“Another ‘whited sepulchre,’ Faugh!” said Hazel, dropping in disgust the two halves of the outwardly magnificent peach she had just broken open, but which within was a mass of squirming maggots.
“Try these,” said Dick Selmes, pulling down a bough1 of the tree, on which grew several, and holding it for her while she made a selection.
“I thought so,” she went on, rapidly breaking open and throwing away another, and then another. “No, I give it up. This is a bad year for peaches.”
The two were alone together among the fragrant2 boskiness of the fruit-laden garden. The midsummer day was hot and cloudless, yet just a puff3 of cool air every now and then, from the not very far distant Indian Ocean, redeemed4 it from downright sultriness. Birds piped and whistled away up among the leaves, but shy of showing themselves over much. There had been too much havoc5 wrought6 among their kind in defence of the fruit to encourage them to court human propinquity.
“How jolly this is!” went on Dick, looking around.
“Are you ever anything but jolly?” she asked.
“Oh yes! I can get the blues7, I can tell you. For instance—”
“For instance—when?” she repeated, as he broke off.
“For instance—well, I don’t mind saying it. That time we left Haakdoornfontein I felt anything but jolly.”
“Yet Haakdoorn isn’t a wildly exciting place at the best of times. Ah, I see. You missed the hunting.”
This was exasperating8. She was in a bright, mischievous9, teasing mood, but oh—how entrancing she looked, the lift of the heavily lashed10 eyelid11, the little flash of white teeth in the bantering12 smile, the rich mantling13 of the sun-kissed, oval face.
“I missed you. Hazel, you know that perfectly14 well. And just think. I had you all to myself in those days, and here not. All these jokers who were here for Christmas—well, I found them a bore, for that reason.”
Christmas had just past, and on and around it several people from far and near had been to spend it with the Waybridges; and of these visitors the bulk had been men—and in proportion had seemed fully15 to appreciate Hazel’s attractions. Dick Selmes could not but own to himself that he had not enjoyed his Christmas over much, though he would not have let it be known for worlds.
“Hadn’t you enough of me all to yourself at Haakdoorn?” she said softly, but still with that mischievous sparkle in her eyes.
“As if that question requires any answer. Darling, you know I want you all to myself always—all through our lives. You must have seen it. Haven’t you?”
“Perhaps. I won’t tease you any more now. But you must listen to me.” The girl had grown very grave now—very earnest. Her eyes, dilated16 with varying emotions, were full upon his face, and the predominant emotion, was unqualified approval. “First of all, what would your father have to say?”
“The dad? Why, he’d be delighted, of course.”
“Yes, but would he? I’m not so sure. He has never heard of my existence, and would think you had been entrapped17 by some nobody in the course of your travels—” Here a slight wave of colour had come over her face. “Now, I won’t have that thought of me, or said by any one.”
“But, Hazel darling,” he pleaded eagerly, “I think you are setting up a kind of—er—bogey. The old dad is the dearest old chap in the world, and a jolly sight too good to me, and for me.”
She looked at him and softened18. She liked him more—more than ever—for what he had just said. Perhaps she showed it.
“I can quite believe that,” she answered. “Still, it doesn’t alter what I say.”
His face fell. So blank was it that for a moment he felt positively19 miserable20.
“But, Hazel dearest, don’t you care for me a little bit?”
Her heart went out to him.
“Dick, you know I am very fond of you,” she answered, adding to herself, “as who could help being?”—“No—no, not yet,” putting out a hand as he made a step forward.
“But—now we are engaged,” he protested rapturously.
“We are not,” she answered, and his face fell again. “And the only condition on which we will be is the one I told you. Get your father’s consent.”
“It strikes me, Hazel, that you are forgetting I am not exactly under age. I am quite independent into the bargain.”
“All the more reason why I should refuse to be the means of bringing dissension between you. Why, it would be murderous—absolutely murderous, after what you have told me. I am not forgetting either that you have a certain position.”
“Oh, hang the ‘position’!” cried Dick. “But you are very cool and—er—judicial over it all, Hazel. If you cared as much as I do.”
“Perhaps, dear, I am speaking and acting21 in your own interests,” answered the girl, softly. “I am setting you a test. It might be that when you get back home again something might transpire22 which would make you devoutly23 thankful to me for having refused to allow you to engage yourself to some little nobody whom you had found amusing in the course of your wanderings.”
“Hazel! Now you hurt me.”
He looked it. There was no doubt about it that his feelings were deeply wounded, but there was a dignity about the way in which he took it that appealed to her so powerfully as well-nigh to bring about her surrender there and then.
“I didn’t mean to, God knows,” she answered earnestly and more softly still. “But I am looking at things from a sheer common-sense standpoint. You are very brave and strong, Dick, but in one way, I believe I am stronger than you. I am only putting before you a little trial of strength, of endurance. Surely you won’t shrink from that?”
“Let us understand each other, Hazel,” he said gravely, all his boyish light-heartedness gone. “You won’t engage yourself to me until I get my father’s consent?”
“That’s it.”
“But you will, conditionally24, on my getting it?”
She thought a minute.
“I will wait until you do get it, or it is refused. But, Dick, understand that this doesn’t bind26 you in the slightest degree.”
“Oh, but it does bind me. Whoever heard of a one-sided engagement?” some of his light-heartedness returning. “I’ll write to the dear old dad on the very first opportunity.”
“Wouldn’t it be better to go yourself than to write?”
“And leave you all that time? No—no, Hazel. I’m not going to give you that chance of forgetting me.”
“Or yourself?” with a significant smile.
“Now you are repeating the offence, and I shan’t forgive you unless you give me just one k— Oh, damn!”
The change of tone, the change of attitude were in keeping, and Dick found himself in a sort of “standing at attention” rigidity27, as small Jacky Waybridge came lounging down the garden path, a catapult in his hand. We fear that Dick came near wishing he had left that unwelcome urchin28 to the sharks on a former occasion, but that in such case he himself would not now be here—with Hazel.
“Been shooting any birds, Jacky?” said Dick. “Look. Just over there I saw a rare clump29 of mouse-birds light just now; over there, just this side of the mealie land.”
The spot indicated would take the small intruder fairly out of sight.
“No good, catapult’s broken.”
“Why don’t you go to the house and get another?”
“They’re all broken. Mr Selmes, couldn’t you mend it for me?”
“I’ll try. Let’s see. Ah, got a bit of reimpje about you?”
The youngster felt in his pockets.
“No, I haven’t,” he said.
“Well, you’d better cut away to the house and get one,” said Dick.
There is a modicum30 of cussedness, sometimes vague, sometimes more pronounced, inherent in most children.
This one had his share of it. He was fond of Hazel, and attached to his rescuer, yet there was something about the two which had aroused his infantile curiosity. When he saw them alone together—which he did pretty frequently—a sort of instinct to watch them would come uppermost in his unformed mind, and this was upon him now. So he said—
“Never mind about the catapult, Mr Selmes. I’m tired. I’ll sit and talk to you and Hazel.”
“Well, what shall we talk about, Jacky?” said Dick, making a virtue31 of necessity.
“Oh, let’s go on talking about—what you were talking about while I came.”
This was funny. The two looked at each other.
“But that wouldn’t interest you in the least, Jacky,” answered the girl. “In fact, you wouldn’t understand it.”
The sharp eyes of the youngster were full upon her face, and did not fail to notice that she changed colour slightly. When he himself had done something which he ought not to have done, and was taxed with it, he would change colour too; wherefore now he drew his own deductions32. What could Hazel have been doing that came within that category?
“Never mind,” he said. “I won’t tell. No, I won’t.”
“Won’t tell?” repeated Hazel. “Won’t tell what, Jacky?”
“I won’t tell,” was all they could get out of him. Dick Selmes burst out laughing.
“Before you can ‘tell’ anything, kid, you must first of all have something to tell,” he said. “You’ve been talking a lot of bosh. Now, I think we’d better go in, for it must be getting on for dinner-time.” The two got up, and as they strolled along beneath the high quince hedge, hanging out round fruit, like the balls upon a Christmas tree, both hoped for an opportunity of at any rate satisfactorily closing their conversation. But it was not to be. That little wretch33 stuck to them like their shadow, nor did either want to inflame34 his curiosity by telling him positively to clear.
“Then it is to be conditional25,” Dick said, just before they reached the door.
“That’s the word.”
“On the terms named?”
“Exactly on the terms named.”
“Good. I accept them—except as to the one-sided part of the business.”
“That, too, I insist upon,” she answered, with a smile and a bright nod, as she left him.
Alone, for a brief space, Dick Selmes went over in his mind the interview, so untowardly35 and exasperatingly36 interrupted, and was obliged to admit to himself that his love and admiration37 for Hazel Brandon were, if possible, deepened and intensified38. Her beauty and bright, sweetness of disposition39 had fascinated and captured him, but now he had awakened40 to the fact that she possessed41 a rare depth of character indeed. He knew now that she cared for him—yes, and that very deeply; he had read it in the course of that interview by several unmistakable signs. Yet she had deliberately42, and of set purpose insisted upon that conditional delay. It showed a worldly wisdom, a knowledge of human nature beyond his own, he was constrained43 to admit; and in every way it was creditable to her. Of the obstacle he made entirely44 light, for it was in reality no obstacle at all except for the period of waiting involved.
And over himself some change had come. What was it? He felt a gravity he had never felt before. The old, thistledown, light-hearted recklessness seemed to have left him. His mind, attuned45 to a new and set purpose, seemed to have altered, to have solidified46. And yet, realising this development, he rejoiced in it. He would not have foregone it for the world. Henceforward his was a new being.
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1
bough
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| n.大树枝，主枝 | |
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2
fragrant
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| adj.芬香的，馥郁的，愉快的 | |
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puff
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| n.一口(气)；一阵(风)；v.喷气，喘气 | |
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4
redeemed
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| adj. 可赎回的，可救赎的 动词redeem的过去式和过去分词形式 | |
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5
havoc
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| n.大破坏，浩劫，大混乱，大杂乱 | |
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6
wrought
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| v.引起；以…原料制作；运转；adj.制造的 | |
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7
blues
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| n.抑郁，沮丧；布鲁斯音乐 | |
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8
exasperating
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| adj. 激怒的 动词exasperate的现在分词形式 | |
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9
mischievous
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| adj.调皮的，恶作剧的，有害的，伤人的 | |
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10
lashed
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| adj.具睫毛的v.鞭打( lash的过去式和过去分词 )；煽动；紧系；怒斥 | |
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11
eyelid
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| n.眼睑，眼皮 | |
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bantering
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| adj.嘲弄的v.开玩笑，说笑，逗乐( banter的现在分词 )；（善意地）取笑，逗弄 | |
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13
mantling
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| 覆巾 | |
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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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15
fully
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| adv.完全地，全部地，彻底地；充分地 | |
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16
dilated
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| adj.加宽的，扩大的v.（使某物）扩大，膨胀，张大( dilate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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17
entrapped
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| v.使陷入圈套，使入陷阱( entrap的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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18
softened
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| （使）变软( soften的过去式和过去分词 )； 缓解打击； 缓和； 安慰 | |
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positively
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| adv.明确地，断然，坚决地；实在，确实 | |
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miserable
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| adj.悲惨的，痛苦的；可怜的，糟糕的 | |
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acting
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| n.演戏，行为，假装；adj.代理的，临时的，演出用的 | |
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transpire
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| v.(使)蒸发，(使)排出 ；泄露，公开 | |
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devoutly
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| adv.虔诚地，虔敬地，衷心地 | |
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conditionally
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| adv. 有条件地 | |
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conditional
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| adj.条件的，带有条件的 | |
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bind
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| vt.捆，包扎；装订；约束；使凝固；vi.变硬 | |
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rigidity
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| adj.钢性，坚硬 | |
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urchin
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| n.顽童；海胆 | |
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29
clump
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| n.树丛，草丛；vi.用沉重的脚步行走 | |
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modicum
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| n.少量，一小份 | |
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virtue
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| n.德行，美德；贞操；优点；功效，效力 | |
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deductions
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| 扣除( deduction的名词复数 )； 结论； 扣除的量； 推演 | |
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wretch
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| n.可怜的人，不幸的人；卑鄙的人 | |
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inflame
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| v.使燃烧；使极度激动；使发炎 | |
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untowardly
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| adj.意外的； 不顺利的；倔强的；难对付的 | |
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exasperatingly
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admiration
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| n.钦佩，赞美，羡慕 | |
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38
intensified
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| v.（使）增强， （使）加剧( intensify的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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disposition
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| n.性情，性格；意向，倾向；排列，部署 | |
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40
awakened
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| v.（使）醒( awaken的过去式和过去分词 )；（使）觉醒；弄醒；（使）意识到 | |
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41
possessed
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| adj.疯狂的；拥有的，占有的 | |
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42
deliberately
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| adv.审慎地；蓄意地；故意地 | |
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constrained
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| adj.束缚的,节制的 | |
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44
entirely
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| ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地 | |
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45
attuned
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| v.使协调( attune的过去式和过去分词 )；调音 | |
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46
solidified
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| （使）成为固体，（使）变硬，（使）变得坚固( solidify的过去式和过去分词 )； 使团结一致； 充实，巩固； 具体化 | |
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