章节正文
the way of joy, Esther turned and ran out of the room.
The two men remained looking at each other with some
confusion on both sides. Van Tromp was naturally the first
to recover; he put out his hand with a fine gesture.
'And you know my little lass, my Esther?' he said. 'This is
pleasant; this is what I have conceived of home. A strange
word for the old rover; but we all have a taste for home and
the home-like, disguise it how we may. It has brought me
here, Mr. Naseby,' he concluded, with an intonation that
would have made his fortune on the stage, so just, so sad, so
dignified, so like a man of the world and a philosopher, 'and
you see a man who is content.'
'I see,' said Dick.
'Sit down,' continued the parasite, setting the example.
'Fortune has gone against me. (I am just sirrupping a little
brandy - after my journey.) I was going down, Mr. Naseby;
between you and me, I was DECAVE; I borrowed fifty francs,
smuggled my valise past the concierge - a work of
considerable tact - and here I am!'
'Yes,' said Dick; 'and here you are.' He was quite idiotic.
Esther, at this moment, re-entered the room.
'Are you glad to see him?' she whispered in his ear, the
pleasure in her voice almost bursting through the whisper
into song.
'Oh yes,' said Dick, 'very.'
'I knew you would be,' she replied; 'I told him how you loved
him.'
'Help yourself,' said the Admiral, 'help yourself; and let us
drink to a new existence.'
'To a new existence,' repeated Dick; and he raised the
tumbler to his lips, but set it down untasted. He had had
enough of novelties for one day.
Esther was sitting on a stool beside her father's feet,
holding her knees in her arms, and looking with pride from
one to the other of her two visitors. Her eyes were so
bright that you were never sure if there were tears in them
or not; little voluptuous shivers ran about her body;
sometimes she nestled her chin into her throat, sometimes
threw back her head, with ecstasy; in a word, she was in that
state when it is said of people that they cannot contain
themselves for happiness. It would be hard to exaggerate the
agony of Richard.
And, in the meantime, Van Tromp ran on interminably.
'I never forget a friend,' said he, 'nor yet an enemy: of the
latter, I never had but two - myself and the public; and I
fancy I have had my vengeance pretty freely out of both.' He
chuckled. 'But those days are done. Van Tromp is no more.
He was a man who had successes; I believe you knew I had
successes - to which we shall refer no farther,' pulling down
his neckcloth with a smile. 'That man exists no more: by an
exercise of will I have destroyed him. There is something
like it in the poets. First, a brilliant and conspicuous
career - the observed, I may say, of all observers, including
the bum-bailie: and then, presto! a quiet, sly, old, rustic
BONHOMME, cultivating roses. In Paris, Mr. Naseby - '
'Call him Richard, father,' said Esther.
'Richard, if he will allow me. Indeed, we are old friends,
and now near neighbours; and, A PROPOS, how are we off for
neighbours, Richard? The cottage stands, I think, upon your
father's land - a family which I respect - and the wood, I
understand, is Lord Trevanion's. Not that I care; I am an
old Bohemian. I have cut society with a cut direct; I cut it
when I was prosperous, and now I reap my reward, and can cut
it with dignity in my declension. These are our little
AMOURS PROPRES, my daughter: your father must respect
himself. Thank you, yes; just a leetle, leetle, tiny -
thanks, thanks; you spoil me. But, as I was saying, Richard,
or was about to say, my daughter has been allowed to rust;
her aunt was a mere duenna; hence, in parenthesis, Richard,
her distrust of me; my nature and that of the duenna are
poles asunder - poles! But, now that I am here, now that I
have given up the fight, and live henceforth for one only of
my works - I have the modesty to say it is my best - my
daughter - well, we shall put all that to rights. The
neighbours, Richard?'
Dick was understood to say that there were many good families
in the Vale of Thyme.
'You shall introduce us,' said the Admiral.
Dick's shirt was wet; he made a lumbering excuse to go; which
Esther explained to herself by a fear of intrusion, and so
set down to the merit side of Dick's account, while she
proceeded to detain him.
'Before our walk?' she cried. 'Never! I must have my walk.'
'Let us all go,' said the Admiral, rising.
'You do not know that you are wanted,' she cried, leaning on
his shoulder with a caress. 'I might wish to speak to my old
friend about my new father. But you shall come to-day, you
shall do all you want; I have set my heart on spoiling you.'
'I will just take ONE drop more,' said the Admiral, stooping
to help himself to brandy. 'It is surprising how this
journey has fatigued me. But I am growing old, I am growing
old, I am growing old, and - I regret to add - bald.'
He cocked a white wide-awake coquettishly upon his head - the
habit of the lady-killer clung to him; and Esther had already
thrown on her hat, and was ready, while he was still studying
the result in a mirror: the carbuncle had somewhat painfully
arrested his attention.
'We are papa now; we must be respectable,' he said to Dick,
in explanation of his dandyism: and then he went to a bundle
and chose himself a staff. Where were the elegant canes of
his Parisian epoch? This was a support for age, and designed
for rustic scenes. Dick began to see and appreciate the
man's enjoyment in a new part, when he saw how carefully he
had 'made it up.' He had invented a gait for this first
country stroll with his daughter, which was admirably in key.
He walked with fatigue, he leaned upon the staff; he looked
round him with a sad, smiling sympathy on all that he beheld;
he even asked the name of a plant, and rallied himself gently
for an old town bird, ignorant of nature. 'This country life
will make me young again,' he sighed. They reached the top
of the hill towards the first hour of evening; the sun was
descending heaven, the colour had all drawn into the west;
the hills were modelled in their least contour by the soft,
slanting shine; and the wide moorlands, veined with glens and
hazelwoods, ran west and north in a hazy glory of light.
Then the painter wakened in Van Tromp.
'Gad, Dick,' he cried, 'what value!'
An ode in four hundred lines would not have seemed so
touching to Esther; her eyes filled with happy tears; yes,
here was the father of whom she had dreamed, whom Dick had
described; simple, enthusiastic, unworldly, kind, a painter
at heart, and a fine gentleman in manner.
And just then the Admiral perceived a house by the wayside,
and something depending over the house door which might be
construed as a sign by the hopeful and thirsty.
'Is that,' he asked, pointing with his stick, 'an inn?'
There was a marked change in his voice, as though he attached
importance to the inquiry: Esther listened, hoping she should
hear wit or wisdom.
Dick said it was.
'You know it?' inquired the Admiral.
'I have passed it a hundred times, but that is all,' replied
Dick.
'Ah,' said Van Tromp, with a smile, and shaking his head;
'you are not an old campaigner; you have the world to learn.
Now I, you see, find an inn so very near my own home, and my
first thought is my neighbours. I shall go forward and make
my neighbours' acquaintance; no, you needn't come; I shall
not be a moment.'
And he walked off briskly towards the inn, leaving Dick alone
with Esther on the road.
'Dick,' she exclaimed, 'I am so glad to get a word with you;
I am so happy, I have such a thousand things to say; and I
want you to do me a favour. Imagine, he has come without a
paint-box, without an easel; and I want him to have all. I
want you to get them for me in Thymebury. You saw, this
moment, how his heart turned to painting. They can't live
without it,' she added; meaning perhaps Van Tromp and Michel
Angelo.
Up to that moment, she had observed nothing amiss in Dick's
behaviour. She was too happy to be curious; and his silence,
in presence of the great and good being whom she called her
father, had seemed both natural and praiseworthy. But now
that they were alone, she became conscious of a barrier
between her lover and herself, and alarm sprang up in her
heart.
'Dick,' she cried, 'you don't love me.'
'I do that,' he said heartily.
'But you are unhappy; you are strange; you - you are not glad
to see my father,' she concluded, with a break in her voice.
'Esther,' he said, 'I tell you that I love you; if you love
me, you know what that means, and that all I wish is to see
you happy. Do you think I cannot enjoy your pleasures?
Esther, I do. If I am uneasy, if I am alarmed, if - . Oh,
believe me, try and believe in me,' he cried, giving up
argument with perhaps a happy inspiration.
But the girl's suspicions were aroused; and though she
pressed the matter no farther (indeed, her father was already
seen returning), it by no means left her thoughts. At one
moment she simply resented the selfishness of a man who had
obtruded his dark looks and passionate" target="_blank" title="a.易动情的；易怒的">passionate language on her joy;
for there is nothing that a woman can less easily forgive
than the language of a passion which, even if only for the
moment, she does not share. At another, she suspected him of
jealousy against her father; and for that, although she could
see excuses for it, she yet despised him. And at least, in
one way or the other, here was the dangerous beginning of a
separation between two hearts. Esther found herself at
variance with her sweetest friend; she could no longer look
into his heart and find it written with the same language as
her own; she could no longer think of him as the sun which
radiated happiness upon her life, for she had turned to him
once, and he had breathed upon her black and chilly, radiated
blackness and frost. To put the whole matter in a word, she
was beginning, although ever so slightly, to fall out of
love.
CHAPTER VI - THE PRODIGAL FATHER GOES ON FROM STRENGTH TO
STRENGTH
WE will not follow all the steps of the Admiral's return and
installation, but hurry forward towards the catastrophe,
merely chronicling by the way a few salient incidents,
wherein we must rely entirely upon the evidence of Richard,
for Esther to this day has never opened her mouth upon this
trying passage of her life, and as for the Admiral - well,
that naval officer, although still alive, and now more
suitably installed in a seaport town where he has a telescope
and a flag in his front garden, is incapable of throwing the
slightest gleam of light upon the affair. Often and often
has he remarked to the present writer: 'If I know what it was
all about, sir, I'll be - ' in short, be what I hope he will
not. And then he will look across at his daughter's
The two men remained looking at each other with some
confusion on both sides. Van Tromp was naturally the first
to recover; he put out his hand with a fine gesture.
'And you know my little lass, my Esther?' he said. 'This is
pleasant; this is what I have conceived of home. A strange
word for the old rover; but we all have a taste for home and
the home-like, disguise it how we may. It has brought me
here, Mr. Naseby,' he concluded, with an intonation that
would have made his fortune on the stage, so just, so sad, so
dignified, so like a man of the world and a philosopher, 'and
you see a man who is content.'
'I see,' said Dick.
'Sit down,' continued the parasite, setting the example.
'Fortune has gone against me. (I am just sirrupping a little
brandy - after my journey.) I was going down, Mr. Naseby;
between you and me, I was DECAVE; I borrowed fifty francs,
smuggled my valise past the concierge - a work of
considerable tact - and here I am!'
'Yes,' said Dick; 'and here you are.' He was quite idiotic.
Esther, at this moment, re-entered the room.
'Are you glad to see him?' she whispered in his ear, the
pleasure in her voice almost bursting through the whisper
into song.
'Oh yes,' said Dick, 'very.'
'I knew you would be,' she replied; 'I told him how you loved
him.'
'Help yourself,' said the Admiral, 'help yourself; and let us
drink to a new existence.'
'To a new existence,' repeated Dick; and he raised the
tumbler to his lips, but set it down untasted. He had had
enough of novelties for one day.
Esther was sitting on a stool beside her father's feet,
holding her knees in her arms, and looking with pride from
one to the other of her two visitors. Her eyes were so
bright that you were never sure if there were tears in them
or not; little voluptuous shivers ran about her body;
sometimes she nestled her chin into her throat, sometimes
threw back her head, with ecstasy; in a word, she was in that
state when it is said of people that they cannot contain
themselves for happiness. It would be hard to exaggerate the
agony of Richard.
And, in the meantime, Van Tromp ran on interminably.
'I never forget a friend,' said he, 'nor yet an enemy: of the
latter, I never had but two - myself and the public; and I
fancy I have had my vengeance pretty freely out of both.' He
chuckled. 'But those days are done. Van Tromp is no more.
He was a man who had successes; I believe you knew I had
successes - to which we shall refer no farther,' pulling down
his neckcloth with a smile. 'That man exists no more: by an
exercise of will I have destroyed him. There is something
like it in the poets. First, a brilliant and conspicuous
career - the observed, I may say, of all observers, including
the bum-bailie: and then, presto! a quiet, sly, old, rustic
BONHOMME, cultivating roses. In Paris, Mr. Naseby - '
'Call him Richard, father,' said Esther.
'Richard, if he will allow me. Indeed, we are old friends,
and now near neighbours; and, A PROPOS, how are we off for
neighbours, Richard? The cottage stands, I think, upon your
father's land - a family which I respect - and the wood, I
understand, is Lord Trevanion's. Not that I care; I am an
old Bohemian. I have cut society with a cut direct; I cut it
when I was prosperous, and now I reap my reward, and can cut
it with dignity in my declension. These are our little
AMOURS PROPRES, my daughter: your father must respect
himself. Thank you, yes; just a leetle, leetle, tiny -
thanks, thanks; you spoil me. But, as I was saying, Richard,
or was about to say, my daughter has been allowed to rust;
her aunt was a mere duenna; hence, in parenthesis, Richard,
her distrust of me; my nature and that of the duenna are
poles asunder - poles! But, now that I am here, now that I
have given up the fight, and live henceforth for one only of
my works - I have the modesty to say it is my best - my
daughter - well, we shall put all that to rights. The
neighbours, Richard?'
Dick was understood to say that there were many good families
in the Vale of Thyme.
'You shall introduce us,' said the Admiral.
Dick's shirt was wet; he made a lumbering excuse to go; which
Esther explained to herself by a fear of intrusion, and so
set down to the merit side of Dick's account, while she
proceeded to detain him.
'Before our walk?' she cried. 'Never! I must have my walk.'
'Let us all go,' said the Admiral, rising.
'You do not know that you are wanted,' she cried, leaning on
his shoulder with a caress. 'I might wish to speak to my old
friend about my new father. But you shall come to-day, you
shall do all you want; I have set my heart on spoiling you.'
'I will just take ONE drop more,' said the Admiral, stooping
to help himself to brandy. 'It is surprising how this
journey has fatigued me. But I am growing old, I am growing
old, I am growing old, and - I regret to add - bald.'
He cocked a white wide-awake coquettishly upon his head - the
habit of the lady-killer clung to him; and Esther had already
thrown on her hat, and was ready, while he was still studying
the result in a mirror: the carbuncle had somewhat painfully
arrested his attention.
'We are papa now; we must be respectable,' he said to Dick,
in explanation of his dandyism: and then he went to a bundle
and chose himself a staff. Where were the elegant canes of
his Parisian epoch? This was a support for age, and designed
for rustic scenes. Dick began to see and appreciate the
man's enjoyment in a new part, when he saw how carefully he
had 'made it up.' He had invented a gait for this first
country stroll with his daughter, which was admirably in key.
He walked with fatigue, he leaned upon the staff; he looked
round him with a sad, smiling sympathy on all that he beheld;
he even asked the name of a plant, and rallied himself gently
for an old town bird, ignorant of nature. 'This country life
will make me young again,' he sighed. They reached the top
of the hill towards the first hour of evening; the sun was
descending heaven, the colour had all drawn into the west;
the hills were modelled in their least contour by the soft,
slanting shine; and the wide moorlands, veined with glens and
hazelwoods, ran west and north in a hazy glory of light.
Then the painter wakened in Van Tromp.
'Gad, Dick,' he cried, 'what value!'
An ode in four hundred lines would not have seemed so
touching to Esther; her eyes filled with happy tears; yes,
here was the father of whom she had dreamed, whom Dick had
described; simple, enthusiastic, unworldly, kind, a painter
at heart, and a fine gentleman in manner.
And just then the Admiral perceived a house by the wayside,
and something depending over the house door which might be
construed as a sign by the hopeful and thirsty.
'Is that,' he asked, pointing with his stick, 'an inn?'
There was a marked change in his voice, as though he attached
importance to the inquiry: Esther listened, hoping she should
hear wit or wisdom.
Dick said it was.
'You know it?' inquired the Admiral.
'I have passed it a hundred times, but that is all,' replied
Dick.
'Ah,' said Van Tromp, with a smile, and shaking his head;
'you are not an old campaigner; you have the world to learn.
Now I, you see, find an inn so very near my own home, and my
first thought is my neighbours. I shall go forward and make
my neighbours' acquaintance; no, you needn't come; I shall
not be a moment.'
And he walked off briskly towards the inn, leaving Dick alone
with Esther on the road.
'Dick,' she exclaimed, 'I am so glad to get a word with you;
I am so happy, I have such a thousand things to say; and I
want you to do me a favour. Imagine, he has come without a
paint-box, without an easel; and I want him to have all. I
want you to get them for me in Thymebury. You saw, this
moment, how his heart turned to painting. They can't live
without it,' she added; meaning perhaps Van Tromp and Michel
Angelo.
Up to that moment, she had observed nothing amiss in Dick's
behaviour. She was too happy to be curious; and his silence,
in presence of the great and good being whom she called her
father, had seemed both natural and praiseworthy. But now
that they were alone, she became conscious of a barrier
between her lover and herself, and alarm sprang up in her
heart.
'Dick,' she cried, 'you don't love me.'
'I do that,' he said heartily.
'But you are unhappy; you are strange; you - you are not glad
to see my father,' she concluded, with a break in her voice.
'Esther,' he said, 'I tell you that I love you; if you love
me, you know what that means, and that all I wish is to see
you happy. Do you think I cannot enjoy your pleasures?
Esther, I do. If I am uneasy, if I am alarmed, if - . Oh,
believe me, try and believe in me,' he cried, giving up
argument with perhaps a happy inspiration.
But the girl's suspicions were aroused; and though she
pressed the matter no farther (indeed, her father was already
seen returning), it by no means left her thoughts. At one
moment she simply resented the selfishness of a man who had
obtruded his dark looks and passionate" target="_blank" title="a.易动情的；易怒的">passionate language on her joy;
for there is nothing that a woman can less easily forgive
than the language of a passion which, even if only for the
moment, she does not share. At another, she suspected him of
jealousy against her father; and for that, although she could
see excuses for it, she yet despised him. And at least, in
one way or the other, here was the dangerous beginning of a
separation between two hearts. Esther found herself at
variance with her sweetest friend; she could no longer look
into his heart and find it written with the same language as
her own; she could no longer think of him as the sun which
radiated happiness upon her life, for she had turned to him
once, and he had breathed upon her black and chilly, radiated
blackness and frost. To put the whole matter in a word, she
was beginning, although ever so slightly, to fall out of
love.
CHAPTER VI - THE PRODIGAL FATHER GOES ON FROM STRENGTH TO
STRENGTH
WE will not follow all the steps of the Admiral's return and
installation, but hurry forward towards the catastrophe,
merely chronicling by the way a few salient incidents,
wherein we must rely entirely upon the evidence of Richard,
for Esther to this day has never opened her mouth upon this
trying passage of her life, and as for the Admiral - well,
that naval officer, although still alive, and now more
suitably installed in a seaport town where he has a telescope
and a flag in his front garden, is incapable of throwing the
slightest gleam of light upon the affair. Often and often
has he remarked to the present writer: 'If I know what it was
all about, sir, I'll be - ' in short, be what I hope he will
not. And then he will look across at his daughter's
- disguise [dis´gaiz]
vt.假装；隐瞒 n.伪装 (初中英语单词) - admiral [´ædmərəl] n.海军上将，舰队司令 (初中英语单词)
- throat [θrəut] n.咽喉；嗓子；出入口 (初中英语单词)
- meantime [´mi:ntaim] n.&ad.其间；同时 (初中英语单词)
- freely [´fri:li] ad.自由地；慷慨地 (初中英语单词)
- brilliant [´briliənt] a.灿烂的；杰出的 (初中英语单词)
- cottage [´kɔtidʒ] n.村舍；小屋；小别墅 (初中英语单词)
- prosperous [´prɔspərəs] a.繁荣的；顺利的 (初中英语单词)
- reward [ri´wɔ:d] n.&v.报答；报酬；奖赏 (初中英语单词)
- dignity [´digniti] n.尊严，尊贵；高官显贵 (初中英语单词)
- henceforth [´hens´fɔ:θ] ad.今后；从今以后 (初中英语单词)
- lumbering [´lʌmbəriŋ] n.伐木(业) (初中英语单词)
- account [ə´kaunt] vi.说明 vt.认为 n.帐目 (初中英语单词)
- surprising [sə´praiziŋ] a.惊人的；意外的 (初中英语单词)
- explanation [,eksplə´neiʃən] n.解释；说明；辩解 (初中英语单词)
- appreciate [ə´pri:ʃieit] v.评价；珍惜；感激 (初中英语单词)
- sympathy [´simpəθi] n.同情，怜悯 (初中英语单词)
- ignorant [´ignərənt] a.无知的，愚昧的 (初中英语单词)
- painter [´peintə] n.画家；(油)漆工 (初中英语单词)
- inquiry [in´kwaiəri] n.询问；质询；调查 (初中英语单词)
- acquaintance [ə´kweintəns] n.相识；熟人，相识的人 (初中英语单词)
- painting [´peintiŋ] n.绘画；(油)画；着色 (初中英语单词)
- conscious [´kɔnʃəs] a.意识的；自觉的 (初中英语单词)
- sprang [spræŋ] spring 的过去式 (初中英语单词)
- unhappy [ʌn´hæpi] a.不幸的；不快乐的 (初中英语单词)
- passion [´pæʃən] n.激情；激怒；恋爱 (初中英语单词)
- beginning [bi´giniŋ] n.开始，开端；起源 (初中英语单词)
- chilly [´tʃili] a.凉飕飕的 (初中英语单词)
- slightly [´slaitli] ad.轻微地；细长的 (初中英语单词)
- writer [´raitə] n.作者；作家 (初中英语单词)
- philosopher [fi´lɔsəfə] n.哲学家；思想家；哲人 (高中英语单词)
- repeated [ri´pi:tid] a.反复的；重复的 (高中英语单词)
- ecstasy [´ekstəsi] n.狂喜；出神，入迷 (高中英语单词)
- exaggerate [ig´zædʒəreit] v.夸张，言过其实 (高中英语单词)
- vengeance [´vendʒəns] n.报复，复仇 (高中英语单词)
- saying [´seiŋ, ´sei-iŋ] n.言语；言论；格言 (高中英语单词)
- distrust [dis´trʌst] n.&vt.不信任，怀疑 (高中英语单词)
- detain [di´tein] vt.留住；拘留 (高中英语单词)
- caress [kə´res] n.&vt.爱抚；接吻 (高中英语单词)
- elegant [´eligənt] a.文雅的；优美的 (高中英语单词)
- rustic [´rʌstik] a.田野的；质朴的 (高中英语单词)
- enjoyment [in´dʒɔimənt] n.享受；愉快；乐趣 (高中英语单词)
- stroll [strəul] n.&v.漫步；散步；游荡 (高中英语单词)
- fatigue [fə´ti:g] n.&vt.(使)疲劳(劳累) (高中英语单词)
- enthusiastic [inθju:zi´æstik] a.热情的，热心的 (高中英语单词)
- uneasy [ʌn´i:zi] a.不安的；不自在的 (高中英语单词)
- passionate [´pæʃənit] a.易动情的；易怒的 (高中英语单词)
- setting [´setiŋ] n.安装；排字；布景 (英语四级单词)
- asunder [ə´sʌndə] a.分开地；零散地 (英语四级单词)
- modesty [´mɔdisti] n.谨慎；端庄；羞怯 (英语四级单词)
- brandy [´brændi] n.白兰地酒 (英语四级单词)
- parisian [pə´riziən] n.&a.巴黎人(的) (英语四级单词)
- hopeful [´həupfəl] a.有希望的，激励人的 (英语四级单词)
- briskly [´briskli] ad.轻快地；活泼地 (英语四级单词)
- incapable [in´keipəbəl] a.无能力的；不能的 (英语四级单词)
- parasite [´pærəsait] n.寄生动(植)物；食客 (英语六级单词)
- intrusion [in´tru:ʒən] n.侵入；打扰；强加 (英语六级单词)
- admirably [´ædmərəbli] ad.令人钦佩地；极妙地 (英语六级单词)
- contour [´kɔntuə] n.外形 vt.描...的轮廓 (英语六级单词)
- selfishness [´selfiʃnis] n.自私；不顾别人 (英语六级单词)
- prodigal [´prɔdigəl] a.浪费的 n.挥霍者 (英语六级单词)
- seaport [´si:pɔ:t] n.海港 (英语六级单词)
文章标签:名著
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