"Andre Norton - The Opal-Eyed Fan" - читать интересную книгу автора (Norton Andre)

"Miss Rooke-"
Startled, Persis looked to the head of the stairs. There stood a woman of the same sturdy build as Molly, but
clad with far more elegance in a gray mus-lin, a ribboned cap on her gray-brown hair which was dressed high in the
manner of a much earlier time. Yet this style became her round, rather highly colored face better than the modern curls.
She had the air of one used to giving orders and now offered her hand with assurance.
"I am Mrs. Pryor."
A housekeeper perhaps, but no servant, not even what might be deemed an "upper" one, Persis deduced.
The girl curtsied as she would to the mother of one of her friends.
"Please, can you tell me how my uncle is?" If the doctor had shared the truth with anyone of this household,
it must have been with the very competent appearing Mrs. Pryor.
For a moment she was eyed measuringly, and then the answer came:
"He is an old man, and one in a perilous state of health. The storm and the wreck—well, they have not been
good for him. But I have seen many recoveries which were unexpected. One does not go until one's time comes, and he
is fighting—" Her words were far from reassuring.
"The doctor—he—?" Persis did not know how to put into plain language a question concerning his
competence.
But Mrs. Pryor seemed to divine what she could not bring herself to ask.
"Dr. Veering is a very good physician. Having a ten-dency toward lung disorder, as a young man he went to
stay several years in Panama. Some time ago he came here and began to experiment with plants, to see how many of
the useful tropical ones could be grown this far north. Captain Leverett has fostered his proj-ect and given him Verde
Key for his garden. But he lives on Lost Lady, and we are lucky. You can accept that he knows his calling well."
"Thank you—" Persis was a little subdued. Mrs. Pryor's unassailable dignity was having the same quelling
effect on her as Miss Pickett's had had—re-ducing one to the status of a schoolgirl. This state of affairs she began to
resent.
"Now, my dear Miss Rooke—" The housekeeper be-came as brisk as Miss Pickett when she was about to
order someone to do something for "her own good." "Why not go down to the veranda—there is luncheon waiting.
And since the storm has blown itself out, it is quite pleasant there."
Persis' inner reaction was the same as it had been to Miss Pickett's suggestions—to do just the opposite. But
that was only silly childishness. So she went.
Her journey, short as it was, through the lower floor of the house proved (to her surprise) that Captain
Leverett's residence could match any in the better part of New York. A wealth of furnishings, and the thick carpets
were outstanding. Wrecker's loot, Persis thought disdainfully, though she looked about with a curiosity she could not
control.
Since her knowledge of what went on in the Keys (rank piracy, some of the shipowners her uncle had known
wrathfully termed it) was founded mainly on their conversation, she had little liking for what she saw. It was true that a
wrecker must be licensed by the government, that he must agree on rescue fees with the captain of the unfortunate
vessel he boarded, and he was further bound by the law to hold legal auction of the cargo. But the fact remained that
he prospered from the ill luck of others—richly, if this house was any indication.
At least the wreckers now operated under American law, and those from the Bahamas (about whom there
were some dark stories) were forbidden these waters. Though there were always rumors of lure lights and the like to
bring ships into danger.
Persis went out on the veranda and stopped short. She had forgotten the mound foundation of the house she
had sighted from her chamber window. Now she seemed to be on a hill from which one could look down on a sea of
green growth and white, shell-strewn sand.
Several chairs made of cane stood by a table on which the dishes were covered by a netting not unlike that
used to curtain the beds. And seated on one of those chairs was a young girl who stared at Persis with something near
to open rudeness.
Her hair, of a very pale shade of gold, was very elaborately dressed, the upper knot based by a band of
flowers. And her complexion had manifestly been well guarded from the glare of the southern sun. But her brows and
lashes were dark, giving an arresting vivid-ness to her features which Persis thought a little bold. There was very little