75 лучших рассказов / 75 Best Short Stories

This gem by Kimon is – here is his signature, you see; Peter is particularly good at lettering – and as I handled the genuine tetradrachm about two years ago, when Lord Seastoke exhibited it at a meeting of our society in Albemarle Street, there is nothing at all wonderful in my being able to fix the locale of your mystery. Indeed, I feel that I ought to apologize for it all being so simple.’

�I think,’ remarked Mr. Carlyle, critically examining the loose threads on his left boot, �that the apology on that head would be more appropriate from me.

’

Aunt Jane’s Album (Eliza Calvert Hall)

They were a bizarre mass of color on the sweet spring landscape, those patchwork quilts, swaying in a long line under the elms and maples. The old orchard made a blossoming background for them, and farther off on the horizon rose the beauty of fresh verdure and purple mist on those low hills, or �knobs’, that are to the heart of the Kentuckian[78 - Kentuckian – a resident of Kentucky, the US state in the south (102 694 sq.

km)] as the Alps to the Swiss or the sea to the sailor.

I opened the gate softly and paused for a moment between the blossoming lilacs that grew on each side of the path. The fragrance of the white and the purple blooms was like a resurrection-call over the graves of many a dead spring; and as I stood, shaken with thoughts as the flowers are with the winds, Aunt Jane came around from the back of the house, her black silk cape fluttering from her shoulders, and a calico sunbonnet hiding her features in its cavernous depth.

She walked briskly to the clothes-line and began patting and smoothing the quilts where the breeze had disarranged them.

�Aunt Jane,’ I called out, �are you having a fair all by yourself?’

She turned quickly, pushing back the sunbonnet from her eyes.

�Why, child,’ she said, with a happy laugh, �you come pretty nigh skeerin’ me.

No, I ain’t havin’ any fair; I’m jest givin’ my quilts their spring airin’. Twice a year I put ’em out in the sun and wind; and this mornin’ the air smelt so sweet, I thought it was a good chance to freshen ’em up for the summer. It’s about time to take ’em in now.’

She began to fold the quilts and lay them over her arm, and I did the same.