Fathers and sons -- Fiction; People with disabilities -- Fiction; Princes -- Fiction; Refugees -- Fiction
"Take her away," said the gentleman to Lazarus. He did not even glance
at her. He drew something from his coat-pocket and handed it to the old
soldier. "Take her away," he repeated. And because it seemed as if she
were not any longer a person at all, Mrs. Beedle actually shuffled down
the passage to the cellar-kitchen steps. Lazarus did not leave her until
he, too, had descended into the cellar kitchen, where he stood and
towered above her like an infuriated giant.
"To-morrow he will be on his way to Samavia, miserable woman!" he said.
"Before he goes, it would be well for you to implore his pardon."
But Mrs. Beedle's point of view was not his. She had recovered some of
her breath.
"I don't know where Samavia is," she raged, as she struggled to set her
dusty, black cap straight. "I'll warrant it's one of these little
foreign countries you can scarcely see on the map--and not a decent
English town in it! He can go as soon as he likes, so long as he pays
his rent before he does it. Samavia, indeed! You talk as if he was
Buckingham Palace!"
XXXI
"THE SON OF STEFAN LORISTAN"
When a party composed of two boys attended by a big soldierly
man-servant and accompanied by two distinguished-looking, elderly men,
of a marked foreign type, appeared on the platform of Charing Cross
Station they attracted a good deal of attention. In fact, the good looks
and strong, well-carried body of the handsome lad with the thick black
hair would have caused eyes to turn towards him even if he had not
seemed to be regarded as so special a charge by those who were with him.
But in a country where people are accustomed to seeing a certain manner
and certain forms observed in the case of persons--however young--who
are set apart by the fortune of rank and distinction, and where the
populace also rather enjoys the sight of such demeanor, it was
inevitable that more than one quick-sighted looker-on should comment on
the fact that this was not an ordinary group of individuals.
"See that fine, big lad over there!" said a workman, whose head, with a
pipe in its mouth, stuck out of a third-class smoking carriage window.
"He's some sort of a young swell, I'll lay a shillin'! Take a look at
him," to his mate inside.
The mate took a look. The pair were of the decent, polytechnic-educated
type, and were shrewd at observation.
"Yes, he's some sort of young swell," he summed him up. "But he's not
English by a long chalk. He must be a young Turk, or Russian, sent over
to be educated. His suite looks like it. All but the ferret-faced chap
on crutches. Wonder what he is!"
A good-natured looking guard was passing, and the first man hailed him.
"Have we got any swells traveling with us this morning?" he asked,
jerking his head towards the group. "That looks like it. Any one leaving
Windsor or Sandringham to cross from Dover to-day?"
The man looked at the group curiously for a moment and then shook his
head.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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