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The Arrow of Gold-Part1_JOSEPH CONRAD (1857-1924)_English Literature(文学名著)-第2页

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in a state of sobriety. I had just returned from my second West

Indies voyage. My eyes were still full of tropical splendour, my



memory of my experiences, lawful and lawless, which had their charm

and their thrill; for they had startled me a little and had amused



me considerably. But they had left me untouched. Indeed they were

other men's adventures, not mine. Except for a little habit of



responsibility which I had acquired they had not matured me. I was

as young as before. Inconceivably young - still beautifully



unthinking - infinitely receptive.

You may believe that I was not thinking of Don Carlos and his fight



for a kingdom. Why should I? You don't want to think of things

which you meet every day in the newspapers and in conversation. I



had paid some calls since my return and most of my acquaintance

were legitimists and intensely interested in the events of the



frontier of Spain, for political, religious, or romantic reasons.

But I was not interested. Apparently I was not romantic enough.



Or was it that I was even more romantic than all those good people?

The affair seemed to me commonplace. That man was attending to his



business of a Pretender.

On the front page of the illustrated paper I saw lying on a table



near me, he looked picturesque enough, seated on a boulder, a big

strong man with a square-cut beard, his hands resting on the hilt



of a cavalry sabre - and all around him a landscape of savage

mountains. He caught my eye on that spiritedly composed woodcut.



(There were no inane snapshot-reproductions in those days.) It was

the obviousromance for the use of royalists but it arrested my



attention.

Just then some masks from outside invaded the cafe, dancing hand in



hand in a single file led by a burly man with a cardboard nose. He

gambolled in wildly and behind him twenty others perhaps, mostly



Pierrots and Pierrettes holding each other by the hand and winding

in and out between the chairs and tables: eyes shining in the



holes of cardboard faces, breasts panting; but all preserving a

mysterious silence.



They were people of the poorer sort (white calico with red spots,

costumes), but amongst them there was a girl in a black dress sewn



over with gold half moons, very high in the neck and very short in

the skirt. Most of the ordinary clients of the cafe didn't even



look up from their games or papers. I, being alone and idle,

stared abstractedly. The girl costumed as Night wore a small black



velvet mask, what is called in French a "loup." What made her

daintiness join that obviously rough lot I can't imagine. Her



uncovered mouth and chin suggested refined prettiness.

They filed past my table; the Night noticed perhaps my fixed gaze



and throwing her body forward out of the wriggling chain shot out

at me a slender tongue like a pink dart. I was not prepared for



this, not even to the extent of an appreciative "Tres foli," before

she wriggled and hopped away. But having been thus distinguished I



could do no less than follow her with my eyes to the door where the

chain of hands being broken all the masks were trying to get out at



once. Two gentlemen coming in out of the street stood arrested in

the crush. The Night (it must have been her idiosyncrasy) put her



tongue out at them, too. The taller of the two (he was in evening

clothes under a light wide-open overcoat) with great presence of



mind chucked her under the chin, giving me the view at the same

time of a flash of white teeth in his dark, lean face. The other



man was very different; fair, with smooth, ruddy cheeks and burly

shoulders. He was wearing a grey suit, obviously bought ready-



made, for it seemed too tight for his powerful frame.

That man was not altogether a stranger to me. For the last week or



so I had been rather on the look-out for him in all the public

places where in a provincial town men may expect to meet each



other. I saw him for the first time (wearing that same grey ready-

made suit) in a legitimist drawing-room where, clearly, he was an



object of interest, especially to the women. I had caught his name

as Monsieur Mills. The lady who had introduced me took the



earliest opportunity to murmur into my ear: "A relation of Lord

X." (Un proche parent de Lord X.) And then she added, casting up



her eyes: "A good friend of the King." Meaning Don Carlos of

course.



I looked at the proche parent; not on account of the parentage but

marvelling at his air of ease in that cumbrous body and in such






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