The Lock and Key Library: Classic Mystery and Detective Stories: Modern English
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The Lock and Key Library: Classic Mystery and Detective Stories: Modern English
Detective and mystery stories, English; Fiction; Short stories
"The undertaking meant many long hours of undulation and skidding over the
November snow, to the somniferous bell jangle of my dirty little horses,
the only impression of interest being a weird gypsy concert I came in for
at a miserable drinking-booth half buried in the snow where we halted for
the refreshment of man and beast. Here, I remember, I discovered a very
definite connection between the characteristic run of the tsimbol, the
peculiar bite of the Zigeuner's bow on his fiddle-string, and some
distinctive points of Turanian tongues. In other countries, in Spain, for
instance, your gypsy speaks differently on his instrument. But, oddly
enough, when I later attempted to put this observation on paper I could
find no word to express it."
A few of our company evinced signs of sleepiness, but most of us who knew
Marshfield, and that he could, unless he had something novel to say, be as
silent and retiring as he now evinced signs of being copious, awaited
further developments with patience. He has his own deliberate way of
speaking, which he evidently enjoys greatly, though it be occasionally
trying to his listeners.
"On the afternoon of my second day's drive, the snow, which till then had
fallen fine and continuous, ceased, and my Jehu, suddenly interrupting
himself in the midst of some exciting wolf story quite in keeping with the
time of year and the wild surroundings, pointed to a distant spot against
the gray sky to the northwest, between two wood-covered folds of
ground--the first eastern spurs of the great Carpathian chain.
"'There stands Yany,' said he. I looked at my far-off goal with interest.
As we drew nearer, the sinking sun, just dipping behind the hills, tinged
the now distinct frontage with a cold copper-like gleam, but it was only
for a minute; the next the building became nothing more to the eye than a
black irregular silhouette against the crimson sky.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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