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Glasses-Part4_HENRY JAMES(1843-1916)_English Literature(文学名著)-第2页

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free hand while I turned confusedly away.

CHAPTER VII



I don't remember how soon it was I spoke to Geoffrey Dawling; his

sittings were irregular, but it was certainly the very next time he



gave me one.

"Has any rumour ever reached you of Miss Saunt's having anything



the matter with her eyes?" He stared with a candour that was a

sufficient answer to my question, backing it up with a shocked and



mystified "Never!" Then I asked him if he had observed in her any

symptom, however disguised, of embarrassed sight; on which, after a



moment's thought, he exclaimed "Disguised?" as if my use of that

word had vaguely awakened a train. "She's not a bit myopic," he



said; "she doesn't blink or contract her lids." I fully recognised

this and I mentioned that she altogether denied the impeachment;



owing it to him moreover to explain the ground of my inquiry, I

gave him a sketch of the incident that had taken place before me at



the shop. He knew all about Lord Iffield; that nobleman had

figured freely in our conversation as his preferred, his injurious



rival. Poor Dawling's contention was that if there had been a

definiteengagement between his lordship and the young lady, the



sort of thing that was announced in the Morning Post, renunciation

and retirement would be comparatively easy to him; but that having



waited in vain for any such assurance he was entitled to act as if

the door were not really closed or were at any rate not cruelly



locked. He was naturally much struck with my anecdote and still

more with my interpretation of it.



"There IS something, there IS something--possibly something very

grave, certainly something that requires she should make use of



artificial aids. She won't admit it publicly, because with her

idolatry of her beauty, the feeling she is all made up of, she sees



in such aids nothing but the humiliation and the disfigurement.

She has used them in secret, but that is evidently not enough, for



the affection she suffers from, apparently some definite menace,

has lately grown much worse. She looked straight at me in the



shop, which was violently lighted, without seeing it was I. At the

same distance, at Folkestone, where as you know I first met her,



where I heard this mystery hinted at and where she indignantly

denied the thing, she appeared easily enough to recognise people.



At present she couldn't really make out anything the shop-girl

showed her. She has successfully concealed from the man I saw her



with that she resorts in private to a pince-nez and that she does

so not only under the strictest orders from her oculist, but



because literally the poor thing can't accomplish without such help

half the business of life. Iffield however has suspected



something, and his suspicions, whether expressed or kept to

himself, have put him on the watch. I happened to have a glimpse



of the movement at which he pounced on her and caught her in the

act."



I had thought it all out; my idea explained many things, and

Dawling turned pale as he listened to me.



"Was he rough with her?" he anxiously asked.

"How can I tell what passed between them? I fled from the place."



My companion stared. "Do you mean to say her eyesight's going?"

"Heaven forbid! In that case how could she take life as she does?"



"How DOES she take life? That's the question!" He sat there

bewilderedly brooding; the tears rose to his lids; they reminded me



of those I had seen in Flora's the day I risked my enquiry. The

question he had asked was one that to my own satisfaction I was



ready to answer, but I hesitated to let him hear as yet all that my

reflections had suggested. I was indeed privately astonished at



their ingenuity. For the present I only rejoined that it struck me

she was playing a particular game; at which he went on as if he



hadn't heard me, suddenly haunted with a fear, lost in the dark

possibility. "Do you mean there's a danger of anything very bad?"



"My dear fellow, you must ask her special adviser."

"Who in the world is her special adviser?"



"I haven't a conception. But we mustn't get too excited. My




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