CHAPTER XIV. — AT ARM’S LENGTH.

For three or four weeks Walter Tyrrel remained in town, awaiting the result of the Wharfedale Viaduct competition. With some difficulty he raised and paid over meanwhile to Erasmus Walker the ten thousand pounds of blackmail—for it was little else—agreed upon between them. The great engineer accepted the money with as little compunction as men who earn large incomes always display in taking payment for doing nothing. It is an enviable state of mind, unattainable by most of us who work hard for our living. He pocketed his check with a smile, as if it were quite in the nature of things that ten thousand pounds should drop upon him from the clouds without rhyme or reason. To Tyrrel, on the other hand, with his sensitive conscience, the man’s greed and callousness¹ seemed simply incomprehensible. He stood aghast at such sharp practice. But for Cleer’s sake, and to ease his own soul, he paid it all over without a single murmur².

And then the question came up in his mind, “Would it be effectual after all? Would Walker play him false? Would he throw the weight of his influence into somebody else’s scale? Would the directors submit as tamely as he thought to his direction or dictation?” It would be hard on Tyrrel if, after his spending ten thousand pounds without security of any sort, Eustace were to miss the chance, and Cleer to go unmarried.

At the end of a month, however, as Tyrrel sat one morning in his own room at the Metropole, which he mostly frequented, Eustace Le Neve rushed in, full of intense excitement. Tyrrel’s heart rose in his mouth. He grew pale with agitation³. The question had been decided⁴ one way or the other he saw.

“Well; which is it?” he gasped⁵ out. “Hit or miss? Have you got it?”

“Yes; I’ve got it!” Eustace answered, half beside himself with delight. “I’ve got it! I’ve got it! The chairman and Walker have just been round to call on me, and congratulate me on my success. Walker says my fortune’s made. It’s a magnificent design. And in any case it’ll mean work for me for the next four years; after which I’ll not want for occupation elsewhere. So now, of course, I can marry almost immediately.”

“Thank God!” Tyrrel murmured, falling back into his chair as he spoke⁶, and turning deadly white.

He was glad of it, oh, so glad; and yet, in his own heart, it would cost him many pangs⁸ to see Cleer really married in good earnest to Eustace.

He had worked for it with all his might to be sure; he had worked for it and paid for it! and now he saw his wishes on the very eve of fulfillment, the natural man within him rose up in revolt against the complete success of his own unselfish action.

As for Mrs. Trevennack, when she heard the good news, she almost fainted with joy. It might yet be in time. Cleer might be married now before poor Michael broke forth⁹ in that inevitable¹⁰ paroxysm.

For inevitable she felt it was at last. As each day went by it grew harder and harder for the man to contain himself. Fighting desperately¹¹ against it every hour, immersing himself as much as he could in the petty fiddling¹² details of the office and the Victualing Yard so as to keep the fierce impulse under due control, Michael Trevennack yet found the mad mood within him more and more ungovernable with each week that went by. As he put it to his own mind he could feel his wings growing as if they must burst through the skin; he could feel it harder and ever harder as time went on to conceal¹³ the truth, to pretend he was a mere¹⁴ man, when he knew himself to be really the Prince of the Archangels, to busy himself about contracts for pork, and cheese, and biscuits, when he could wing his way boldly over sea and land, or stand forth before the world in gorgeous gear, armed as of yore in the adamant¹⁵ and gold of his celestial¹⁶ panoply¹⁷!

So Michael Trevennack thought in his own seething¹⁸ soul. But that strong, brave woman, his wife, bearing her burden unaided, and watching him closely day and night with a keen eye of mingled¹⁹ love and fear, could see that the madness was gaining on him gradually. Oftener and oftener now did he lose himself in his imagined world; less and less did he tread the solid earth beneath us. Mrs. Trevennack had by this time but one anxious care left in life—to push on as fast as possible Cleer and Eustace’s marriage.

But difficulties intervened, as they always WILL intervene in this work-a-day world of ours. First of all there were formalities about the appointment itself. Then, even when all was arranged, Eustace found he had to go north in person, shortly after Christmas, and set to work with a will at putting his plan into practical shape for contractor²⁰ and workmen. And as soon as he got there he saw at once he must stick at it for six months at least before he could venture to take a short holiday for the sake of getting married. Engineering is a very absorbing trade; it keeps a man day and night at the scene of his labors²¹.

Storm or flood at any moment may ruin everything. It would be prudent²² too, Eustace thought, to have laid by a little more for household expenses, before plunging²³ into the unknown sea of matrimony; and though Mrs. Trevennack, flying full in the face of all matronly respect for foresight²⁴ in young people, urged him constantly to marry, money or no money, and never mind about a honeymoon²⁵, Eustace stuck to his point and determined²⁶ to take no decisive step till he saw how the work was turning out in Wharfedale. It was thus full August of the succeeding year before he could fix a date definitely; and then, to Cleer’s great joy, he named a day at last, about the beginning of September.

It was an immense relief to Mrs. Trevennack’s mind when, after one or two alterations²⁷, she knew the third was finally fixed²⁸ upon. She had good reasons of her own for wishing it to be early; for the twenty-ninth is Michaelmas Day, and it was always with difficulty that her husband could be prevented from breaking out before the eyes of the world on that namesake feast of St. Michael and All Angels. For, on that sacred day, when in every Church in Christendom his importance as the generalissimo of the angelic host was remembered and commemorated²⁹, it seemed hard indeed to the seraph³⁰ in disguise that he must still guard his incognito³¹, still go on as usual with his petty higgling over corned beef and biscuits and the price of jute sacking. “There was war in heaven,” said the gospel for the day—that sonorous³² gospel Mrs. Trevennack so cordially dreaded—for her husband would always go to church at morning service, and hold himself more erect³³ than was his wont³⁴, to hear it—“There was war in heaven; Michael and his angels fought against the dragon; and the dragon fought and his angels, and prevailed not.” And should he, who could thus battle against all the powers of evil, be held in check any longer, as with a leash³⁵ of straw, by the Lords Commissioners³⁶ of the Admiralty? No, no, he would stand forth in his true angelic shape, and show these martinets what form they had ignorantly taken for mere Michael Trevennack of the Victualing Department!

One thing alone eased Mrs. Trevennack’s mind through all those weary months of waiting and watching: Walter Tyrrel had long since gone back again to Penmorgan. Her husband had been free from that greatest of all temptations, to a mad paroxysm of rage—the sight of the man who, as he truly believed, had killed their Michael. And now, if only Tyrrel would keep away from town till Cleer was married and all was settled—Mrs. Trevennack sighed deep—she would almost count herself a happy woman!

On the day of Cleer’s wedding, however, Walter Tyrrel came to town. He came on purpose. He couldn’t resist the temptation of seeing with his own eyes the final success of his general plan, even though it cost him the pang⁷ of watching the marriage of the one girl he ever truly loved to another man by his own deliberate contrivance. But he didn’t forget Eustace Le Neve’s earnest warning, that he should keep out of the way of Michael Trevennack. Even without Eustace, his own conscience would have urged that upon him. The constant burden of his remorse³⁷ for that boyish crime weighed hard upon him every hour of every day that he lived. He didn’t dare on such a morning to face the father of the boy he had unwittingly and half-innocently murdered.

So, very early, as soon as the church was opened, he stole in unobserved, and took a place by himself in the farthest corner of the gallery. A pillar concealed³⁸ him from view; for further security he held his handkerchief constantly in front of his face, or shielded himself behind one of the big free-seat prayer-books. Cleer came in looking beautiful in her wedding dress; Mrs. Trevennack’s pathetic face glowed radiant for once in this final realization³⁹ of her dearest wishes. A single second only, near the end of the ceremony, Tyrrel leaned forward incautiously, anxious to see Cleer at an important point of the proceedings⁴⁰. At the very same instant Trevennack raised his face. Their eyes met in a flash. Tyrrel drew back, horrorstruck, and penitent⁴¹ at his own intrusion at such a critical moment. But, strange to say, Trevennack took no overt⁴² notice. Had his wife only known she would have sunk in her seat in her agony of fear. But happily she didn’t know. Trevennack went through the ceremony, all outwardly calm; he gave no sign of what he had seen, even to his wife herself. He buried it deep in his own heart. That made it all the more dangerous.

1 callousness   

参考例句：

• He remembered with what callousness he had watched her. 他记得自己以何等无情的态度瞧着她。 来自辞典例句
• She also lacks the callousness required of a truly great leader. 她还缺乏一个真正伟大领袖所应具备的铁石心肠。 来自辞典例句

2 murmur   

n.低语，低声的怨言；v.低语，低声而言

参考例句：

• They paid the extra taxes without a murmur.他们毫无怨言地交了附加税。
• There was a low murmur of conversation in the hall.大厅里有窃窃私语声。

3 agitation   

n.搅动；搅拌；鼓动，煽动

参考例句：

• Small shopkeepers carried on a long agitation against the big department stores.小店主们长期以来一直在煽动人们反对大型百货商店。
• These materials require constant agitation to keep them in suspension.这些药剂要经常搅动以保持悬浮状态。

4 decided   

adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的

参考例句：

• This gave them a decided advantage over their opponents.这使他们比对手具有明显的优势。
• There is a decided difference between British and Chinese way of greeting.英国人和中国人打招呼的方式有很明显的区别。

5 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：

• She gasped at the wonderful view. 如此美景使她惊讶得屏住了呼吸。
• People gasped with admiration at the superb skill of the gymnasts. 体操运动员的高超技艺令人赞叹。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》

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 pang   

n.剧痛，悲痛，苦闷

参考例句：

• She experienced a sharp pang of disappointment.她经历了失望的巨大痛苦。
• She was beginning to know the pang of disappointed love.她开始尝到了失恋的痛苦。

8 pangs   

突然的剧痛( pang的名词复数 )； 悲痛

参考例句：

• She felt sudden pangs of regret. 她突然感到痛悔不已。
• With touching pathos he described the pangs of hunger. 他以极具感伤力的笔触描述了饥饿的痛苦。

9 forth   

adv.向前；向外，往外

参考例句：

• The wind moved the trees gently back and forth.风吹得树轻轻地来回摇晃。
• He gave forth a series of works in rapid succession.他很快连续发表了一系列的作品。

10 inevitable   

adj.不可避免的，必然发生的

参考例句：

• Mary was wearing her inevitable large hat.玛丽戴着她总是戴的那顶大帽子。
• The defeat had inevitable consequences for British policy.战败对英国政策不可避免地产生了影响。

11 desperately   

adv.极度渴望地，绝望地，孤注一掷地

参考例句：

• He was desperately seeking a way to see her again.他正拼命想办法再见她一面。
• He longed desperately to be back at home.他非常渴望回家。

12 fiddling   

微小的

参考例句：

• He was fiddling with his keys while he talked to me. 和我谈话时他不停地摆弄钥匙。
• All you're going to see is a lot of fiddling around. 你今天要看到的只是大量的胡摆乱弄。 来自英汉文学 - 廊桥遗梦

13 conceal   

v.隐藏，隐瞒，隐蔽

参考例句：

• He had to conceal his identity to escape the police.为了躲避警方，他只好隐瞒身份。
• He could hardly conceal his joy at his departure.他几乎掩饰不住临行时的喜悦。

14 mere   

adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过

参考例句：

• That is a mere repetition of what you said before.那不过是重复了你以前讲的话。
• It's a mere waste of time waiting any longer.再等下去纯粹是浪费时间。

15 adamant   

adj.坚硬的，固执的

参考例句：

• We are adamant on the building of a well-off society.在建设小康社会这一点上，我们是坚定不移的。
• Veronica was quite adamant that they should stay on.维罗妮卡坚信他们必须继续留下去。

16 celestial   

adj.天体的；天上的

参考例句：

• The rosy light yet beamed like a celestial dawn.玫瑰色的红光依然象天上的朝霞一样绚丽。
• Gravity governs the motions of celestial bodies.万有引力控制着天体的运动。

17 panoply   

n.全副甲胄，礼服

参考例句：

• But all they had added was the trappings and panoply of applied science.但是他们所增添的一切,不过是实用科学的装饰和甲胄罢了。
• The lakes were surrounded By a panoply of mountains.群湖为壮丽的群山所环抱。

18 seething   

沸腾的，火热的

参考例句：

• The stadium was a seething cauldron of emotion. 体育场内群情沸腾。
• The meeting hall was seething at once. 会场上顿时沸腾起来了。

19 mingled   

混合，混入( mingle的过去式和过去分词 )； 混进，与…交往[联系]

参考例句：

• The sounds of laughter and singing mingled in the evening air. 笑声和歌声交织在夜空中。
• The man and the woman mingled as everyone started to relax. 当大家开始放松的时候，这一男一女就开始交往了。

20 contractor   

n.订约人，承包人，收缩肌

参考例句：

• The Tokyo contractor was asked to kick $ 6000 back as commission.那个东京的承包商被要求退还6000美元作为佣金。
• The style of house the contractor builds depends partly on the lay of the land.承包商所建房屋的式样，有几分要看地势而定。

21 labors   

v.努力争取(for)( labor的第三人称单数 )；苦干；详细分析；（指引擎）缓慢而困难地运转

参考例句：

• He was tiresome in contending for the value of his own labors. 他老为他自己劳动的价值而争强斗胜，令人生厌。 来自辞典例句
• Farm labors used to hire themselves out for the summer. 农业劳动者夏季常去当雇工。 来自辞典例句

22 prudent   

adj.谨慎的，有远见的，精打细算的

参考例句：

• A prudent traveller never disparages his own country.聪明的旅行者从不贬低自己的国家。
• You must school yourself to be modest and prudent.你要学会谦虚谨慎。

23 plunging   

adj.跳进的，突进的v.颠簸( plunge的现在分词 )；暴跌；骤降；突降

参考例句：

• War broke out again, plunging the people into misery and suffering. 战祸复发，生灵涂炭。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》
• He is plunging into an abyss of despair. 他陷入了绝望的深渊。 来自《简明英汉词典》

24 foresight   

n.先见之明，深谋远虑

参考例句：

• The failure is the result of our lack of foresight.这次失败是由于我们缺乏远虑而造成的。
• It required a statesman's foresight and sagacity to make the decision.作出这个决定需要政治家的远见卓识。

25 honeymoon   

n.蜜月（假期）；vi.度蜜月

参考例句：

• While on honeymoon in Bali,she learned to scuba dive.她在巴厘岛度蜜月时学会了带水肺潜水。
• The happy pair are leaving for their honeymoon.这幸福的一对就要去度蜜月了。

26 determined   

adj.坚定的；有决心的

参考例句：

• I have determined on going to Tibet after graduation.我已决定毕业后去西藏。
• He determined to view the rooms behind the office.他决定查看一下办公室后面的房间。

27 alterations   

n.改动( alteration的名词复数 )；更改；变化；改变

参考例句：

• Any alterations should be written in neatly to the left side. 改动部分应书写清晰，插在正文的左侧。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Gene mutations are alterations in the DNA code. 基因突变是指DNA 密码的改变。 来自《简明英汉词典》

28 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。

29 commemorated   

v.纪念，庆祝( commemorate的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• Lincoln commemorated the soldiers killed in the battle in his address. 林肯在演说中表扬阵亡将士。 来自辞典例句
• You'll be commemorated for killing a spy, and be specially discharged. 你们每杀一个间谍将会被记录到特殊档案。 来自电影对白

30 seraph   

n.六翼天使

参考例句：

• Seraph is of the highest rank of angels in the Bible.六翼天使是圣经中级别最高的天使。
• In the Bible,a seraph is a kind of angel.在圣经中，六翼天使是天使的一种。

31 incognito   

adv.匿名地；n.隐姓埋名；adj.化装的，用假名的，隐匿姓名身份的

参考例句：

• He preferred to remain incognito.他更喜欢继续隐姓埋名下去。
• He didn't want to be recognized,so he travelled incognito.他不想被人认出，所以出行时隐瞒身分。

32 sonorous   

adj.响亮的，回响的；adv.圆润低沉地；感人地；n.感人，堂皇

参考例句：

• The sonorous voice of the speaker echoed round the room.那位演讲人洪亮的声音在室内回荡。
• He has a deep sonorous voice.他的声音深沉而洪亮。

33 erect   

n./v.树立，建立，使竖立；adj.直立的，垂直的

参考例句：

• She held her head erect and her back straight.她昂着头，把背挺得笔直。
• Soldiers are trained to stand erect.士兵们训练站得笔直。

34 wont   

adj.习惯于；v.习惯；n.习惯

参考例句：

• He was wont to say that children are lazy.他常常说小孩子们懒惰。
• It is his wont to get up early.早起是他的习惯。

35 leash   

n.牵狗的皮带，束缚；v.用皮带系住

参考例句：

• I reached for the leash,but the dog got in between.我伸手去拿系狗绳，但被狗挡住了路。
• The dog strains at the leash,eager to be off.狗拼命地扯拉皮带，想挣脱开去。

36 commissioners   

n.专员( commissioner的名词复数 )；长官；委员；政府部门的长官

参考例句：

• The Commissioners of Inland Revenue control British national taxes. 国家税收委员管理英国全国的税收。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• The SEC has five commissioners who are appointed by the president. 证券交易委员会有５名委员，是由总统任命的。 来自英汉非文学 - 政府文件

37 remorse   

n.痛恨，悔恨，自责

参考例句：

• She had no remorse about what she had said.她对所说的话不后悔。
• He has shown no remorse for his actions.他对自己的行为没有任何悔恨之意。

38 concealed   

a.隐藏的，隐蔽的

参考例句：

• The paintings were concealed beneath a thick layer of plaster. 那些画被隐藏在厚厚的灰泥层下面。
• I think he had a gun concealed about his person. 我认为他当时身上藏有一支枪。

39 realization   

n.实现；认识到，深刻了解

参考例句：

• We shall gladly lend every effort in our power toward its realization.我们将乐意为它的实现而竭尽全力。
• He came to the realization that he would never make a good teacher.他逐渐认识到自己永远不会成为好老师。

40 proceedings   

n.进程，过程，议程；诉讼(程序)；公报

参考例句：

• He was released on bail pending committal proceedings. 他交保获释正在候审。
• to initiate legal proceedings against sb 对某人提起诉讼

41 penitent   

adj.后悔的；n.后悔者；忏悔者

参考例句：

• They all appeared very penitent,and begged hard for their lives.他们一个个表示悔罪，苦苦地哀求饶命。
• She is deeply penitent.她深感愧疚。

42 overt   

adj.公开的，明显的，公然的

参考例句：

• His opponent's intention is quite overt.他的对手的意图很明显。
• We should learn to fight with enemy in an overt and covert way.我们应学会同敌人做公开和隐蔽的斗争。