The Oval Portrait
We saw the dark shape of the roof above the forest. It was not far
away, but travelling was difficult in that wild part of the mountains.
We did not arrive until night was falling.
It was a sad and strangely beautiful house, many hundreds of
years old. Pedro, my servant, broke in through a small door at the
back and carried me carefully inside. I was so badly hurt that I
would die if we stayed out all night.
`People were living here until a very short time ago,' Pedro
said. 'They left in a hurry.'
He carried me through several tall, richly decorated rooms to
a smaller room in a corner of the great house. He helped me to
lie down on the bed. There were a lot of very fine modern
pictures in this room. I looked at them for a while in the dying
light. They were everywhere on the walls, all round me.
After dark, I could not sleep because of the pain. Also, I was so
weak now that I was afraid that I was dying. So I asked Pedro to
light the lamp beside the bed.
I began to look at the pictures on the walls, and as I did so I
read a small book. I found this book on the bed next to me. It
described all the pictures in the room, one by one, and told their
stories.
I looked and read for a long time, and the hours passed
quickly. Midnight came and went. My eyes became more and
more tired, and soon I found it hard to read the words on the
page. So I reached out — this was painful and difficult — and
moved the lamp closer. Now, the lamp's light fell in a different
part of the room, a part that was in deep shadow until then. I saw
more pictures, and among them there was a portrait of a young
woman. As soon as I saw it, I closed my eyes.