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Within the Tides-Part5_JOSEPH CONRAD (1857-1924)_English Literature(文学名著)-第2页

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of that coin. Nothing significant came from her. It could not be

said that she had received from the contacts of the external world



impressions of a personal kind, different from other women. What

was ravishing in her was her quietness and, in her grave attitudes,



the unfailing brilliance of her femininity. He did not know what

there was under that ivory forehead so splendidly shaped, so



gloriously crowned. He could not tell what were her thoughts, her

feelings. Her replies were reflective, always preceded by a short



silence, while he hung on her lips anxiously. He felt himself in

the presence of a mysterious being in whom spoke an unknown voice,



like the voice of oracles, bringing everlastingunrest to the

heart.



He was thankful enough to sit in silence with secretly clenched

teeth, devoured by jealousy - and nobody could have guessed that



his quiet deferential bearing to all these grey-heads was the

supreme effort of stoicism, that the man was engaged in keeping a



sinister watch on his tortures lest his strength should fail him.

As before, when grappling with other forces of nature, he could



find in himself all sorts of courage except the courage to run

away.



It was perhaps from the lack of subjects they could have in common

that Miss Moorsom made him so often speak of his own life. He did



not shrink from talking about himself, for he was free from that

exacerbated, timid vanity which seals so many vain-glorious lips.



He talked to her in his restrained voice, gazing at the tip of her

shoe, and thinking that the time was bound to come soon when her



very inattention would get weary of him. And indeed on stealing a

glance he would see her dazzling and perfect, her eyes vague,



staring in mournful immobility, with a drooping head that made him

think of a tragic Venus arising before him, not from the foam of



the sea, but from a distant, still more formless, mysterious, and

potent immensity of mankind.



CHAPTER V

One afternoon Renouard stepping out on the terrace found nobody



there. It was for him, at the same time, a melancholy

disappointment and a poignant relief.



The heat was great, the air was still, all the long windows of the

house stood wide open. At the further end, grouped round a lady's



work-table, several chairs disposed sociably suggested invisible

occupants, a company of conversing shades. Renouard looked towards



them with a sort of dread. A most elusive, faint sound of ghostly

talk issuing from one of the rooms added to the illusion and



stopped his already hesitating footsteps. He leaned over the

balustrade of stone near a squat vase holding a tropical plant of a



bizarre shape. Professor Moorsom coming up from the garden with a

book under his arm and a white parasol held over his bare head,



found him there and, closing the parasol, leaned over by his side

with a remark on the increasing heat of the season. Renouard



assented and changed his position a little; the other, after a

short silence, administered unexpectedly a question which, like the



blow of a club on the head, deprived Renouard of the power of

speech and even thought, but, more cruel, left him quivering with



apprehension, not of death but of everlastingtorment. Yet the

words were extremely simple.



"Something will have to be done soon. We can't remain in a state

of suspended expectation for ever. Tell me what do you think of



our chances?"

Renouard, speechless, produced a faint smile. The professor



confessed in a jocular tone his impatience to complete the circuit

of the globe and be done with it. It was impossible to remain






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