章节正文
Really, it was quite a comfortable abode, cool and rainproof,
especially after Bastin had built his hut in which to cook.
Marama and his people were very humble in their demeanour and
implored us to visit them on the main island. I answered that
perhaps we would later on, as we wished to procure certain things
from the wreck. Also, he requested Bastin to continue his
ministrations as the latter greatly desired to do. But to this
proposal I would not allow him to give any direct answer at the
moment. Indeed, I dared not do so until I was sure of Oro's
approval.
Towards evening they departed in their canoes, leaving behind
them the usual ample store of provisions.
We cooked our meal as usual, only to discover that what Yva had
said about the Life-water was quite true, since we had but little
appetite for solid food, though this returned upon the following
day. The same thing happened upon every occasion after drinking
of that water which certainly was a most invigorating fluid.
Never for years had any of us felt so well as it caused us to do.
So we lit our pipes and talked about our experiences though of
these, indeed, we scarcely knew what to say. Bastin accepted them
as something out of the common, of course, but as facts which
admitted of no discussion. After all, he said, the Old Testament
told much the same story of people called the Sons of God who
lived very long lives and ran after the daughters of men whom
they should have left alone, and thus became the progenitors of a
remarkable race. Of this race, he presumed that Oro and his
daughter were survivors, especially as they spoke of their family
as "Heaven born." How they came to survive was more than he could
understand and really scarcely worth bothering over, since there
they were.
It was the same about the Deluge, continued Bastin, although
naturally Oro spoke falsely, or, at any rate, grossly
exaggerated, when he declared that he had caused this
catastrophe, unless indeed he was talking about a totally
different deluge, though even then he could not have brought it
about. It was curious, however, that the people drowned were said
to have been wicked, and Oro had the same opinion about those
whom he claimed to have drowned, though for the matter of that,
he could not conceive anyone more wicked than Oro himself. On his
own showing he was a most revengeful person and one who declined
to agree to a quite suitablealliance, apparently desired by both
parties, merely because it offended his family pride. No, on
reflection he might be unjust to Oro in this particular, since he
never told that story; it was only shown in some pictures which
very likely were just made up to astonish us. Meanwhile, it was
his business to preach to this old sinner down in that hole, and
he confessed honestly that he did not like the job. Still, it
must be done, so with our leave he would go apart and seek
inspiration, which at present seemed to be quite lacking.
Thus declaimed Bastin and departed.
"Don't you tell your opinion about the Deluge or he may cause
another just to show that you are wrong," called Bickley after
him.
"I can't help that," answered Bastin. "Certainly I shall not
hide the truth to save Oro's feelings, if he has got any. If he
revenges himself upon us in any way, we must just put up with it
like other martyrs."
"I haven't the slightest ambition to be a martyr," said
Bickley.
"No," shouted Bastin from a little distance, "I am quite aware
of that, as you have often said so before. Therefore, if you
become one, I am sorry to say that I do not see how you can
expect any benefit. You would only be like a man who puts a
sovereign into the offertory bag in mistake for a shilling. The
extra nineteen shillings will do him no good at all, since in his
heart he regrets the error and wishes that he could have them
back."
Then he departed, leaving me laughing. But Bickley did not
laugh.
"Arbuthnot," he said, "I have come to the conclusion that I
have gone quite mad. I beg you if I should show signs of
homicidal mania, which I feel developing in me where Bastin is
concerned, or of other normal" target="_blank" title="a.变态的，反常的">abnormalviolence, that you will take
whatever steps you consider necessary, even to putting me out of
the way if that is imperative."
"What do you mean?" I asked. "You seem sane enough."
"Sane, when I believe that I have seen and experienced a great
number of things which I know it to be quite impossible that I
should have seen or experienced. The only explanation is that I
am suffering from delusions."
"Then is Bastin suffering from delusions, too?"
"Certainly, but that is nothing new in his case."
"I don't agree with you, Bickley--about Bastin, I mean. I am by
no means certain that he is not the wisest of the three of us. He
has a faith and he sticks to it, as millions have done before
him, and that is better than making spiritual experiments, as I
am sorry to say I do, or rejecting things because one cannot
understand them, as you do, which is only a form of intellectual
vanity."
"I won't argue the matter, Arbuthnot; it is of no use. I repeat
that I am mad, and Bastin is mad."
"How about me? I also saw and experienced these things. Am I
mad, too?"
"You ought to be, Arbuthnot. If it isn't enough to drive a man
mad when he sees himself exactly reproduced in an utterly
impossible moving-picture show exhibited by an utterly impossible
young woman in an utterly impossible underground city, then I
don't know what is.
"What do you mean?" I asked, starting.
"Mean? Well, if you didn't notice it, there's hope for you."
"Notice what?"
"All that envoy scene. There, as I thought, appeared Yva. Do
you admit that?"
"Of course; there could be no mistake on that point."
"Very well. Then according to my version there came a man,
still young, dressed in outlandish clothes, who made propositions
of peace and wanted to marry Yva, who wanted to marry him. Is
that right?"
"Absolutely."
"Well, and didn't you recognise the man?"
"No; I only noticed that he was a fine-looking fellow whose
appearance reminded me of someone."
"I suppose it must be true," mused Bickley, "that we do not
know ourselves."
"So the old Greek thought, since he urged that this should be
our special study. 'Know thyself,' you remember."
"I meant physically, not intellectually. Arbuthnot, do you mean
to tell me that you did not recognise your own double in that
man? Shave off your beard and put on his clothes and no one could
distinguish you apart."
I sprang up, dropping my pipe.
"Now you mention it," I said slowly, "I suppose there was a
resemblance. I didn't look at him very much; I was studying the
simulacrum of Yva. Also, you know it is some time since--I mean,
there are no pier-glasses in Orofena."
"The man was you," went on Bickley with conviction. "If I were
superstitious I should think it a queer sort of omen. But as I am
not, I know that I must be mad."
"Why? After all, an ancient man and a modern man might resemble
each other."
"There are degrees in resemblance," said Bickley with one of
his contemptuous snorts. "It won't do, Humphrey, my boy," he
added. "I can only think of one possible explanation--outside of
the obvious one of madness."
"What is that?"
"The Glittering Lady produced what Bastin called that
cinematograph show in some way or other, did she not? She said
that in order to do this she loosed some hidden forces. I suggest
that she did nothing of the sort."
"Then whence did the pictures come and why?"
"From her own brain, in order to impress us with a cock-and-
bull, fairy-book story. If this were so she would quite naturally
fill the role of the lover of the piece with the last man who had
happened to impress her. Hence the resemblance."
"You presuppose a great deal, Bickley, including supernatural
cunning and unexampled hypnotic influence. I don't know, first,
why she should be so anxious to add another impression to the
many we have received in this place; and, secondly, if she was,
how she managed to mesmerise three average but totally different
men into seeing the same things. My explanation is that you were
deceived as to the likeness, which, mind you, I did not
recognise; nor, apparently, did Bastin."
"Bastin never recognises anything. But if you are in doubt, ask
Yva herself. She ought to know. Now I'm off to try to analyse
that confounded Life-water, which I suspect is of the ordinary
spring variety, lightened up with natural carbonic acid gas and
possibly not uninfluenced by radium. The trouble is that here I
can only apply some very elementary tests."
So he went also, in an opposite direction to Bastin, and I was
left alone with Tommy, who annoyed me much by attempting
continually to wander off into the cave, whence I must recall
him. I suppose that my experiences of the day, reviewed beneath
the sweet influences of the wonderful tropical night, affected
me. At any rate, that mystical side of my nature, to which I
think I alluded at the beginning of this record, sprang into
active and, in a sense, unholy life. The normal vanished, the
normal" target="_blank" title="a.变态的，反常的">abnormal took possession, and that is unholy to most of us
creatures of habit and tradition, at any rate, if we are British.
I lost my footing on the world; my spirit began to wander in
strange places; of course, always supposing that we have a
spirit, which Bickley would deny.
I gave up reason; I surrendered myself to unreason; it is a not
unpleasant process, occasionally. Supposing now that all we see
and accept is but the merest fragment of the truth, or perhaps
only a refraction thereof? Supposing that we do live again and
again, and that our animating principle, whatever it might be,
does inhabit various bodies, which, naturally enough, it would
shape to its own taste and likeness? Would that taste and
likeness vary so very much over, let us say, a million years or
so, which, after all, is but an hour, or a minute, in the aeons
of Eternity?
On this hypothesis, which is so wild that one begins to suspect
that it may be true, was it impossible that I and that murdered
man of the far past were in fact identical? If the woman were the
same, preserved across the gulf in some unknown fashion, why
should not her lover be the same? What did I say--her lover? Was
I her lover? No, I was the lover of one who had died--my lost
wife. Well, if I had died and lived again, why should not--why
should not that Sleeper--have lived again during her long sleep?
Through all those years the spirit must have had some home, and,
if so, in what shapes did it live? There were points,
similarities, which rushed in upon me--oh! it was ridiculous.
Bickley was right. We were all mad!
There was another thing. Oro had declared that we were at war
with Germany. If this were so, how could he know it? Such
knowledge would presume powers of telepathy or vision beyond
those given to man. I could not believe that he possessed these;
as Bickley said, it would be past experience. Yet it was most
strange that he who was uninformed as to our national history and
dangers, should have hit upon a country with which we might well
have been plunged into sudden struggle. Here again I was
especially after Bastin had built his hut in which to cook.
Marama and his people were very humble in their demeanour and
implored us to visit them on the main island. I answered that
perhaps we would later on, as we wished to procure certain things
from the wreck. Also, he requested Bastin to continue his
ministrations as the latter greatly desired to do. But to this
proposal I would not allow him to give any direct answer at the
moment. Indeed, I dared not do so until I was sure of Oro's
approval.
Towards evening they departed in their canoes, leaving behind
them the usual ample store of provisions.
We cooked our meal as usual, only to discover that what Yva had
said about the Life-water was quite true, since we had but little
appetite for solid food, though this returned upon the following
day. The same thing happened upon every occasion after drinking
of that water which certainly was a most invigorating fluid.
Never for years had any of us felt so well as it caused us to do.
So we lit our pipes and talked about our experiences though of
these, indeed, we scarcely knew what to say. Bastin accepted them
as something out of the common, of course, but as facts which
admitted of no discussion. After all, he said, the Old Testament
told much the same story of people called the Sons of God who
lived very long lives and ran after the daughters of men whom
they should have left alone, and thus became the progenitors of a
remarkable race. Of this race, he presumed that Oro and his
daughter were survivors, especially as they spoke of their family
as "Heaven born." How they came to survive was more than he could
understand and really scarcely worth bothering over, since there
they were.
It was the same about the Deluge, continued Bastin, although
naturally Oro spoke falsely, or, at any rate, grossly
exaggerated, when he declared that he had caused this
catastrophe, unless indeed he was talking about a totally
different deluge, though even then he could not have brought it
about. It was curious, however, that the people drowned were said
to have been wicked, and Oro had the same opinion about those
whom he claimed to have drowned, though for the matter of that,
he could not conceive anyone more wicked than Oro himself. On his
own showing he was a most revengeful person and one who declined
to agree to a quite suitablealliance, apparently desired by both
parties, merely because it offended his family pride. No, on
reflection he might be unjust to Oro in this particular, since he
never told that story; it was only shown in some pictures which
very likely were just made up to astonish us. Meanwhile, it was
his business to preach to this old sinner down in that hole, and
he confessed honestly that he did not like the job. Still, it
must be done, so with our leave he would go apart and seek
inspiration, which at present seemed to be quite lacking.
Thus declaimed Bastin and departed.
"Don't you tell your opinion about the Deluge or he may cause
another just to show that you are wrong," called Bickley after
him.
"I can't help that," answered Bastin. "Certainly I shall not
hide the truth to save Oro's feelings, if he has got any. If he
revenges himself upon us in any way, we must just put up with it
like other martyrs."
"I haven't the slightest ambition to be a martyr," said
Bickley.
"No," shouted Bastin from a little distance, "I am quite aware
of that, as you have often said so before. Therefore, if you
become one, I am sorry to say that I do not see how you can
expect any benefit. You would only be like a man who puts a
sovereign into the offertory bag in mistake for a shilling. The
extra nineteen shillings will do him no good at all, since in his
heart he regrets the error and wishes that he could have them
back."
Then he departed, leaving me laughing. But Bickley did not
laugh.
"Arbuthnot," he said, "I have come to the conclusion that I
have gone quite mad. I beg you if I should show signs of
homicidal mania, which I feel developing in me where Bastin is
concerned, or of other normal" target="_blank" title="a.变态的，反常的">abnormalviolence, that you will take
whatever steps you consider necessary, even to putting me out of
the way if that is imperative."
"What do you mean?" I asked. "You seem sane enough."
"Sane, when I believe that I have seen and experienced a great
number of things which I know it to be quite impossible that I
should have seen or experienced. The only explanation is that I
am suffering from delusions."
"Then is Bastin suffering from delusions, too?"
"Certainly, but that is nothing new in his case."
"I don't agree with you, Bickley--about Bastin, I mean. I am by
no means certain that he is not the wisest of the three of us. He
has a faith and he sticks to it, as millions have done before
him, and that is better than making spiritual experiments, as I
am sorry to say I do, or rejecting things because one cannot
understand them, as you do, which is only a form of intellectual
vanity."
"I won't argue the matter, Arbuthnot; it is of no use. I repeat
that I am mad, and Bastin is mad."
"How about me? I also saw and experienced these things. Am I
mad, too?"
"You ought to be, Arbuthnot. If it isn't enough to drive a man
mad when he sees himself exactly reproduced in an utterly
impossible moving-picture show exhibited by an utterly impossible
young woman in an utterly impossible underground city, then I
don't know what is.
"What do you mean?" I asked, starting.
"Mean? Well, if you didn't notice it, there's hope for you."
"Notice what?"
"All that envoy scene. There, as I thought, appeared Yva. Do
you admit that?"
"Of course; there could be no mistake on that point."
"Very well. Then according to my version there came a man,
still young, dressed in outlandish clothes, who made propositions
of peace and wanted to marry Yva, who wanted to marry him. Is
that right?"
"Absolutely."
"Well, and didn't you recognise the man?"
"No; I only noticed that he was a fine-looking fellow whose
appearance reminded me of someone."
"I suppose it must be true," mused Bickley, "that we do not
know ourselves."
"So the old Greek thought, since he urged that this should be
our special study. 'Know thyself,' you remember."
"I meant physically, not intellectually. Arbuthnot, do you mean
to tell me that you did not recognise your own double in that
man? Shave off your beard and put on his clothes and no one could
distinguish you apart."
I sprang up, dropping my pipe.
"Now you mention it," I said slowly, "I suppose there was a
resemblance. I didn't look at him very much; I was studying the
simulacrum of Yva. Also, you know it is some time since--I mean,
there are no pier-glasses in Orofena."
"The man was you," went on Bickley with conviction. "If I were
superstitious I should think it a queer sort of omen. But as I am
not, I know that I must be mad."
"Why? After all, an ancient man and a modern man might resemble
each other."
"There are degrees in resemblance," said Bickley with one of
his contemptuous snorts. "It won't do, Humphrey, my boy," he
added. "I can only think of one possible explanation--outside of
the obvious one of madness."
"What is that?"
"The Glittering Lady produced what Bastin called that
cinematograph show in some way or other, did she not? She said
that in order to do this she loosed some hidden forces. I suggest
that she did nothing of the sort."
"Then whence did the pictures come and why?"
"From her own brain, in order to impress us with a cock-and-
bull, fairy-book story. If this were so she would quite naturally
fill the role of the lover of the piece with the last man who had
happened to impress her. Hence the resemblance."
"You presuppose a great deal, Bickley, including supernatural
cunning and unexampled hypnotic influence. I don't know, first,
why she should be so anxious to add another impression to the
many we have received in this place; and, secondly, if she was,
how she managed to mesmerise three average but totally different
men into seeing the same things. My explanation is that you were
deceived as to the likeness, which, mind you, I did not
recognise; nor, apparently, did Bastin."
"Bastin never recognises anything. But if you are in doubt, ask
Yva herself. She ought to know. Now I'm off to try to analyse
that confounded Life-water, which I suspect is of the ordinary
spring variety, lightened up with natural carbonic acid gas and
possibly not uninfluenced by radium. The trouble is that here I
can only apply some very elementary tests."
So he went also, in an opposite direction to Bastin, and I was
left alone with Tommy, who annoyed me much by attempting
continually to wander off into the cave, whence I must recall
him. I suppose that my experiences of the day, reviewed beneath
the sweet influences of the wonderful tropical night, affected
me. At any rate, that mystical side of my nature, to which I
think I alluded at the beginning of this record, sprang into
active and, in a sense, unholy life. The normal vanished, the
normal" target="_blank" title="a.变态的，反常的">abnormal took possession, and that is unholy to most of us
creatures of habit and tradition, at any rate, if we are British.
I lost my footing on the world; my spirit began to wander in
strange places; of course, always supposing that we have a
spirit, which Bickley would deny.
I gave up reason; I surrendered myself to unreason; it is a not
unpleasant process, occasionally. Supposing now that all we see
and accept is but the merest fragment of the truth, or perhaps
only a refraction thereof? Supposing that we do live again and
again, and that our animating principle, whatever it might be,
does inhabit various bodies, which, naturally enough, it would
shape to its own taste and likeness? Would that taste and
likeness vary so very much over, let us say, a million years or
so, which, after all, is but an hour, or a minute, in the aeons
of Eternity?
On this hypothesis, which is so wild that one begins to suspect
that it may be true, was it impossible that I and that murdered
man of the far past were in fact identical? If the woman were the
same, preserved across the gulf in some unknown fashion, why
should not her lover be the same? What did I say--her lover? Was
I her lover? No, I was the lover of one who had died--my lost
wife. Well, if I had died and lived again, why should not--why
should not that Sleeper--have lived again during her long sleep?
Through all those years the spirit must have had some home, and,
if so, in what shapes did it live? There were points,
similarities, which rushed in upon me--oh! it was ridiculous.
Bickley was right. We were all mad!
There was another thing. Oro had declared that we were at war
with Germany. If this were so, how could he know it? Such
knowledge would presume powers of telepathy or vision beyond
those given to man. I could not believe that he possessed these;
as Bickley said, it would be past experience. Yet it was most
strange that he who was uninformed as to our national history and
dangers, should have hit upon a country with which we might well
have been plunged into sudden struggle. Here again I was
- humble [´hʌmbəl]
a.谦卑的 vt.贬抑 (初中英语单词) - procure [prə´kjuə] v.获得；完(达)成；实现 (初中英语单词)
- discussion [di´skʌʃən] n.讨论；辩论 (初中英语单词)
- survive [sə´vaiv] vt.幸存；残存 (初中英语单词)
- wicked [´wikid] a.邪恶的；不道德的 (初中英语单词)
- conceive [kən´si:v] v.设想；表达；怀孕 (初中英语单词)
- suitable [´su:təbəl, ´sju:-] a.合适的，适当的 (初中英语单词)
- alliance [ə´laiəns] n.联盟；同盟 (初中英语单词)
- astonish [ə´stɔniʃ] vt.使惊讶；使惊异 (初中英语单词)
- meanwhile [´mi:n´wail] n.&ad.其间；同时 (初中英语单词)
- preach [pri:tʃ] v.宣扬；鼓吹 n.训诫 (初中英语单词)
- honestly [´ɔnistli] ad.诚实地，老实地 (初中英语单词)
- ambition [æm´biʃən] n.雄心，野心；企图 (初中英语单词)
- therefore [´ðeəfɔ:] ad.&conj.因此；所以 (初中英语单词)
- conclusion [kən´klu:ʒən] n.结束；结论；推论 (初中英语单词)
- abnormal [æb´nɔ:məl] a.变态的，反常的 (初中英语单词)
- violence [´vaiələns] n.猛烈；暴力(行) (初中英语单词)
- explanation [,eksplə´neiʃən] n.解释；说明；辩解 (初中英语单词)
- suffering [´sʌfəriŋ] n.痛苦；灾害 (初中英语单词)
- spiritual [´spiritʃuəl] a.精神(上)的；神圣的 (初中英语单词)
- sprang [spræŋ] spring 的过去式 (初中英语单词)
- conviction [kən´vikʃən] n.定罪；确信，信服 (初中英语单词)
- obvious [´ɔbviəs] a.明显的；显而易见的 (初中英语单词)
- hidden [´hid(ə)n] hide 的过去分词 (初中英语单词)
- impress [im´pres, ´impres] v.铭刻 n.印记；特征 (初中英语单词)
- anxious [´æŋkʃəs] a.担忧的；渴望的 (初中英语单词)
- impression [im´preʃən] n.印刷；印象；效果 (初中英语单词)
- suspect [´sʌspekt, sə´spekt] v.怀疑；觉得 n.嫌疑犯 (初中英语单词)
- variety [və´raiəti] n.变化；多样(性)；种类 (初中英语单词)
- wander [´wɔndə, ´wɑ:n:dər] v.徘徊；流浪 (初中英语单词)
- beginning [bi´giniŋ] n.开始，开端；起源 (初中英语单词)
- normal [´nɔ:məl] a.正规的 n.正常状态 (初中英语单词)
- tradition [trə´diʃən] n.传统；惯例；传说 (初中英语单词)
- occasionally [ə´keiʒənəli] ad.偶然地；非经常地 (初中英语单词)
- fragment [´frægmənt] n.碎片；破片；断片 (初中英语单词)
- whatever [wɔt´evə] pron.&a.无论什么 (初中英语单词)
- vision [´viʒən] n.视觉；想象力；幻影 (初中英语单词)
- apparently [ə´pærəntli] ad.显然，表面上地 (高中英语单词)
- shilling [´ʃiliŋ] n.先令 (高中英语单词)
- underground [,ʌndə´graund] ad.&a.地下(的) (高中英语单词)
- seeing [si:iŋ] see的现在分词 n.视觉 (高中英语单词)
- likeness [´laiknis] n.相似；肖像；外表 (高中英语单词)
- carbonic [kɑ:´bɔnik] a.(含)碳的 (高中英语单词)
- tropical [´trɔpikəl] a.热带地区的 (高中英语单词)
- inhabit [in´hæbit] vt.居住；栖息；住宅 (高中英语单词)
- identical [ai´dentikəl] a.完全相同的 (高中英语单词)
- presume [pri´zju:m] v.假定；推测；以为 (高中英语单词)
- demeanour [di´mi:nə] n.行为；举止；态度 (英语四级单词)
- unjust [ʌn´dʒʌst] a.不公平(正)的 (英语四级单词)
- sinner [´sinə] n.罪人 (英语四级单词)
- experienced [ik´spiəriənst] a.有经验的；熟练的 (英语四级单词)
- version [´və:ʃən, ´və:rʒən] n.翻译；说明；译本 (英语四级单词)
- physically [´fizikəli] ad.按照自然规律 (英语四级单词)
- whence [wens] ad.从何处；从那里 (英语四级单词)
- totally [´təutəli] ad.统统，完全 (英语四级单词)
- elementary [,eli´mentəri] a.基本的；初级的 (英语四级单词)
- uninformed [,ʌnin´fɔ:md] a.未得到通知的 (英语四级单词)
- departed [di´pɑ:tid] a.已往的；已故的 (英语六级单词)
- deluge [´delju:dʒ] n.大洪水 vt.泛滥 (英语六级单词)
- contemptuous [kən´temptjuəs] a.蔑视的；傲慢的 (英语六级单词)
- secondly [´sekəndli] a.第二(点)；其次 (英语六级单词)
- footing [´futiŋ] n.立脚点；基础；地位 (英语六级单词)
文章标签:名著
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