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Chita-A Memory of Last Island-Part9_Lafcadio Hearn(1850-1904)_English Literature(文学名著)-第2页

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In the early days of the settlement, a Spanish fisherman had

died; and his comrades had built him a little tomb with the



surplus of the same bricks and other material brought down the

bayou for the construction of Viosca's cottages. But no one,



except perhaps some wandering duck hunter, had approached the

sepulchre for years. High weeds and grasses wrestled together



all about it, and rendered it totallyinvisible from the

surrounding level of the marsh.



Fiddlers swarmed away as Chita advanced over the moist soil, each

uplifting its single huge claw as it sidled off;--then frogs



began to leap before her as she reached the thicker grass;--and

long-legged brown insects sprang showering to right and left as



she parted the tufts of the thickening verdure. As she went on,

the bitter-weeds disappeared;--jointed grasses and sinewy dark



plants of a taller growth rose above her head: she was almost

deafened by the storm of insect shrilling, and the mosquitoes



became very wicked. All at once something long and black and

heavy wriggled almost from under her naked feet,--squirming so



horribly that for a minute or two she could not move for fright.

But it slunk away somewhere, and hid itself; the weeds it had



shaken ceased to tremble in its wake; and her courage returned.

She felt such an exquisite and fearful pleasure in the



gratification of that naughty curiosity! Then, quite

unexpectedly--oh! what a start it gave her!--the solitary white



object burst upon her view, leprous and ghastly as the yawn of a

cotton-mouth. Tombs ruin soon in Louisiana;--the one Chita



looked upon seemed ready to topple down. There was a great

ragged hole at one end, where wind and rain, and perhaps also the



burrowing of crawfish and of worms, had loosened the bricks, and

caused them to slide out of place. It seemed very black inside;



but Chita wanted to know what was there. She pushed her way

through a gap in the thin and rotten line of pickets, and through



some tall weeds with big coarse pink flowers;--then she crouched

down on hands and knees before the black hole, and peered in. It



was not so black inside as she had thought; for a sunbeam slanted

down through a chink in the roof; and she could see!



A brown head--without hair, without eyes, but with teeth, ever so

many teeth!--seemed to laugh at her; and close to it sat a Toad,



the hugest she had ever seen; and the white skin of his throat

kept puffing out and going in. And Chita screamed and screamed,



and fled in wild terror,--screaming all the way, till Carmen ran

out to meet her and carry her home. Even when safe in her



adopted mother's arms, she sobbed with fright. To the vivid

fancy of the child there seemed to be some hideous relation



between the staring reptile and the brown death's-head, with its

empty eyes, and its nightmare-smile.



The shock brought on a fever,--a fever that lasted several days,

and left her very weak. But the experience taught her to obey,



taught her that Carmen knew best what was for her good. It also

caused her to think a great deal. Carmen had told her that the



dead people never frighten" target="_blank" title="vt.吓唬，使惊惧">frightened good little girls who stayed at

home.



--"Madrecita Carmen," she asked, "is my mamma dead?"

--"Pobrecita! .... Yes, my angel. God called her to Him,--your



darling mother."

--"Madrecita," she asked again,--her young eyes growing vast



with horror,--"is my own mamma now like That?" ... She pointed

toward the place of the white gleam, behind the great trees.



--"No, no, no! my darling!" cried Carmen, appalled herself by

the ghastly question,--"your mamma is with the dear, good,



loving God, who lives in the beautiful sky, above the clouds, my

darling, beyond the sun!"



But Carmen's kind eyes were full of tears; and the child read

their meaning. He who teareth off the Mask of the Flesh had



looked into her face one unutterable moment:--she had seen the

brutal Truth, naked to the bone!



Yet there came to her a little thrill of consolation, caused by

the words of the tender falsehood; for that which she had






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