Harlequinade: A Novel (Classic Reprint) - Tapa blanda

Excerpt from Harlequinade: A Novel

Mrs. Kennedy welcomed her son on his arrival as she would presently welcome his father. She was a quiet voiced lady with an intelligent face of matronly beauty. Maurice Kennedy was very like his mother, much more so than was Gwendoline his sister, the remaining mem ber of the family.

Unlike most of the houses in the road, number eighty seven had no name. Mr. Kennedy had been firm on the point. Pretentious was his invariable reply when Gwendoline suggested a name, and, as Mrs. Kennedy agreed with him, he was able to remain firm.

About the Publisher

Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com

This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

Excerpt from Harlequinade: A Novel

Maurice Kennedy purchased the Westminster Gazette from the cripple outside Waterloo, leisurely entered the station, and caught the five-seventeen to Clapham Junction. Five evenings out of seven in each week he did the same, for, despite his comparatively few years, he was already a creature of habit, the vice which, complacent and insidious, destroys more souls than all the others together.

He was a Civil Servant, so that he was not wholly to blame.

Arrived at Clapham Junction - without exception the most abominable station in all the world - he walked home along Northcote Road, up to Wandsworth Common, and so to Mansfeld Road, wherein at number eighty-seven he lived.

He always went home that way ...

The house was what romantic house-agents quaintly describe as double-fronted. A tiny garden faced the road and produced in due season geraniums, lobelia, and reluctant roses (Nature is almost as much a slave to habit as a Civil Servant). This garden was as unpersuadable as a mule, and for twenty years Maurice's father had steadily failed to achieve a certain pet desire of his, to wit, a synchronizing display of red, white, and blue flowers which should leave no doubt as to the thought, the principle, behind them.

About the Publisher

Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com

This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.