Gender Readings. Top Ten. Ренц Т.Г - 66 стр.

       I talked a little with the old man about China.
       “There’s no port in China that I don’t know better than you
know your coat pocket.Where ashi p can go I’ve been.I could keep
you sitting here all day long for six months and not tell you half the
things I’ve seen in my day”.
       “Well, one thing you’ve not done, George, as far as I can see,”
said Mrs Meadows, “the mocking but not unkindly smile still in her
eyes, and that’s to make a fortune.”
       “I’m not one to save money. Make it and spend it; that’s my motto.
But one thing I can say for myself: if I had the chance of going through
life again I’d take it. And there aren’t many people who’ll say that.”
       “No, indeed,” I said.
       I looked at him with admiration and respect. He was a toothless,
cri ppled, penniless old man, but he had made asuccess of life, for he
had enjoyed it. When I left him he asked me to come and see him
again next day. If I was interested in China he would tell me all the
stories I wanted to hear.
       Next morning I thought I would go and ask if the old man would
like to see me. I strolled down the magnificent avenue of elm trees and
when I came to the garden saw Mrs Meadows picking flowers. I bade
her good morning and she raised herself. She had a huge armful of
white flowers. I glanced at the house and I saw that the blinds were
drawn: I was surprised, for Mrs Meadows liked the sunshine.
       “Time enough to live in the dark when you’re buried,” she
always said. “How’s Captain Meadows?” I asked her.
       “He always was a wild fellow,” she answered. “When Lizzie took
him a cup of tea this morning she found he was dead.” “Dead?”
       “Yes. Died in his sleep. I was just picking these flowers to put in
the room. Well, I’m glad he died in that old house. It always means a
lot to those Meadows to do that”.
       They had had a good deal of difficulty in persuading him to go to
bed. He had talked to them of all the things that had happened to him
in his long life. He was happy to be back in his old home. He was
proud that he had walked up the drive without assistance, and he
boasted that he would live for another twenty years. But fate had been
kind: death had written the full-stop in the right place.
       Mrs Meadows smelt the white flowers that she held in her arms.
       “Well, I’m glad he came back,” she said. “After I married Tom
Meadows and George went away, the fact is I was never quite sure
that I’d married the right one”.

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