Адаптированный текст повести А. К. Дойла «Знак четырех» на английском языке с транскрипцией и видеопрезентацией. Учебное пособие

The diagram upon it appears to be a plan of part of a large building with numerous halls, corridors, and passages.

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At one point is a small cross done in red ink, and above it is «3.37 from left,» in faded pencil-writing. In the left-hand corner is a curious hieroglyphic like four crosses in a line with their arms touching.

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Beside it is written, in very rough and coarse characters, «The sign of the four, – Jonathan Small, Mahomet Singh, Abdullah Khan, Dost Akbar.» No, I confess that I do not see how this bears upon the matter.

Yet it is evidently a document of importance.

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It has been kept carefully in a pocket-book; for the one side is as clean as the other.»

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«It was in his pocket-book that we found it.»

«Preserve it carefully, then, Miss Morstan, for it may prove to be of use to us. I begin to suspect that this matter may turn out to be much deeper and more subtle than I at first supposed. I must reconsider my ideas.

»

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He leaned back in the cab, and I could see by his drawn brow and his vacant eye that he was thinking intently. Miss Morstan and I chatted in an undertone about our present expedition and its possible outcome, but our companion maintained his impenetrable reserve until the end of our journey.

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It was a September evening, and not yet seven o’clock, but the day had been a dreary one, and a dense drizzly fog lay low upon the great city.

Mud-colored clouds drooped sadly over the muddy streets.

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Down the Strand the lamps were but misty splotches of diffused light which threw a feeble circular glimmer upon the slimy pavement. The yellow glare from the shop-windows streamed out into the steamy, vaporous air, and threw a murky, shifting radiance across the crowded thoroughfare.

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There was, to my mind, something eerie and ghost-like in the endless procession of faces which flitted across these narrow bars of light, – sad faces and glad, haggard and merry.

Like all human kind, they flitted from the gloom into the light, and so back into the gloom once more.

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I am not subject to impressions, but the dull, heavy evening, with the strange business upon which we were engaged, combined to make me nervous and depressed. I could see from Miss Morstan’s manner that she was suffering from the same feeling.