Мертвая комната. Уровень 2 / The Dead Secret

Treverton began for the third time.

Her voice failed.

“I haven't done – you must swear – close, close, come close – your master – swear to give it – ”

The last words died away very softly. The lips closed. Sarah sprang to the door, opened it, and called for help. Then she ran back to the bedside, caught up the sheet of the paper, and hid it in her bosom.

The doctor entered the room. He spoke first to the servant who followed him.

“Go to your master,” he said, “and beg him to wait in his own room until I can come and speak to him.

”

Then he said to Sarah,

“Let me recommend you to leave us for a little while.”

He touched Sarah on the arm. She went out.

Chapter II

Sarah Leeson turned the key of her bedroom door, and took the sheet of the paper from its place of concealment in her bosom. She placed it on her little dressing-table, and fixed her eyes eagerly on the lines. The characters were clear. There was the address: “To my Husband;” there the first line beneath, in her dead mistress's handwriting; there the lines that followed, with the signature at the end – Mrs.

Treverton's first, and then her own. Sarah Leeson read the few lines as a condemned prisoner.

The oath! Sarah pushed away the paper and rose to her feet. Then she began to talk to herself. She repeated incessantly the phrases:

“How can I give him the letter? Such a good master; so kind to us all. Why did she die, and leave it all to me? I can't bear it alone; it's too much for me!”

Then she read aloud the address again,

“To my Husband… Why give it to him at all? Why not let the secret die with her and die with me? Why must he know it? He won't know it!”

She opened the door and glided into the passage.

She stopped there for a moment and hesitated a little, then whispered, “I must! I must!”

She descended very slowly. The door of Mrs. Treverton's bedroom was opened, when she knocked at it.

“I want to speak to my master.”

“Look for him somewhere else. He was here half an hour ago,” said the nurse.

“Do you know where he is?”

“No. I mind my own business[6 - I mind my own business. – Я занимаюсь своими делами.].”

With that discourteous answer, the nurse closed the door. Sarah looked toward the inner end of the passage. The door of the nursery was situated there. It was ajar.