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The Coxon Fund-Part2_HENRY JAMES(1843-1916)_English Literature(文学名著)-第2页

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wrongs. She bored me to extinction, and I knew but too well how

she had bored her husband; but there were those who stood by her,



the most efficient of whom were indeed the handful of poor

Saltram's backers. They did her liberal justice, whereas her mere



patrons and partisans had nothing but hatred for our philosopher.

I'm bound to say it was we, however--we of both camps, as it were--



who had always done most for her.

I thought my young lady looked rich--I scarcely knew why; and I



hoped she had put her hand in her pocket. I soon made her out,

however, not at all a fine fanatic--she was but a generous,



irresponsible enquirer. She had come to England to see her aunt,

and it was at her aunt's she had met the dreary lady we had all so



much on our mind. I saw she'd help to pass the time when she

observed that it was a pity this lady wasn't intrinsically more



interesting. That was refreshing, for it was an article of faith

in Mrs. Saltram's circle--at least among those who scorned to know



her horrid husband--that she was attractive on her merits. She was

in truth a most ordinary person, as Saltram himself would have been



if he hadn't been a prodigy. The question of vulgarity had no

application to him, but it was a measure his wife kept challenging



you to apply. I hasten to add that the consequences of your doing

so were no sufficient reason for his having left her to starve.



"He doesn't seem to have much force of character," said my young

lady; at which I laughed out so loud that my departing friends



looked back at me over their shoulders as if I were making a joke

of their discomfiture. My joke probably cost Saltram a



subscription or two, but it helped me on with my interlocutress.

"She says he drinks like a fish," she sociably continued, "and yet



she allows that his mind's wonderfully clear." It was amusing to

converse with a pretty girl who could talk of the clearness of



Saltram's mind. I expected next to hear she had been assured he

was awfully clever. I tried to tell her--I had it almost on my



conscience--what was the proper way to regard him; an effort

attended perhaps more than ever on this occasion with the usual



effect of my feeling that I wasn't after all very sure of it. She

had come to-night out of high curiosity--she had wanted to learn



this proper way for herself. She had read some of his papers and

hadn't understood them; but it was at home, at her aunt's, that her



curiosity had been kindled--kindled mainly by his wife's remarkable

stories of his want of virtue. "I suppose they ought to have kept



me away," my companion dropped, "and I suppose they'd have done so

if I hadn't somehow got an idea that he's fascinating. In fact



Mrs. Saltram herself says he is."

"So you came to see where the fascination resides? Well, you've



seen!"

My young lady raised fine eyebrows. "Do you mean in his bad



faith?"

"In the extraordinary effects of it; his possession, that is, of



some quality or other that condemns us in advance to forgive him

the humiliation, as I may call it, to which he has subjected us."



"The humiliation?"

"Why mine, for instance, as one of his guarantors, before you as



the purchaser of a ticket."

She let her charming gay eyes rest on me. "You don't look



humiliated a bit, and if you did I should let you off, disappointed

as I am; for the mysterious quality you speak of is just the



quality I came to see."

"Oh, you can't 'see' it!" I cried.



"How then do you get at it?"

"You don't! You mustn't suppose he's good-looking," I added.



"Why his wife says he's lovely!"

My hilarity may have struck her as excessive, but I confess it



broke out afresh. Had she acted only in obedience to this singular

plea, so characteristic, on Mrs. Saltram's part, of what was



irritating in the narrowness of that lady's point of view? "Mrs.

Saltram," I explained, "undervalues him where he's strongest, so



that, to make up for it perhaps, she overpraises him where he's




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