米德尔马契 英文版 Middlemarch
乔治.艾略特 George Eliot
CHAPTER LXIV. Page 2
"Very good, Mrs. Lydgate, very good. I am at your commands,whenever you require any service of me," said Mr. Trumbull, who feltpleasure in conjecturing that some new resources had been opened."Rely on me, I beg. The affair shall go no further."
That evening Lydgate was a little comforted by observing that Rosamondwas more lively than she had usually been of late, and even seemedinterested in doing what would please him without being asked.He thought, "If she will be happy and I can rub through, what doesit all signify? It is only a narrow swamp that we have to passin a long journey. If I can get my mind clear again, I shall do."
He was so much cheered that he began to search for an accountof experiments which he had long ago meant to look up, and hadneglected out of that creeping self-despair which comes in the trainof petty anxieties. He felt again some of the old delightfulabsorption in a far-reaching inquiry, while Rosamond played thequiet music which was as helpful to his meditation as the plashof an oar on the evening lake. It was rather late; he had pushedaway all the books, and was looking at the fire with his handsclasped behind his head in forgetfulness of everything except theconstruction of a new controlling experiment, when Rosamond, whohad left the piano and was leaning back in her chair watching him, said--
"Mr. Ned Plymdale has taken a house already."
Lydgate, startled and jarred, looked up in silence for a moment,like a man who has been disturbed in his sleep. Then flushingwith an unpleasant consciousness, he asked--
"How do you know?"
"I called at Mrs. Plymdale's this morning, and she told me that hehad taken the house in St. Peter's Place, next to Mr. Hackbutt's."
Lydgate was silent. He drew his hands from behind his head andpressed them against the hair which was hanging, as it was apt to do,in a mass on his forehead, while he rested his elbows on his knees.He was feeling bitter disappointment, as if he had openeda door out of a suffocating place and had found it walled up;but he also felt sure that Rosamond was pleased with the cause ofhis disappointment. He preferred not looking at her and not speaking,until he had got over the first spasm of vexation. After all,he said in his bitterness, what can a woman care about so muchas house and furniture? a husband without them is an absurdity.When he looked up and pushed his hair aside, his dark eyes hada miserable blank non-expectance of sympathy in them, but heonly said, coolly--
"Perhaps some one else may turn up. I told Trumbull to be onthe look-out if he failed with Plymdale."
"How much money is it that those disagreeable people want?"
"What disagreeable people?"
"Those who took the list--and the others. I mean, how much moneywould satisfy them so that you need not be troubled any more?"
Lydgate surveyed her for a moment, as if he were looking for symptoms,and then said, "Oh, if I could have got six hundred from Plymdalefor furniture and as premium, I might have managed. I could havepaid off Dover, and given enough on account to the others to makethem wait patiently, if we contracted our expenses."
"But I mean how much should you want if we stayed in this house?"
"More than I am likely to get anywhere," said Lydgate, with rathera grating sarcasm in his tone. It angered him to perceive thatRosamond's mind was wandering over impracticable wishes insteadof facing possible efforts.
"Why should you not mention the sum?" said Rosamond, with a mildindication that she did not like his manners.
"Well," said Lydgate in a guessing tone, "it would take at leasta thousand to set me at ease. But," he added, incisively, "I haveto consider what I shall do without it, not with it."
Rosamond said no more.
But the next day she carried out her plan of writing to SirGodwin Lydgate. Since the Captain's visit, she had received aletter from him, and also one from Mrs. Mengan, his married sister,condoling with her on the loss of her baby, and expressingvaguely the hope that they should see her again at Quallingham.Lydgate had told her that this politeness meant nothing; but shewas secretly convinced that any backwardness in Lydgate's familytowards him was due to his cold and contemptuous behavior, and shehad answered the letters in her most charming manner, feeling someconfidence that a specific invitation would follow. But there hadbeen total silence. The Captain evidently was not a great penman,and Rosamond reflected that the sisters might have been abroad.However, the season was come for thinking of friends at home,and at any rate Sir Godwin, who had chucked her under the chin,and pronounced her to be like the celebrated beauty, Mrs. Croly,who had made a conquest of him in 1790, would be touched by any appealfrom her, and would find it pleasant for her sake to behave as he oughtto do towards his nephew. Rosamond was naively convinced of what anold gentleman ought to do to prevent her from suffering annoyance.And she wrote what she considered the most judicious letter possible--one which would strike Sir Godwin as a proof of her excellent sense--pointing out how desirable it was that Tertius should quit such a placeas Middlemarch for one more fitted to his talents, how the unpleasantcharacter of the inhabitants had hindered his professional success,and how in consequence he was in money difficulties, from which itwould require a thousand pounds thoroughly to extricate him.She did not say that Tertius was unaware of her intention to write;for she had the idea that his supposed sanction of her letter wouldbe in accordance with what she did say of his great regard for hisuncle Godwin as the relative who had always been his best friend.Such was the force of Poor Rosamond's tactics now she applied themto affairs.
This had happened before the party on New Year's Day, and no answerhad yet come from Sir Godwin. But on the morning of that dayLydgate had to learn that Rosamond had revoked his order toBorthrop Trumbull. Feeling it necessary that she should be graduallyaccustomed to the idea of their quitting the house in Lowick Gate,he overcame his reluctance to speak to her again on the subject,and when they were breakfasting said--
"I shall try to see Trumbull this morning, and tell him to.advertise the house in the `Pioneer' and the `Trumpet.' If the thingwere advertised, some one might be inclined to take it who wouldnot otherwise have thought of a change. In these country placesmany people go on in their old houses when their families are toolarge for them, for want of knowing where they can find another.And Trumbull seems to have got no bite at all."
Rosamond knew that the inevitable moment was come. "I orderedTrumbull not to inquire further," she said, with a careful calmnesswhich was evidently defensive.
Lydgate stared at her in mute amazement. Only half an hourbefore he had been fastening up her plaits for her, and talkingthe "little language" of affection, which Rosamond, though notreturning it, accepted as if she had been a serene and lovely image,now and then miraculously dimpling towards her votary.With such fibres still astir in him, the shock he received couldnot at once be distinctly anger; it was confused pain. He laiddown the knife and fork with which he was carving, and throwinghimself back in his chair, said at last, with a cool irony in his tone--
"May I ask when and why you did so?"
"When I knew that the Plymdales had taken a house, I called to tellhim not to mention ours to them; and at the same time I told himnot to let the affair go on any further. I knew that it would bevery injurious to you if it were known that you wished to part withyour house and furniture, and I had a very strong objection to it.I think that was reason enough."
"It was of no consequence then that I had told you imperativereasons of another kind; of no consequence that I had come to adifferent conclusion, and given an order accordingly?" said Lydgate,bitingly, the thunder and lightning gathering about his brow and eyes.
The effect of any one's anger on Rosamond had always been to makeher shrink in cold dislike, and to become all the more calmly correct,in the conviction that she was not the person to misbehave whateverothers might do. She replied--
"I think I had a perfect right to speak on a subject which concernsme at least as much as you."
"Clearly--you had a right to speak, but only to me. You had no rightto contradict my orders secretly, and treat me as if I were a fool,"said Lydgate, in the same tone as before. Then with some added scorn,"Is it possible to make you understand what the consequences will be?Is it of any use for me to tell you again why we must try to partwith the house?"
"It is not necessary for you to tell me again," said Rosamond,in a voice that fell and trickled like cold water-drops. "I rememberedwhat you said. You spoke just as violently as you do now.But that does not alter my opinion that you ought to try everyother means rather than take a step which is so painful to me.And as to advertising the house, I think it would be perfectlydegrading to you."
"And suppose I disregard your opinion as you disregard mine?"
"You can do so, of course. But I think you ought to have told mebefore we were married that you would place me in the worst position,rather than give up your own will."
Lydgate did not speak, but tossed his head on one side, and twitchedthe corners of his mouth in despair. Rosamond, seeing that he wasnot looking at her, rose and set his cup of coffee before him; but hetook no notice of it, and went on with an inward drama and argument,occasionally moving in his seat, resting one arm on the table,and rubbing his hand against his hair. There was a conflux of emotionsand thoughts in him that would not let him either give thoroughway to his anger or persevere with simple rigidity of resolve.Rosamond took advantage of his silence.
"These would be very strong considerations," said Lydgate,half ironically--still there was a withered paleness about hislips as he looked at his coffee, and did not drink--"these wouldbe very strong considerations if I did not happen to be in debt."
"Many persons must have been in debt in the same way, but if theyare respectable, people trust them. I am sure I have heard papasay that the Torbits were in debt, and they went on very well. Itcannot be good to act rashly," said Rosamond, with serene wisdom.
Lydgate sat paralyzed by opposing impulses: since no reasoninghe could apply to Rosamond seemed likely to conquer her assent,he wanted to smash and grind some object on which he could at leastproduce an impression, or else to tell her brutally that he was master,and she must obey. But he not only dreaded the effect of suchextremities on their mutual life--he had a growing dread of Rosamond'squiet elusive obstinacy, which would not allow any assertion of powerto be final; and again, she had touched him in a spot of keenestfeeling by implying that she had been deluded with a false visionof happiness in marrying him. As to saying that he was master,it was not the fact. The very resolution to which he had wroughthimself by dint of logic and honorable pride was beginning to relaxunder her torpedo contact. He swallowed half his cup of coffee,and then rose to go.
"I may at least request that you will not go to Trumbull at present--until it has been seen that there are no other means," said Rosamond.Although she was not subject to much fear, she felt it safer notto betray that she had written to Sir Godwin. "Promise me that youwill not go to him for a few weeks, or without telling me."
Lydgate gave a short laugh. "I think it is I who should exacta promise that you will do nothing without telling me," he said,turning his eyes sharply upon her, and then moving to the door.
After a pause,she said--in the town,and without that first shock of revelation about Dover.
"You remember that we are going to dine at papa's," said Rosamond,wishing that he should turn and make a more thorough concessionto her. But he only said "Oh yes," impatiently, and went away.She held it to be very odious in him that he did not thinkthe painful propositions he had had to make to her were enough,without showing so unpleasant a temper. And when she put themoderate request that he would defer going to Trumbull again,it was cruel in him not to assure her of what he meant to do.She was convinced of her having acted in every way for the best;and each grating or angry speech of Lydgate's served onlyas an addition to the register of offences in her mind.Poor Rosamond for months had begun to associate her husband withfeelings of disappointment, and the terribly inflexible relationof marriage had lost its charm of encouraging delightful dreams.It had freed her from the disagreeables of her father's house,but it had not given her everything that she had wished and hoped.The Lydgate with whom she had been in love had been a group of airyconditions for her, most of which had disappeared, while theirplace had been taken by every-day details which must be livedthrough slowly from hour to hour, not floated through with a rapidselection of favorable aspects. The habits of Lydgate's profession,his home preoccupation with scientific subjects, which seemedto her almost like a morbid vampire's taste, his peculiar viewsof things which had never entered into the dialogue of courtship--all these continually alienating influences, even without the factof his having placed himself at a disadvantage in the town,and without that first shock of revelation about Dover's debt,would have made his presence dull to her. There was anotherpresence which ever since the early days of her marriage, until fourmonths ago, had been an agreeable excitement, but that was gone:Rosamond would not confess to herself how much the consequent blankhad to do with her utter ennui; and it seemed to her (perhapsshe was right) that an invitation to Quallingham, and an openingfor Lydgate to settle elsewhere than in Middlemarch--in London,or somewhere likely to be free from unpleasantness--would satisfy herquite well, and make her indifferent to the absence of Will Ladislaw,towards whom she felt some resentment for his exaltation ofMrs. Casaubon.
That was the state of things with Lydgate and Rosamond on the NewYear's Day when they dined at her father's, she looking mildlyneutral towards him in remembrance of his ill-tempered behaviorat breakfast, and he carrying a much deeper effect from the inwardconflict in which that morning scene was only one of many epochs.His flushed effort while talking to Mr. Farebrother--his effort afterthe cynical pretence that all ways of getting money are essentiallythe same, and that chance has an empire which reduces choiceto a fool's illusion--was but the symptom of a wavering resolve,a benumbed response to the old stimuli of enthusiasm.
What was he to do? He saw even more keenly than Rosamond didthe dreariness of taking her into the small house in Bride Street,where she would have scanty furniture around her and discontent within:a life of privation and life with Rosamond were two images whichhad become more and more irreconcilable ever since the threatof privation had disclosed itself. But even if his resolves hadforced the two images into combination, the useful preliminariesto that hard change were not visibly within reach. And thoughhe had not given the promise which his wife had asked for,he did not go again to Trumbull. He even began to thinkof taking a rapid journey to the North and seeing Sir Godwin.He had once believed that nothing would urge him into makingan application for money to his uncle, but he had not then knownthe full pressure of alternatives yet more disagreeable. He couldnot depend on the effect of a letter; it was only in an interview,however disagreeable this might be to himself, that he could givea thorough explanation and could test the effectiveness of kinship.No sooner had Lydgate begun to represent this step to himself asthe easiest than there was a reaction of anger that he--he who hadlong ago determined to live aloof from such abject calculations,such self-interested anxiety about the inclinations and the pocketsof men with whom he had been proud to have no aims in common--should havefallen not simply to their level, but to the level of soliciting them.