"Wilbur Smith - Courtney 03 - Blue Horizon" - читать интересную книгу автора (Smith Wilbur)

She lay without moving until the darkness was complete, and she heard an owl hoot in the top of the beech tree. Then she stood up and crept through the woods, starting and trembling at every rustle and scurry of the small night creatures.

She did not leave the cottage again for some days. During the day she immersed herself in her father's books. There was one in particular that fascinated her and she read it from the first page to the last, then started again at the beginning. The title was In Darkest Africa. The tales of strange animals and savage tribes enchanted her, and wiled away the long days. She read of great hairy men that lived in the tops of the trees, of a tribe that ate the flesh of other men, and of tiny pygmies with

a single eye in the centre of their foreheads. Reading became the opiate for her fears. One evening she fell asleep at the kitchen table, her golden head on the open book, the flame fluttering in the lamp.

The glimmer of the light showed through the uncurtained window, and from there through a chink in the hedge. Two dark figures, who were passing on the road, stopped and exchanged a few hoarse words. Then they crept through the gate in the hedge. One went to the front door of the cottage while the other circled round to the back.

"Who are you?"

The harsh bellow brought Louisa awake and on her feet in the same instant. "We know you're in there! Come out now!"

She darted to the back door and struggled with the locking bar, then threw open the door and dashed out into the night. At that moment a heavy masculine hand fell on the back of her neck, and she was lifted by the scruff with her feet dangling and kicking as if she were a newborn kitten.

The man who held her opened the shutter of the bullseye lantern he carried and shone the beam into her face. "Who are you?" he demanded.

In the lamplight she recognized his red face and bushy whiskers. "Jan!" she squeaked. "It's me! Louisa! Louisa Leuven."

Jan was the van Ritters' footman. The belligerence in his expression faded, slowly replaced by amazement. "Little Louisa! Is it really you? We all thought you must be dead with the rest of them."

Aw days later Jan travelled with Louise to Amsterdam in a cart containing some of the salvaged possessions of the van Ritters family. When he led her into the kitchens of the Huis Brabant the servants who had survived crowded round to welcome her. Her prettiness, her sweet manner and sunny nature had always made her a favourite in the servants' quarters, so they grieved with her when they heard that Anne and Hendrick were dead. They could hardly believe that little Louisa, at just ten, had survived without her parents or friends, and had done so on her own resources and resolve. Elise the cook, who had been a dear friend of her mother, immediately took her under her protection.

Louisa had to tell her tale again and again as news of her survival spread, and the other servants, the workers and seamen from the van Ritters' ships and warehouses came to hear it.

Every week Stals, the butler and major-domo of the household, wrote a report to Mijnheer van Ritters in London, where he had taken refuge

from the plague with the remainder of his family. At the end of one report he mentioned that Louisa, the schoolmaster's daughter, had been rescued. Mijnheer was gracious enough to reply, "See that the child is taken in and set to work in the household. You may pay her as a scullery maid When I return to Amsterdam I shall decide what is to be done with her."

In early December when the cold weather cleansed the city of the last traces of the plague, Mijnheer van Ritters brought home his family. His wife had been carried away by the plague, but her absence would make no difference to their lives. Out of the twelve children only five had survived the pestilence. One morning, when Mijnheer van Ritters had been over a month in Amsterdam, and had attended to all the more pressing matters that awaited his attention, he ordered Stals to bring Louisa to him.

She hesitated in the doorway to Mijnheer van Ritters' library. He looked up from the thick leather bound ledger in which he was writing. "Come in, child," he ordered. "Come here where I can see you."

Stals led her to stand in front of the great man's desk. She curtsied to him, and he nodded approval. "Your father was a good man, and he taught you manners." He got up and went to stand in front of the tall bay windows. For a minute he looked out through the diamond panes at one of his ships, unloading bales of cotton from the Indies into the warehouse. Then he turned back to study Louisa. She had grown since last he had seen her, and her face and limbs had filled out. He knew that she had had the plague, but she had recovered well. There were no traces on her face of the ravages of the disease. She was a pretty girl, very pretty indeed, he decided. And it was not an insipid beauty: her expression was alert and intelligent. Her eyes were alive, and sparkled with the blue of precious sapphires. Her skin was creamy and unblemished, but her hair was her most attractive attribute: she wore it in two long plaits that hung forward over her shoulders. He asked her a few questions.

She tried to hide her fear and awe of him, and to answer in a sensible manner.

"Are you attending to your lessons, child?"

"I have all my father's books, Mijnheer. I read every night before I sleep."

"What work are you doing?"

"I wash and peel the vegetables, and I knead the bread, and help Pieter wash and dry the pots and pans, Mijnheer."

"Are you happy?"

"Oh, yes, Mijnheer. Elise, the cook, is so kind to me, like my own mother."

"I think we can find something more useful for you to do." Van Ritters stroked his beard thoughtfully.