"Andre Norton & Rosemary Edghill - Carolus Rex 1 - The Shadow of Albion" - читать интересную книгу автора (Norton Andre)

тАЮJem has just ridden back from Mooncoign, my lady. Dr. Falconer is coming,
with your coach to bear you safe away as soon as you are well enough to travel.тАЬ
тАЮWhat is тАУ where is Mooncoign? I am Sarah Gunningham. I am afraid there has
been some sort of mistake.тАЬ
 To SarahтАЩs utter bewilderment, mistress and maid exchanged wide-eyed fearful
glances. Mistress Bulford moistened dry lips before responding.
тАЮYou must soil be sadly shaken by your ordeal. Perhaps you would like some tea,
Your Ladyship?тАЬ
At her mistressтАЩs gesture, Rose dipped another hasty curtsy and fled. With
RoseтАЩs departure, Mistress Bulford seemed to lose all sense of what to do. She
seated herself upon a low stool at SarahтАЩs side and gazed up at her imploringly тАУ
almost as if Sarah were some sort of public performance, Sarah thought
uncharitably. Her head pounded abominably, and every bruise she had collected on
the so-rudely-interrupted coach ride burned and throbbed.
But even so, the sense that had warned her of danger in the forests of the New
World warned of danger here. This was more than a simple case of mistaken
identity, and тАУ alone and friendless in an alien land тАУ Sarah must walk as softly as
ever she had in the wilderness.
тАЮTea will be delightful,тАЬ Sarah said cautiously, and was rewarded by a faint
lessening of the inexplicable tension which gripped her hostess.
тАЮSo this is Bulford Hall,тАЬ Sarah hazarded next, gripped by a strong sense of me
absurd unreality of her situation. She, who had always been tongue-tied even in the
presence of those she knew, was now compelled to make small-talk with this strange
Englishwoman who stared at her as if she were mad.
тАЮYes, Your Ladyship.тАЬ
тАЮAnd you, I collect, must be Mistress Bulford?тАЬ Sarah pursued doggedly. She
smiled, to turn me remark into a jest in the all-too-likely possibility that the woman
was someone else entirely.
тАЮThatтАЩs right, Your Ladyship,тАЬ the woman said in tones of relief. тАЮDonтАЩt you
remember? When Bulford and I came to wed it was you as sent as handsome a pair
of silver tankards as ever anyone did see, and said as how the Bulfords might always
look to Roxbury.тАЬ
Roxbury. Worse and worse. For a moment Sarah entertained me distempered
freak that she might in fact be whoever Mistress Bulford thought she was тАУ and had
simply run mad тАУ but the vision of that other Sarah, glimpsed in an instant before the
crash, robbed me notion of much of its humor. SarahтАЩs heart beat faster as she
phrased her next question.
тАЮAnd so of course you know who I am?тАЬ Innocuously as the question had been
put, it had still been the wrong thing to say. Renewed fear showed in Mistress
BulfordтАЩs eyes as she replied, тАЮWhy, you are Lady Roxbury тАУ the Marchioness of
Roxbury тАУ Your Ladyship.тАЬ
 Chapter 4
A Knight of Ghosts and Shadows


(Paris, Germinal, 1805)


The tall man with the dangerous eyes knew that someone was going to die tonight.
Rupert St. Ives Dyer, Captain His Grace the Duke of Wessex, coolly surveyed