In the Valley of the Shadow - Bram Stoker (a book to read TXT) 📗
- Author: Bram Stoker
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screen put behind me.
“You can’t get a train, sir, before half-past six.”
“Excuse me, there is a train at 5.55, and I am going to get
it. By the way, are you sure Sister is not about? I thought I
saw her round the corner of the screen. No? Then give me some
soda and milk, and have you a cigarette anywhere?”
Russell naturally denied having cigarettes, whereupon, as
he afterwards told me, I proceeded to curse him, his family,
antecedents, and descendants together, with such copiousness
and minuteness of diction that I spoke without stopping for an
hour and a half! I fancy Mr Kipling is responsible for at least
the Indian meticulosity of my comminations. Anyhow, the effort
having exhausted me, on Russell saying that I had now missed
the train, and had better go back to bed to wait for the next,
I sensibly agreed.
That was the climax, and on awaking some hours later from a
peaceful sleep I found that the crisis was past, and that I
was as sane again as usual. The first book I asked for was the
Pilgrim’s Progress, and as soon as I was permitted to read I
turned to the account of Christian’s passage through the Valley
of the Shadow. I had felt before that Bunyan’s demons were stage
demons, his quagmires and pits merely simulacra, the accessories
generally such as Drury Lane would laugh to scorn. Now I am sure
of it. The real difficulty, of course, is to do it better.
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