"Robin McKinley - Rose Daughter" - читать интересную книгу автора (McKinley Robin)

There was a lawyersтАЩ letter with the will, dated seven years later, saying that the old woman had
disappeared soon after making the will, and in accordance with the law, the woman had now been
declared dead, and the house was theirs. It was called Rose Cottage. It lay many weeksтАЩ journey from
the city, and it stood alone in rough country, at a little distance from the nearest town.
Even their fatherтАЩs creditors were not interested in it.
She wrote to the lawyers, asking if there was any further transaction necessary if they wished to take
up residence, and received a prompt but curt note in reply saying that the business was no longer
anything to do with them but that they supposed the house was still standing.
Rose Cottage, she thought. What a romantic name. I wonder what the woman who had it was like. I
suppose itтАЩs Like a lot of other house namesтАФa timid family naming theirs Dragon Villa or city folk
longing for the country calling theirs Broadmeadow. PerhapsтАФshe almost didnтАЩt dare finish the
thoughtтАФperhaps for us, just now, perhaps the name is a good omen.
Hesitantly she told her sisters about it. Lionheart said: тАЬI wish to go so far away from this hateful city
that no one round me even knows its name.тАЭ
Jeweltongue said: тАЬI would not stay here a day longer than I must, if they asked me to be mayor and
my only alternative was to live in a hole in the ground.тАЭ
It was teatime. Late-afternoon light slanted in through the long panes of their sitting-room. They no
longer used any of the bigger rooms; their present sitting-room was a small antechamber that had
formerly been used to keep not-very-welcome guests waiting long enough to let them know they were
not very welcome. In here Jeweltongue saw that the surfaces were dust-free, the glass panes sparkling,
and the cushions all plumped. But the view into the garden showed a lawn growing shaggy, and twigs and
flower stems broken by rain or wind lay across the paths. It had been three weeks since the Duke and
Baron sent their last messages.
Beauty sat staring out the window for a minute in the silence following her sistersтАЩ words. It was still
strange to her how silent the house was; it had never been silent before. Even very late at night, very early
in the morning, the bustle had only been subdued, not absent. Now silence lay, cold and thick and
paralysing as a heavy fall of snow. Beauty shivered, and tucked her hands under her elbows. тАЬIтАЩll tell
Father, then, when he wakes. At least something is settled. ...тАЭ Her voice tailed off. She rose stiffly to her
feet. тАЬI have several more letters I should write tonight.тАЭ She turned to leave.
тАЬBeautyтАФтАЭ LionheartтАЩs voice. Beauty stopped by JeweltongueтАЩs chair, which was nearest the door,
and turned back. тАЬThank you,тАЭ said her eldest sister.
Jeweltongue reached suddenly up, and grasped BeautyтАЩs hand, and laid the back of it against her
cheek for a moment. тАЬI donтАЩt know what we would be doing without you,тАЭ she said, not looking up. тАЬI
still canтАЩt bear the thought of.. . meeting any of the people we used to know. Every morning I think.
Today will be betterтАФтАЭ
тАЬAnd it isnтАЩt,тАЭ said Lionheart.
Beauty went back to the desk in another little room she had set up as an office. Quickly she began
going through various heaps of papers, setting a few aside. She had already rebuffed suggestions of aid
from businessmen she knew only wished to gloat and gossip; uneasily she discarded overtures from
sorcerers declaring that their affairs could yet be put right, all assistance to be extended on credit, terms
to be drawn up later upon the return of their just prosperity. Now she drew a sheet of her fatherтАЩs
writing-paper towards her, picked up a pen. and began to write an acceptance, for herself and her
sisters, of the best, which was to say the least humiliating, offer of the several auction houses that had
approached them, to dispose of their private belongings, especially the valuable things that had come to
them from their mother, which their father had given his wife in better days. Beauty had told no one that
she was not sure even this final desperate recourse would save their father from a debtorsтАЩ prison.
And in the next few days she made time wherever she could to visit various of the people who had
adopted her animals. She learnt what she could, in haste and distress of mind, of butterтАФand
cheese-making from a woman who had been a dairymaid before she married a town man, while her cat,
once a barn-loft kitten, played lag to rules of her own devising among their feet and the legs of furniture.