But that lady, true to her creed3, pretended not to see. “It is eleven o’clock,” she said lightly. “What a sleeper4 you are! I am off, but Hawks5 has orders to take care of you. I’ll ring for your breakfast. I’ve left my addresses for the next two months in my desk. But I hope you’ll get on. Of course I could get you invited to any of the houses, but France would hear of it, and my clever fiction would be spoiled?—”
“I could not visit. I shall be very well here. You are too kind.”
Mrs. Winstone thought she was, particularly as there was not the least prospect6 of reward. A cutlet for a cutlet. However, noblesse oblige. She bestowed7 a kiss on Julia and sailed out.
After her bath and breakfast Julia made a careful toilet for the first time in many weeks. Sometimes she had not brushed or even unbraided her hair for days.
She telephoned to the house in Park Lane. Mr. Jones was better and Lady Ishbel had gone to the shop. Julia left the house immediately and drove to Bond Street.
There were several people in the show-room. She went up to the boudoir which had witnessed so many gay little teas and so many confidential8 chats. It was an hour before Ishbel came running up the stairs and flung her arms about Julia.
“You dear thing!” she cried. “How I have worried about you. You wouldn’t answer my notes. And you look like a ghost! I was afraid?—”
“You are in trouble, too. You look worn out?—”
“Oh, poor Jimmy! He’s ruined, and has had a stroke. There’s tragedy for you. How he fought—and he hated to take my jewels, poor dear. I’m hunting for a little house to take him to—he clings to me; it’s pitiful. The doctor wants him to go to a nursing home, but I couldn’t! I’ll do my best. And,” with a sudden dash into her more familiar self, “all my beaux will go to South Africa; I shall have time for my invalid9. That’s all there is of my story. Tell me yours.”
“I’ve come to take you at your word—you once promised to teach me how to trim hats—to help me earn my bread?—”
“So! It’s come! Bridgit and I have been expecting it.”
Julia told her story, all that could be told, as briefly10 as possible. She was, in truth, deeply ashamed of it, and, after her aunt’s rebuff, felt no longer any yearning11 for sympathy. But Ishbel wept bitterly.
“How I wish we could have rescued you in the beginning, as we planned! It was criminal of us to give it up.” She dried her eyes. “There! It has done me good to cry. Literally12 I have had not a moment to shed a tear on my own account. Of course I’ll put you to work at once, and when I get a little house you will live with me. It will be too nice. I’ve never had half enough of you. I suppose you could tear yourself away from Mrs. Winstone. How did she receive you?”
“Oh, she’s frightfully cut up. ‘Scandal’—‘work’—I don’t know which she fears most. But I could see she was relieved to learn that Harold had kept himself inside the law.”
“She must feel as if she were the author of a book called ‘The lost duchess!’ Well, we won’t mortify13 her publicly for some time. Of course you must stay out of the salesroom for a while, or France would trace you. In the workroom, no one, not even Mrs. Winstone, will be any the wiser. Will you come house-hunting with me?”
A fortnight later, Ishbel, with that latent energy of which she betrayed so little in manner and appearance, had furnished a villa14 in St. John’s Wood, installed Mr. Jones and the servants, and turned over the house in Park Lane to the creditors15. As she was obliged to keep both a valet and a nurse for Mr. Jones, there was no spare room for Julia, but there were lodgings17 close by, and it was arranged that she was to dine every night at the villa.
Perhaps there is no accommodation on this round globe as dreary18 as a London suburban19 lodging16, but Ishbel adorned20 the little rooms out of her own superfluities, and Julia was so thankful to be alone and free that she would have settled down to the dingy21 carpet and grimy furniture without a murmur22. And she had no time to mope or think. It would be long before she recovered the buoyancy of her nature, for she had told Mrs. Winstone and Ishbel little of the horrors of those three months alone with her husband. But when indignities23 are too odious24 to take to the most intimate and sympathetic ear, the only thing to do is to banish25 them from the memory; and this Julia did to the best of her ability.
She found a certain fascination26 in working with her hands, although she did not take kindly27 to the crowded workroom. Ishbel, who never drove any of her people when she could avoid it, made her hours as few as possible. But her seclusion28 was of short duration. France wrote to Mrs. Winstone, threatening her with the law, but, taking her communication literally, flung himself off to South Africa. After his departure Julia spent a part of each day in the show-room, although she continued to trim hats; her fingers proving nimble and apt, she was determined29 to learn the business. In the show-room she met many of her old acquaintances, and Mrs. Winstone waxed so indignant that communication between them ceased. The duke, who never found politics amusing when his party was busy exterminating30 mosquitoes, and who at the moment was wholly absorbed in his wife and in his prospects31 of an heir, remained at Bosquith for a year on end; if he thought about Julia at all, he supposed her to be at White Lodge32.
Her personal life flowed on peacefully for eight months. The past faded into the limbo33 of nightmares. She made little more than enough to pay for her rooms and two meals, but even had she found time to miss the beautiful garments she had loved, she would have had no occasion to use them. No one entertained. All England was in mourning. Hardly a family of any size but had lost one or more of its men, particularly if the men were officers. Ishbel’s milliners and dressmakers worked all day on black, nothing but black. So constant, and always sudden, was the demand for mourning trousseaux that she and Julia often worked at night after the women, worn out, had gone home.
And those that had no men at the front to be killed were ashamed to admit it, to be out of the fashion, and swelled34 the demands for mourning. The Americans, resident in London, felt “out of it” in colors, and even those come on their annual pilgrimage were advised to wear black-and-white or dull gray. Ishbel and Julia laughed sometimes over their work and speculated as to the origin of other fads35, but they were too busy and too tired for more than the passing jest. All England was sad enough without pretence36, and worrying not only for relatives and friends at the front, but for the nation’s prestige. Julia and Ishbel, at dinner, talked of little else but the news in the evening bulletins, and often it was of a personal nature. Nigel Herbert had been among the first to volunteer, had been wounded at Vaal Kranz, recovered, and was fighting again, besides corresponding with one of the great dailies. Two of Ishbel’s admirers had died at Ladysmith, one of enteric, the other in a reckless sortie. Still another was in hospital with two bullets in him; and beyond the brief despatch37 which conveyed this news to the press, she had heard nothing. His going had solved a problem, but she was thankful for her work. Geoffrey Herbert had been killed at Paardeberg, and Bridgit had gone out to the Cape38 with hospital supplies.
Of France not a word was heard until June 12th, when his name was among the list of wounded at the battle of Diamond Hill. Two months later Julia read of his arrival in England.
点击
收听单词发音
收听单词发音 |
1
exhaustion
|
|
| n.耗尽枯竭，疲惫，筋疲力尽，竭尽，详尽无遗的论述 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
2
cowered
|
|
| v.畏缩，抖缩( cower的过去式 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
3
creed
|
|
| n.信条；信念，纲领 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
4
sleeper
|
|
| n.睡眠者，卧车，卧铺 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
5
hawks
|
|
| 鹰( hawk的名词复数 )； 鹰派人物，主战派人物 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
6
prospect
|
|
| n.前景，前途；景色，视野 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
7
bestowed
|
|
| 赠给，授予( bestow的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
8
confidential
|
|
| adj.秘（机）密的，表示信任的，担任机密工作的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
9
invalid
|
|
| n.病人，伤残人；adj.有病的，伤残的；无效的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
10
briefly
|
|
| adv.简单地，简短地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
11
yearning
|
|
| a.渴望的；向往的；怀念的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
12
literally
|
|
| adv.照字面意义，逐字地；确实 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
13
mortify
|
|
| v.克制，禁欲，使受辱 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
14
villa
|
|
| n.别墅，城郊小屋 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
15
creditors
|
|
| n.债权人，债主( creditor的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
16
lodging
|
|
| n.寄宿，住所；(大学生的)校外宿舍 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
17
lodgings
|
|
| n. 出租的房舍, 寄宿舍 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
18
dreary
|
|
| adj.令人沮丧的，沉闷的，单调乏味的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
19
suburban
|
|
| adj.城郊的，在郊区的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
20
adorned
|
|
| [计]被修饰的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
21
dingy
|
|
| adj.昏暗的，肮脏的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
22
murmur
|
|
| n.低语，低声的怨言；v.低语，低声而言 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
23
indignities
|
|
| n.侮辱，轻蔑( indignity的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
24
odious
|
|
| adj.可憎的，讨厌的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
25
banish
|
|
| vt.放逐，驱逐；消除，排除 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
26
fascination
|
|
| n.令人着迷的事物，魅力，迷恋 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
27
kindly
|
|
| adj.和蔼的，温和的，爽快的；adv.温和地，亲切地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
28
seclusion
|
|
| n.隐遁，隔离 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
29
determined
|
|
| adj.坚定的；有决心的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
30
exterminating
|
|
| v.消灭，根绝( exterminate的现在分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
31
prospects
|
|
| n.希望，前途(恒为复数) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
32
lodge
|
|
| v.临时住宿，寄宿，寄存，容纳；n.传达室，小旅馆 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
33
limbo
|
|
| n.地狱的边缘；监狱 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
34
swelled
|
|
| 增强( swell的过去式和过去分词 )； 肿胀； （使）凸出； 充满（激情） | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
35
fads
|
|
| n.一时的流行，一时的风尚( fad的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
36
pretence
|
|
| n.假装，作假；借口，口实；虚伪；虚饰 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
37
despatch
|
|
| n./v.(dispatch)派遣；发送；n.急件；新闻报道 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
38
cape
|
|
| n.海角，岬；披肩，短披风 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
| 欢迎访问英文小说网 |