一双蓝眼睛 英文版 A Pair of Blue Eyes
托马斯.哈代 Thomas Hardy
Chapter XI Page 1
'Journeys end in lovers meeting.'
connectedwith that outcast lover of hers.brigs,barques, and schooners, either?
Stephen lay watching the Great Bear; Elfride was regarding amonotonous parallelogram of window blind. Neither slept thatnight.
Early the next morning--that is to say, four hours after theirstolen interview, and just as the earliest servant was heardmoving about--Stephen Smith went downstairs, portmanteau in hand.Throughout the night he had intended to see Mr. Swancourt again,but the sharp rebuff of the previous evening rendered such aninterview particularly distasteful. Perhaps there was another andless honest reason. He decided to put it off. Whatever of moraltimidity or obliquity may have lain in such a decision, noperception of it was strong enough to detain him. He wrote a notein his room, which stated simply that he did not feel happy in thehouse after Mr. Swancourt's sudden veto on what he had favoured afew hours before; but that he hoped a time would come, and thatsoon, when his original feelings of pleasure as Mr. Swancourt'sguest might be recovered.
He expected to find the downstairs rooms wearing the gray andcheerless aspect that early morning gives to everything out of thesun. He found in the dining room a breakfast laid, of whichsomebody had just partaken.
Stephen gave the maid-servant his note of adieu. She stated thatMr. Swancourt had risen early that morning, and made an earlybreakfast. He was not going away that she knew of.
Stephen took a cup of coffee, left the house of his love, andturned into the lane. It was so early that the shaded placesstill smelt like night time, and the sunny spots had hardly feltthe sun. The horizontal rays made every shallow dip in the groundto show as a well-marked hollow. Even the channel of the path wasenough to throw shade, and the very stones of the road casttapering dashes of darkness westward, as long as Jael's tent-nail.
At a spot not more than a hundred yards from the vicar's residencethe lane leading thence crossed the high road. Stephen reachedthe point of intersection, stood still and listened. Nothingcould be heard save the lengthy, murmuring line of the sea uponthe adjacent shore. He looked at his watch, and then mounted agate upon which he seated himself, to await the arrival of thecarrier. Whilst he sat he heard wheels coming in two directions.
The vehicle approaching on his right he soon recognized as thecarrier's. There were the accompanying sounds of the owner'svoice and the smack of his whip, distinct in the still morningair, by which he encouraged his horses up the hill.
The other set of wheels sounded from the lane Stephen had justtraversed. On closer observation, he perceived that they weremoving from the precincts of the ancient manor-house adjoining thevicarage grounds. A carriage then left the entrance gates of thehouse, and wheeling round came fully in sight. It was a plaintravelling carriage, with a small quantity of luggage, apparentlya lady's. The vehicle came to the junction of the four ways half-a-minute before the carrier reached the same spot, and crosseddirectly in his front, proceeding by the lane on the other side.
Inside the carriage Stephen could just discern an elderly ladywith a younger woman, who seemed to be her maid. The road theyhad taken led to Stratleigh, a small watering-place sixteen milesnorth.
He heard the manor-house gates swing again, and looking up sawanother person leaving them, and walking off in the direction ofthe parsonage. 'Ah, how much I wish I were moving that way!' felthe parenthetically. The gentleman was tall, and resembled Mr.Swancourt in outline and attire. He opened the vicarage gate andwent in. Mr. Swancourt, then, it certainly was. Instead ofremaining in bed that morning Mr. Swancourt must have taken itinto his head to see his new neighbour off on a journey. He musthave been greatly interested in that neighbour to do such anunusual thing.
The carrier's conveyance had pulled up, and Stephen now handed inhis portmanteau and mounted the shafts. 'Who is that lady in thecarriage?' he inquired indifferently of Lickpan the carrier.
'That, sir, is Mrs. Troyton, a widder wi' a mint o' money. She'sthe owner of all that part of Endelstow that is not LordLuxellian's. Only been here a short time; she came into it bylaw. The owner formerly was a terrible mysterious party--neverlived here--hardly ever was seen here except in the month ofSeptember, as I might say.'
The horses were started again, and noise rendered furtherdiscourse a matter of too great exertion. Stephen crept insideunder the tilt, and was soon lost in reverie.
Three hours and a half of straining up hills and jogging downbrought them to St. Launce's, the market town and railway stationnearest to Endelstow, and the place from which Stephen Smith hadjourneyed over the downs on the, to him, memorable winter eveningat the beginning of the same year. The carrier's van was so timedas to meet a starting up-train, which Stephen entered. Two orthree hours' railway travel through vertical cuttings inmetamorphic rock, through oak copses rich and green, stretchingover slopes and down delightful valleys, glens, and ravines,sparkling with water like many-rilled Ida, and he plunged amid thehundred and fifty thousand people composing the town of Plymouth.
There being some time upon his hands he left his luggage at thecloak-room, and went on foot along Bedford Street to the nearestchurch. Here Stephen wandered among the multifarious tombstonesand looked in at the chancel window, dreaming of something thatwas likely to happen by the altar there in the course of thecoming month. He turned away and ascended the Hoe, viewed themagnificent stretch of sea and massive promontories of land, butwithout particularly discerning one feature of the variedperspective. He still saw that inner prospect--the event he hopedfor in yonder church. The wide Sound, the Breakwater, the light-house on far-off Eddystone, the dark steam vessels, brigs,barques, and schooners, either floating stilly, or gliding withtiniest motion, were as the dream, then; the dreamed-of event wasas the reality.
Soon Stephen went down from the Hoe, and returned to the railwaystation. He took his ticket, and entered the London train.
That day was an irksome time at Endelstow vicarage. Neitherfather nor daughter alluded to the departure of Stephen. Mr.Swancourt's manner towards her partook of the compunctiouskindness that arises from a misgiving as to the justice of someprevious act.
Either from lack of the capacity to grasp the whole coup d'oeil,or from a natural endowment for certain kinds of stoicism, womenare cooler than men in critical situations of the passive form.Probably, in Elfride's case at least, it was blindness to thegreater contingencies of the future she was preparing for herself,which enabled her to ask her father in a quiet voice if he couldgive her a holiday soon, to ride to St. Launce's and go on toPlymouth.
Now, she had only once before gone alone to Plymouth, and that wasin consequence of some unavoidable difficulty. Being a countrygirl, and a good, not to say a wild, horsewoman, it had been herdelight to canter, without the ghost of an attendant, over thefourteen or sixteen miles of hard road intervening between theirhome and the station at St. Launce's, put up the horse, and go onthe remainder of the distance by train, returning in the samemanner in the evening. It was then resolved that, though she hadsuccessfully accomplished this journey once, it was not to berepeated without some attendance.
But Elfride must not be confounded with ordinary young feminineequestrians. The circumstances of her lonely and narrow life madeit imperative that in trotting about the neighbourhood she musttrot alone or else not at all. Usage soon rendered this perfectlynatural to herself. Her father, who had had other experiences,did not much like the idea of a Swancourt, whose pedigree could beas distinctly traced as a thread in a skein of silk, scamperingover the hills like a farmer's daughter, even though he couldhabitually neglect her. But what with his not being able toafford her a regular attendant, and his inveterate habit ofletting anything be to save himself trouble, the circumstance grewcustomary. And so there arose a chronic notion in the villagers'minds that all ladies rode without an attendant, like MissSwancourt, except a few who were sometimes visiting at LordLuxellian's.
'I don't like your going to Plymouth alone, particularly going toSt. Launce's on horseback. Why not drive, and take the man?'
'It is not nice to be so overlooked.' Worm's company would notseriously have interfered with her plans, but it was her humour togo without him.
'When do you want to go?' said her father.
She only answered, 'Soon.'
'I will consider,' he said.
Only a few days elapsed before she asked again. A letter hadreached her from Stephen. It had been timed to come on that dayby special arrangement between them. In it he named the earliestmorning on which he could meet her at Plymouth. Her father hadbeen on a journey to Stratleigh, and returned in unusual buoyancyof spirit. It was a good opportunity; and since the dismissal ofStephen her father had been generally in a mood to make smallconcessions, that he might steer clear of large ones connectedwith that outcast lover of hers.
'Next Thursday week I am going from home in a differentdirection,' said her father. 'In fact, I shall leave home thenight before. You might choose the same day, for they wish totake up the carpets, or some such thing, I think. As I said, Idon't like you to be seen in a town on horseback alone; but go ifyou will.'
Thursday week. Her father had named the very day that Stephenalso had named that morning as the earliest on which it would beof any use to meet her; that was, about fifteen days from the dayon which he had left Endelstow. Fifteen days--that fragment ofduration which has acquired such an interesting individuality fromits connection with the English marriage law.
She involuntarily looked at her father so strangely, that onbecoming conscious of the look she paled with embarrassment. Herfather, too, looked confused. What was he thinking of?
There seemed to be a special facility offered her by a powerexternal to herself in the circumstance that Mr. Swancourt hadproposed to leave home the night previous to her wished-for day.Her father seldom took long journeys; seldom slept from homeexcept perhaps on the night following a remote Visitation. Well,she would not inquire too curiously into the reason of theopportunity, nor did he, as would have been natural, proceed toexplain it of his own accord. In matters of fact there hadhitherto been no reserve between them, though they were notusually confidential in its full sense. But the divergence oftheir emotions on Stephen's account had produced an estrangementwhich just at present went even to the extent of reticence on themost ordinary household topics.
Elfride was almost unconsciously relieved, persuading herself thather father's reserve on his business justified her in secrecy asregarded her own--a secrecy which was necessarily a foregonedecision with her. So anxious is a young conscience to discover apalliative, that the ex post facto nature of a reason is of noaccount in excluding it.
The intervening fortnight was spent by her mostly in walking byherself among the shrubs and trees, indulging sometimes insanguine anticipations; more, far more frequently, in misgivings.All her flowers seemed dull of hue; her pets seemed to lookwistfully into her eyes, as if they no longer stood in the samefriendly relation to her as formerly. She wore melancholyjewellery, gazed at sunsets, and talked to old men and women. Itwas the first time that she had had an inner and private worldapart from the visible one about her. She wished that her father,instead of neglecting her even more than usual, would make someadvance--just one word; she would then tell all, and riskStephen's displeasure. Thus brought round to the youth again, shesaw him in her fancy, standing, touching her, his eyes full of sadaffection, hopelessly renouncing his attempt because she hadrenounced hers; and she could not recede.
On the Wednesday she was to receive another letter. She hadresolved to let her father see the arrival of this one, be theconsequences what they might: the dread of losing her lover bythis deed of honesty prevented her acting upon the resolve. Fiveminutes before the postman's expected arrival she slipped out, anddown the lane to meet him. She met him immediately upon turning asharp angle, which hid her from view in the direction of thevicarage. The man smilingly handed one missive, and was going onto hand another, a circular from some tradesman.
'No,' she said; 'take that on to the house.'
'Why, miss, you are doing what your father has done for the lastfortnight.'
She did not comprehend.
scamp forsurreptitiously preserving some blind kittens that ought to havebeen !
'Why, come to this corner, and take a letter of me every morning,all writ in the same handwriting, and letting any others for himgo on to the house.' And on the postman went.
No sooner had he turned the corner behind her back than she heardher father meet and address the man. She had saved her letter bytwo minutes. Her father audibly went through precisely the sameperformance as she had just been guilty of herself.
This stealthy conduct of his was, to say the least, peculiar.
Given an impulsive inconsequent girl, neglected as to her innerlife by her only parent, and the following forces alive withinher; to determine a resultant:
First love acted upon by a deadly fear of separation from itsobject: inexperience, guiding onward a frantic wish to prevent theabove-named issue: misgivings as to propriety, met by hope ofultimate exoneration: indignation at parental inconsistency infirst encouraging, then forbidding: a chilling sense ofdisobedience, overpowered by a conscientious inability to brook abreaking of plighted faith with a man who, in essentials, hadremained unaltered from the beginning: a blessed hope thatopposition would turn an erroneous judgement: a bright faith thatthings would mend thereby, and wind up well.
Probably the result would, after all, have been nil, had not thefollowing few remarks been made one day at breakfast.
Her father was in his old hearty spirits. He smiled to himself atstories too bad to tell, and called Elfride a little scamp forsurreptitiously preserving some blind kittens that ought to havebeen drowned. After this expression, she said to him suddenly:
If Mr. Smith had been already in the family, you would not havebeen made wretched by discovering he had poor relations?'
'Do you mean in the family by marriage?' he replied inattentively,and continuing to peel his egg.
The accumulating scarlet told that was her meaning, as much as theaffirmative reply.
'I should have put up with it, no doubt,' Mr. Swancourt observed.
'So that you would not have been driven into hopeless melancholy,but have made the best of him?'
Elfride's erratic mind had from her youth upwards been constantlyin the habit of perplexing her father by hypothetical questions,based on absurd conditions. The present seemed to be cast soprecisely in the mould of previous ones that, not being given tosyntheses of circumstances, he answered it with customarycomplacency.
'If he were allied to us irretrievably, of course I, or anysensible man, should accept conditions that could not be altered;certainly not be hopelessly melancholy about it. I don't believeanything in the world would make me hopelessly melancholy. Anddon't let anything make you so, either.'
'I won't, papa,' she cried, with a serene brightness that pleasedhim.
Certainly Mr. Swancourt must have been far from thinking that thebrightness came from an exhilarating intention to hold back nolonger from the mad action she had planned.
In the evening he drove away towards Stratleigh, quite alone. Itwas an unusual course for him. At the door Elfride had been againalmost impelled by her feelings to pour out all.
'Why are you going to Stratleigh, papa?' she said, and looked athim longingly.
'I will tell you to-morrow when I come back,' he said cheerily;'not before then, Elfride. Thou wilt not utter what thou dost notknow, and so far will I trust thee, gentle Elfride.'
She was repressed and hurt.
'I will tell you my errand to Plymouth, too, when I come back,'she murmured.
He went away. His jocularity made her intention seem the lighter,as his indifference made her more resolved to do as she liked.
It was a familiar September sunset, dark-blue fragments of cloudupon an orange-yellow sky. These sunsets used to tempt her towalk towards them, as any beautiful thing tempts a near approach.She went through the field to the privet hedge, clambered into themiddle of it, and reclined upon the thick boughs. After lookingwestward for a considerable time, she blamed herself for notlooking eastward to where Stephen was, and turned round.Ultimately her eyes fell upon the ground.
A peculiarity was observable beneath her. A green field spreaditself on each side of the hedge, one belonging to the glebe, theother being a part of the land attached to the manor-houseadjoining. On the vicarage side she saw a little footpath, thedistinctive and altogether exceptional feature of which consistedin its being only about ten yards long; it terminated abruptly ateach end.
A footpath, suddenly beginning and suddenly ending, coming fromnowhere and leading nowhere, she had never seen before.
Yes, she had, on second thoughts. She had seen exactly such apath trodden in the front of barracks by the sentry.
And this recollection explained the origin of the path here. Herfather had trodden it by pacing up and down, as she had once seenhim doing.
Sitting on the hedge as she sat now, her eyes commanded a view ofboth sides of it. And a few minutes later, Elfride looked over tothe manor side.
Here was another sentry path. It was like the first in length,and it began and ended exactly opposite the beginning and endingof its neighbour, but it was thinner, and less distinct.
Two reasons existed for the difference. This one might have beentrodden by a similar weight of tread to the other, exercised aless number of times; or it might have been walked just asfrequently, but by lighter feet.
Probably a gentleman from Scotland-yard, had he been passing atthe time, might have considered the latter alternative as the moreprobable. Elfride thought otherwise, so far as she thought atall. But her own great To-Morrow was now imminent; all thoughtsinspired by casual sights of the eye were only allowed to exercisethemselves in inferior corners of her brain, previously to beingbanished altogether.
Elfride was at length compelled to reason practically upon herundertaking. All her definite perceptions thereon, when theemotion accompanying them was abstracted, amounted to no more thanthese:
'Say an hour and three-quarters to ride to St. Launce's.