Chapter VII

Marie’s father, Albert Tovesky, was one of the more intelligent Bohemians who came West in the early seventies. He settled in Omaha and became a leader and adviser¹ among his people there. Marie was his youngest child, by a second wife, and was the apple of his eye. She was barely sixteen, and was in the graduating class of the Omaha High School, when Frank Shabata arrived from the old country and set all the Bohemian girls in a flutter. He was easily the buck² of the beer-gardens, and on Sunday he was a sight to see, with his silk hat and tucked shirt and blue frock-coat, wearing gloves and carrying a little wisp of a yellow cane³. He was tall and fair, with splendid teeth and close-cropped yellow curls, and he wore a slightly disdainful expression, proper for a young man with high connections, whose mother had a big farm in the Elbe valley. There was often an interesting discontent in his blue eyes, and every Bohemian girl he met imagined herself the cause of that unsatisfied expression. He had a way of drawing out his cambric handkerchief slowly, by one corner, from his breast-pocket, that was melancholy⁴ and romantic in the extreme. He took a little flight with each of the more eligible⁵ Bohemian girls, but it was when he was with little Marie Tovesky that he drew his handkerchief out most slowly, and, after he had lit a fresh cigar, dropped the match most despairingly. Any one could see, with half an eye, that his proud heart was bleeding for somebody.

One Sunday, late in the summer after Marie’s graduation, she met Frank at a Bohemian picnic down the river and went rowing with him all the afternoon. When she got home that evening she went straight to her father’s room and told him that she was engaged to Shabata. Old Tovesky was having a comfortable pipe before he went to bed. When he heard his daughter’s announcement, he first prudently⁶ corked⁷ his beer bottle and then leaped to his feet and had a turn of temper. He characterized Frank Shabata by a Bohemian expression which is the equivalent of stuffed shirt.

“Why don’t he go to work like the rest of us did? His farm in the Elbe valley, indeed! Ain’t he got plenty brothers and sisters? It’s his mother’s farm, and why don’t he stay at home and help her? Haven’t I seen his mother out in the morning at five o’clock with her ladle and her big bucket on wheels, putting liquid manure⁸ on the cabbages? Don’t I know the look of old Eva Shabata’s hands? Like an old horse’s hoofs⁹ they are — and this fellow wearing gloves and rings! Engaged, indeed! You aren’t fit to be out of school, and that’s what’s the matter with you. I will send you off to the Sisters of the Sacred Heart in St. Louis, and they will teach you some sense, I guess!”

Accordingly, the very next week, Albert Tovesky took his daughter, pale and tearful, down the river to the convent. But the way to make Frank want anything was to tell him he couldn’t have it. He managed to have an interview with Marie before she went away, and whereas he had been only half in love with her before, he now persuaded himself that he would not stop at anything. Marie took with her to the convent, under the canvas lining¹⁰ of her trunk, the results of a laborious¹¹ and satisfying morning on Frank’s part; no less than a dozen photographs of himself, taken in a dozen different love-lorn attitudes. There was a little round photograph for her watch-case, photographs for her wall and dresser, and even long narrow ones to be used as bookmarks. More than once the handsome gentleman was torn to pieces before the French class by an indignant nun¹².

Marie pined in the convent for a year, until her eighteenth birthday was passed. Then she met Frank Shabata in the union Station in St. Louis and ran away with him. Old Tovesky forgave his daughter because there was nothing else to do, and bought her a farm in the country that she had loved so well as a child. Since then her story had been a part of the history of the Divide. She and Frank had been living there for five years when Carl Linstrum came back to pay his long deferred¹³ visit to Alexandra. Frank had, on the whole, done better than one might have expected. He had flung himself at the soil with savage¹⁴ energy. Once a year he went to Hastings or to Omaha, on a spree. He stayed away for a week or two, and then came home and worked like a demon¹⁵. He did work; if he felt sorry for himself, that was his own affair.

1 adviser   

n.劝告者，顾问

参考例句：

• They employed me as an adviser.他们聘请我当顾问。
• Our department has engaged a foreign teacher as phonetic adviser.我们系已经聘请了一位外籍老师作为语音顾问。

2 buck   

n.雄鹿，雄兔；v.马离地跳跃

参考例句：

• The boy bent curiously to the skeleton of the buck.这个男孩好奇地弯下身去看鹿的骸骨。
• The female deer attracts the buck with high-pitched sounds.雌鹿以尖声吸引雄鹿。

3 cane   

n.手杖，细长的茎，藤条；v.以杖击，以藤编制的

参考例句：

• This sugar cane is quite a sweet and juicy.这甘蔗既甜又多汁。
• English schoolmasters used to cane the boys as a punishment.英国小学老师过去常用教鞭打男学生作为惩罚。

4 melancholy   

n.忧郁，愁思；adj.令人感伤（沮丧）的，忧郁的

参考例句：

• All at once he fell into a state of profound melancholy.他立即陷入无尽的忧思之中。
• He felt melancholy after he failed the exam.这次考试没通过，他感到很郁闷。

5 eligible   

adj.有条件被选中的；(尤指婚姻等)合适(意)的

参考例句：

• He is an eligible young man.他是一个合格的年轻人。
• Helen married an eligible bachelor.海伦嫁给了一个中意的单身汉。

6 prudently   

adv. 谨慎地，慎重地

参考例句：

• He prudently pursued his plan. 他谨慎地实行他那计划。
• They had prudently withdrawn as soon as the van had got fairly under way. 他们在蓬车安全上路后立即谨慎地离去了。

7 corked   

adj.带木塞气味的，塞着瓶塞的v.用瓶塞塞住( cork的过去式 )

参考例句：

• Our army completely surrounded and corked up the enemy stronghold. 我军把敌人的堡垒完全包围并封锁起来。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• He kept his emotions corked up inside him. 他把感情深藏于内心。 来自《简明英汉词典》

8 manure   

n.粪，肥，肥粒；vt.施肥

参考例句：

• The farmers were distributing manure over the field.农民们正在田间施肥。
• The farmers used manure to keep up the fertility of their land.农夫们用粪保持其土质的肥沃。

9 hoofs   

n.（兽的）蹄，马蹄( hoof的名词复数 )v.（兽的）蹄，马蹄( hoof的第三人称单数 )

参考例句：

• The stamp of the horse's hoofs on the wooden floor was loud. 马蹄踏在木头地板上的声音很响。 来自辞典例句
• The noise of hoofs called him back to the other window. 马蹄声把他又唤回那扇窗子口。 来自辞典例句

10 lining   

n.衬里，衬料

参考例句：

• The lining of my coat is torn.我的外套衬里破了。
• Moss makes an attractive lining to wire baskets.用苔藓垫在铁丝篮里很漂亮。

11 laborious   

adj.吃力的，努力的，不流畅

参考例句：

• They had the laborious task of cutting down the huge tree.他们接受了伐大树的艰苦工作。
• Ants and bees are laborious insects.蚂蚁与蜜蜂是勤劳的昆虫。

12 nun   

n.修女，尼姑

参考例句：

• I can't believe that the famous singer has become a nun.我无法相信那个著名的歌星已做了修女。
• She shaved her head and became a nun.她削发为尼。

13 deferred   

adj.延期的，缓召的v.拖延，延缓，推迟( defer的过去式和过去分词 )；服从某人的意愿，遵从

参考例句：

• The department deferred the decision for six months. 这个部门推迟了六个月才作决定。
• a tax-deferred savings plan 延税储蓄计划

14 savage   

adj.野蛮的；凶恶的，残暴的；n.未开化的人

参考例句：

• The poor man received a savage beating from the thugs.那可怜的人遭到暴徒的痛打。
• He has a savage temper.他脾气粗暴。

15 demon   

n.魔鬼，恶魔

参考例句：

• The demon of greed ruined the miser's happiness.贪得无厌的恶习毁掉了那个守财奴的幸福。
• He has been possessed by the demon of disease for years.他多年来病魔缠身。