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Glasses-Part2_HENRY JAMES(1843-1916)_English Literature(文学名著)-第2页

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any I was prepared for; but it was explained in some degree by the

next words she uttered: "I'm happy to say there's nothing the



matter with any part of me whatever, not the least little thing!"

She spoke with her habitual complacency, with triumphant assurance;



she smiled again, and I could see how she wished that she hadn't so

taken me up. She turned it off with a laugh. "I've good eyes,



good teeth, a good digestion and a good temper. I'm sound of wind

and limb!" Nothing could have been more characteristic than her



blush and her tears, nothing less acceptable to her than to be

thought not perfect in every particular. She couldn't submit to



the imputation of a flaw. I expressed my delight in what she told

me, assuring her I should always do battle for her; and as if to



rejoin her companions she got up from her place on my mother's

toes. The young men presented their backs to us; they were leaning



on the rail of the cliff. Our incident had produced a certain

awkwardness, and while I was thinking of what next to say she



exclaimed irrelevantly: "Don't you know? He'll be Lord

Considine." At that moment the youth marked for this high destiny



turned round, and she spoke to my mother. "I'll introduce him to

you--he's awfully nice." She beckoned and invited him with her



parasol; the movement struck me as taking everything for granted.

I had heard of Lord Considine and if I had not been able to place



Lord Iffield it was because I didn't know the name of his eldest

son. The young man took no notice of Miss Saunt's appeal; he only



stared a moment and then on her repeating it quietly turned his

back. She was an odd creature: she didn't blush at this; she only



said to my mother apologetically, but with the frankest sweetest

amusement, "You don't mind, do you? He's a monster of shyness!"



It was as if she were sorry for every one--for Lord Iffield, the

victim of a complaint so painful, and for my mother, the subject of



a certain slight. "I'm sure I don't want him!" said my mother, but

Flora added some promise of how she would handle him for his



rudeness. She would clearly never explain anything by any failure

of her own appeal. There rolled over me while she took leave of us



and floated back to her friends a wave of superstitious dread. I

seemed somehow to see her go forth to her fate, and yet what should



fill out this orb of a high destiny if not such beauty and such

joy? I had a dim idea that Lord Considine was a great proprietor,



and though there mingled with it a faint impression that I

shouldn't like his son the result of the two images was a whimsical



prayer that the girl mightn't miss her possible fortune.

CHAPTER IV



One day in the course of the following June there was ushered into

my studio a gentleman whom I had not yet seen but with whom I had



been very briefly in correspondence. A letter from him had

expressed to me some days before his regret on learning that my



"splendid portrait" of Miss Flora Louisa Saunt, whose full name

figured by her own wish in the catalogue of the exhibition of the



Academy, had found a purchaser before the close of the private

view. He took the liberty of inquiring whether I might have at his



service some other memorial of the same lovely head, some

preliminary sketch, some study for the picture. I had replied that



I had indeed painted Miss Saunt more than once and that if he were

interested in my work I should be happy to show him what I had



done. Mr. Geoffrey Dawling, the person thus introduced to me,

stumbled into my room with awkwardmovements and equivocal sounds--



a long, lean, confused, confusing young man, with a bad complexion

and large protrusive teeth. He bore in its most indelible pressure



the postmark, as it were, of Oxford, and as soon as he opened his

mouth I perceived, in addition to a remarkablerevelation of gums,



that the text of the queer communication matched the registered

envelope. He was full of refinements and angles, of dreary and



distinguished knowledge. Of his unconscious drollery his dress

freely partook; it seemed, from the gold ring into which his red



necktie was passed to the square toe-caps of his boots, to conform

with a high sense of modernness to the fashion before the last.



There were moments when his overdone urbanity, all suggestive

stammers and interrogative quavers, made him scarcely intelligible;



but I felt him to be a gentleman and I liked the honesty of his




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