The answer was prompt and emphatic2. “No, the gentleman is no friend at all of mine, Mr. Bender.”
“A friend of my daughter’s,” Lord Theign easily explained. “I hope they’re looking after him.”
“Oh, they took care he had tea and bread and butter to any extent; and were so good as to move something,” Mr. Bender conscientiously3 added, “so that he could get up on a chair and see straight into the Moretto.”
This was a touch, however, that appeared to affect Lord John unfavourably. “Up on a chair? I say!”
Mr. Bender took another view. “Why, I got right up myself — a little more and I’d almost have begun to paw it! He got me quite interested”— the proprietor4 of the picture would perhaps care to know —“in that Moretto.” And it was on these lines that Mr. Bender continued to advance. “I take it that your biggest value, however, Lord Theign, is your splendid Sir Joshua. Our friend there has a great deal to say about that too — but it didn’t lead to our moving any more furniture.” On which he paused as to enjoy, with a show of his fine teeth, his host’s reassurance5. “It has yet, my impression of that picture, sir, led to something else. Are you prepared, Lord Theign, to entertain a proposition?”
Lord Theign met Mr. Bender’s eyes while this inquirer left these few portentous6 words to speak for themselves. “To the effect that I part to you with ‘The Beautiful Duchess of Waterbridge’? No, Mr. Bender, such a proposition would leave me intensely cold.”
Lord John had meanwhile had a more headlong cry. “My dear Bender, I envy you!”
“I guess you don’t envy me,” his friend serenely7 replied, “as much as I envy Lord Theign.” And then while Mr. Bender and the latter continued to face each other searchingly and firmly: “What I allude8 to is an overture9 of a strong and simple stamp — such as perhaps would shed a softer light on the difficulties raised by association and attachment10. I’ve had some experience of first shocks, and I’d be glad to meet you as man to man.”
Mr. Bender was, quite clearly, all genial11 and all sincere; he intended no irony12 and used, consciously, no great freedom. Lord Theign, not less evidently, saw this, and it permitted him amusement. “As rich man to poor man is how I’m to understand it? For me to meet you,” he added, “I should have to be tempted13 — and I’m not even temptable14. So there we are,” he blandly15 smiled.
His blandness16 appeared even for a moment to set an example to Lord John. “‘The Beautiful Duchess of Waterbridge,’ Mr. Bender, is a golden apple of one of those great family trees of which respectable people don’t lop off the branches whose venerable shade, in this garish17 and denuded18 age, they so much enjoy.”
Mr. Bender looked at him as if he had cut some irrelevant19 caper20. “Then if they don’t sell their ancestors where in the world are all the ancestors bought?”
“Doesn’t it for the moment sufficiently21 answer your question,” Lord Theign asked, “that they’re definitely not bought at Dedborough?”
“Why,” said Mr. Bender with a wealthy patience, “you talk as if it were my interest to be reasonable — which shows how little you understand. I’d be ashamed — with the lovely ideas I have — if I didn’t make you kick.” And his sturdy smile for it all fairly proclaimed his faith. “Well, I guess I can wait!”
This again in turn visibly affected22 Lord John: marking the moment from which he, in spite of his cultivated levity23, allowed an intenser and more sustained look to keep straying toward their host. “Mr. Bender’s bound to have something!”
It was even as if after a minute Lord Theign had been reached by his friend’s mute pressure. “‘Something’?”
“Something, Mr. Bender?” Lord John insisted.
It made their visitor rather sharply fix him. “Why, have you an interest, Lord John?”
This personage, though undisturbed by the challenge, if such it was, referred it to Lord Theign. “Do you authorise me to speak — a little — as if I have an interest?”
Lord Theign gave the appeal — and the speaker — a certain attention, and then appeared rather sharply to turn away from them. “My dear fellow, you may amuse yourself at my expense as you like!”
“Oh, I don’t mean at your expense,” Lord John laughed —“I mean at Mr. Bender’s!”
“Well, go ahead, Lord John,” said that gentleman, always easy, but always too, as you would have felt, aware of everything —“go ahead, but don’t sweetly hope to create me in any desire that doesn’t already exist in the germ. The attempt has often been made, over here — has in fact been organised on a considerable scale; but I guess I’ve got some peculiarity24, for it doesn’t seem as if the thing could be done. If the germ is there, on the other hand,” Mr. Bender conceded, “it develops independently of all encouragement.”
Lord John communicated again as in a particular sense with Lord Theign. “He thinks I really mean to offer him something!”
Lord Theign, who seemed to wish to advertise a degree of detachment from the issue, or from any other such, strolled off, in his restlessness, toward the door that opened to the terrace, only stopping on his way to light a cigarette from a matchbox on a small table. It was but after doing so that he made the remark: “Ah, Mr. Bender may easily be too much for you!”
“That makes me the more sorry, sir,” said his visitor, “not to have been enough for you!”
“I risk it, at any rate,” Lord John went on —“I put you, Bender, the question of whether you wouldn’t Move,’ as you say, to acquire that Moretto.”
Mr. Bender’s large face had a commensurate gaze. “As I say? I haven’t said anything of the sort!”
“But you do ‘love’ you know,” Lord John slightly overgrimaced.
“I don’t when I don’t want to. I’m different from most people — I can love or not as I like. The trouble with that Moretto,” Mr. Bender continued, “is that it ain’t what I’m after.”
His “after” had somehow, for the ear, the vividness of a sharp whack25 on the resisting surface of things, and was concerned doubtless in Lord John’s speaking again across to their host. “The worst he can do for me, you see, is to refuse it.”
Lord Theign, who practically had his back turned and was fairly dandling about in his impatience26, tossed out to the terrace the cigarette he had but just lighted. Yet he faced round to reply: “It’s the very first time in the history of this house (a long one, Mr. Bender) that a picture, or anything else in it, has been offered ——!”
It was not imperceptible that even if he hadn’t dropped Mr. Bender mightn’t have been markedly impressed. “Then it must be the very first time such an offer has failed.”
“Oh, it isn’t that we in the least press it!” Lord Theign quite naturally laughed.
“Ah, I beg your pardon — I press it very hard!” And Lord John, as taking from his face and manner a cue for further humorous license27, went so far as to emulate28, though sympathetically enough, their companion’s native form. “You don’t mean to say you don’t feel the interest of that Moretto?”
Mr. Bender, quietly confident, took his time to reply. “Well, if you had seen me up on that chair you’d have thought I did.”
“Then you must have stepped down from the chair properly impressed.”
“I stepped down quite impressed with that young man.”
“Mr. Crimble?”— it came after an instant to Lord John. “With his opinion, really? Then I hope he’s aware of the picture’s value.”
“You had better ask him,” Mr. Bender observed.
“Oh, we don’t depend here on the Mr. Crimbles!” Lord John returned.
Mr. Bender took a longer look at him. “Are you aware of the value yourself?”
His friend resorted again, as for the amusement of the thing, to their entertainer. “Am I aware of the value of the Moretto?”
Lord Theign, who had meanwhile lighted another cigarette, appeared, a bit extravagantly29 smoking, to wish to put an end to his effect of hovering30 aloof31.
“That question needn’t trouble us — when I see how much Mr. Bender himself knows about it.”
“Well, Lord Theign, I only know what that young man puts it at.” And then as the others waited, “Ten thousand,” said Mr. Bender.
“Ten thousand?” The owner of the work showed no emotion.
“Well,” said Lord John again in Mr. Bender’s style, “what’s the matter with ten thousand?”
The subject of his gay tribute considered. “There’s nothing the matter with ten thousand.”
“Then,” Lord Theign asked, “is there anything the matter with the picture?”
“Yes, sir — I guess there is.”
It gave an upward push to his lordship’s eyebrows32. “But what in the world ——?”
“Well, that’s just the question!”
The eyebrows continued to rise. “Does he pretend there’s a question of whether it is a Moretto?”
“That’s what he was up there trying to find out.”
“But if the value’s, according to himself, ten thousand ——?”
“Why, of course,” said Mr. Bender, “it’s a fine work anyway.”
“Then,” Lord Theign brought good-naturedly out, “what’s the matter with you, Mr. Bender?”
That gentleman was perfectly33 clear. “The matter with me, Lord Theign, is that I’ve no use for a ten thousand picture.”
“‘No use?’"— the expression had an oddity. “But what’s it your idea to do with such things?”
“I mean,” Mr. Bender explained, “that a picture of that rank is not what I’m after.”
“The figure,” said his noble host — speaking thus, under pressure, commercially —“is beyond what you see your way to?”
But Lord John had jumped at the truth. “The matter with Mr. Bender is that he sees his way much further.”
“Further?” their companion echoed.
“The matter with Mr. Bender is that he wants to give millions.”
Lord Theign sounded this abyss with a smile. “Well, there would be no difficulty about that, I think!”
“Ah,” said his guest, “you know the basis, sir, on which I’m ready to pay.”
“On the basis then of the Sir Joshua,” Lord John inquired, “how far would you go?”
Mr. Bender indicated by a gesture that on a question reduced to a moiety34 by its conditional35 form he could give but semi-satisfaction. “Well, I’d go all the way.”
“He wants, you see,” Lord John elucidated36, “an ideally expensive thing.”
Lord Theign appeared to decide after a moment to enter into the pleasant spirit of this; which he did by addressing his younger friend. “Then why shouldn’t I make even the Moretto as expensive as he desires?”
“Because you can’t do violence to that master’s natural modesty,” Mr. Bender declared before Lord John had time to speak. And conscious at this moment of the reappearance of his fellow-explorer, he at once supplied a further light. “I guess this gentleman at any rate can tell you.”
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1
evoked
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| [医]诱发的 | |
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emphatic
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| adj.强调的，着重的；无可置疑的，明显的 | |
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conscientiously
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| adv.凭良心地；认真地，负责尽职地；老老实实 | |
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proprietor
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| n.所有人；业主；经营者 | |
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reassurance
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| n.使放心，使消除疑虑 | |
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portentous
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| adj.不祥的，可怕的，装腔作势的 | |
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serenely
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| adv.安详地，宁静地，平静地 | |
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allude
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| v.提及，暗指 | |
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overture
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| n.前奏曲、序曲，提议，提案，初步交涉 | |
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attachment
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| n.附属物，附件；依恋；依附 | |
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genial
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| adj.亲切的，和蔼的，愉快的，脾气好的 | |
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irony
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| n.反语，冷嘲；具有讽刺意味的事，嘲弄 | |
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tempted
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| v.怂恿（某人）干不正当的事；冒…的险（tempt的过去分词） | |
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temptable
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| adj.可诱惑的 | |
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blandly
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| adv.温和地，殷勤地 | |
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blandness
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| n.温柔，爽快 | |
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garish
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| adj.华丽而俗气的，华而不实的 | |
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denuded
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| adj.[医]变光的，裸露的v.使赤裸( denude的过去式和过去分词 )；剥光覆盖物 | |
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irrelevant
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| adj.不恰当的，无关系的，不相干的 | |
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caper
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| v.雀跃，欢蹦；n.雀跃，跳跃；续随子，刺山柑花蕾；嬉戏 | |
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sufficiently
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| adv.足够地，充分地 | |
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affected
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| adj.不自然的，假装的 | |
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levity
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| n.轻率，轻浮，不稳定，多变 | |
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peculiarity
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| n.独特性，特色；特殊的东西；怪癖 | |
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whack
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| v.敲击，重打，瓜分；n.重击，重打，尝试，一份 | |
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impatience
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| n.不耐烦，急躁 | |
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license
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| n.执照，许可证，特许；v.许可，特许 | |
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emulate
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| v.努力赶上或超越，与…竞争；效仿 | |
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extravagantly
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| adv.挥霍无度地 | |
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hovering
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| 鸟( hover的现在分词 )； 靠近（某事物）； （人）徘徊； 犹豫 | |
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aloof
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| adj.远离的；冷淡的，漠不关心的 | |
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eyebrows
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| 眉毛( eyebrow的名词复数 ) | |
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perfectly
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| adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地 | |
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moiety
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| n.一半；部分 | |
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conditional
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| adj.条件的，带有条件的 | |
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elucidated
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| v.阐明，解释( elucidate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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