gone to sea . For twenty years he sent them presents now and

306
received his letter, in which he wrote that he was crippled with
rheumatism and feeling he had not much longer to live, wanted
to return to the house in which he was born.
When I came the whole family was assembled in the kitchen.
I was amused to see that Mrs. Meadows was wearing her best
silk dress. On the other side of the fireplace sat an old man with
a wrinkled yellow face. He was very thin and his skin hung on
his bones like an old suit too large for him. Captain George, as
he had called himself, told us that he had been so ill he thought
he would never be able to get back, but the look of his old home
had done him a lot of good. He said good
humouredly: “I feel
now better and stronger than I have for many years, dear Emily!”
No one had called Mrs. Meadows by her Christian name for a
generation and it gave me a shock, as though the old man were
taking a liberty with her. It was strange to look at these two old
smiling people and to think that nearly half a century ago he
had loved her and she had married another.
When I asked him if he had ever been married he said he
knew too much about women for that. Then he added looking at
Mrs. Meadows: “I said I’d never marry anyone but you, Emily,
and I never had.” He said it not with regret, but with some satis

faction.
Captain Meadows told us a lot of interesting stories about
his adventures and about many things he had seen and done.
“Well, one thing you haven’t done. George, and that is to

жүктеу/скачать 3.9 Mb.

Достарыңызбен бөлісу: