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

quoted Parson, and in the end she said that she must know. They argued
concerning this for many days, days of the ending of summer, of shortening
evenings, and as they argued autumn grew nearer and nearer and the green
letter from China.
And at last he promised that when the green letter came he would take it as
usual to the lonely house and then hide somewhere near and creep to the
window at nightfall and hear what the grim folk said; perhaps they might
read aloud the letter from China. And before he had time to repent of that
promise a cold wind came one night and the woods turned golden, the plover
went in bands at evening over the marshes, the year had turned, and there
came the letter from China. Never before had Amuel felt such misgivings as
he went his postman's rounds, never before had he so much feared the day
that took him up to the wold and the lonely house, while snug by the fire
his wife looked pleasurably forward to curiosity's gratification and hoped
to have news ere nightfall that all the gossips of the village would envy.
One consolation only had Amuel as he set out with a shiver, there was a
letter that day for the last house in the lane. Long did he tarry there to
look at their cheery faces, to hear the sound of their laughter,--you did
not hear laughter in wold-hut,--and when the last topic had been utterly
talked out and no excuse for lingering remained he heaved a heavy sigh and
plodded grimly away and so came late to wold-hut.
He gave his postman's knock on the shut oak door, heard it reverberate
through the silent house, saw the grim elder man and his gristly hand, gave
up the green letter from China, and strode away. There is a clump of trees
growing all alone in the wold, desolate, mournful, by day, by night full of
ill omen, far off from all other trees as wold-hut from other houses. Near
it stands wold-hut. Not today did Amuel stride briskly on with all the new
winds of autumn blowing cheerily past him till he saw the village before him
and broke into song; but as soon as he was out of sight of the house he
turned and stooping behind a fold of the ground ran back to the desolate
wood. There he waited watching the evil house, just too far to hear voices.
The sun was low already. He chose the window at which he meant to eavesdrop,
a little barred one at the back, close to the ground. And then the pigeons
came in; for a great distance there was no other wood, so numbers shelter
there, though the clump is small and of so evil a look (if they notice
that); the first one frightened Amuel, he felt that it might be a spirit
escaped from torture in some dim parlour of the house that he watched, his
nerves were strained and he feared foolish fears. Then he grew used to them
and the sun set then and the aspect of everything altered and he felt
strange fears again. Behind him was a hollow in the wold, he watched it
darkening; and before him he saw the house through the trunks of the trees.
He waited for them to light their lamps so that they could not see, when he
would steal up softly and crouch by the little back window. But though every
bird was home, though the night grew chilly as tombs, though a star was out,
still there shone no yellow light from any window. Amuel waited and
shuddered. He did not dare to move till they lit their lamps, they might be
watching. The damp and the cold so strangely affected him that autumn
evening and the remnants of sunset, the stars and the wold and the whole
vault of the sky seemed like a hall that they had prepared for Fear. He
began to feel a dread of prodigious things, and still no light shone in the