The next morning we went to a paperhanger’s shop and asked to see the very newest and most artistic1 designs in stock. There were lots of lovely things, but after great discussion we decided2 on a thick white paper, perfectly3 plain, except in each corner of the room, where there was a sort of conventional rose tree, growing up about seven feet high, with outstanding branches laden4 with the most exquisite5 pink roses. The white of the background was partly tinged6 with blue, with here and there a soft, irregular blue like a cloud. Looking up suddenly, you might imagine you were in the open air in the midst of a rose garden, and that would be a very pleasant delusion7 in Onslow Square.
The salesman asked how many pieces he should send, and whether we wished it hung at once. When I said we intended to hang it ourselves, he said—
“Oh, indeed, madam!” and looked unutterable things.
We were so quelled8 that we did not dare to ask him about the enamel9 and paste as we intended, but bought those at a modest little shop further on, and went home rejoicing.
Mrs Forbes had laughed and shaken all over in the most jovial10 manner when we told her of our plans, but she didn’t approve of the white paper and paint, because, forsooth, it would get soiled. Of course it would get soiled! Things always do sooner or later. Old people are so dreadfully prudent11 that they get no pleasure out of life. When this paper is shabby Lorna can get a new one, or she may be married, or dead, or half a dozen different things. It’s absurd to plan years ahead. I cheered up poor Lorna, who is of a sensitive nature and easily depressed12, and when she recovered asked what she thought we ought to do next.
“The first thing to settle,” she said decidedly, “is Midas! He can help us in a dozen ways if he will, for he is really wonderfully handy for a boy of his age. He will do nothing unless we consult him formally, and make a definite business arrangement, but it pleases him and won’t hurt us, as it will be only a few coppers13. He is saving up for a motor-car at the present moment, and Wallace says that by steady attention to business he really believes he will get one by the time he is sixty.”
We called Midas in and consulted him professionally. He is tall and lanky14, and has pale blue eyes with long light eyelashes. You would think to look at him that he was a gentle, unworldly creature, addicted15 to poetry, but he isn’t! He sat astride the table and viewed the landscape o’er.
“The first thing will be to take every stick of furniture out of the room, and have the carpet up. I know what girls are when they do jobs of this kind. You will be up to your eyes in paste, and it won’t be safe to leave anything within touching16 distance. The furniture must be removed and stored. I’ll store it for you in my room. Then you’ll need a ladder, and some planks17 for the lengths of paper to lie on while you paste ’em. I’ll hire you the old shutter18 from the drawing-room.”
“The shutters19 are as much mine as yours,” said Lorna. “I don’t need to hire them; I can have them if I want!”
“That’s where you show your ignorance, my dear. They are in my possession, and I won’t give them up without compensation. Then you’ll need a man to assist in the hanging!”
“Say a boy at once, and name your price, and be done with it. You are a regular Shylock!”
Midas grinned as if pleased with the compliment, drew a pocket-book and a stubby end of a pencil from his pocket, and began alternately stroking his chin and jotting20 down words and figures. Lorna grimaced21 at me behind his back, but kept a stern expression for his benefit. I suppose she knew that if he saw her smile prices would go up. Presently he drew a line, tore the leaf out of the book and handed it across with a bow.
“My estimate, ladies! It is always more satisfactory to have an agreement beforehand.”
I peeped over Lorna’s shoulder and read—
Estimate For Proposed Renovations.
To Removal of furniture 1 9
Storage of same at rate of 6 pence per day 1 6
Restoration of same 1 9
Impliments 1 0
Man’s time 1 3
Sundrys 6
7 9
It was quite a formidable total, but Lorna was evidently accustomed to extortionate demands, and began beating him down without delay.
“Well, of all the outrageous22 pieces of impudence23! Seven and ninepence, indeed! You must have taken leave of your senses. If you think I am going to pay you four or five shillings for carrying a few odds24 and ends of furniture along the passage, you are mightily25 mistaken! And we should have to help you, too, for you couldn’t manage alone. If we asked Wallace he’d do it at once, without any pay at all.”
“Drink to me only with thine eyes!” chanted the little wretch26, folding his arms and gazing fixedly27 at me with a life-like assumption of Wallace’s attitude and expression, which sent Lorna into fits of laughter, and made me magenta28 with embarrassment29. “If you like to wait until Wallace has time to run your errands and see you through your difficulties, you will get your room finished by Christmas—with luck! I am sorry you think my charges high, but I’m afraid I don’t see my way to reduce ’em.”
“Midas, don’t be a goose! We will pay you twopence an hour for your time, and twopence a day for storage—that’s the limit. That disposes of the first four items. As for the rest, we had better understand each other before we go any further. Kindly30 distinguish between implements31 and sundries.”
“Is this an Oxford32 local, or is it a conversation between a brother and sister?” Midas demanded, throwing back his head, and mutely appealing to an unseen arbiter33 in the corner of the ceiling. “If you can’t understand a simple thing like that, it doesn’t say much for your education. It is easily seen you were never a plumber34! I thought we were going to come to a friendly agreement, but you are so close and grasping, there is no dealing35 with you. Look here, will you give me half-a-crown for the job?”
I gasped36 with surprise at this sudden and sweeping37 reduction of terms, but Lorna said calmly—
“Done! A halfpenny discount if paid within the hour!” and they shook hands with mutual38 satisfaction.
“Cheap at the price!” was Lorna’s comment, as the contractor39 left the room, and before the next few days were over I heartily40 agreed with this opinion. Midas was an ideal workman, grudging41 neither time nor pains to accomplish his task in a satisfactory manner. His long arms and strong wrists made light of what would have been heavy tasks for us, and the dirtier he grew the more he enjoyed it. It must be dreadful to live in a town! Lorna assured me plaintively42 that the room had been thoroughly43 spring-cleaned at Easter, but I should have thought it had happened nearer the Flood. I swallowed pecks of dust, and my hands grew raw with washing before we began to paint. I thought we should never have finished enamelling that room. The first coat made hardly any impression on the background, and we had to go over it again and again before we got anything like a good effect. To a casual observer it looked really very nice, but we knew where to look for shortcomings, and I grew hot whenever anyone looked at a certain panel in the door.
Then we set to work on the paper. First you cut it into lengths. It seems quite easy, but it isn’t, because you waste yards making the patterns meet, and then you haven’t enough, and you go into town to buy more, and they haven’t it in stock, and it has to be ordered, and you sit and champ, and can’t get any further.
Then you make the paste. It smells horrid44, and do what you will, cover yourself as best you can, it gets up to the eyes! We wore two old holland skirts of Lorna’s, quite short and trig, and washing shirts, and huge print wrappers; but before we had been working for an hour our fingers were glued together; then we yawned or sneezed and put our hands to our faces, and they were stickied. Then bits of hair—“tendrils” as they call them in books—fell down, and we fastened them up, and our hair got as bad. We were spectacles!
A kettle was kept on the hob, and we were continually bathing our hands in hot water, for, of course, we dared not touch the outside of the paper unless they were quite clean, and the table wanted washing before each fresh strip was laid down, as the paste had always oozed45 off the edges of the last piece. There is one thing sure and certain: I shall never take up paper-hanging as a profession.
The hanging itself is really rather exciting. Midas climbed to the top of the ladder and held the top of the strip in position; Lorna crouched46 beneath, and guided it in the way it should go, so as to meet the edge of the one before, and I stood on a chair and smoothed it down and down with a clean white cloth. Doing it with great care like this, we got no wrinkles at all, and when the first side of the room was finished, it looked so professional that we danced—literally danced—for joy.
By the end of the afternoon it was done, and so were we! Simply so tired we could hardly stand, but mentally we were full of triumph, for that room was a picture to behold47. We ran out into the passage and brought in everyone we could find, servants and charwoman included. Then they made remarks, and we stood and listened.
The cook said, “My, Miss Lorna, wouldn’t the pattern go round?” The charwoman said, “I like a bit of gilding48 meself. It looks ’andsome.” The parlourmaid said, “How will the furniture look against it, miss?” which was really the nastiest hit of all; only the little Tweeny stared and flushed, and rolled her hands in her apron50, and said, “All them roses on the wall! It would be like a Bank-’oliday to sit aside ’em!”
Tweeny has the soul of a poet. I bought her some flowers the very next time I went out. Wallace came in and twiddled his moustache, and said—
“By Jove, is it really done! Aren’t you dead beat? I say, Miss Sackville, don’t do any more to-day. It’s too bad of Lorna to work you like this. I shall interfere51 in my professional capacity.”
He was far too much engrossed52 in Una Sackville to have any eyes for the paper.
Mrs Forbes thought, like the cook, that it was a pity that the pattern didn’t go round; and the dear old doctor tip-toed up and down, jingled53 the money in his pockets, and said—
“Eh, what? Eh, what? Something quite novel, eh! Didn’t go in for things of this sort in my young days. Very smart indeed, my dear, very smart! Now I suppose you will be wanting some new fixings,” (his hand came slowly out of his waistcoat pocket, and my hopes ran mountains high). “Mustn’t spoil the ship for a penn’orth of tar49, you know. There, that will help to buy a few odds and ends.”
He put something into Lorna’s hand; she looked at it, flushed red with delight, and hugged him rapturously round the neck. After he had gone she showed it to me with an air of triumph, and it was—half-a-sovereign! I expected several pounds, and had hard work not to show my disappointment, but I suppose ten shillings means as much to Lorna as ten pounds to me. Well, I am not at all sure that you don’t get more fun out of planning and contriving54 to make a little money go a long way, than in simply going to a shop and ordering what you want. Lorna’s worldly wealth amounted, with the half-sovereign, to seventeen and six-pence, and with this lordly sum for capital we set to work to transform the room.

点击
收听单词发音

1
artistic
![]() |
|
adj.艺术(家)的,美术(家)的;善于艺术创作的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
2
decided
![]() |
|
adj.决定了的,坚决的;明显的,明确的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
3
perfectly
![]() |
|
adv.完美地,无可非议地,彻底地 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
4
laden
![]() |
|
adj.装满了的;充满了的;负了重担的;苦恼的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
5
exquisite
![]() |
|
adj.精美的;敏锐的;剧烈的,感觉强烈的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
6
tinged
![]() |
|
v.(使)发丁丁声( ting的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句: |
|
|
7
delusion
![]() |
|
n.谬见,欺骗,幻觉,迷惑 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
8
quelled
![]() |
|
v.(用武力)制止,结束,镇压( quell的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句: |
|
|
9
enamel
![]() |
|
n.珐琅,搪瓷,瓷釉;(牙齿的)珐琅质 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
10
jovial
![]() |
|
adj.快乐的,好交际的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
11
prudent
![]() |
|
adj.谨慎的,有远见的,精打细算的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
12
depressed
![]() |
|
adj.沮丧的,抑郁的,不景气的,萧条的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
13
coppers
![]() |
|
铜( copper的名词复数 ); 铜币 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
14
lanky
![]() |
|
adj.瘦长的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
15
addicted
![]() |
|
adj.沉溺于....的,对...上瘾的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
16
touching
![]() |
|
adj.动人的,使人感伤的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
17
planks
![]() |
|
(厚)木板( plank的名词复数 ); 政纲条目,政策要点 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
18
shutter
![]() |
|
n.百叶窗;(照相机)快门;关闭装置 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
19
shutters
![]() |
|
百叶窗( shutter的名词复数 ); (照相机的)快门 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
20
jotting
![]() |
|
n.简短的笔记,略记v.匆忙记下( jot的现在分词 );草草记下,匆匆记下 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
21
grimaced
![]() |
|
v.扮鬼相,做鬼脸( grimace的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句: |
|
|
22
outrageous
![]() |
|
adj.无理的,令人不能容忍的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
23
impudence
![]() |
|
n.厚颜无耻;冒失;无礼 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
24
odds
![]() |
|
n.让步,机率,可能性,比率;胜败优劣之别 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
25
mightily
![]() |
|
ad.强烈地;非常地 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
26
wretch
![]() |
|
n.可怜的人,不幸的人;卑鄙的人 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
27
fixedly
![]() |
|
adv.固定地;不屈地,坚定不移地 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
28
magenta
![]() |
|
n..紫红色(的染料);adj.紫红色的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
29
embarrassment
![]() |
|
n.尴尬;使人为难的人(事物);障碍;窘迫 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
30
kindly
![]() |
|
adj.和蔼的,温和的,爽快的;adv.温和地,亲切地 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
31
implements
![]() |
|
n.工具( implement的名词复数 );家具;手段;[法律]履行(契约等)v.实现( implement的第三人称单数 );执行;贯彻;使生效 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
32
Oxford
![]() |
|
n.牛津(英国城市) | |
参考例句: |
|
|
33
arbiter
![]() |
|
n.仲裁人,公断人 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
34
plumber
![]() |
|
n.(装修水管的)管子工 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
35
dealing
![]() |
|
n.经商方法,待人态度 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
36
gasped
![]() |
|
v.喘气( gasp的过去式和过去分词 );喘息;倒抽气;很想要 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
37
sweeping
![]() |
|
adj.范围广大的,一扫无遗的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
38
mutual
![]() |
|
adj.相互的,彼此的;共同的,共有的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
39
contractor
![]() |
|
n.订约人,承包人,收缩肌 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
40
heartily
![]() |
|
adv.衷心地,诚恳地,十分,很 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
41
grudging
![]() |
|
adj.勉强的,吝啬的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
42
plaintively
![]() |
|
adv.悲哀地,哀怨地 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
43
thoroughly
![]() |
|
adv.完全地,彻底地,十足地 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
44
horrid
![]() |
|
adj.可怕的;令人惊恐的;恐怖的;极讨厌的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
45
oozed
![]() |
|
v.(浓液等)慢慢地冒出,渗出( ooze的过去式和过去分词 );使(液体)缓缓流出;(浓液)渗出,慢慢流出 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
46
crouched
![]() |
|
v.屈膝,蹲伏( crouch的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句: |
|
|
47
behold
![]() |
|
v.看,注视,看到 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
48
gilding
![]() |
|
n.贴金箔,镀金 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
49
tar
![]() |
|
n.柏油,焦油;vt.涂或浇柏油/焦油于 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
50
apron
![]() |
|
n.围裙;工作裙 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
51
interfere
![]() |
|
v.(in)干涉,干预;(with)妨碍,打扰 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
52
engrossed
![]() |
|
adj.全神贯注的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
53
jingled
![]() |
|
喝醉的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
54
contriving
![]() |
|
(不顾困难地)促成某事( contrive的现在分词 ); 巧妙地策划,精巧地制造(如机器); 设法做到 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
欢迎访问英文小说网 |