"Smith, Wilbur - Courtney 02 - Monsoon" - читать интересную книгу автора (Smith Wilbur)

iron key that he had removed from his father's study that morning, and
unlocked the grille gate, then swung it open on its creaking hinges.

He showed no hesitation as he entered the vault where so many of his
ancestors lay in their stone sarcophagi. Guy followed him with less
confidence. The presence of the dead always made him uneasy. He
paused at the entrance to the crypt.

There were high windows at ground level through which glimmered an
eerie light, the only illumination.

Stone and marble coffins were arranged around the circular walls of the
crypt. There were sixteen, all of the Courtneys and their wives since
Great-grandfather Charles. Guy looked instinctively to the marble
coffin that contained the earthly remains of his own mother, in the
centre of the line of his father's three dead wives. There was a
carved effigy of her on the lid, and she was beautiful, Guy thought, a
pale lily of a girl. He had never known her, never taken suck at her
bosom: the three-day labour of giving birth to twins had been too much
for such a delicate creature. She had died of blood loss and
exhaustion only hours after Guy had vented his birth cry. The boys had
been raised by a series of nurses, and by their stepmother, who had
been Dorian's mother.

He crossed to the marble coffin and knelt at the head.

He read the inscription in front of him: "Within this casket lies
Margaret Courtney, beloved second wife of Sir Henry Courtney, mother of
Thomas and of Guy, who departed this life on the 2nd of May 1673. Safe
in the bosom of Christ." Guy closed his eyes and began to pray.

"She can't hear you," Tom told him, not unkindly.

"Yes, she can," Guy replied, without raising his head or opening his
eyes.

Tom lost interest and wandered down the row of coffins. To his
mother's right lay Dorian's mother, his father's last wife. It was
only three years ago that the cutter in which she had been sailing had
overturned at the entrance to the bay, and the rip tide had swept her
out to sea. Despite her husband's efforts to save her, the current had
been too strong and had nearly taken Hal with her. It had cast them
both up in a wind-battered cove five miles down the coast, but by then
Elizabeth was drowned and Hal nearly so.

Tom felt tears welling up from deep inside of him, for he had loved her
as he could not love the mother he had never known. He coughed and
brushed his eyes, forcing the tears back before Guy could see his
childish weakness.