds go, and fell to
the floor and wept, a pitiable, sodden heap.
And about that time I began to hear far off down the windy road, by which
that sack had come, faintly at first and slowly louder and louder, the click
clack clop of a lame horse coming nearer. Click clack clop and a loose shoe
rattling, the sound of a horse too weary to be out upon such a night, too
lame to be out at all.
Click clack clop. And all of a sudden the old wayfarer heard it; heard it
above the sound of his won sobbing, and at once went white to the lips. Such
sudden fear as blanched him in a moment struck right to the hearts of all
there. They muttered to him that it was only their play, they hastily
whispered excuses, they asked him what was wrong, but seemed scarecely to
hope for an answer, nor did he speak, but sat with a frozen stare, all at
once dry-eyed, a monument to terror.
Nearer and nearer came the click clack clop.
And when I saw the expression of that man's face and how its horror deepened
as the ominous sound drew nearer, then I knew that something was wrong. And
looking for the last time upon all four I saw the wayfarer horror-struck by
his sack and the other three crowding round to put their huge emeralds back
then, even on such a night, I slipped away from the inn.
Outside the bitter wind roared in my ears, and close in the darkness the
horse went click clack clop.
And as soon as my eyes could see at all in the night I saw a man in a huge
hat looped up in front, wearing a sword in a scabbard shabby and huge, and
looking blacker than the darkness, riding on a lean horse slowly up to the
inn. Whether his were the emeralds, or who he was, or why he rode a lame
horse on such a night, I did not stop to discover, but went at once from the
inn as he strode in his great black riding coat up to the door.