Читать книгу The Sisters-In-Law - Gertrude Franklin Horn Atherton - Страница 28

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Gora went up to the large attic which, soon, after her mother's death, she had furnished for her personal use. The walls were hung with a thin bluish green material and there were several pieces of good furniture that she had picked up at auctions. One side of the room was covered with book shelves which Mortimer had made for her on rainy winter nights and they were filled with the books she had found in second-hand shops. A number of them bore the autographs of men once prosilient in the city's history but long since gone down to disaster. There were a few prints that she had found in the same way, but no oils or water colors or ornaments. She despised the second-rate, and the best of these was rarely to be bought for a song even at auction.

She sighed as she reflected that if obliged to flee to the hills there was practically nothing she could save beyond the contents of her bags; but at least she could remain with her treasures until the last minute, and she pinned the curtains across the small windows and lit several candles.

Between the blasts of dynamite the street was very quiet. She could hear the measured tread of the sentry as he passed, a member of the Citizens' Patrol, like her brother. Suddenly she heard a shot, and extinguishing the candles hastily she peered out of a window from behind the curtains. The sentry was pounding on a door opposite with the butt of his rifle. It was the home of an eccentric old bachelor who possessed a fine collection of ceramics and a cellar of vintage wine.

The door opened with obvious reluctance and the head of Mr. Andrew

Bennett appeared.

"What you doin' here?" shouted the sentry. "Haven't all youse been told three hours ago to light out for the hills? Git out—"

"But the fire hasn't crossed Van Ness Avenue. I prefer—"

"Your opinion ain't asked. Git out."

"I call that abominable tyranny."

"Git out or I'll shoot. We ain't standin' no nonsense."

Gora recognized the voice as that of a young man, clerk in a butcher shop in Polk Street, and appreciated the intense satisfaction he took in his brief period of authority.

Mr. Bennett emerged in a moment with two large bags and walked haughtily up the street at the point of the bayonet. Gora stood expectantly behind her curtain, and some ten minutes later saw him sneak round the eastern end of his block, dart back as the sentry turned suddenly, and when the footsteps once more receded run up the street and into his house. She laughed sympathetically and hoped he would not be caught a second time.