Joe Abercrombie Half A King Epub Download Nook
Tanesha Prately
'The leave-taking is not till the afternoon but we hadbetter go before one of the cosmeticians finds us. Theylike to make a few final adjustments before WaitingOnes are admitted. Still, it gives you an idea of thechaise-longue arrangement. We usually recommend thecasket half-exposure for gentlemen because the legsnever look so well.'
'Then they took me to the embalming-rooms andthere was Mrs Komstock lying on the table in her weddingdress. I shall never forget the sight of her. She wastransfigured. That's the only word for it. Since then I'vehad the pleasure of showing their Loved Ones to morepeople than I can count and more than half of them say:"Why, they're quite transfigured." Of course there wasno colour in her yet and her hair was kinda wispy; shewas pure white like wax, and so cool and silent. I hardlydared touch her at first. Then I gave her a shampoo andher blue rinse and a set just as she always had it, curlyall over and kinda fluffed up where it was thin. Thenwhile she was drying the cosmetician put the colour on.She let me watch and I got talking with her and she toldme how there was a vacancy for a novice cosmetician rightat the moment so I went straight back and gave Mr Jebbmy notice. That was nearly two years ago and I've beenhere ever since.'
A figure now presented itself, but among the many fantastic masks that weredispersed through the apartments none could tell precisely from whence it came.It was a man in an old-fashioned dress of black serge and having the aspect ofa steward or principal domestic in the household of a nobleman or great Englishlandholder. This figure advanced to the outer door of the mansion, and,throwing both its leaves wide open, withdrew a little to one side and lookedback toward the grand staircase, as if expecting some person to descend. At thesame time, the music in the street sounded a loud and doleful summons. The eyesof Sir William Howe and his guests being directed to the staircase, thereappeared on the uppermost landing-place, that was discernible from the bottom,several personages descending toward the door. The foremost was a man of sternvisage, wearing a steeple-crowned hat and a skull-cap beneath it, a dark cloakand huge wrinkled boots that came halfway up his legs. Under his arm was arolled-up banner which seemed to be the banner of England, but strangely rentand torn; he had a sword in his right hand and grasped a Bible in his left. Thenext figure was of milder aspect, yet full of dignity, wearing a broad ruff,over which descended a beard, a gown of wrought velvet and a doublet and hoseof black satin; he carried a roll of manuscript in his hand. Close behind thesetwo came a young man of very striking countenance and demeanor with deepthought and contemplation on his brow, and perhaps a flash of enthusiasm in hiseye; his garb, like that of his predecessors, was of an antique fashion, andthere was a stain of blood upon his ruff. In the same group with these werethree or four others, all men of dignity and evident command, and bearingthemselves like personages who were accustomed to the gaze of the multitude. Itwas the idea of the beholders that these figures went to join the mysteriousfuneral that had halted in front of the province-house, yet that suppositionseemed to be contradicted by the air of triumph with which they waved theirhands as they crossed the threshold and vanished through the portal.
Sir William Howe and his guests stood at the doors of the contiguous apartmentswatching the progress of this singular pageant with various emotions of anger,contempt or half-acknowledged fear, but still with an anxious curiosity. Theshapes which now seemed hastening to join the mysterious procession wererecognized rather by striking peculiarities of dress or broad characteristicsof manner than by any perceptible resemblance of features to their prototypes.Their faces, indeed, were invariably kept in deep shadow, but Dr. Byles andother gentlemen who had long been familiar with the successive rulers of theprovince were heard to whisper the names of Shirley, of Pownall, of Sir FrancisBernard and of the well-remembered Hutchinson, thereby confessing that theactors, whoever they might be, in this spectral march of governors hadsucceeded in putting on some distant portraiture of the real personages. Asthey vanished from the door, still did these shadows toss their arms into thegloom of night with a dread expression of woe. Following the mimicrepresentative of Hutchinson came a military figure holding before his face thecocked hat which he had taken from his powdered head, but his epaulettes andother insignia of rank were those of a general officer, and something in hismien reminded the beholders of one who had recently been master of theprovince-house and chief of all the land.
During the progress of the story a storm had been gathering abroad and ragingand rattling so loudly in the upper regions of the Province House that itseemed as if all the old governors and great men were running riot above stairswhile Mr. Bela Tiffany babbled of them below. In the course of generations,when many people have lived and died in an ancient house, the whistling of thewind through its crannies and the creaking of its beams and rafters becomestrangely like the tones of the human voice, or thundering laughter, or heavyfootsteps treading the deserted chambers. It is as if the echoes of half acentury were revived. Such were the ghostly sounds that roared and murmured inour ears when I took leave of the circle round the fireside of the ProvinceHouse and, plunging down the doorsteps, fought my way homeward against adrifting snow-storm.
From such a man as if another self had scared me I scramble hastily over therocks, and take refuge in a nook which many a secret hour has given me a rightto call my own. I would do battle for it even with the churl that shouldproduce the title-deeds. Have not my musings melted into its rocky walls andsandy floor and made them a portion of myself? It is a recess in the line ofcliffs, walled round by a rough, high precipice which almost encircles andshuts in a little space of sand. In front the sea appears as between thepillars of a portal; in the rear the precipice is broken and intermixed withearth which gives nourishment not only to clinging and twining shrubs, but totrees that grip the rock with their naked roots and seem to struggle hard forfooting and for soil enough to live upon. These are fir trees, but oaks hangtheir heavy branches from above, and throw down acorns on the beach, and shedtheir withering foliage upon the waves. At this autumnal season the precipiceis decked with variegated splendor. Trailing wreaths of scarlet flaunt from thesummit downward; tufts of yellow-flowering shrubs and rose-bushes, with theirreddened leaves and glossy seed-berries, sprout from each crevice; at everyglance I detect some new light or shade of beauty, all contrasting with thestern gray rock. A rill of water trickles down the cliff and fills a littlecistern near the base. I drain it at a draught, and find it fresh and pure.This recess shall be my dining-hall. And what the feast? A few biscuits madesavory by soaking them in sea-water, a tuft of samphire gathered from thebeach, and an apple for the dessert. By this time the little rill has filledits reservoir again, and as I quaff it I thank God more heartily than for acivic banquet that he gives me the healthful appetite to make a feast of breadand water.
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