老妇人的故事 英文版The Old Wives' Tale
阿诺德.本涅特 Arnold Bennett
II
"Sam!" she cried from the top of the crooked stairs.
No answer. The door at the foot was closed.
"Sam!"
"Hello?" Distantly, faintly.
"I've done all I'm going to do to-night."
And she ran back along the corridor, a white figure in the deepgloom, and hurried into bed, and drew the clothes up to her chin.
In the life of a bride there are some dramatic moments. If she hasmarried the industrious apprentice, one of those moments occurswhen she first occupies the sacred bed-chamber of her ancestors,and the bed on which she was born. Her parents' room had alwaysbeen to Constance, if not sacred, at least invested with a certainmoral solemnity. She could not enter it as she would enter anotherroom. The course of nature, with its succession of deaths,conceptions, and births, slowly makes such a room august with amysterious quality which interprets the grandeur of mere existenceand imposes itself on all. Constance had the strangest sensationsin that bed, whose heavy dignity of ornament symbolized a pastage; sensations of sacrilege and trespass, of being a naughty girlto whom punishment would accrue for this shocking freak. Not sinceshe was quite tiny had she slept in that bed--one night with hermother, before her father's seizure, when he had been away. What alimitless, unfathomable bed it was then! Now it was just a bed--soshe had to tell herself--like any other bed. The tiny child that,safely touching its mother, had slept in the vast expanse, seemedto her now a pathetic little thing; its image made her feelmelancholy. And her mind dwelt on sad events: the death of herfather, the flight of darling Sophia; the immense grief, and theexile, of her mother. She esteemed that she knew what life was,and that it was grim. And she sighed. But the sigh was anaffectation, meant partly to convince herself that she was grown-up, and partly to keep her in countenance in the intimidating bed.This melancholy was factitious, was less than transient foam onthe deep sea of her joy. Death and sorrow and sin were dim shapesto her; the ruthless egoism of happiness blew them away with apuff, and their wistful faces vanished. To see her there in thebed, framed in mahogany and tassels, lying on her side, with heryoung glowing cheeks, and honest but not artless gaze, and therich curve of her hip lifting the counterpane, one would have saidthat she had never heard of aught but love.
Mr. Povey entered, the bridegroom, quickly, firmly, carrying itoff rather well, but still self-conscious. "After all," hisshoulders were trying to say, "what's the difference between thisbedroom and the bedroom of a boarding-house? Indeed, ought we notto feel more at home here? Besides, confound it, we've beenmarried a fortnight!"
"Doesn't it give you a funny feeling, sleeping in this room? Itdoes me," said Constance. Women, even experienced women, are sofoolishly frank. They have no decency, no self-respect.
"Really?" replied Mr. Povey, with loftiness, as who should say:"What an extraordinary thing that a reasonable creature can havesuch fancies! Now to me this room is exactly like any other room."And he added aloud, glancing away from the glass, where he wasunfastening his necktie: "It's not a bad room at all." This, withthe judicial air of an auctioneer.
Not for an instant did he deceive Constance, who read his realsensations with accuracy. But his futile poses did not in theslightest degree lessen her respect for him. On the contrary, sheadmired him the more for them; they were a sort of embroidery onthe solid stuff of his character. At that period he could not dowrong for her. The basis of her regard for him was, she oftenthought, his honesty, his industry, his genuine kindliness of act,his grasp of the business, his perseverance, his passion for doingat once that which had to be done. She had the greatest admirationfor his qualities, and he was in her eyes an indivisible whole;she could not admire one part of him and frown upon another.Whatever he did was good because he did it. She knew that somepeople were apt to smile at certain phases of his individuality;she knew that far down in her mother's heart was a suspicion thatshe had married ever so little beneath her. But this knowledge didnot disturb her. She had no doubt as to the correctness of her ownestimate.
Mr. Povey was an exceedingly methodical person, and he was alsoone of those persons who must always be 'beforehand' with time.Thus at night he would arrange his raiment so that in the morningit might be reassumed in the minimum of minutes. He was not a man,for example, to leave the changing of studs from one shirt toanother till the morrow. Had it been practicable, he would havebrushed his hair the night before. Constance already loved towatch his meticulous preparations. She saw him now go into his oldbedroom and return with a paper collar, which he put on thedressing-table next to a black necktie. His shop-suit was laid outon a chair.
"Oh, Sam!" she exclaimed impulsively, "you surely aren't going tobegin wearing those horrid paper collars again!" During thehoneymoon he had worn linen collars.
Her tone was perfectly gentle, but the remark, nevertheless,showed a lack of tact. It implied that all his life Mr. Povey hadbeen enveloping his neck in something which was horrid. Like allpersons with a tendency to fall into the ridiculous, Mr. Povey wasexceedingly sensitive to personal criticisms. He flushed darkly.
"I didn't know they were 'horrid,'" he snapped. He was hurt andangry. Anger had surprised him unawares.
Both of them suddenly saw that they were standing on the edge of achasm, and drew back. They had imagined themselves to be wanderingsafely in a flowered meadow, and here was this bottomless chasm!It was most disconcerting.
Mr. Povey's hand hovered undecided over the collar. "However--" hemuttered.
"Just as you like, dear," she said quickly. "Please!"
"Oh no!" And he did his best to smile, and went off gawkily withthe collar and came back with a linen one.
Her passion for him burned stronger than ever. She knew then thatshe did not love him for his good qualities, but for somethingboyish and naive that there was about him, an indescribablesomething that occasionally, when his face was close to hers, madeher dizzy.
The chasm had disappeared. In such moments, when each must pretendnot to have seen or even suspected the chasm, small-talk isessential.
"Wasn't that Mr. Yardley in the shop to-night?" began Constance.
"Yes."
"What did he want?"
"I'd sent for him. He's going to paint us a signboard."
Useless for Samuel to make-believe that nothing in this world ismore ordinary than a signboard.
"Oh!" murmured Constance. She said no more, the episode of thepaper collar having weakened her self-confidence.
But a signboard!
What with servants, chasms, and signboards, Constance consideredthat her life as a married woman would not be deficient inexcitement. Long afterwards, she fell asleep, thinking of Sophia.