"Friesner, Esther M - ss - A Beltaine and Suspenders" - читать интересную книгу автора (Friesner Esther M)

"Mountains?" Olivia echoed, her voice pitching itself all the higher to reflect
her outright skepticism. She threw herself into the pew beside Father Herrick
and slapped the velvet cushions until dust motes streamed skyward. "Mountains in
Sussex? Really, Vicar, next you'll be speaking of French modesty and American
etiquette."

"Mountains." Father Herrick remained firm. "I said it was no natural place, did
I not? Yes, mountains, and bristling with the ageless, bearded giants of the
wildwood such as have not been seen on our shores since the misty dawning of the
Druids' reign."

"Druids did not ever reign. You know as well as I that they were teachers,
healers, advisors to the chieftains --"

"Olivia, it was a trifle of poetic exaggeration on my part, no more," Father
Herrick replied.

"Like the mountains?" she countered archly.

He sighed. "You've no use for romance, do you?"

Olivia's raucous laugh had a barking undertone that had temporarily cleared the
church steeple of its resident family of ravens many times before this.
"Rubbish," she said in brief. "Which is the sum of my opinion concerning this."
With a jab of her brittle fingernail she skewered the slim pamphlet presently
lying dead-center between the two of them on the musty pew.

It was not a very prepossessing example of the printer's art, to be sure. Its
creamy paper was covered with a chain mail of rings left by the damp bottoms of
uncounted pint measures. In places these careless attentions had caused the ink
to run, yet one could still easily read the words, A Monograph Inquiring into
the Obscure Ritual Practices and Beliefs of Greater Ambrose Surlesard, with
Special Reference to the Mayday Cycle of Forbidden Rites, by Lord William
Stilby-Nash, 1848.

Gently Father Herrick rescued the document from Olivia's impalement. "Then I
take it you decline to accompany me."

"What? And miss seeing mountains in Sussex?" Olivia chuckled, a marginally
sweeter sound than her abrasive laugh. Then she turned suddenly serious. "Look,
Vicar, I still don't believe the natter you've dished out about finding this
little gem of the printer's art in a barrow on Portobello Road last Sunday
fortnight, but if you're willing to lay yourself open to the finger of scorn by
mounting an expedition to Greater Whatsis, who am I to pass up the opportunity
for a bit of an excursion ? I'm at least as keen a preservationist and scholar
of old folkways as yourself, although without half your opportunities for
publication."

"And here I thought you did the work for love, Miss Drummond," the vicar