Alena_Zybina: переводы

→Elinor had to step sideways around the wardrobe to squeeze into her bed, which was tall enough to require the use of a stepstool to climb into it. The furnishings were so out of place they might have been placed there in storage. However, it had its own fireplace and was only steps from the water closet, an amenity their own home in Hertfordshire did not have. Elinor used it, then returned to her room, removed her gown, and hung it carefully on a peg in the wardrobe, shivering; despite the sunshine, it was unseasonably cold for April.

→She chose a bedroom as far from her parents’ suite as possible, a little room her sister would not try to whine or wheedle away from her. It looked like an afterthought, tucked into an odd corner, with only one window that looked out on the rear of the house and massive furniture that might have graced a medieval manor.

→Behind her, Amelia’s drawling voice battled with her mother’s higher-pitched twitter. Small mercy: if she were forced to attend social gatherings where she would be on display like a cake in a shop window, she at least would not have to endure her younger sister’s presence there.

→Mr. Pembroke cast his iron-grey gaze silently on her for the space of several breaths, during which time the back of Elinor’s neck prickled with apprehension. Surely he could find nothing to criticize in such an ordinary request? “Very well,” he said finally. “Choose what room you will. I suppose you won’t want my permission to light a fire in your grate, daughter?” He laughed at his poor joke, and Elinor smiled weakly and made her escape.

→“Mr. Pembroke, only listen! We have had callers already,” her mother cried. She waved two calling cards in the air as if they were tickets to a grand opera.

→“Why is this house so cold?” Amelia said, removing her velvet-lined bonnet with reluctance and dangling it by its ribbons. “Do you suppose they use that horrid-smelling substance so we’ll be impressed at how thoroughly they’ve cleaned? Really, you would think, with as much as papa is spending on this place, the servants might at least make it comfortable.”

→She followed her mother into the narrow front hall. It was not a welcoming house, here on the unfashionable side of Mayfair, its plain, striped wallpaper cold blue and white, its walls devoid of paintings or portraits that would have made it seem more homelike. The air smelled of a harsh, astringent cleanser and, beneath that, the dust the cleanser was intended to eradicate. Elinor made immediately for the stairs. It had been a long journey, and she wanted nothing more than to rest in some room far, far away from her parents’ scrutiny.

→It was only Elinor’s imagination that the black-clad butler, upon opening the door to their rented London house, drew back farther than was strictly necessary to let her pass. Her father’s enthusiasm for telling the world he had an Extraordinary Scorcher for a daughter would not have extended to sharing the news with the employment agency.

→In which Elinor arrives in London, to her dismay