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Автор Донна Леон
Falling in Love
Death at La Fenice
Death in a Strange Country
Dressed for Death
Death and Judgment
Acqua Alta
Quietly in Their Sleep
A Noble Radiance
Fatal Remedies
Friends in High Places
A Sea of Troubles
Willful Behaviour
Uniform Justice
Doctored Evidence
Blood from a Stone
Through a Glass, Darkly
Suffer the Little Children
The Girl of His Dreams
About Face
A Question of Belief
Drawing Conclusions
Handel’s Bestiary
Beastly Things
Venetian Curiosities
The Jewels of Paradise
The Golden Egg
My Venice and Other Essays
By its Cover
Gondola
Donna Leon
Falling in Love
Atlantic Monthly Press
Copyright©2015byDonnaLeon
Jacket photograph © Mark Delavan and Adrianne Pieczonka; Canadian Opera Company’s 2012 production of Tosca
Photo: Michael Cooper
Author photograph © Regine Mosimann/Diogenes Verlag AG Zürich
ISBN 978-0-8021-2353-4
eISBN 978-0-8021-9183-0
Atlantic Monthly Press
an imprint of Grove Atlantic
154 West 14th Street
New York, NY 10011
Distributed by Publishers Group West
groveatlantic. com
For Ada Pesch
A loving heart pays no attention to the voice of virtue,
or cannot hear it.
Handel
1
The woman knelt over her lover, her face, her entire body, stiff with terror, staring at the blood on her hand. He lay on his back, one arm flung out, palm upturned as if begging her to place something into it; his life, perhaps. She had touched his chest, urging him to get up so they could get out of there, but he hadn’t moved, so she had shaken him, the same old sleepy-head who never wanted to get out of bed.
Her hand had come away red and, without thinking, she pressed it to her mouth to stifle her scream, knowing she must make no noise, not let them know she was there. Then horror overcame her caution, and she screamed his name again and again, telling herself he was dead, and it was all over; like this, in blood.
She looked at where her hand had been and saw the red blotches: how had so much blood come from them, so small, so small? She rubbed her clean hand across her mouth, and it came away coloured with the blood on her face. Panicked, seeing the blood, she spoke his name. All over, all over. She said his name again, this time louder, but he could no longer hear or answer her, or anyone. Unthinking, she leaned forward to kiss him, grabbed at his shoulders in a vain attempt to shake some life into him, but there was to be no more life, for either one of them.
