登陆注册
5302400000020

第20章 Relating how Mistress Anne discovered a miniature(

The good gentlewoman took her leave gladly.She had spent a life in timid fears of such things and persons as were not formed by Nature to excite them,but never had she experienced such humble terrors as those with which Mistress Clorinda inspired her.Never did she approach her without inward tremor,and never did she receive permission to depart from her presence without relief.And yet her beauty and wit and spirit had no admirer regarding them with more of wondering awe.

In the bare west wing of the house,comfortless though the neglect of its master had made it,there was one corner where she was unafraid.Her first charges,Mistress Barbara and Mistress Anne,were young ladies of gentle spirit.Their sister had said of them that their spirit was as poor as their looks.It could not be said of them by any one that they had any pretension to beauty,but that which Mistress Clorinda rated at as poor spirit was the one element of comfort in their poor dependent kinswoman's life.They gave her no ill words,they indulged in no fantastical whims and vapours,and they did not even seem to expect other entertainment than to walk the country roads,to play with their little lap-dog Cupid,wind silks for their needlework,and please themselves with their embroidery-frames.

To them their sister appeared a goddess whom it would be presumptuous to approach in any frame of mind quite ordinary.Her beauty must be heightened by rich adornments,while their plain looks were left without the poorest aid.It seemed but fitting that what there was to spend must be spent on her.They showed no signs of resentment,and took with gratitude such cast-off finery as she deigned at times to bestow upon them,when it was no longer useful to herself.She was too full of the occupations of pleasure to have had time to notice them,even if her nature had inclined her to the observance of family affections.It was their habit,when they knew of her going out in state,to watch her incoming and outgoing through a peep-hole in a chamber window.Mistress Margery told them stories of her admirers and of her triumphs,of the county gentlemen of fortune who had offered themselves to her,and of the modes of life in town of the handsome Sir John Oxon,who,without doubt,was of the circle of her admiring attendants,if he had not fallen totally her victim,as others had.

Of the two young women,it was Mistress Anne who had the more parts,and the attraction of the mind the least dull.In sooth,Nature had dealt with both in a niggardly fashion,but Mistress Barbara was the plainer and the more foolish.Mistress Anne had,perchance,the tenderer feelings,and was in secret given to a certain sentimentality.She was thin and stooping,and had but a muddy complexion;her hair was heavy,it is true,but its thickness and weight seemed naught but an ungrateful burden;and she had a dull,soft eye.In private she was fond of reading such romances as she could procure by stealth from the library of books gathered together in past times by some ancestor Sir Jeoffry regarded as an idiot.

Doubtless she met with strange reading in the volumes she took to her closet,and her simple virgin mind found cause for the solving of many problems;but from the pages she contrived to cull stories of lordly lovers and cruel or kind beauties,whose romances created for her a strange world of pleasure in the midst of her loneliness.

Poor,neglected young female,with every guileless maiden instinct withered at birth,she had need of some tender dreams to dwell upon,though Fate herself seemed to have decreed that they must be no more than visions.

It was,in sooth,always the beauteous Clorinda about whose charms she builded her romances.In her great power she saw that for which knights fought in tourney and great kings committed royal sins,and to her splendid beauty she had in secrecy felt that all might be forgiven.She cherished such fancies of her,that one morning,when she believed her absent from the house,she stole into the corridor upon which Clorinda's apartment opened.Her first timid thought had been,that if a chamber door were opened she might catch a glimpse of some of the splendours her sister's woman was surely laying out for her wearing at a birth-night ball,at the house of one of the gentry of the neighbourhood.But it so happened that she really found the door of entrance open,which,indeed,she had not more than dared to hope,and finding it so,she stayed her footsteps to gaze with beating heart within.On the great bed,which was of carved oak and canopied with tattered tapestry,there lay spread such splendours as she had never beheld near to before.'Twas blue and silver brocade Mistress Clorinda was to shine in to-night;it lay spread forth in all its dimensions.The beautiful bosom and shoulders were to be bared to the eyes of scores of adorers,but rich lace was to set their beauties forth,and strings of pearls.

Why Sir Jeoffry had not sold his lady's jewels before he became enamoured of her six-year-old child it would be hard to explain.

There was a great painted fan with jewels in the sticks,and on the floor--as if peeping forth from beneath the bravery of the expanded petticoats--was a pair of blue and silver shoes,high-heeled and arched and slender.In gazing at them Mistress Anne lost her breath,thinking that in some fashion they had a regal air of being made to trample hearts beneath them.

To the gentle,hapless virgin,to whom such possessions were as the wardrobe of a queen,the temptation to behold them near was too great.She could not forbear from passing the threshold,and she did with heaving breast.She approached the bed and gazed;she dared to touch the scented gloves that lay by the outspread petticoat of blue and silver;she even laid a trembling finger upon the pointed bodice,which was so slender that it seemed small enough for even a child.

同类推荐
  • A Personal Record

    A Personal Record

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 小隐书

    小隐书

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 塞下曲

    塞下曲

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 舍利忏法

    舍利忏法

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • The Tremendous Adventures of Major Gahagan

    The Tremendous Adventures of Major Gahagan

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
热门推荐
  • 爱情过了保险期

    爱情过了保险期

    婚姻这围城终究是困不住他那颗不爱我的心。“叶岑,做我的女人。”傅南笙危险的脸庞慢慢地朝我逼近。我媚笑地看着他,“大哥,您这叫乱伦。”“那不正好顺了你这小妖精的心。”我无辜地翻了个白眼,这男人……一路上我与傅南笙开始斗智斗勇,无意中却缠出了自已最真实的感情。直到惊天秘密的突然出现,我被他无情地推入无间地狱至此粉身碎骨不得超生。“傅南笙,你爱过我么?”我红着眼眶痛苦的问。“没有。”现实狠狠地给了我一巴掌,原来相信真爱的始终只有我一人……我以为那不过是故事的结束,岂料正真的纠缠才刚刚开始。--情节虚构,请勿模仿
  • 医品贵女

    医品贵女

    穆采薇:一朝穿越而来,满脸黑包惹人厌,身背骂名被人嫌,处处碰壁艰难。她拿得起放得下。胖没问题,丑不可怕,减肥美容样样不落,美好生活如同芝麻开花。家徒四壁,不在话下,上山采药下河捉蛇,发家致富并且财源滚滚!
  • 红笸箩(上篇)

    红笸箩(上篇)

    洪家大院的四眼狗每天早晨和它的主人一样,总会把洪家窝堡的人吵醒。洪家的狗是江北曹大眼珠子去年送给洪怀德的。洪怀德喜欢狗,但洪怀德不喜欢咬人的狗。洪怀德的狗养了一茬又一茬,如果咬了人,洪怀德就会把这狗交给后宅院的洪耙子,洪耙子就会把这狗吊在大门柱子上,几袋烟的工夫,全堡子的人都能闻到洪耙子院子里飘出来的烀狗肉的香味。四眼狗练的是嘴上功夫,每天早晨到晚上,听见风吹草动,它就使劲地嚎。
  • Like My Teacher Always Said…
  • 茶花女

    茶花女

    《茶花女》是小仲马的第一部扬名文坛的力作,小说所表达的人道主义思想,体现了人间的真情,人与人之间的关怀、宽容与尊重,体现了人性的爱,这种思想感情引起人们的共鸣,并且受到普遍的欢迎。《茶花女》也许在社会道德方面未必替小仲马争得好的评价,但却实实在在令这位作者在死后依旧名垂千古。
  • 唐墟

    唐墟

    盛极一时的大唐帝国轰然落幕,乱世英雄起四方。身世隐晦的肖俞,自幼被宦官收养,本欲放歌纵酒,逍遥度日,却终究敌不过时势与命数···
  • 仁学

    仁学

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 迷魂记

    迷魂记

    这么说,一切都是幻象。而且,不是那种发生在眼前你伸手去摸仿佛就摸得到的幻象。这幻象,像块囊肿,潜伏在五脏六腑的什么地方,地久天长,由她本人日日呵护,慢慢成长,然而你是怎么也察觉不到的。从始至今,发生过什么事吗?凝视,或许只因为不解;同声协气,是因在别人眼中,他们都是异类;酒后的真言,跟胡话其实没什么差别;因自卑而不敢向前——这是最大的一个笑话。
  • 此生伊然

    此生伊然

    镂空雕花的古式木床,精巧的挂钩细细的挂住粉色的幔帘,隐约有风吹进房间里,景颜睁开眼。仿佛做了一场无比真实的梦。梦吗?明明自己那么真实的经历过这一切。那又如何解释眼前的这一切呢?是否不过是自己的另一个梦?在这里的日子,并没有小说中那些公主贵妃们那么好——至少她来这里三天,连一个正经的人都没见到。她完全是个被忽视的存在。甚至连每部穿越小说中必备的忠心小丫头都没有。盯……
  • 潜室扎记

    潜室扎记

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。