老妇人的故事 英文版The Old Wives' Tale
阿诺德.本涅特 Arnold Bennett
III
The girls made way for him to pass them at the head of thetwisting stairs which led down to the parlour. Constance followed,and Sophia followed Constance.
"Have father's chair," said Constance.
There were two rocking-chairs with fluted backs covered byantimacassars, one on either side of the hearth. That to the leftwas still entitled "father's chair," though its owner had not satin it since long before the Crimean war, and would never sit in itagain.
said Sophia eagerly. right hand was behind her back.father.
"I think I'd sooner have the other one," said Mr. Povey, "becauseit's on the right side, you see." And he touched his right cheek.
Having taken Mrs. Baines's chair, he bent his face down to thefire, seeking comfort from its warmth. Sophia poked the fire,whereupon Mr. Povey abruptly withdrew his face. He then feltsomething light on his shoulders. Constance had taken theantimacassar from the back of the chair, and protected him with itfrom the draughts. He did not instantly rebel, and therefore waspermanently barred from rebellion. He was entrapped by theantimacassar. It formally constituted him an invalid, andConstance and Sophia his nurses. Constance drew the curtain acrossthe street door. No draught could come from the window, for thewindow was not 'made to open.' The age of ventilation had notarrived. Sophia shut the other two doors. And, each near a door,the girls gazed at Mr. Povey behind his back, irresolute, butfilled with a delicious sense of responsibility.
The situation was on a different plane now. The seriousness of Mr.Povey's toothache, which became more and more manifest, hadalready wiped out the ludicrous memory of the encounter in theshowroom. Looking at these two big girls, with their short-sleevedblack frocks and black aprons, and their smooth hair, and theircomposed serious faces, one would have judged them incapable ofthe least lapse from an archangelic primness; Sophia especiallypresented a marvellous imitation of saintly innocence. As for thetoothache, its action on Mr. Povey was apparently periodic; itgathered to a crisis like a wave, gradually, the tortureincreasing till the wave broke and left Mr. Povey exhausted, butfree for a moment from pain. These crises recurred about once aminute. And now, accustomed to the presence of the young virgins,and having tacitly acknowledged by his acceptance of theantimacassar that his state was abnormal, he gave himself upfrankly to affliction. He concealed nothing of his agony, whichwas fully displayed by sudden contortions of his frame, andfrantic oscillations of the rocking-chair. Presently, as he layback enfeebled in the wash of a spent wave, he murmured with asick man's voice:
"I suppose you haven't got any laudanum?"
The girls started into life. "Laudanum, Mr. Povey?"
"Yes, to hold in my mouth."
He sat up, tense; another wave was forming. The excellent fellowwas lost to all self-respect, all decency.
"There's sure to be some in mother's cupboard," said Sophia.
Constance, who bore Mrs. Baines's bunch of keys at her girdle, asolemn trust, moved a little fearfully to a corner cupboard whichwas hung in the angle to the right of the projecting fireplace,over a shelf on which stood a large copper tea-urn. That cornercupboard, of oak inlaid with maple and ebony in a simple borderpattern, was typical of the room. It was of a piece with the deepgreen "flock" wall paper, and the tea-urn, and the rocking-chairswith their antimacassars, and the harmonium in rosewood with aChinese paper-mache tea-caddy on the top of it; even with thecarpet, certainly the most curious parlour carpet that ever was,being made of lengths of the stair-carpet sewn together side byside. That corner cupboard was already old in service; it had heldthe medicines of generations. It gleamed darkly with the grave andgenuine polish which comes from ancient use alone. The key whichConstance chose from her bunch was like the cupboard, smooth andshining with years; it fitted and turned very easily, yet with afirm snap. The single wide door opened sedately as a portal.
The girls examined the sacred interior, which had the air of beinginhabited by an army of diminutive prisoners, each crying aloudwith the full strength of its label to be set free on a mission.
"There it is!" said Sophia eagerly.
And there it was: a blue bottle, with a saffron label, "Caution.POISON. Laudanum. Charles Critchlow, M.P.S. Dispensing Chemist.St. Luke's Square, Bursley."
Those large capitals frightened the girls. Constance took thebottle as she might have taken a loaded revolver, and she glancedat Sophia. Their omnipotent, all-wise mother was not present totell them what to do. They, who had never decided, had to decidenow. And Constance was the elder. Must this fearsome stuff, whosevery name was a name of fear, be introduced in spite of printedwarnings into Mr. Povey's mouth? The responsibility wasterrifying.
"Perhaps I'd just better ask Mr. Critchlow," Constance faltered.
The expectation of beneficent laudanum had enlivened Mr. Povey,had already, indeed, by a sort of suggestion, half cured histoothache.
"Oh no!" he said. "No need to ask Mr. Critchlow ... Two or threedrops in a little water." He showed impatience to be at thelaudanum.
The girls knew that an antipathy existed between the chemist andMr. Povey.
"It's sure to be all right," said Sophia. "I'll get the water."
With youthful cries and alarms they succeeded in pouring fourmortal dark drops (one more than Constance intended) into a cupcontaining a little water. And as they handed the cup to Mr. Poveytheir faces were the faces of affrighted comical conspirators.They felt so old and they looked so young.
Mr. Povey imbibed eagerly of the potion, put the cup on themantelpiece, and then tilted his head to the right so as tosubmerge the affected tooth. In this posture he remained, awaitingthe sweet influence of the remedy. The girls, out of a nicemodesty, turned away, for Mr. Povey must not swallow the medicine,and they preferred to leave him unhampered in the solution of adelicate problem. When next they examined him, he was leaning backin the rocking-chair with his mouth open and his eyes shut.
"Has it done you any good, Mr. Povey?"
"I think I'll lie down on the sofa for a minute," was Mr. Povey'sstrange reply; and forthwith he sprang up and flung himself on tothe horse-hair sofa between the fireplace and the window, where helay stripped of all his dignity, a mere beaten animal in a greysuit with peculiar coat-tails, and a very creased waistcoat, and alapel that was planted with pins, and a paper collar and close-fitting paper cuffs.
Constance ran after him with the antimacassar, which she spreadsoftly on his shoulders; and Sophia put another one over his thinlittle legs, all drawn up.
They then gazed at their handiwork, with secret self-accusationsand the most dreadful misgivings.
"He surely never swallowed it!" Constance whispered.
"He's asleep, anyhow," said Sophia, more loudly.
Mr. Povey was certainly asleep, and his mouth was very wide open--like a shop-door. The only question was whether his sleep was notan eternal sleep; the only question was whether he was not out ofhis pain for ever.
Then he snored--horribly; his snore seemed a portent of disaster.
Sophia approached him as though he were a bomb, and stared,growing bolder, into his mouth.
"Oh, Con," she summoned her sister, "do come and look! It's toodroll!"
In an instant all their four eyes were exploring the singularlandscape of Mr. Povey's mouth. In a corner, to the right of thatinterior, was one sizeable fragment of a tooth, that was attachedto Mr. Povey by the slenderest tie, so that at each respiration ofMr. Povey, when his body slightly heaved and the gale moaned inthe cavern, this tooth moved separately, showing that its longconnection with Mr. Povey was drawing to a close.
"That's the one," said Sophia, pointing. "And it's as loose asanything. Did you ever see such a funny thing?"
The extreme funniness of the thing had lulled in Sophia the fearof Mr. Povey's sudden death.
"I'll see how much he's taken," said Constance, preoccupied, goingto the mantelpiece.
"Why, I do believe---" Sophia began, and then stopped, glancing atthe sewing-machine, which stood next to the sofa.
It was a Howe sewing-machine. It had a little tool-drawer, and inthe tool-drawer was a small pair of pliers. Constance, engaged insniffing at the lees of the potion in order to estimate itsprobable deadliness, heard the well-known click of the littletool-drawer, and then she saw Sophia nearing Mr. Povey's mouthwith the pliers.
"Sophia!" she exclaimed, aghast. "What in the name of goodness areyou doing?"
"Nothing," said Sophia.
The next instant Mr. Povey sprang up out of his laudanum dream.
"It jumps!" he muttered; and, after a reflective pause, "but it'smuch better." He had at any rate escaped death.
Sophia's right hand was behind her back.
Just then a hawker passed down King Street, crying mussels andcockles.
"Oh!" Sophia almost shrieked. "Do let's have mussels and cocklesfor tea!" And she rushed to the door, and unlocked and opened it,regardless of the risk of draughts to Mr. Povey.
In those days people often depended upon the caprices of hawkersfor the tastiness of their teas; but it was an adventurous age,when errant knights of commerce were numerous and enterprising.You went on to your doorstep, caught your meal as it passed,withdrew, cooked it and ate it, quite in the manner of the earlyBriton.
Constance was obliged to join her sister on the top step. Sophiadescended to the second step.
"Fresh mussels and cockles all alive oh!" bawled the hawker,looking across the road in the April breeze. He was the celebratedHollins, a professional Irish drunkard, aged in iniquity, whocheerfully saluted magistrates in the street, and referred to theworkhouse, which he occasionally visited, as the Bastile.
Sophia was trembling from head to foot.
"What ARE you laughing at, you silly thing?" Constance demanded.
Sophia surreptitiously showed the pliers, which she had partlythrust into her pocket. Between their points was a mostperceptible, and even recognizable, fragment of Mr. Povey.
This was the crown of Sophia's career as a perpetrator of theunutterable.
"What!" Constance's face showed the final contortions of thathorrified incredulity which is forced to believe.
in mother's cupboard," said Sophia. career ?
Sophia nudged her violently to remind her that they were in thestreet, and also quite close to Mr. Povey.
"Now, my little missies," said the vile Hollins. "Three pence apint, and how's your honoured mother to-day? Yes, fresh, so helpme God!"