一双蓝眼睛 英文版 A Pair of Blue Eyes
托马斯.哈代 Thomas Hardy
Chapter VII Page 1
'No more of me you knew, my love!'
Stephen Smith revisited Endelstow Vicarage, agreeably to hispromise. He had a genuine artistic reason for coming, though nosuch reason seemed to be required. Six-and-thirty old seat ends,of exquisite fifteenth-century workmanship, were rapidly decayingin an aisle of the church; and it became politic to make drawingsof their worm-eaten contours ere they were battered pastrecognition in the turmoil of the so-called restoration.
He entered the house at sunset, and the world was pleasant againto the two fair-haired ones. A momentary pang of disappointmenthad, nevertheless, passed through Elfride when she casuallydiscovered that he had not come that minute post-haste fromLondon, but had reached the neighbourhood the previous evening.Surprise would have accompanied the feeling, had she notremembered that several tourists were haunting the coast at thisseason, and that Stephen might have chosen to do likewise.
They did little besides chat that evening, Mr. Swancourt beginningto question his visitor, closely yet paternally, and in good part,on his hopes and prospects from the profession he had embraced.Stephen gave vague answers. The next day it rained. In theevening, when twenty-four hours of Elfride had completelyrekindled her admirer's ardour, a game of chess was proposedbetween them.
The game had its value in helping on the developments of theirfuture.
Elfride soon perceived that her opponent was but a learner. Shenext noticed that he had a very odd way of handling the pieceswhen castling or taking a man. Antecedently she would havesupposed that the same performance must be gone through by allplayers in the same manner; she was taught by his differing actionthat all ordinary players, who learn the game by sight,unconsciously touch the men in a stereotyped way. This impressionof indescribable oddness in Stephen's touch culminated in speechwhen she saw him, at the taking of one of her bishops, push itaside with the taking man instead of lifting it as a preliminaryto the move.
'How strangely you handle the men, Mr. Smith!'
'Do I? I am sorry for that.'
'Oh no--don't be sorry; it is not a matter great enough forsorrow. But who taught you to play?'
'Nobody, Miss Swancourt,' he said. 'I learnt from a book lent meby my friend Mr. Knight, the noblest man in the world.'
'But you have seen people play?'
'I have never seen the playing of a single game. This is thefirst time I ever had the opportunity of playing with a livingopponent. I have worked out many games from books, and studiedthe reasons of the different moves, but that is all.'
This was a full explanation of his mannerism; but the fact that aman with the desire for chess should have grown up without beingable to see or engage in a game astonished her not a little. Shepondered on the circumstance for some time, looking into vacancyand hindering the play.
Mr. Swancourt was sitting with his eyes fixed on the board, butapparently thinking of other things. Half to himself he said,pending the move of Elfride:
'"Quae finis aut quod me manet stipendium?"'
Stephen replied instantly:
'"Effare: jussas cum fide poenas luam."'
'Excellent--prompt--gratifying!' said Mr. Swancourt with feeling,bringing down his hand upon the table, and making three pawns anda knight dance over their borders by the shaking. 'I was musingon those words as applicable to a strange course I am steering--but enough of that. I am delighted with you, Mr. Smith, for it isso seldom in this desert that I meet with a man who is gentlemanand scholar enough to continue a quotation, however trite it maybe.'
'I also apply the words to myself,' said Stephen quietly.
'You? The last man in the world to do that, I should havethought.'
'Come,' murmured Elfride poutingly, and insinuating herselfbetween them, 'tell me all about it. Come, construe, construe!'
Stephen looked steadfastly into her face, and said slowly, and ina voice full of a far-off meaning that seemed quaintly prematurein one so young:
'Quae finis WHAT WILL BE THE END, aut OR, quod stipendium WHATFINE, manet me AWAITS ME? Effare SPEAK OUT; luam I WILL PAY, cumfide WITH FAITH, jussas poenas THE PENALTY REQUIRED.'
The vicar, who had listened with a critical compression of thelips to this school-boy recitation, and by reason of his imperfecthearing had missed the marked realism of Stephen's tone in theEnglish words, now said hesitatingly: 'By the bye, Mr. Smith (Iknow you'll excuse my curiosity), though your translation wasunexceptionably correct and close, you have a way of pronouncingyour Latin which to me seems most peculiar. Not that thepronunciation of a dead language is of much importance; yet youraccents and quantities have a grotesque sound to my ears. Ithought first that you had acquired your way of breathing thevowels from some of the northern colleges; but it cannot be sowith the quantities. What I was going to ask was, if yourinstructor in the classics could possibly have been an Oxford orCambridge man?'
'Yes; he was an Oxford man--Fellow of St. Cyprian's.'
'Really?'
'Oh yes; there's no doubt about it.
'The oddest thing ever I heard of!' said Mr. Swancourt, startingwith astonishment. 'That the pupil of such a man----'
'The best and cleverest man in England!' cried Stephenenthusiastically.
'That the pupil of such a man should pronounce Latin in the wayyou pronounce it beats all I ever heard. How long did he instructyou?'
'Four years.'
'Four years!'
'It is not so strange when I explain,' Stephen hastened to say.'It was done in this way--by letter. I sent him exercises andconstruing twice a week, and twice a week he sent them back to mecorrected, with marginal notes of instruction. That is how Ilearnt my Latin and Greek, such as it is. He is not responsiblefor my scanning. He has never heard me scan a line.'
'A novel case, and a singular instance of patience!' cried thevicar.
said Mr. Swancourt, startingwith astonishment.
'On his part, not on mine. Ah, Henry Knight is one in a thousand!I remember his speaking to me on this very subject ofpronunciation. He says that, much to his regret, he sees a timecoming when every man will pronounce even the common words of hisown tongue as seems right in his own ears, and be thought none theworse for it; that the speaking age is passing away, to make roomfor the writing age.'
Both Elfride and her father had waited attentively to hear Stephengo on to what would have been the most interesting part of thestory, namely, what circumstances could have necessitated such anunusual method of education. But no further explanation wasvolunteered; and they saw, by the young man's manner ofconcentrating himself upon the chess-board, that he was anxious todrop the subject.
The game proceeded. Elfride played by rote; Stephen by thought.It was the cruellest thing to checkmate him after so much labour,she considered. What was she dishonest enough to do in hercompassion? To let him checkmate her. A second game followed; andbeing herself absolutely indifferent as to the result (her playingwas above the average among women, and she knew it), she allowedhim to give checkmate again. A final game, in which she adoptedthe Muzio gambit as her opening, was terminated by Elfride'svictory at the twelfth move.
Stephen looked up suspiciously. His heart was throbbing even moreexcitedly than was hers, which itself had quickened when sheseriously set to work on this last occasion. Mr. Swancourt hadleft the room.
'You have been trifling with me till now!' he exclaimed, his faceflushing. 'You did not play your best in the first two games?'
Elfride's guilt showed in her face. Stephen became the picture ofvexation and sadness, which, relishable for a moment, caused herthe next instant to regret the mistake she had made.
'Mr. Smith, forgive me!' she said sweetly. 'I see now, though Idid not at first, that what I have done seems like contempt foryour skill. But, indeed, I did not mean it in that sense. Icould not, upon my conscience, win a victory in those first andsecond games over one who fought at such a disadvantage and somanfully.'
He drew a long breath, and murmured bitterly, 'Ah, you arecleverer than I. You can do everything--I can do nothing! O MissSwancourt!' he burst out wildly, his heart swelling in his throat,'I must tell you how I love you! All these months of my absence Ihave worshipped you.'
He leapt from his seat like the impulsive lad that he was, slidround to her side, and almost before she suspected it his arm wasround her waist, and the two sets of curls intermingled.
So entirely new was full-blown love to Elfride, that she trembledas much from the novelty of the emotion as from the emotionitself. Then she suddenly withdrew herself and stood upright,vexed that she had submitted unresistingly even to his momentarypressure. She resolved to consider this demonstration aspremature.
'You must not begin such things as those,' she said withcoquettish hauteur of a very transparent nature 'And--you must notdo so again--and papa is coming.'
'Let me kiss you--only a little one,' he said with his usualdelicacy, and without reading the factitiousness of her manner.
'No; not one.'
'Only on your cheek?'
'No.'
'Forehead?'
'Certainly not.'
'You care for somebody else, then? Ah, I thought so!'
'I am sure I do not.'
'Nor for me either?'
'How can I tell?' she said simply, the simplicity lying merely inthe broad outlines of her manner and speech. There were thesemitone of voice and half-hidden expression of eyes which tellthe initiated how very fragile is the ice of reserve at thesetimes.
Footsteps were heard. Mr. Swancourt then entered the room, andtheir private colloquy ended.
The day after this partial revelation, Mr. Swancourt proposed adrive to the cliffs beyond Targan Bay, a distance of three or fourmiles.
Half an hour before the time of departure a crash was heard in theback yard, and presently Worm came in, saying partly to the worldin general, part)y to himself, and slightly to his auditors:
'Ay, ay, sure! That frying of fish will be the end of WilliamWorm. They be at it again this morning--same as ever--fizz, fizz,fizz!'
'Your head bad again, Worm?' said Mr. Swancourt. 'What was thatnoise we heard in the yard?'
'Ay, sir, a weak wambling man am I; and the frying have been goingon in my poor head all through the long night and this morning asusual; and I was so dazed wi' it that down fell a piece of leg-wood across the shaft of the pony-shay, and splintered it off."Ay," says I, "I feel it as if 'twas my own shay; and though I'vedone it, and parish pay is my lot if I go from here, perhaps I amas independent as one here and there."'
'Dear me, the shaft of the carriage broken!' cried Elfride. Shewas disappointed: Stephen doubly so. The vicar showed more warmthof temper than the accident seemed to demand, much to Stephen'suneasiness and rather to his surprise. He had not supposed somuch latent sternness could co-exist with Mr. Swancourt'sfrankness and good-nature.
'You shall not be disappointed,' said the vicar at length. 'It isalmost too long a distance for you to walk. Elfride can trot downon her pony, and you shall have my old nag, Smith.'
Elfride exclaimed triumphantly, 'You have never seen me onhorseback--Oh, you must!' She looked at Stephen and read histhoughts immediately. 'Ah, you don't ride, Mr. Smith?'
'I am sorry to say I don't.'
'Fancy a man not able to ride!' said she rather pertly.
The vicar came to his rescue. 'That's common enough; he has hadother lessons to learn. Now, I recommend this plan: let Elfrideride on horseback, and you, Mr. Smith, walk beside her.'
The arrangement was welcomed with secret delight by Stephen. Itseemed to combine in itself all the advantages of a long slowramble with Elfride, without the contingent possibility of theenjoyment being spoilt by her becoming weary. The pony wassaddled and brought round.
'Now, Mr. Smith,' said the lady imperatively, coming downstairs,and appearing in her riding-habit, as she always did in a changeof dress, like a new edition of a delightful volume, 'you have atask to perform to-day. These earrings are my very favouritedarling ones; but the worst of it is that they have such shorthooks that they are liable to be dropped if I toss my head aboutmuch, and when I am riding I can't give my mind to them. It wouldbe doing me knight service if you keep your eyes fixed upon them,and remember them every minute of the day, and tell me directly Idrop one. They have had such hairbreadth escapes, haven't they,Unity?' she continued to the parlour-maid who was standing at thedoor.
'Yes, miss, that they have!' said Unity with round-eyedcommiseration.
'Once 'twas in the lane that I found one of them,' pursued Elfridereflectively.
'And then 'twas by the gate into Eighteen Acres,' Unity chimed in.
'And then 'twas on the carpet in my own room,' rejoined Elfridemerrily.
'And then 'twas dangling on the embroidery of your petticoat,miss; and then 'twas down your back, miss, wasn't it? And oh, whata way you was in, miss, wasn't you? my! until you found it!'
Stephen took Elfride's slight foot upon his hand: 'One, two,three, and up!' she said.
Unfortunately not so. He staggered and lifted, and the horseedged round; and Elfride was ultimately deposited upon the groundrather more forcibly than was pleasant. Smith looked allcontrition.
'Never mind,' said the vicar encouragingly; 'try again! 'Tis alittle accomplishment that requires some practice, although itlooks so easy. Stand closer to the horse's head, Mr. Smith.'
'Indeed, I shan't let him try again,' said she with a microscopiclook of indignation. 'Worm, come here, and help me to mount.'Worm stepped forward, and she was in the saddle in a trice.
Then they moved on, going for some distance in silence, the hotair of the valley being occasionally brushed from their faces by acool breeze, which wound its way along ravines leading up from thesea.
'I suppose,' said Stephen, 'that a man who can neither sit in asaddle himself nor help another person into one seems a uselessincumbrance; but, Miss Swancourt, I'll learn to do it all for yoursake; I will, indeed.'
'What is so unusual in you,' she said, in a didactic tonejustifiable in a horsewoman's address to a benighted walker, 'isthat your knowledge of certain things should be combined with yourignorance of certain other things.'
Stephen lifted his eyes earnestly to hers.
'You know,' he said, 'it is simply because there are so many otherthings to be learnt in this wide world that I didn't trouble aboutthat particular bit of knowledge. I thought it would be uselessto me; but I don't think so now. I will learn riding, and allconnected with it, because then you would like me better. Do youlike me much less for this?'
She looked sideways at him with critical meditation tenderlyrendered.
'Do I seem like LA BELLE DAME SANS MERCI?' she began suddenly,without replying to his question. 'Fancy yourself saying, Mr.Smith:
"I sat her on my pacing steed,And nothing else saw all day long,For sidelong would she bend, and singA fairy's song,She found me roots of relish sweet,And honey wild, and manna dew; "
and that's all she did.'
'No, no,' said the young man stilly, and with a rising colour.
'"And sure in language strange she said,I love thee true."'
'Not at all,' she rejoined quickly. 'See how I can gallop. Now,Pansy, off!' And Elfride started; and Stephen beheld her lightfigure contracting to the dimensions of a bird as she sank intothe distance--her hair flowing.
He walked on in the same direction, and for a considerable timecould see no signs of her returning. Dull as a flower without thesun he sat down upon a stone, and not for fifteen minutes was anysound of horse or rider to be heard. Then Elfride and Pansyappeared on the hill in a round trot.
'Such a delightful scamper as we have had!' she said, her faceflushed and her eyes sparkling. She turned the horse's head,Stephen arose, and they went on again.
'Well, what have you to say to me, Mr. Smith, after my longabsence?'
'Do you remember a question you could not exactly answer lastnight--whether I was more to you than anybody else?' said he.
'I cannot exactly answer now, either.'
'Why can't you?'
'Because I don't know if I am more to you than any one else.'
'Yes, indeed, you are!' he exclaimed in a voice of intensestappreciation, at the same time gliding round and looking into herface.
'Eyes in eyes,' he murmured playfully; and she blushingly obeyed,looking back into his.
'And why not lips on lips?' continued Stephen daringly.
'No, certainly not. Anybody might look; and it would be the deathof me. You may kiss my hand if you like.'
He expressed by a look that to kiss a hand through a glove, andthat a riding-glove, was not a great treat under thecircumstances.
'There, then; I'll take my glove off. Isn't it a pretty whitehand? Ah, you don't want to kiss it, and you shall not now!'
'If I do not, may I never kiss again, you severe Elfride! You knowI think more of you than I can tell; that you are my queen. Iwould die for you, Elfride!'
A rapid red again filled her cheeks, and she looked at himmeditatively. What a proud moment it was for Elfride then! Shewas ruling a heart with absolute despotism for the first time inher life.
Stephen stealthily pounced upon her hand.
'No; I won't, I won't!' she said intractably; 'and you shouldn'ttake me by surprise.'
There ensued a mild form of tussle for absolute possession of themuch-coveted hand, in which the boisterousness of boy and girl wasfar more prominent than the dignity of man and woman. Then Pansybecame restless. Elfride recovered her position and rememberedherself.
'You make me behave in not a nice way at all!' she exclaimed, in atone neither of pleasure nor anger, but partaking of both. 'Iought not to have allowed such a romp! We are too old now for thatsort of thing.'
'I hope you don't think me too--too much of a creeping-round sortof man,' said he in a penitent tone, conscious that he too hadlost a little dignity by the proceeding.
'You are too familiar; and I can't have it! Considering theshortness of the time we have known each other, Mr. Smith, youtake too much upon you. You think I am a country girl, and itdoesn't matter how you behave to me!'
'I assure you, Miss Swancourt, that I had no idea of freak in mymind. I wanted to imprint a sweet--serious kiss upon your hand;and that's all.'
'Now, that's creeping round again! And you mustn't look into myeyes so,' she said, shaking her head at him, and trotting on a fewpaces in advance. Thus she led the way out of the lane and acrosssome fields in the direction of the cliffs. At the boundary ofthe fields nearest the sea she expressed a wish to dismount. Thehorse was tied to a post. and they both followed an irregularpath, which ultimately terminated upon a flat ledge passing roundthe face of the huge blue-black rock at a height about midwaybetween the sea and the topmost verge. There, far beneath andbefore them, lay the everlasting stretch of ocean; there, upondetached rocks, were the white screaming gulls, seeming everintending to settle, and yet always passing on. Right and leftranked the toothed and zigzag line of storm-torn heights, formingthe series which culminated in the one beneath their feet.