一双蓝眼睛 英文版 A Pair of Blue Eyes
托马斯.哈代 Thomas Hardy
Chapter XI Page 2
'Say half an hour at the Falcon to change my dress.
'Say two hours waiting for some train and getting to Plymouth.
'Say an hour to spare before twelve o'clock.
'Total time from leaving Endelstow till twelve o'clock, fivehours.
'Therefore I shall have to start at seven.'
No surprise or sense of unwontedness entered the minds of theservants at her early ride. The monotony of life we associatewith people of small incomes in districts out of the sound of therailway whistle, has one exception, which puts into shade theexperience of dwellers about the great centres of population--thatis, in travelling. Every journey there is more or less anadventure; adventurous hours are necessarily chosen for the mostcommonplace outing. Miss Elfride had to leave early--that wasall.
Elfride never went out on horseback but she brought homesomething--something found, or something bought. If she trottedto town or village, her burden was books. If to hills, woods, orthe seashore, it was wonderful mosses, abnormal twigs, ahandkerchief of wet shells or seaweed.
Once, in muddy weather, when Pansy was walking with her down thestreet of Castle Boterel, on a fair-day, a packet in front of herand a packet under her arm, an accident befell the packets, andthey slipped down. On one side of her, three volumes of fictionlay kissing the mud; on the other numerous skeins of polychromaticwools lay absorbing it. Unpleasant women smiled through windowsat the mishap, the men all looked round, and a boy, who wasminding a ginger-bread stall whilst the owner had gone to getdrunk, laughed loudly. The blue eyes turned to sapphires, and thecheeks crimsoned with vexation.
After that misadventure she set her wits to work, and wasingenious enough to invent an arrangement of small straps aboutthe saddle, by which a great deal could be safely carried thereon,in a small compass. Here she now spread out and fastened a plaindark walking-dress and a few other trifles of apparel. Wormopened the gate for her, and she vanished away.
left to themselves, make for where they are best.
One of the brightest mornings of late summer shone upon her. Theheather was at its purplest, the furze at its yellowest, thegrasshoppers chirped loud enough for birds, the snakes hissed likelittle engines, and Elfride at first felt lively. Sitting at easeupon Pansy, in her orthodox riding-habit and nondescript hat, shelooked what she felt. But the mercury of those days had a trickof falling unexpectedly. First, only for one minute in ten hadshe a sense of depression. Then a large cloud, that had beenhanging in the north like a black fleece, came and placed itselfbetween her and the sun. It helped on what was alreadyinevitable, and she sank into a uniformity of sadness.
She turned in the saddle and looked back. They were now on anopen table-land, whose altitude still gave her a view of the seaby Endelstow. She looked longingly at that spot.
During this little revulsion of feeling Pansy had been stilladvancing, and Elfride felt it would be absurd to turn her littlemare's head the other way. 'Still,' she thought, 'if I had amamma at home I WOULD go back!'
And making one of those stealthy movements by which women lettheir hearts juggle with their brains, she did put the horse'shead about, as if unconsciously, and went at a hand-gallop towardshome for more than a mile. By this time, from the inveteratehabit of valuing what we have renounced directly the alternativeis chosen, the thought of her forsaken Stephen recalled her, andshe turned about, and cantered on to St. Launce's again.
This miserable strife of thought now began to rage in all itswildness. Overwrought and trembling, she dropped the rein uponPansy's shoulders, and vowed she would be led whither the horsewould take her.
Pansy slackened her pace to a walk, and walked on with heragitated burden for three or four minutes. At the expiration ofthis time they had come to a little by-way on the right, leadingdown a slope to a pool of water. The pony stopped, looked towardsthe pool, and then advanced and stooped to drink.
Elfride looked at her watch and discovered that if she were goingto reach St. Launce's early enough to change her dress at theFalcon, and get a chance of some early train to Plymouth--therewere only two available--it was necessary to proceed at once.
She was impatient. It seemed as if Pansy would never stopdrinking; and the repose of the pool, the idle motions of theinsects and flies upon it, the placid waving of the flags, theleaf-skeletons, like Genoese filigree, placidly sleeping at thebottom, by their contrast with her own turmoil made her impatiencegreater.
Pansy did turn at last, and went up the slope again to the high-road. The pony came upon it, and stood cross-wise, looking up anddown. Elfride's heart throbbed erratically, and she thought,'Horses, if left to themselves, make for where they are best fed.Pansy will go home.'
Pansy turned and walked on towards St. Launce's
Pansy at home, during summer, had little but grass to live on.After a run to St. Launce's she always had a feed of corn tosupport her on the return journey. Therefore, being now more thanhalf way, she preferred St. Launce's.
But Elfride did not remember this now. All she cared to recognizewas a dreamy fancy that to-day's rash action was not her own. Shewas disabled by her moods, and it seemed indispensable to adhereto the programme. So strangely involved are motives that, morethan by her promise to Stephen, more even than by her love, shewas forced on by a sense of the necessity of keeping faith withherself, as promised in the inane vow of ten minutes ago.
She hesitated no longer. Pansy went, like the steed of Adonis, asif she told the steps. Presently the quaint gables and jumbledroofs of St. Launce's were spread beneath her, and going down thehill she entered the courtyard of the Falcon. Mrs. Buckle, thelandlady, came to the door to meet her.
The Swancourts were well known here. The transition fromequestrian to the ordinary guise of railway travellers had beenmore than once performed by father and daughter in thisestablishment.
In less than a quarter of an hour Elfride emerged from the door inher walking dress, and went to the railway. She had not told Mrs.Buckle anything as to her intentions, and was supposed to havegone out shopping.
An hour and forty minutes later, and she was in Stephen's arms atthe Plymouth station. Not upon the platform--in the secretretreat of a deserted waiting-room.
Stephen's face boded ill. He was pale and despondent.
What is the matter?' she asked.
'We cannot be married here to-day, my Elfie! I ought to have knownit and stayed here. In my ignorance I did not. I have thelicence, but it can only be used in my parish in London. I onlycame down last night, as you know.'
'What shall we do?' she said blankly.
'There's only one thing we can do, darling.'
'What's that?'
'Go on to London by a train just starting, and be married thereto-morrow.'
'Passengers for the 11.5 up-train take their seats!' said aguard's voice on the platform.
'Will you go, Elfride?'
'I will.'
In three minutes the train had moved off, bearing away with itStephen and Elfride.