Book VII Nancy’s Flight I

The wheat harvest was nearly over. Nancy and her companions had been carrying dinner to the mowers, in the big wheat field on the other side of Back Creek¹. On her way home Nancy slipped from the company and ran through Mrs. Blake’s yard to her kitchen door. Mary and Betty had finished washing the dishes, and their mother was preparing to roast coffee beans in the oven. After one look at Nancy’s face, she told the children they could go down the road and watch Grandfather cutting his wheat. When they were gone, she turned to the yellow girl.

“What’s the matter now, child? Has that scamp been pestering² you again? Set down and tell me.”

Nancy dropped into a chair. “Oh, I’m most drove out-a my mind, I cain’t bear it no longer, ‘deed I cain’t! I gets no rest night nor day. I’m goin’ to throw myself into the millpawnd, I am!” She bowed her head on her arms and broke into sobs³.

“Hush⁴, hush! Don’t talk so, Nancy, it’s wicked. Stop your crying, and tell me about it.” She stood over the girl, stroking her quivering shoulders until the sobs grew more throaty and, as it were, dried up. Nancy lifted her face.

“Miz’ Blake, you’s the only one I got to talk to. He’s just after me night an’ day, till I wisht I’d never been bawn.”

“I guess a good many of us wish that, sometimes. But we come right again, and bear our lot. Have you said anything to my father?”

“How could I, Miz’ Blake? I’d die a’ shame to speak it before that good ole man. I got nobody I kin⁵ come to but you.”

“Then you must try to make it plain to me, Nancy. Can’t you keep out of his way?”

“It’s worst at night, Miz’ Blake. You know I sleeps outside Miss Sapphy’s door, an’ he’s right over me, at the top of the stairs. One night I heard him comin’ down the stairs in his bare feet, an’ I jumped up an’ run into the Mistress’s room, makin’ out I thought I heered her callin’ me. She was right cross ‘cause I’d waked her up, and sent me back to my bed, an’ I layed there awake till mornin’. If I was to sleep sound, he could slip in to me any time. If I hollered, the Mistress would put it all on me; she’d say I done somethin’ to make him think I was a bad girl. Another time I heard him slippin’ down at night, an’ I jumped an’ run to old Mr. Washington. You know he sleeps on a cot in the wine closet. He give me his bed, an’ he set up all night in the hall. So I cain’t run in to the Mistress agin, an’ I hates to go to Mr. Washington. He needs his rest. Why, Miz’ Blake, there ain’t no stoppin’ Mr. Martin. He kin jist slip into my bed any night if I happens to fall asleep. I got nobody to call to. I cain’t do nothin’!”

Here Nancy sprang from her chair and stood with her hands pressed against her forehead and her blue-black hair.

“I tell you, I’d druther drown myself before he got at me than after! Only I want SOMEBODY as’ll speak up for me to the Master, an’ tell him I didn’t do it from wickedness. Please, mam, tell him how I was drove to it.”

When she spoke⁶ of the Master, she began to cry again, and could not go on.

Presently Mrs. Blake said quietly but resolutely⁷: “I’m a-going to get you away from all this, Nancy. Mind you, no more talk about the mill dam. You’re young and have life before you. I’ve seen how things were going, and I’ve been figuring on how to get you away from the mill. You’ve not been real happy over there for a good while back.”

“No’m, not since she turned on me.” Nancy spoke absently, as if talking to herself. “It ain’t nothing she DOES to me. I don’ know what it is, but she never looks at me no more. She’s jist turned on me.”

Mrs. Blake took her by the shoulders, as if to rouse her. “Now you must listen to me, Nancy. Would you be brave enough to go away from here to a better place, where you’d be safe? I can’t run Mart Colbert out of the neighbourhood, but I think I can get you away. Would you go?”

“I’d go anywheres to git away from him. I’d sooner go down to Georgia an’ pick cotton, ‘deed I would.”

“It won’t come to that, Nancy. Just you hold out a little longer, and I’ll get you out of these troubles. Have you said anything to Till?”

Nancy looked up at her with wondering, startled eyes. “To Maw? How could I, mam?”

Mrs. Blake turned away and began to put slow wood in her stove to get on with her roasting. “Here come my girls up the road. You better let them go along home with you. Maybe Mother’s missed you, but if they’re with you, nothing will be said.”

After Nancy and the children were gone, Mrs. Blake sat down to watch over the pans of browning coffee. She understood why Nancy did not go to Till for advice and protection. Till had been a Dodderidge before ever she was Nancy’s mother. In Till’s mind, her first duty was to her mistress. Ever since Mrs. Colbert had become an invalid⁸, Till’s position in the house was all-important; and position was dear to her. Long ago Matchem had taught her to “value her place,” and that became her rule of life. Anything that made trouble between her and the Mistress would wreck⁹ the order of the household.

Nancy had come into the world by accident; the other relation, that with the Dodderidges, Till regarded as one of the fixed¹⁰ conditions you were born into. Beginning with Jezebel, her kin had lived under the roof and protection of that family for four generations. It was their natural place in the world.

Yes, Mrs. Blake knew why Till shut her eyes to what was going on over at the Mill House. And she realized once more that she herself was by nature incapable¹¹ of understanding her mother. Ever since she could remember, she had seen her mother show shades of kindness and cruelty which seemed to her purely¹² whimsical. At this moment Mrs. Blake could not for the life of her say whether Mrs. Colbert had invited this scapegrace to her house with the deliberate purpose of bringing harm to Nancy, or whether she had asked him merely for the sake of his company, and was now ready to tolerate anything that might amuse him and thus prolong his stay. This was quite possible, since Mrs. Colbert, though often generous, was entirely¹³ self-centred and thought of other people only in their relation to herself. She was born that way, and had been brought up that way.

Yet one must admit inconsistencies. There was her singular indulgence with Tansy Dave, her real affection for Till and old Jezebel, her patience with Sampson’s lazy wife. Even now, from her chair, she took some part in all the celebrations that darkies love. She liked to see them happy. On Christmas morning she sat in the long hall and had all the men on the place come in to get their presents and their Christmas drink. She served each man a strong toddy in one of the big glass tumblers that had been her father’s. When Tap, the mill boy, smacked¹⁴ his lips and said: “Miss Sapphy, if my mammy’s titty had a-tasted like that, I never would a-got weaned,” she laughed as if she had never heard the old joke before.

When the darkies were sick, she doctored them, sent linen¹⁵ for the new babies and had them brought for her to see as soon as the mother was up and about. Recalling these things and trying to be fair to her mother, Mrs. Blake suddenly rose from her chair and said aloud:

“No, it ain’t put on; she believes in it, and they believe in it. But it ain’t right.”

1 creek   

n.小溪，小河，小湾

参考例句：

• He sprang through the creek.他跳过小河。
• People sunbathe in the nude on the rocks above the creek.人们在露出小溪的岩石上裸体晒日光浴。

2 pestering   

使烦恼，纠缠( pester的现在分词 )

参考例句：

• He's always pestering me to help him with his homework. 他总是泡蘑菇要我帮他做作业。
• I'm telling you once and for all, if you don't stop pestering me you'll be sorry. 我这是最后一次警告你。如果你不停止纠缠我，你将来会后悔的。

3 sobs   

啜泣（声），呜咽（声）( sob的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• She was struggling to suppress her sobs. 她拼命不让自己哭出来。
• She burst into a convulsive sobs. 她突然抽泣起来。

4 hush   

int.嘘，别出声；n.沉默，静寂；v.使安静

参考例句：

• A hush fell over the onlookers.旁观者们突然静了下来。
• Do hush up the scandal!不要把这丑事声张出去！

5 kin   

n.家族，亲属，血缘关系；adj.亲属关系的，同类的

参考例句：

• He comes of good kin.他出身好。
• She has gone to live with her husband's kin.她住到丈夫的亲戚家里去了。

6 spoke   

n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说

参考例句：

• They sourced the spoke nuts from our company.他们的轮辐螺帽是从我们公司获得的。
• The spokes of a wheel are the bars that connect the outer ring to the centre.辐条是轮子上连接外圈与中心的条棒。

7 resolutely   

adj.坚决地，果断地

参考例句：

• He resolutely adhered to what he had said at the meeting. 他坚持他在会上所说的话。
• He grumbles at his lot instead of resolutely facing his difficulties. 他不是果敢地去面对困难，而是抱怨自己运气不佳。

8 invalid   

n.病人，伤残人；adj.有病的，伤残的；无效的

参考例句：

• He will visit an invalid.他将要去看望一个病人。
• A passport that is out of date is invalid.护照过期是无效的。

9 wreck   

n.失事，遇难；沉船；vt.(船等)失事，遇难

参考例句：

• Weather may have been a factor in the wreck.天气可能是造成这次失事的原因之一。
• No one can wreck the friendship between us.没有人能够破坏我们之间的友谊。

10 fixed   

adj.固定的，不变的，准备好的；(计算机)固定的

参考例句：

• Have you two fixed on a date for the wedding yet?你们俩选定婚期了吗？
• Once the aim is fixed,we should not change it arbitrarily.目标一旦确定，我们就不应该随意改变。

11 incapable   

adj.无能力的，不能做某事的

参考例句：

• He would be incapable of committing such a cruel deed.他不会做出这么残忍的事。
• Computers are incapable of creative thought.计算机不会创造性地思维。

12 purely   

adv.纯粹地，完全地

参考例句：

• I helped him purely and simply out of friendship.我帮他纯粹是出于友情。
• This disproves the theory that children are purely imitative.这证明认为儿童只会单纯地模仿的理论是站不住脚的。

13 entirely   

ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地

参考例句：

• The fire was entirely caused by their neglect of duty. 那场火灾完全是由于他们失职而引起的。
• His life was entirely given up to the educational work. 他的一生统统献给了教育工作。

14 smacked   

拍，打，掴( smack的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• He smacked his lips but did not utter a word. 他吧嗒两下嘴，一声也不言语。
• She smacked a child's bottom. 她打孩子的屁股。

15 linen   

n.亚麻布，亚麻线，亚麻制品；adj.亚麻布制的，亚麻的

参考例句：

• The worker is starching the linen.这名工人正在给亚麻布上浆。
• Fine linen and cotton fabrics were known as well as wool.精细的亚麻织品和棉织品像羊毛一样闻名遐迩。