Deulin, no doubt, knew this, for Cartoner found him, riding leisurely2 away from the city, just beyond the cemetery. The Frenchman sat his horse with a straight leg and arm which made Cartoner think of those days ten years earlier, to which Deulin seldom referred, when this white-haired dandy was a cavalry3 soldier, engaged in the painful business of killing4 Germans.
Deulin did not think it necessary to refer to the object of Cartoner's ride. Neither did he mention the fact that he knew that this was not the direct way to St. Petersburg.
“I hired a horse and rode out to meet you,” he said, gayly—he was singularly gay this morning, and there was a light in his eye—“to intercept5 you. Kosmaroff is back in Warsaw. I saw him in the streets—and he saw me. I think that man is the god in the machine. He is not a nonentity6. I wonder who he is. There is blood there, my friend.”
“In the mean time,” he said, “I have the hunger of a beggar's dog. What are we to do? It is one o'clock—and I have the inside of a Frenchman. We are a great people. We tear down monarchies8, and build up a new republic which is to last forever, and doesn't. We make history so quickly that the world stands breathless—but we always breakfast before mid-day.”
He took out his watch, and showed its face to Cartoner, with a gesture which could not have been more tragic9 had it marked the hour of the last trump10.
“And we dare not show our faces in the streets. At least, I dare not show mine in the neighborhood of yours in Warsaw. For they have got accustomed to me there. They think I am a harmless old man—a dentist, perhaps.”
“My train goes from the St. Petersburg Station at three,” said Cartoner. “I will have some lunch at the other station, and drive across in a close cab with the blinds down.”
And he gave his low, gentle laugh. Deulin glanced at him as if there were matter for surprise in the sound of it.
“Like a monstrosity going to a fair,” he said. “And I shall go with you. I will even lunch with you at the station—a station steak and a beery table. There is only one room at the station for those who eat and those who await their trains. So that the eaters eat before a famished11 audience like Louis XVI., and the travellers sit among the crumbs12. I am with you. But let us be quick—and get it over. Did you see Bukaty?” he asked, finally, and, leaning forward, he sought an imaginary fly on the lower parts of his horse; for, after all, he was only a man, and lacked the higher skill or the thicker skin of the gentler sex in dealing13 with certain delicate matters.
“No, I only saw the princess,” replied Cartoner. And they rode on in silence.
“You know,” said Deulin, at length, gravely, “if that happens which you expect and I expect, and everybody here is hoping for—I shall seek out Wanda at once, and look after her. I do not know whether it is my duty or not. But it is my inclination14; and I am much too old to put my duty before my inclination. So, if anything happens, and there follows that confusion which you and I have seen once or twice before, where things are stirring and dynasties are crumbling15 in the streets—when friends and foes16 are seeking each other in vain—you need not seek me or think about our friends in Warsaw. You need only think of yourself, remember that. I shall have eloped—with Wanda.”
And he finished with an odd laugh, that had a tender ring in it.
“Bukaty and I,” he went on, after a pause, “do not talk of these things together. But we have come to an understanding on that point. And when the first flurry is over and we come to the top for a breath of air, you have only to wire to my address in Paris to tell me where you are—and I will tell you where—we are. We are old birds at this sport—you and I—and we know how to take care of ourselves.”
They were now in the outskirts17 of the town, among the wide and ill-paved streets where tall houses are springing up on the site of the huts once occupied by the Jews who are now quartered in the neighborhood of the Nowiniarska market-place. For the chosen people must needs live near a market-place, and within hearing of the chink of small coin. In the cities of eastern Europe that have a Jews' quarter there is a barrier erected18 between the daily lives of the two races, though no more than a narrow street may in reality divide them. Different interests, different hopes, aspirations19, and desires are to be found within a few yards, and neighbors are as far apart as if a frontier line or the curse of Babel stood between them.
Cartoner and Deulin, riding through the Jewish quarter, were as safe from recognition as if they were in a country lane at Wilanow; for the men hurrying along the pavements were wrapped each in his own keen thought of gain, and if they glanced up at the horsemen at all, merely looked in order to appraise20 the value of their clothes and saddles—as if there were nothing beyond. For them, it would seem there is no beyond; nothing but the dumb waiting for the removal of that curse which has lasted nineteen hundred years, and instead of wearing itself out, seems to gain in strength as the world grows older.
“We will go by the back ways,” said Cartoner, “and need never see any of our world in Warsaw at all.”
The streets were crowded by men, for the women live an in-door life in an atmosphere that seems to bleach21 and fatten22. The roads were little used for wheel traffic; for the commerce by which these people live is of so retail23 a nature that it seems to pass from hand to hand in mysterious cloth bundles and black stuff bags. The two horsemen were obliged to go slowly through the groups, who never raised their heads, or seemed to speak above a whisper.
“What do they talk of—what do they think—all day?” said Cartoner. And, indeed, the quiet of the streets had a suggestion of surreptitiousness. Even the children are sad, and stand about in melancholy24 solitude25.
“I would sooner be a dog,” answered Deulin, with a shake of the shoulders, as if Care had climbed into the saddle behind him. “Sooner a dog.”
By these ways they reached the station, and there found a messenger to take the horses to their stable. All through the streets they had passed men in one uniform or another, who looked stout26 and well-fed, who strode in the middle of the pavement, while the Poles, whose clothes were poor and threadbare, shuffled27 aside in their patched and shambling boots to make way for the conqueror28. Sometimes they would turn and look back at some sword-bearer who was more offensive than usual, with reflective eyes as if marking him in order to know him at a future time. As is always the case, it was the smaller officials who were the most offensive—the little Jacks-in-office from the postal29 administration, the common officers, the hundred obscure civil servants who wear a sword and uniform unworthily in any one of the three European empires. On the other hand, the men in real authority, and notably30 the officers of the better regiments31, sought to conciliate by politeness and a careful retention32 of themselves in the background. But these well-intentioned efforts were of small avail; for racial things are stronger than human endeavor or the careful foresight33 of statesmen. Here in Warsaw the Muscovite, the Pole, the Jew—herding together in the same streets, under the same roof, obedient to one law, acknowledging one sovereign—were watching each other, hating each other.
At the street corners the smart, quiet police took note of each foot-passenger, every carriage, every stranger passing in a hired droschki. Cartoner and Deulin could see from the passing glance beneath the flat, green cap that they were seen and recognized at every turn. On the steps of the station they were watched with a polite pretense34 of looking the other way by two of the higher officials of the Russian-speaking police.
“I do not mind them,” said Deulin, passing through the doorway35 to the booking-office. “It is not of them that we need be afraid. We are doing no harm, and they cannot send us out of the country while our passports hold out. They have satisfied themselves as to that. For they have been through my belongings36 twice, in my rooms at the Europe—I know when my things have been touched—they or some one else. Perhaps Kosmaroff; who knows?”
Thus he talked on in characteristic fashion, saying a hundred nothings as only Frenchmen and women can, touching37 life lightly like a skilled musician, running nimble fingers over the keys, and striking a chord half by accident here and there which was sonorous38 and had a deeper meaning. He ordered the luncheon39, argued with the waiter, and rallied him on the criminal paucity40 of his menu.
“Yes,” he said, “let it be beef. I know your mutton. It tastes like the smell of goat. So give us beef—your railway beef, which has travelled so far, but not by train. It has come on foot, to be killed and cut up by a locomotive, to be served by a waiter who has assuredly failed as a stoker.”
He sat down as he spoke, and rearranged the small table, covered by a doubtful cloth, through which could be felt the chill of the marble underneath41. Deulin always took the lead in these small matters, and Cartoner accepted his decision without comment. The Frenchman knew him so well, it seemed, that he knew his tastes, or suspected his indifference42. While he thus rattled43 on he glanced sharply from time to time at his companion, and when the waiter was finally sent away with a hundred minute instructions, he turned suddenly to Cartoner.
“You are absorbed. What are you thinking about?” he said.
“I was thinking how well you speak Polish. And yet you have only been here once before,” answered the Englishman, bluntly.
“When I was a young man there were opportunities of learning Polish in Paris,” said Deulin. “Yes—I learned Polish when I was young——”
He had arranged the table to his satisfaction, had picked up several objects to examine them and replace them with care on the exact spot from whence he had taken them, and was now looking round the room with large, deep-lined eyes which were always tired and never at rest.
“When one is young, one learns so much in a short time, especially if that time is ill-spent,” he said, airily. “That is why the virtuous44 are such poor company; they have no backbone45 to their past. With the others—'nous autres'—it is the evil deeds that form a sort of spinal46 column to our lives, rigid47 and strong, upon which to lean in old age when virtue48 is almost a necessity.”
Finally he came round in his tour of inspection49 to the face opposite to him.
“Do you know,” he said, sharply, “you are devilish absent-minded. It is a bad habit. It makes the world think that you have something on your mind. And having nothing on its own mind—or no mind to have anything on—it hates you for your airs of superiority.”
He took up the bottle of wine which the waiter had set upon the table in front of him, inspected the label, and filled two glasses. He tasted the vintage, and made a wry50 face. Then he raised his shoulders with an air or reconciliation51 to the inevitable52.
“When I was a young—a very young diplomatist—an old scoundrel in gold spectacles told me that one of the first rules of the game was to appear content with that which you cannot alter. We must apply that rule to this wine. It is our old friend, Chateau53 la Pompe. It will not hurt you. It will not loosen your tongue, my friend, you need not fear that.”
He spoke so significantly that Cartoner looked across the table at him.
“What do you mean?”
Deulin laughed and made no answer.
“Do you think that my tongue requires loosening?”
And the Frenchman stroked his mustache as he looked thoughtfully into the steady, meditating54 eyes.
“It is not,” he said, “that you assume a reserve which one might think unfair. It is merely that there are so many things which you do not think worth saying, or wise to speak of, or necessary to communicate, that—well—there is nothing left but silence. And silence is sometimes dangerous. Not as dangerous as speech, I allow—but dangerous, nevertheless.”
Cartoner looked at him and waited. Across the little table the two schools went out to meet each other—the old school of diplomacy55, all words; the new, all silence.
“Listen,” said the Frenchman. “I once knew a man into whose care was given the happiness of a fellow-being. There is a greater responsibility, by-the-way, than the well-being56 of a whole nation, even of one of the two greatest nations in the world. And that is a care which you and I have had upon our shoulders for a brief hour here and there. It was the old story; for it was the happiness of a woman. God knows the man meant well! But he bungled57 it. Bon Dieu—how he bungled it! He said too little. Ever since he has talked too much. She was a Polish woman, by-the-way, and that has left a tenderness, nay58, a raw place, in my heart, which smarts at the sound of a Polish word. For I was the man.”
“Well,” asked Cartoner, “what do you want to know?”
“Nothing,” answered the other, quick as thought. “I only tell you the story as a warning. To you especially, who take so much for said that has not been said. You are strong, and a man. Remember that a woman—even the strongest—may not be able to bear such a strain as you can bear.”
Cartoner was listening attentively59 enough. He always listened with attention to his friend on such rare occasions as he chose to be serious.
“You know,” went on Deulin, after a pause, during which the waiter had set before him a battered60 silver dish from which he removed the cover with a flourish full of promise—“you know that I would give into your care unreservedly anything that I possessed61, such as a fortune, or—well—a daughter. I would trust you entirely62. But any man may make a mistake. And if you make a mistake now, I shall never forgive you—never.”
And his eyes flashed with a sudden fierceness as he looked at his companion.
“You have already promised to do the only thing I would ask you to do in Warsaw,” replied Cartoner.
Deulin held up one hand in a gesture commanding silence.
Then with a rapid relapse into his gayer mood he turned to the dish before him.
“And now let us consider the railway beef. It promises little. But it cannot be so tough and indigestible as the memory of a mistake—I tell you that.”
点击
收听单词发音
收听单词发音 |
1
cemetery
|
|
| n.坟墓，墓地，坟场 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
2
leisurely
|
|
| adj.悠闲的；从容的，慢慢的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
3
cavalry
|
|
| n.骑兵；轻装甲部队 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
4
killing
|
|
| n.巨额利润；突然赚大钱，发大财 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
5
intercept
|
|
| vt.拦截，截住，截击 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
6
nonentity
|
|
| n.无足轻重的人 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
7
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： |
|
|
|
|
8
monarchies
|
|
| n. 君主政体, 君主国, 君主政治 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
9
tragic
|
|
| adj.悲剧的，悲剧性的，悲惨的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
10
trump
|
|
| n.王牌，法宝；v.打出王牌，吹喇叭 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
11
famished
|
|
| adj.饥饿的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
12
crumbs
|
|
| int. (表示惊讶)哎呀 n. 碎屑 名词crumb的复数形式 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
13
dealing
|
|
| n.经商方法，待人态度 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
14
inclination
|
|
| n.倾斜；点头；弯腰；斜坡；倾度；倾向；爱好 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
15
crumbling
|
|
| adj.摇摇欲坠的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
16
foes
|
|
| 敌人，仇敌( foe的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
17
outskirts
|
|
| n.郊外，郊区 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
18
ERECTED
|
|
| adj. 直立的，竖立的，笔直的 vt. 使 ... 直立，建立 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
19
aspirations
|
|
| 强烈的愿望( aspiration的名词复数 )； 志向； 发送气音； 发 h 音 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
20
appraise
|
|
| v.估价，评价，鉴定 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
21
bleach
|
|
| vt.使漂白；vi.变白；n.漂白剂 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
22
fatten
|
|
| v.使肥，变肥 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
23
retail
|
|
| v./n.零售；adv.以零售价格 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
24
melancholy
|
|
| n.忧郁，愁思；adj.令人感伤（沮丧）的，忧郁的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
25
solitude
|
|
| n. 孤独; 独居,荒僻之地,幽静的地方 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
27
shuffled
|
|
| v.洗（纸牌）( shuffle的过去式和过去分词 )；拖着脚步走；粗心地做；摆脱尘世的烦恼 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
28
conqueror
|
|
| n.征服者，胜利者 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
29
postal
|
|
| adj.邮政的，邮局的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
30
notably
|
|
| adv.值得注意地，显著地，尤其地，特别地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
31
regiments
|
|
| （军队的）团( regiment的名词复数 )； 大量的人或物 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
32
retention
|
|
| n.保留，保持，保持力，记忆力 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
33
foresight
|
|
| n.先见之明，深谋远虑 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
34
pretense
|
|
| n.矫饰，做作，借口 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
35
doorway
|
|
| n.门口，(喻)入门；门路，途径 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
36
belongings
|
|
| n.私人物品，私人财物 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
37
touching
|
|
| adj.动人的，使人感伤的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
38
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： |
|
|
|
|
39
luncheon
|
|
| n.午宴，午餐，便宴 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
40
paucity
|
|
| n.小量，缺乏 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
41
underneath
|
|
| adj.在...下面，在...底下；adv.在下面 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
42
indifference
|
|
| n.不感兴趣，不关心，冷淡，不在乎 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
43
rattled
|
|
| 慌乱的，恼火的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
44
virtuous
|
|
| adj.有品德的，善良的，贞洁的，有效力的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
45
backbone
|
|
| n.脊骨，脊柱，骨干；刚毅，骨气 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
46
spinal
|
|
| adj.针的，尖刺的，尖刺状突起的；adj.脊骨的，脊髓的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
47
rigid
|
|
| adj.严格的，死板的；刚硬的，僵硬的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
48
virtue
|
|
| n.德行，美德；贞操；优点；功效，效力 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
49
inspection
|
|
| n.检查，审查，检阅 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
50
wry
|
|
| adj.讽刺的；扭曲的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
51
reconciliation
|
|
| n.和解，和谐，一致 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
52
inevitable
|
|
| adj.不可避免的，必然发生的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
53
chateau
|
|
| n.城堡，别墅 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
54
meditating
|
|
| a.沉思的，冥想的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
55
diplomacy
|
|
| n.外交；外交手腕，交际手腕 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
56
well-being
|
|
| n.安康，安乐，幸福 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
57
bungled
|
|
| v.搞糟，完不成( bungle的过去式和过去分词 )；笨手笨脚地做；失败；完不成 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
58
nay
|
|
| adv.不；n.反对票，投反对票者 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
59
attentively
|
|
| adv.聚精会神地；周到地；谛；凝神 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
60
battered
|
|
| adj.磨损的；v.连续猛击；磨损 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
61
possessed
|
|
| adj.疯狂的；拥有的，占有的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
62
entirely
|
|
| ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
63
curtly
|
|
| adv.简短地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
64
perfectly
|
|
| adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
| 欢迎访问英文小说网 |