Nostromo: A Tale of the Seaboard
His voice was covered by the booming of the great bell of the cathedral. Three single strokes, one after another, burst out explosively, dying away in deep and mellow vibrations. And then all the bells in the tower of even' church, convent, or chapel in town, even those that had remained shut up for years, pealed out together with a i rush. In this furious flood of metallic uproar there was a power of suggesting images of strife and violence which blanched Mrs. Gould's cheek, Basilio, who had been waiting at table shrinking within himself, clung to the sideboard with chattering teeth. It was impossible to hear yourself speak.
"Shut these windows!" Charles Gould yelled at him, angrily. All the other servants, terrified at what they for the signal of a general massacre, had rushed upstairs, tumbling over each other, men and women, the obscure and generally invisible population of the ground floor on the four sides of the patio. The women screaming "Misericordia!" ran right into the room, and, falling on their knees against the walls, began to cross themselves convulsively. The staring heads of men blocked the doorway in an instant—mozos from stable, gardeners, nondescript helpers living on crumbs of the munificent house—and Charles Gould beheld all the extent of his domestic establishment even to the gate-keeper. This was a half-paralyzed old man, whose long, white locks fell down to his shoulders—an heirloom taken up by Charles Gould's familial piety. He could remember Henry Gould, an Englishman and Costaguanero of the second generation, chief of the Sulaco province; he had been his personal mozo years and years ago, in peace and war; had
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