sveta_ptz: переводы

→'She cannot stop me. I am the master of this house, and, although I would have permitted this celebration to take place in it, I will not be party to a flagrant deception. You are ninety-seven, old woman. On Monday you will be ninety-eight. Live two more years and you may invite your friends all over again.'

→'Ye would not dare! Elizabeth would ne'er - ne'er allow it! Nor would she! Nor would she!'

→'Can you hear me? I am going downstairs to instruct that letters shall be sent to all the people of the country who have accepted your invitation. It will inform them that you have made a mistake as to your age and that a new invitation will be issued in two years' time.'

→Agatha remained quite rigid. The black cat, unaware of her agitation, looked at her and yawned and tried to settle beside her. George turned and took the book to a table by the window and then came back and considered his victim. With this old woman he had carried on a bitter vendetta for years. It was too long ago to remember who had begun it, whether it had been a mutual antipathy from the start or had grown from some resented slight. But it was too late to heal it now, too late for half measures or for drawing back the knife.

→'And then in the margin beside in another hand is written: "Christened third September." So you see, old woman, on Monday next you will be but ninety-eight.'

→'I hear.'

→'Then let me read it. I dare suppose it is your father's handwriting; the ink is very faded. But very very clear, old woman. Very clear. It says: "Ye tenth day of August, 1697, born to us this wet summer morn eleven o'clock in ye forenoon, our first child, a daughter, Agatha Mary, Praise be to God." Can you hear me or shall I read it again?'

→He took up the book from the table and opened it. He offered it to her but she shrank away.

→'Hark, old woman. Can you hear me still? I was not quite content with that, for baptisms do not always instantly follow births. So last afternoon and eve and all this morning I have had the servants turning the lumber out of the old room above the kitchens, where everything was thrown when the house was changed and repaired. Can you hear me? Let me come closer. Let me speak right into your ear. We found the old family bible which once used to be downstairs in the hall when Francis's father was alive, and behold I have found an entry in it. Let me read it to you. Or would you prefer to read it yourself? Here!'

→'Tis a lie A scabby, lie! There's no such…'

→Agatha's heart was pumping. She felt it was pumping in her head. Keep calm. Keep calm. Don't let him triumph.

→'I looked to a record of the baptisms, old woman. And I looked for yours in 1695. It was not there. Can you hear me? It was not there! You were baptized, the entry is there, for September 1697. What do you say to that?'

→Agatha did not speak. She watched him out of small venomous eyes.

→'Can you hear me? It is important you should hear me! When Morwenna was married to the Rev. Osborne Whitworth, I observed the church register and saw that its records went back a century and a half. Yesterday, as I was passing, I called on Mr Odgers and spent a half-hour reading through the register. It made interesting reading, for it was a history of the Poldarks and the Trenwiths, all in dry, old ink; nearly as old and faded as you, old woman.'

→Mr Warleggan was dressed as if for visitors, in a tight, buttoned, high-collared coat, cut away to show the tight breeches. The short double-breasted waistcoat was of crimson silk, with brass buttons. Her sharp, critical eyes noted his carefully controlled paunch, the cheeks and the shoulders growing heavier each year. Then they noticed he was smiling. It was unheard of. He was smiling at her. It was not a nice smile; but then no movement of his features would have been pleasant to her - unless they expressed pain. He was saying something. He had set down a book on the table beside her and was speaking to her in a voice he well knew she could not hear. Venom curled on her damp grey lips.

→It was a rare event - a unique event - for him to come here. If he had ever been in this room before she could not recollect it. She did not like this; it disturbed her. She shrank more into herself and pulled her day shawl about her shoulders as if his presence were a cold draught she must guard against. Smollet, thus disturbed, arched his back and spat. It was a great satisfaction to Agatha that George was now the only person Smollett ever spat at.

→One moment she had been gazing across at Lucy Pipe folding up her night shawl, then she opened her eyes and George Warleggan was there and Lucy Pipe was retreating through the door.

→On these quiet dreamy reflections, between one doze and the next, came another George than the one she was dreaming about - the one that she disliked so much.

→Then there had been, oh, five or six others. She had not been wanting in suitors. Only, for one reason or another, none had ever quite suited. Or they had gone off like dear George. To hear the young talk today you would think no one had had any excitement in the past, any heartaches, any problems, any bitter frustrations or heady fulfilment. The young of today were more than a shade tedious; pompous, self-centred, so sure that their concerns were the first important ones that had ever happened. They had no perspective, no sense of proportion. Perhaps it was necessary to be old to acquire a true sense of proportion. It was small consolation but it was something.

→Before that there had been Randolph Pentire. A bit of a rascal, always fumbling at one's blouse. Eventually he had married that Kitty Something - Kitty Hawes - and had never had any children. After all that lubricity. She had not sent invitations to them.