MY words however were not absolutely the same - I put something instead of "angel"; and in the sequel my epithet seemed the more apt, for when eventually we heard from our traveller it was merely, it was thoroughly to be tantalised. He was magnificent in his triumph, he described his discovery as stupendous; but his ecstasy only obscured it - there were to be no particulars till he should have submitted his conception to the supreme authority. He had thrown up his commission, he had thrown up his book, he had thrown up everything but the instant need to hurry to Rapallo, on the Genoese shore, where Vereker was making a stay. I wrote him a letter which was to await him at Aden - I besought him to relieve my suspense. That he had found my letter was indicated by a telegram which, reaching me after weary days and in the absence of any answer to my laconic dispatch to him at Bombay, was evidently intended as a reply to both communications. Those few words were in familiar French, the French of the day, which Covick often made use of to show he wasn't a prig. It had for some persons the opposite effect, but his message may fairly be paraphrased. "Have patience; I want to see, as it breaks on you, the face you'll make!" "Tellement envie de voir ta tete!" - that was what I had to sit down with. I can certainly not be said to have sat down, for I seem to remember myself at this time as rattling constantly between the little house in Chelsea and my own. Our impatience, Gwendolen's and mine, was equal, but I kept hoping her light would be greater. We all spent during this episode, for people of our means, a great deal of money in telegrams and cabs, and I counted on the receipt of news from Rapallo immediately after the junction of the discoverer with the discovered. The interval seemed an age, but late one day I heard a hansom precipitated to my door with the crash engendered by a hint of liberality. I lived with my heart in my mouth and accordingly bounded to the window - a movement which gave me a view of a young lady erect on the footboard of the vehicle and eagerly looking up at my house. At sight of me she flourished a paper with a movement that brought me straight down, the movement with which, in melodramas, handkerchiefs and reprieves are flourished at the foot of the scaffold.
同类推荐
热门推荐
悍女来袭:纨绔夫君竟敢逃
许玮宁穿越了!穿到了当朝宰相杜仲余的家,成了他嫡亲的大孙女!本是要嫁给宁远侯长子、骁骑将军的她,刚刚穿越就面临着被换婚的局面,自己嫡亲的妹妹要嫁给将军,而她则要代替妹妹,嫁给纨绔王爷?这都什么鬼?婚事可以说换就换吗?好,反正你王爷不少胳膊不少腿,长的也还不赖,换就换!可是新婚之夜你要和我来点刺激的?谁告诉你老娘是那样的人!反正你就是个纨绔,我还怕了你了?滚下老娘的床,咱们且斗一斗,让你愿赌服输!