章节正文
seemed life!
CHAPTER V
MY RESURRECTION
My first impulse was to find the custodian of the cemetery and ask
him to have me conducted home, but various thoughts that came to me
restrained me from following that course. My return would create
general alarm; why should I hurry now that I was master of the
situation? I felt my limbs; I had only an insignificant wound on my
left arm, where I had bitten myself, and a slight feverishness lent
me unhoped-for strength. I should no doubt be able to walk unaided.
Still I lingered; all sorts of dim visions confused my mind. I had
felt beside me in the open grave some sextons' tools which had been
left there, and I conceived a sudden desire to repair the damage I
had done, to close up the hole through which I had crept, so as to
conceal all traces of my resurrection. I do not believe that I had
any positivemotive in doing so. I only deemed it useless to
proclaim my adventure aloud, feeling ashamed to find myself alive
when the whole world thought me dead. In half an hour every trace
of my escape was obliterated, and then I climbed out of the hole.
The night was splendid, and deep silence reigned in the cemetery;
the black trees threw motionless shadows over the white tombs. When
I endeavored to ascertain my bearings I noticed that one half of the
sky was ruddy, as if lit by a huge conflagration; Paris lay in that
direction, and I moved toward it, following a long avenue amid the
darkness of the branches.
However, after I had gone some fifty yards I was compelled to stop,
feeling faint and weary. I then sat down on a stone bench and for
the first time looked at myself. I was fully attired with the
exception that I had no hat. I blessed my beloved Marguerite for
the pious thought which had prompted her to dress me in my best
clothes--those which I had worn at our wedding. That remembrance of
my wife brought me to my feet again. I longed to see her without
delay.
At the farther end of the avenue I had taken a wall arrested my
progress. However, I climbed to the top of a monument, reached the
summit of the wall and then dropped over the other side. Although
roughly shaken by the fall, I managed to walk for a few minutes
along a broad deserted street skirting the cemetery. I had no
notion as to where I might be, but with the reiteration of monomania
I kept saying to myself that I was going toward Paris and that I
should find the Rue Dauphine somehow or other. Several people
passed me but, seized with sudden distrust, I would not stop them
and ask my way. I have since realized that I was then in a burning
fever and already nearly delirious. Finally, just as I reached a
large thoroughfare, I became giddy and fell heavily upon the
pavement.
Here there is a blank in my life. For three whole weeks I remained
unconscious. When I awoke at last I found myself in a strange room.
A man who was nursing me told me quietly that he had picked me up
one morning on the Boulevard Montparnasse and had brought me to his
house. He was an old doctor who had given up practicing.
When I attempted to thank him he sharply answered that my case had
seemed a curious one and that he had wished to study it. Moreover,
during the first days of my convalescence he would not allow me to
ask a single question, and later on he never put one to me. For
eight days longer I remained in bed, feeling very weak and not even
trying to remember, for memory was a weariness and a pain. I felt
half ashamed and half afraid. As soon as I could leave the house I
would go and find out whatever I wanted to know. Possibly in the
delirium of fever a name had escaped me; however, the doctor never
alluded to anything I may have said. His charity was not only
generous; it was discreet.
The summer had come at last, and one warm June morning I was
permitted to take a short walk. The sun was shining with that
joyous brightness which imparts renewed youth to the streets of old
Paris. I went along slowly, questioning the passers-by at every
crossing I came to and asking the way to Rue Dauphine. When I
reached the street I had some difficulty in recognizing the
lodginghouse where we had alighted on our arrival in the capital. A
childish terror made me hesitate. If I appeared suddenly before
Marguerite the shock might kill her. It might be wiser to begin by
revealing myself to our neighbor Mme Gabin; still I shrank from
taking a third party into confidence. I seemed unable to arrive at
a resolution, and yet in my innermost heart I felt a great void,
like that left by some sacrifice long since consummated.
The building looked quite yellow in the sunshine. I had just
recognized it by a shabby eating house on the ground floor, where we
had ordered our meals, having them sent up to us. Then I raised my
eyes to the last window of the third floor on the left-hand side,
and as I looked at it a young woman with tumbled hair, wearing a
loose dressing gown, appeared and leaned her elbows on the sill. A
young man followed and printed a kiss upon her neck. It was not
Marguerite. Still I felt no surprise. It seemed to me that I had
dreamed all this with other things, too, which I was to learn
presently.
For a moment I remained in the street, uncertain whether I had
better go upstairs and question the lovers, who were still laughing
in the sunshine. However, I decided to enter the little restaurant
below. When I started on my walk the old doctor had placed a five-
franc piece in my hand. No doubt I was changed beyond recognition,
for my beard had grown during the brain fever, and my face was
wrinkled and haggard. As I took a seat at a small table I saw Mme
Gabin come in carrying a cup; she wished to buy a penny-worth of
coffee. Standing in front of the counter, she began to gossip with
the landlady of the establishment.
"Well," asked the latter, "so the poor little woman of the third
floor has made up her mind at last, eh?"
"How could she help herself?" answered Mme Gabin. "It was the very
best thing for her to do. Monsieur Simoneau showed her so much
kindness. You see, he had finished his business in Paris to his
satisfaction, for he has inherited a pot of money. Well, he offered
to take her away with him to his own part of the country and place
her with an aunt of his, who wants a housekeeper and companion.
The landlady laughed archly. I buried my face in a newspaper which
I picked off the table. My lips were white and my hands shook.
"It will end in a marriage, of course," resumed Mme Gabin. "The
little widow mourned for her husband very properly, and the young
man was extremely well behaved. Well, they left last night--and,
after all, they were free to please themselves."
Just then the side door of the restaurant, communicating with the
passage of the house, opened, and Dede appeared.
"Mother, ain't you coming?" she cried. "I'm waiting, you know; do
be quick."
"Presently," said the mother testily. "Don't bother."
The girl stood listening to the two women with the precocious
shrewdness of a child born and reared amid the streets of Paris.
"When all is said and done," explained Mme Gabin, "the dear departed
did not come up to Monsieur Simoneau. I didn't fancy him overmuch;
he was a puny sort of a man, a poor, fretful fellow, and he hadn't a
penny to bless himself with. No, candidly, he wasn't the kind of
husband for a young and healthy wife, whereas Monsieur Simoneau is
rich, you know, and as strong as a Turk."
"Oh yes!" interrupted Dede. "I saw him once when he was washing--
his door was open. His arms are so hairy!"
"Get along with you," screamed the old woman, shoving the girl out
of the restaurant. "You are always poking your nose where it has no
business to be."
Then she concluded with these words: "Look here, to my mind the
other one did quite right to take himself off. It was fine luck for
the little woman!"
When I found myself in the street again I walked along slowly with
trembling limbs. And yet I was not suffering much; I think I smiled
once at my shadow in the sun. It was quite true. I WAS very puny.
It had been a queer notion of mine to marry Marguerite. I recalled
her weariness at Guerande, her impatience, her dull, monotonous
life. The dear creature had been very good to me, but I had never
been a real lover; she had mourned for me as a sister for her
brother, not otherwise. Why should I again disturb her life? A
dead man is not jealous.
When I lifted my eyelids I saw the garden of the Luxembourg before
me. I entered it and took a seat in the sun, dreaming with a sense
of infinite restfulness. The thought of Marguerite stirred me
softly. I pictured her in the provinces, beloved, petted and very
happy. She had grown handsomer, and she was the mother of three
boys and two girls. It was all right. I had behaved like an honest
man in dying, and I would not commit the cruel folly of coming to
life again.
Since then I have traveled a good deal. I have been a little
everywhere. I am an ordinary man who has toiled and eaten like
anybody else. Death no longer frightens me, but it does not seem to
care for me now that I have no motive in living, and I sometimes
fear that I have been forgotten upon earth.
End
CHAPTER V
MY RESURRECTION
My first impulse was to find the custodian of the cemetery and ask
him to have me conducted home, but various thoughts that came to me
restrained me from following that course. My return would create
general alarm; why should I hurry now that I was master of the
situation? I felt my limbs; I had only an insignificant wound on my
left arm, where I had bitten myself, and a slight feverishness lent
me unhoped-for strength. I should no doubt be able to walk unaided.
Still I lingered; all sorts of dim visions confused my mind. I had
felt beside me in the open grave some sextons' tools which had been
left there, and I conceived a sudden desire to repair the damage I
had done, to close up the hole through which I had crept, so as to
conceal all traces of my resurrection. I do not believe that I had
any positivemotive in doing so. I only deemed it useless to
proclaim my adventure aloud, feeling ashamed to find myself alive
when the whole world thought me dead. In half an hour every trace
of my escape was obliterated, and then I climbed out of the hole.
The night was splendid, and deep silence reigned in the cemetery;
the black trees threw motionless shadows over the white tombs. When
I endeavored to ascertain my bearings I noticed that one half of the
sky was ruddy, as if lit by a huge conflagration; Paris lay in that
direction, and I moved toward it, following a long avenue amid the
darkness of the branches.
However, after I had gone some fifty yards I was compelled to stop,
feeling faint and weary. I then sat down on a stone bench and for
the first time looked at myself. I was fully attired with the
exception that I had no hat. I blessed my beloved Marguerite for
the pious thought which had prompted her to dress me in my best
clothes--those which I had worn at our wedding. That remembrance of
my wife brought me to my feet again. I longed to see her without
delay.
At the farther end of the avenue I had taken a wall arrested my
progress. However, I climbed to the top of a monument, reached the
summit of the wall and then dropped over the other side. Although
roughly shaken by the fall, I managed to walk for a few minutes
along a broad deserted street skirting the cemetery. I had no
notion as to where I might be, but with the reiteration of monomania
I kept saying to myself that I was going toward Paris and that I
should find the Rue Dauphine somehow or other. Several people
passed me but, seized with sudden distrust, I would not stop them
and ask my way. I have since realized that I was then in a burning
fever and already nearly delirious. Finally, just as I reached a
large thoroughfare, I became giddy and fell heavily upon the
pavement.
Here there is a blank in my life. For three whole weeks I remained
unconscious. When I awoke at last I found myself in a strange room.
A man who was nursing me told me quietly that he had picked me up
one morning on the Boulevard Montparnasse and had brought me to his
house. He was an old doctor who had given up practicing.
When I attempted to thank him he sharply answered that my case had
seemed a curious one and that he had wished to study it. Moreover,
during the first days of my convalescence he would not allow me to
ask a single question, and later on he never put one to me. For
eight days longer I remained in bed, feeling very weak and not even
trying to remember, for memory was a weariness and a pain. I felt
half ashamed and half afraid. As soon as I could leave the house I
would go and find out whatever I wanted to know. Possibly in the
delirium of fever a name had escaped me; however, the doctor never
alluded to anything I may have said. His charity was not only
generous; it was discreet.
The summer had come at last, and one warm June morning I was
permitted to take a short walk. The sun was shining with that
joyous brightness which imparts renewed youth to the streets of old
Paris. I went along slowly, questioning the passers-by at every
crossing I came to and asking the way to Rue Dauphine. When I
reached the street I had some difficulty in recognizing the
lodginghouse where we had alighted on our arrival in the capital. A
childish terror made me hesitate. If I appeared suddenly before
Marguerite the shock might kill her. It might be wiser to begin by
revealing myself to our neighbor Mme Gabin; still I shrank from
taking a third party into confidence. I seemed unable to arrive at
a resolution, and yet in my innermost heart I felt a great void,
like that left by some sacrifice long since consummated.
The building looked quite yellow in the sunshine. I had just
recognized it by a shabby eating house on the ground floor, where we
had ordered our meals, having them sent up to us. Then I raised my
eyes to the last window of the third floor on the left-hand side,
and as I looked at it a young woman with tumbled hair, wearing a
loose dressing gown, appeared and leaned her elbows on the sill. A
young man followed and printed a kiss upon her neck. It was not
Marguerite. Still I felt no surprise. It seemed to me that I had
dreamed all this with other things, too, which I was to learn
presently.
For a moment I remained in the street, uncertain whether I had
better go upstairs and question the lovers, who were still laughing
in the sunshine. However, I decided to enter the little restaurant
below. When I started on my walk the old doctor had placed a five-
franc piece in my hand. No doubt I was changed beyond recognition,
for my beard had grown during the brain fever, and my face was
wrinkled and haggard. As I took a seat at a small table I saw Mme
Gabin come in carrying a cup; she wished to buy a penny-worth of
coffee. Standing in front of the counter, she began to gossip with
the landlady of the establishment.
"Well," asked the latter, "so the poor little woman of the third
floor has made up her mind at last, eh?"
"How could she help herself?" answered Mme Gabin. "It was the very
best thing for her to do. Monsieur Simoneau showed her so much
kindness. You see, he had finished his business in Paris to his
satisfaction, for he has inherited a pot of money. Well, he offered
to take her away with him to his own part of the country and place
her with an aunt of his, who wants a housekeeper and companion.
The landlady laughed archly. I buried my face in a newspaper which
I picked off the table. My lips were white and my hands shook.
"It will end in a marriage, of course," resumed Mme Gabin. "The
little widow mourned for her husband very properly, and the young
man was extremely well behaved. Well, they left last night--and,
after all, they were free to please themselves."
Just then the side door of the restaurant, communicating with the
passage of the house, opened, and Dede appeared.
"Mother, ain't you coming?" she cried. "I'm waiting, you know; do
be quick."
"Presently," said the mother testily. "Don't bother."
The girl stood listening to the two women with the precocious
shrewdness of a child born and reared amid the streets of Paris.
"When all is said and done," explained Mme Gabin, "the dear departed
did not come up to Monsieur Simoneau. I didn't fancy him overmuch;
he was a puny sort of a man, a poor, fretful fellow, and he hadn't a
penny to bless himself with. No, candidly, he wasn't the kind of
husband for a young and healthy wife, whereas Monsieur Simoneau is
rich, you know, and as strong as a Turk."
"Oh yes!" interrupted Dede. "I saw him once when he was washing--
his door was open. His arms are so hairy!"
"Get along with you," screamed the old woman, shoving the girl out
of the restaurant. "You are always poking your nose where it has no
business to be."
Then she concluded with these words: "Look here, to my mind the
other one did quite right to take himself off. It was fine luck for
the little woman!"
When I found myself in the street again I walked along slowly with
trembling limbs. And yet I was not suffering much; I think I smiled
once at my shadow in the sun. It was quite true. I WAS very puny.
It had been a queer notion of mine to marry Marguerite. I recalled
her weariness at Guerande, her impatience, her dull, monotonous
life. The dear creature had been very good to me, but I had never
been a real lover; she had mourned for me as a sister for her
brother, not otherwise. Why should I again disturb her life? A
dead man is not jealous.
When I lifted my eyelids I saw the garden of the Luxembourg before
me. I entered it and took a seat in the sun, dreaming with a sense
of infinite restfulness. The thought of Marguerite stirred me
softly. I pictured her in the provinces, beloved, petted and very
happy. She had grown handsomer, and she was the mother of three
boys and two girls. It was all right. I had behaved like an honest
man in dying, and I would not commit the cruel folly of coming to
life again.
Since then I have traveled a good deal. I have been a little
everywhere. I am an ordinary man who has toiled and eaten like
anybody else. Death no longer frightens me, but it does not seem to
care for me now that I have no motive in living, and I sometimes
fear that I have been forgotten upon earth.
End
- impulse [´impʌls]
n.推动(力)；冲动；刺激 (初中英语单词) - repair [ri´peə] v.&n.修理，修补 (初中英语单词)
- motive [´məutiv] n.动机；主题 a.运动的 (初中英语单词)
- useless [´ju:sləs] a.无用的，无价值的 (初中英语单词)
- ashamed [ə´ʃeimd] a.惭愧；不好意思 (初中英语单词)
- beloved [bi´lʌvd] a.为....所爱的 n.爱人 (初中英语单词)
- wedding [´wediŋ] n.婚礼，结婚 (初中英语单词)
- monument [´mɔnjumənt] n.纪念碑；古迹 (初中英语单词)
- shaken [´ʃeikən] shake的过去分词 (初中英语单词)
- sharply [´ʃɑ:pli] ad.锋利地；剧烈地 (初中英语单词)
- whatever [wɔt´evə] pron.&a.无论什么 (初中英语单词)
- arrival [ə´raivəl] n.到达；到达的人(物) (初中英语单词)
- terror [´terə] n.恐怖；惊骇 (初中英语单词)
- hesitate [´heziteit] vi.犹豫，踌躇 (初中英语单词)
- unable [ʌn´eibəl] a.不能的；无能为力的 (初中英语单词)
- resolution [,rezə´lu:ʃən] n.决心；坚决；果断 (初中英语单词)
- sunshine [´sʌnʃain] n.日光，阳光 (初中英语单词)
- uncertain [ʌn´sə:tn] a.不定的；不可靠的 (初中英语单词)
- standing [´stændiŋ] n.持续 a.直立的 (初中英语单词)
- monsieur [mə´sjə:] n.先生 (初中英语单词)
- properly [´prɔpəli] ad.适当地；严格地 (初中英语单词)
- extremely [ik´stri:mli] ad.极端地；非常地 (初中英语单词)
- restaurant [´restərɔnt] n.饭店，菜馆 (初中英语单词)
- waiting [´weitiŋ] n.等候；伺候 (初中英语单词)
- healthy [´helθi] a.健康的 (初中英语单词)
- whereas [weər´æz] conj.鉴于；因此；而 (初中英语单词)
- suffering [´sʌfəriŋ] n.痛苦；灾害 (初中英语单词)
- otherwise [´ʌðəwaiz] ad.另外 conj.否则 (初中英语单词)
- disturb [di´stə:b] vt.扰乱；使不安；打乱 (初中英语单词)
- commit [kə´mit] vt.犯(罪)；把...判处 (初中英语单词)
- cemetery [´semitri] n.墓地，公墓 (高中英语单词)
- positive [´pɔzətiv] a.确定的 (高中英语单词)
- motionless [´məuʃənləs] a.静止的；固定的 (高中英语单词)
- ascertain [,æsə´tein] vt.探查；查明 (高中英语单词)
- remembrance [ri´membrəns] n.记忆(力)；回忆 (高中英语单词)
- saying [´seiŋ, ´sei-iŋ] n.言语；言论；格言 (高中英语单词)
- distrust [dis´trʌst] n.&vt.不信任，怀疑 (高中英语单词)
- charity [´tʃæriti] n.施舍；慈悲；博爱 (高中英语单词)
- brightness [´braitnis] n.光明；快乐 (高中英语单词)
- shabby [´ʃæbi] a.(衣服)破旧的 (高中英语单词)
- decided [di´saidid] a.明显的；决定的 (高中英语单词)
- counter [´kauntə] n.计算者；柜台；计算机 (高中英语单词)
- gossip [´gɔsip] n.&vi.说闲话；聊天 (高中英语单词)
- landlady [´lænd,leidi] n.女房东；女店主 (高中英语单词)
- housekeeper [´haus,ki:pə] n.主妇，女管家 (高中英语单词)
- infinite [´infinit] a.无限的，无穷的 (高中英语单词)
- insignificant [,insig´nifikənt] a.无意义的；无价值的 (英语四级单词)
- bitten [´bitn] bite的过去分词 (英语四级单词)
- blessed [´blesid] a.享福的；神圣的 (英语四级单词)
- weariness [wiərinis] n.疲倦；厌烦 (英语四级单词)
- upstairs [,ʌp´steəz] ad.在楼上 a.楼上的 (英语四级单词)
- haggard [´hægəd] a.憔悴的 (英语四级单词)
- impatience [im´peiʃəns] n.不耐烦，急躁 (英语四级单词)
- traveled [´trævəld] a.见面广的；旅客多的 (英语四级单词)
- thoroughfare [´θʌrəfeə] n.大路；干道；通道 (英语六级单词)
- boulevard [´bu:ləvɑ:d] n.林荫大道 (英语六级单词)
- shrank [ʃræŋk] shrink的过去式 (英语六级单词)
- fretful [´fretfəl] a.焦虑的，烦躁的 (英语六级单词)
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章节正文
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