Читать книгу Grace Poole Her Testimony: A Short Story from the collection, Reader, I Married Him - Helen Dunmore - Страница 7
ОглавлениеREADER, I MARRIED HIM. Those are her words for sure. She would have him at the time and place she chose, with every dish on the table to her appetite.
She came in meek and mild but I knew her at first glance. There she sat in her low chair at a decent distance from the fire, buttering up Mrs Fairfax as if the old lady were a plate of parsnips. She didn’t see me but I saw her. You don’t live the life I’ve lived without learning to move so quiet that there is never a stir to frighten anyone.
Jane Eyre. You couldn’t touch her. Nothing could bring a flush of colour to that pale cheek. What kind of pallor was it, you ask? A snowdrop pushing its way out of the bare earth, as green as it was white: that would be a comparison she’d like. But I would say: sheets. Blank sheets. Paper, or else a bed that no one had ever lain in or ever would.
I am a coarse creature. No one has ever married me and I have not much taste for marrying. I like my porter, and there’s no harm in that. I am quick with the laudanum too. My lady takes it flavoured with cinnamon, and I keep the bottle under lock and key because sometimes she likes it too much. This little pale one won’t touch a drop of anything. Won’t let it sully her lips. Doesn’t want to be babbling out her secrets in that French she’s so proud of, as if anyone cared to listen. The little girl speaks French as pure as a bird.
