The Polyglots
Page 38
As I went up, he said, ‘There is the question of his daughter——’
‘I have two daughters,’ Captain Negodyaev was saying, ‘Màsha and Natàsha——’
‘There’s only one on the passport,’ rejoined the official.
‘Quite so,’ flustered the other. ‘Màsha does not appear on the passport because she is grown up, is married, and lives with her husband, Ippolit Sergèiech Blagovèschenski, away in South Russia. And Natàsha——’
His eyes filled. His face twitched. He gulped. ‘The gong has—hasn’t sounded yet?’ he asked nervously.
‘Not yet.’
Red-eyed, he looked at his wife. A tiny tear glittered on her lashes. ‘Our cherub,’ she lisped, ‘is gone—gone from us—to the cherubim.’
I told the passport official.
‘I see,’ said the man.
And while we stood there and waited, and while we paced on in silence I heard no stealthy steps; no cool covert hands hid my sight. There was no gurgling laughter, no shrug, no ecstatic delight. It was doleful in the gathering twilight, and the lights of England blinked at us ruefully, sadly. The gong echoed to the sound of the sea, and the gulls, the wind, and the drizzling rain.
THE END
THE NEVERSINK LIBRARY
AFTER MIDNIGHT
by Irmgard Keun 978-1-935554-41-7
$15.00 / $17.00 CAN
THE ETERNAL PHILISTINE
by Ödön von Horvath 978-1-935554-47-9
$15.00 / $17.00 CAN
THE LATE LORD BYRON
by Doris Langley Moore 978-1-935554-48-6
$18.95 / $21.50 CAN
THE TRAIN
by Georges Simenon 978-1-935554-46-2
$14.00 / $16.00 CAN
THE AUTOBIOGRAPHYOF A SUPER-TRAMP
by W. H. Davies 978-1-61219-022-8
$15.00 / $17.00 CAN
FAITHFUL RUSLAN
by Georgi Vladimov 978-1-935554-67-7
$15.00 / $17.00 CAN
THE PRESIDENT
by Georges Simenon 978-1-935554-62-2
$14.00 / $16.00 CAN
THE WAR WITH THE NEWTS
by Karel Čapek 978-1-61219-023-5
$15.00 / $17.00 CAN
AMBIGUOUS ADVENTURE
by Cheikh Hamidou Kane 978-1-61219-054-9
$15.00 / $17.00 CAN
THE DEVIL IN THE FLESH
by Raymond Radiguet 978-1-61219-056-3
$15.00 / $17.00 CAN
THE MADONNA OF THESLEEPING CARS
by Maurice Dekobra 978-1-61219-058-7
$15.00 / $17.00 CAN
THE BOOK OF KHALID
by Ameen Rihani 978-1-61219-087-7
$15.00 / $17.00 CAN
YOUTH WITHOUT GOD
by Ödön von Horváth 978-1-61219-119-5
$15.00 / $15.00 CAN
THE TRAVELS AND SURPRISING ADVENTURES OF BARON MUNCHAUSEN
by Rudolf Erich Raspe 978-1-61219-123-2
$15.00 / $15.00 CAN
SNOWBALL’S CHANCE
by John Reed 978-1-61219-125-6
$15.00 / $15.00 CAN
FUTILITY
by William Gerhardie 978-1-61219-145-4
$15.00 / $15.00 CAN
THE REVERBERATOR
by Henry James 978-1-61219-156-0
$15.00 / $15.00 CAN
THE RIGHT WAY TO DO WRONG
by Harry Houdini 978-1-61219-166-9
$15.00 / $15.00 CAN
A COUNTRY DOCTOR’S NOTEBOOK
by Mikhail Bulgakov 978-1-61219-190-4
$15.00 / $15.00 CAN
I AWAIT THE DEVIL’S COMING
by Mary MacLane 978-1-61219-194-2
$16.00 / $16.00 CAN
THE POLYGLOTS
by William Gerhardie 978-1-61219-188-1
$17.00 / $17.00 CAN
MY AUTOBIOGRAPHY
by Charlie Chaplin 978-1-61219-192-8
$20.00 / $20.00 CAN
WHERE THERE’S LOVE,THERE’S HATE
by Adolfo Bioy Casares and Silvina Ocampo 978-1-61219-150-8 $15.00 / $15.00 CAN
THE DIFFICULTY OF BEING
by Jean Cocteau 978-1-61219-290-1
$15.95 / $15.95 CAN
THE OASIS
by Mary McCarthy 978-1-61219-228-4
$15.00 / $15.00 CAN
COLLEGE OF ONE
by Sheilah Graham 978-1-61219-283-3
$15.00 / $15.00 CAN