老妇人的故事 英文版The Old Wives' Tale
阿诺德.本涅特 Arnold Bennett
I
In the year 1893 there was a new and strange man living at No. 4,St. Luke's Square. Many people remarked on the phenomenon. Veryfew of his like had ever been seen in Bursley before. One of thestriking things about him was the complex way in which he securedhimself by means of glittering chains. A chain stretched acrosshis waistcoat, passing through a special button-hole, without abutton, in the middle. To this cable were firmly linked a watch atone end and a pencil-case at the other; the chain also served as aprotection against a thief who might attempt to snatch the fancywaistcoat entire. Then there were longer chains, beneath thewaistcoat, partly designed, no doubt, to deflect bullets, butserving mainly to enable the owner to haul up penknives,cigarette-cases, match-boxes, and key-rings from the profunditiesof hip-pockets. An essential portion of the man's braces, visiblesometimes when he played at tennis, consisted of chain, and theupper and nether halves of his cuff-links were connected bychains. Occasionally he was to be seen chained to a dog.
A reversion, conceivably, to a mediaeval type! Yes, but also theexemplar of the excessively modern! Externally he was aconsequence of the fact that, years previously, the leading tailorin Bursley had permitted his son to be apprenticed in London. Thefather died; the son had the wit to return and make a fortunewhile creating a new type in the town, a type of which multiplechains were but one feature, and that the least expensive if themost salient. For instance, up to the historic year in which theyoung tailor created the type, any cap was a cap in Bursley, andany collar was a collar. But thenceforward no cap was a cap, andno collar was a collar, which did not exactly conform in shape andmaterial to certain sacred caps and collars guarded by the youngtailor in his back shop. None knew why these sacred caps andcollars were sacred, but they were; their sacredness endured forabout six months, and then suddenly--again none knew why--theyfell from their estate and became lower than offal for dogs, andwere supplanted on the altar. The type brought into existence bythe young tailor was to be recognized by its caps and collars, andin a similar manner by every other article of attire, except itsboots. Unfortunately the tailor did not sell boots, and so imposedon his creatures no mystical creed as to boots. This was a pity,for the boot-makers of the town happened not to be inflamed by thetype-creating passion as the tailor was, and thus the new typefinished abruptly at the edges of the tailor's trousers.
The man at No. 4, St. Luke's Square had comparatively small andnarrow feet, which gave him an advantage; and as he was endowedwith a certain vague general physical distinction he managed,despite the eternal untidiness of his hair, to be eminent amongthe type. Assuredly the frequent sight of him in her houseflattered the pride of Constance's eye, which rested on him almostalways with pleasure. He had come into the house with startlingabruptness soon after Cyril left school and was indentured to thehead-designer at "Peel's," that classic earthenware manufactory.The presence of a man in her abode disconcerted Constance at thebeginning; but she soon grew accustomed to it, perceiving that aman would behave as a man, and must be expected to do so. Thisman, in truth, did what he liked in all things. Cyril havingalways been regarded by both his parents as enormous, one wouldhave anticipated a giant in the new man; but, queerly, he wasslim, and little above the average height. Neither in enormity norin many other particulars did he resemble the Cyril whom he hadsupplanted. His gestures were lighter and quicker; he had nothingof Cyril's ungainliness; he had not Cyril's limitless taste forsweets, nor Cyril's terrific hatred of gloves, barbers, and soap.He was much more dreamy than Cyril, and much busier. In fact,Constance only saw him at meal-times. He was at Peel's in the dayand at the School of Art every night. He would dream during ameal, even; and, without actually saying so, he gave theimpression that he was the busiest man in Bursley, wrapped inoccupations and preoccupations as in a blanket--a blanket whichConstance had difficulty in penetrating.
Constance wanted to please him; she lived for nothing but toplease him; he was, however, exceedingly difficult to please, notin the least because he was hypercritical and exacting, butbecause he was indifferent. Constance, in order to satisfy herdesire of pleasing, had to make fifty efforts, in the hope that hemight chance to notice one. He was a good man, amazinglyindustrious--when once Constance had got him out of bed in themorning; with no vices; kind, save when Constance mistakenly triedto thwart him; charming, with a curious strain of humour thatConstance only half understood. Constance was unquestionably vainabout him, and she could honestly find in him little to blame. Butwhereas he was the whole of her universe, she was merely a dimfigure in the background of his. Every now and then, with hisgentle, elegant raillery, he would apparently rediscover her, asthough saying: "Ah! You're still there, are you?" Constance couldnot meet him on the plane where his interests lay, and he neverknew the passionate intensity of her absorption in that minor partof his life which moved on her plane. He never worried about hersolitude, or guessed that in throwing her a smile and a word atsupper he was paying her meagrely for three hours of lone rockingin a rocking-chair.
The worst of it was that she was quite incurable. No experiencewould suffice to cure her trick of continually expecting him tonotice things which he never did notice. One day he said, in themidst of a silence: "By the way, didn't father leave any boxes ofcigars?" She had the steps up into her bedroom and reached downfrom the dusty top of the wardrobe the box which she had put thereafter Samuel's funeral. In handing him the box she was doing agreat deed. His age was nineteen and she was ratifying hisprecocious habit of smoking by this solemn gift. He entirelyignored the box for several days. She said timidly: "Have youtried those cigars?" "Not yet," he replied. "I'll try 'em one ofthese days." Ten days later, on a Sunday when he chanced not tohave gone out with his aristocratic friend Matthew Peel-Swynnerton, he did at length open the box and take out a cigar."Now," he observed roguishly, cutting the cigar, "we shall see,Mrs. Plover!" He often called her Mrs. Plover, for fun. Though sheliked him to be sufficiently interested in her to tease her, shedid not like being called Mrs. Plover, and she never failed tosay: "I'm not Mrs. Plover." He smoked the cigar slowly, in therocking-chair, throwing his head back and sending clouds to theceiling. And afterwards he remarked: "The old man's cigars weren'tso bad." "Indeed!" she answered tartly, as if maternally resentingthis easy patronage. But in secret she was delighted. There wassomething in her son's favourable verdict on her husband's cigarsthat thrilled her.
And she looked at him. Impossible to see in him any resemblance tohis father! Oh! He was a far more brilliant, more advanced, morecomplicated, more seductive being than his homely father! Shewondered where he had come from. And yet ...! If his father hadlived, what would have occurred between them? Would the boy havebeen openly smoking cigars in the house at nineteen?
She laboriously interested herself, so far as he would allow, inhis artistic studies and productions. A back attic on the secondfloor was now transformed into a studio--a naked apartment whichsmelt of oil and of damp clay. Often there were traces of clay onthe stairs. For working in clay he demanded of his mother a smock,and she made a smock, on the model of a genuine smock which sheobtained from a country-woman who sold eggs and butter in theCovered Market. Into the shoulders of the smock she put a week'sfancy-stitching, taking the pattern from an old book ofembroidery. One day when he had seen her stitching morn, noon, andafternoon, at the smock, he said, as she rocked idly after supper:"I suppose you haven't forgotten all about the smock I asked youfor, have you, mater?" She knew that he was teasing her; but,while perfectly realizing how foolish she was, she nearly alwaysacted as though his teasing was serious; she picked up the smockagain from the sofa. When the smock was finished he examined itintently; then exclaimed with an air of surprise: "By Jove! That'sbeautiful! Where did you get this pattern? "He continued to stareat it, smiling in pleasure. He turned over the tattered leaves ofthe embroidery-book with the same naive, charmed astonishment, andcarried the book away to the studio. "I must show that toSwynnerton," he said. As for her, the epithet 'beautiful' seemed astrange epithet to apply to a mere piece of honest stitchery donein a pattern, and a stitch with which she had been familiar allher life. The fact was she understood his 'art' less and less. Thesole wall decoration of his studio was a Japanese print, whichstruck her as being entirely preposterous, considered as apicture. She much preferred his own early drawings of moss-rosesand picturesque castles--things that he now mercilessly contemned.Later, he discovered her cutting out another smock. "What's thatfor?" he inquired. "Well," she said, "you can't manage with onesmock. What shall you do when that one has to go to the wash?""Wash!" he repeated vaguely. "There's no need for it to go to thewash." "Cyril," she replied, "don't try my patience! I wasthinking of making you half-a-dozen." He whistled. "With all thatstitching?" he questioned, amazed at the undertaking. "Why not?"she said. In her young days, no seamstress ever made fewer thanhalf-a-dozen of anything, and it was usually a dozen; it wassometimes half-a-dozen dozen. "Well," he murmured, "you have got anerve! I'll say that." Similar things happened whenever he showedthat he was pleased. If he said of a dish, in the local tongue: "Icould do a bit of that!" or if he simply smacked his lips over it,she would surfeit him with that dish.