JOSEPH CONRAD
street a good distance beyond the Great Square. There, in a large drawing-room, panelled and bare, with heavy cornices and a lofty ceiling, in a little oasis of light made by two candles in a desert of dusk, I sat at a little table to worry and ink myself all over till the task of preparation was done. The table of my toil faced a tall white double door which was kept closed; but now and then it would come ajar and a nun in a white calf would squeeze herself through, glide across the room and disappear. There were two of these noiseless nursing nuns. Their voices were seldom heard. For indeed what could they have to say! When they did speak to me, it was with their lips hardly moving, in a claustral clear whisper. Domestic matters were ordered by the elderly housekeeper of our neighbour on the second floor, a Canon of the Cathedral, lent for the emergency. She too spoke but seldom. She wore a black dress with a cross hanging by a chain on her ample bosom. And though when she spoke she moved her lips more than the nuns, she never let her voice rise above a peacefully murmuring note. The air around me was all piety, resignation and silence.
I don't know what would have become of me if I had not been a reading boy. My lessons done I would have had nothing to do but sit and watch the awful stillness of the sick-room flow out through the closed white door and coldly enfold my scared heart. I suppose that in a futile childish way I would have gone crazy. But I was a reading boy. There were many books about, lying on consoles, on tables, and even on the floor, for we had not had time to settle down. I read! What did I not read! Sometimes the eldest nun gliding up and casting a mistrustful glance at the open pages would lay her hand lightly on my head and suggest in a doubtful whisper: “Perhaps it isn't very good for you to read these books.” I would raise my eyes to her face mutely and with a vague gesture of giving it up she would glide away.
Later in the evening, but not always, I would be permitted to tiptoe into the sick-room to say good-night to the figure prone on the bed which often could not recognise my presence but by a slow movement of
[ 93 ]
