Lying on the table in the morning-room he saw his own book of poems. What tact12! He picked it up and opened it. It was what the reviewers call “a slim volume.” He read at hazard:
“...But silence and the topless dark
And Blackpool from the nightly gloom
Hollows a bright tumultuous tomb.”
He put it down again, shook his head, and sighed. “What genius I had then!” he reflected, echoing the aged14 Swift. It was nearly six months since the book had been published; he was glad to think he would never write anything of the same sort again. Who could have been reading it, he wondered? Anne, perhaps; he liked to think so. Perhaps, too, she had at last recognised herself in the Hamadryad of the poplar sapling; the slim Hamadryad whose movements were like the swaying of a young tree in the wind. “The Woman who was a Tree” was what he had called the poem. He had given her the book when it came out, hoping that the poem would tell her what he hadn’t dared to say. She had never referred to it.
He shut his eyes and saw a vision of her in a red velvet15 cloak, swaying into the little restaurant where they sometimes dined together in London—three quarters of an hour late, and he at his table, haggard with anxiety, irritation16, hunger. Oh, she was damnable!
It occurred to him that perhaps his hostess might be in her boudoir. It was a possibility; he would go and see. Mrs. Wimbush’s boudoir was in the central tower on the garden front. A little staircase cork-screwed up to it from the hall. Denis mounted, tapped at the door. “Come in.” Ah, she was there; he had rather hoped she wouldn’t be. He opened the door.
Priscilla Wimbush was lying on the sofa. A blotting-pad rested on her knees and she was thoughtfully sucking the end of a silver pencil.
“Hullo,” she said, looking up. “I’d forgotten you were coming.”
Mrs. Wimbush laughed. Her voice, her laughter, were deep and masculine. Everything about her was manly18. She had a large, square, middle-aged19 face, with a massive projecting nose and little greenish eyes, the whole surmounted20 by a lofty and elaborate coiffure of a curiously21 improbable shade of orange. Looking at her, Denis always thought of Wilkie Bard22 as the cantatrice.
“That’s why I’m going to
Sing in op’ra, sing in op’ra,
Sing in op-pop-pop-pop-pop-popera.”
Today she was wearing a purple silk dress with a high collar and a row of pearls. The costume, so richly dowagerish, so suggestive of the Royal Family, made her look more than ever like something on the Halls.
“What have you been doing all this time?” she asked.
“Well,” said Denis, and he hesitated, almost voluptuously23. He had a tremendously amusing account of London and its doings all ripe and ready in his mind. It would be a pleasure to give it utterance24. “To begin with,” he said...
But he was too late. Mrs. Wimbush’s question had been what the grammarians call rhetorical; it asked for no answer. It was a little conversational25 flourish, a gambit in the polite game.
“You find me busy at my horoscopes,” she said, without even being aware that she had interrupted him.
A little pained, Denis decided26 to reserve his story for more receptive ears. He contented27 himself, by way of revenge, with saying “Oh?” rather icily.
“Did I tell you how I won four hundred on the Grand National this year?”
“Wonderful, isn’t it? Everything is in the Stars. In the Old Days, before I had the Stars to help me, I used to lose thousands. Now”—she paused an instant—“well, look at that four hundred on the Grand National. That’s the Stars.”
Denis would have liked to hear more about the Old Days. But he was too discreet29 and, still more, too shy to ask. There had been something of a bust30 up; that was all he knew. Old Priscilla—not so old then, of course, and sprightlier—had lost a great deal of money, dropped it in handfuls and hatfuls on every race-course in the country. She had gambled too. The number of thousands varied31 in the different legends, but all put it high. Henry Wimbush was forced to sell some of his Primitives—a Taddeo da Poggibonsi, an Amico di Taddeo, and four or five nameless Sienese—to the Americans. There was a crisis. For the first time in his life Henry asserted himself, and with good effect, it seemed.
Priscilla’s gay and gadding32 existence had come to an abrupt33 end. Nowadays she spent almost all her time at Crome, cultivating a rather ill-defined malady34. For consolation35 she dallied36 with New Thought and the Occult. Her passion for racing37 still possessed38 her, and Henry, who was a kind-hearted fellow at bottom, allowed her forty pounds a month betting money. Most of Priscilla’s days were spent in casting the horoscopes of horses, and she invested her money scientifically, as the stars dictated39. She betted on football too, and had a large notebook in which she registered the horoscopes of all the players in all the teams of the League. The process of balancing the horoscopes of two elevens one against the other was a very delicate and difficult one. A match between the Spurs and the Villa40 entailed41 a conflict in the heavens so vast and so complicated that it was not to be wondered at if she sometimes made a mistake about the outcome.
“Such a pity you don’t believe in these things, Denis, such a pity,” said Mrs. Wimbush in her deep, distinct voice.
“I can’t say I feel it so.”
“Ah, that’s because you don’t know what it’s like to have faith. You’ve no idea how amusing and exciting life becomes when you do believe. All that happens means something; nothing you do is ever insignificant42. It makes life so jolly, you know. Here am I at Crome. Dull as ditchwater, you’d think; but no, I don’t find it so. I don’t regret the Old Days a bit. I have the Stars...” She picked up the sheet of paper that was lying on the blotting-pad. “Inman’s horoscope,” she explained. “(I thought I’d like to have a little fling on the billiards43 championship this autumn.) I have the Infinite to keep in tune44 with,” she waved her hand. “And then there’s the next world and all the spirits, and one’s Aura, and Mrs. Eddy45 and saying you’re not ill, and the Christian46 Mysteries and Mrs. Besant. It’s all splendid. One’s never dull for a moment. I can’t think how I used to get on before—in the Old Days. Pleasure—running about, that’s all it was; just running about. Lunch, tea, dinner, theatre, supper every day. It was fun, of course, while it lasted. But there wasn’t much left of it afterwards. There’s rather a good thing about that in Barbecue-Smith’s new book. Where is it?”
She sat up and reached for a book that was lying on the little table by the head of the sofa.
“Do you know him, by the way?” she asked.
“Who?”
“Mr. Barbecue-Smith.”
Denis knew of him vaguely47. Barbecue-Smith was a name in the Sunday papers. He wrote about the Conduct of Life. He might even be the author of “What a Young Girl Ought to Know”.
“No, not personally,” he said.
“I’ve invited him for next week-end.” She turned over the pages of the book. “Here’s the passage I was thinking of. I marked it. I always mark the things I like.”
Holding the book almost at arm’s length, for she was somewhat long-sighted, and making suitable gestures with her free hand, she began to read, slowly, dramatically.
“‘What are thousand pound fur coats, what are quarter million incomes?’” She looked up from the page with a histrionic movement of the head; her orange coiffure nodded portentously48. Denis looked at it, fascinated. Was it the Real Thing and henna, he wondered, or was it one of those Complete Transformations49 one sees in the advertisements?
“‘What are Thrones and Sceptres?’”
The orange Transformation—yes, it must be a Transformation—bobbed up again.
“‘What are the gaieties of the Rich, the splendours of the Powerful, what is the pride of the Great, what are the gaudy50 pleasures of High Society?’”
The voice, which had risen in tone, questioningly, from sentence to sentence, dropped suddenly and boomed reply.
“‘They are nothing. Vanity, fluff, dandelion seed in the wind, thin vapours of fever. The things that matter happen in the heart. Seen things are sweet, but those unseen are a thousand times more significant. It is the unseen that counts in Life.’”
Mrs. Wimbush lowered the book. “Beautiful, isn’t it?” she said.
Denis preferred not to hazard an opinion, but uttered a non-committal “H’m.”
“Ah, it’s a fine book this, a beautiful book,” said Priscilla, as she let the pages flick51 back, one by one, from under her thumb. “And here’s the passage about the Lotus Pool. He compares the Soul to a Lotus Pool, you know.” She held up the book again and read. “‘A Friend of mine has a Lotus Pool in his garden. It lies in a little dell embowered with wild roses and eglantine, among which the nightingale pours forth52 its amorous53 descant54 all the summer long. Within the pool the Lotuses blossom, and the birds of the air come to drink and bathe themselves in its crystal waters...’ Ah, and that reminds me,” Priscilla exclaimed, shutting the book with a clap and uttering her big profound laugh—“that reminds me of the things that have been going on in our bathing-pool since you were here last. We gave the village people leave to come and bathe here in the evenings. You’ve no idea of the things that happened.”
She leaned forward, speaking in a confidential55 whisper; every now and then she uttered a deep gurgle of laughter. “...mixed bathing...saw them out of my window...sent for a pair of field-glasses to make sure...no doubt of it...” The laughter broke out again. Denis laughed too. Barbecue-Smith was tossed on the floor.
“It’s time we went to see if tea’s ready,” said Priscilla. She hoisted56 herself up from the sofa and went swishing off across the room, striding beneath the trailing silk. Denis followed her, faintly humming to himself:
“That’s why I’m going to
Sing in op’ra, sing in op’ra,
Sing in op-pop-pop-pop-pop-popera.”
And then the little twiddly bit of accompaniment at the end: “ra-ra.”
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1
scattered
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| adj.分散的，稀疏的；散步的；疏疏落落的 | |
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deserted
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| adj.荒芜的，荒废的，无人的，被遗弃的 | |
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3
remains
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| n.剩余物，残留物；遗体，遗迹 | |
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chambers
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| n.房间( chamber的名词复数 )；（议会的）议院；卧室；会议厅 | |
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primitives
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| 原始人（primitive的复数形式） | |
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oases
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| n.（沙漠中的）绿洲( oasis的名词复数 )；（困苦中）令人快慰的地方（或时刻）；乐土；乐事 | |
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7
austere
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| adj.艰苦的；朴素的，朴实无华的；严峻的 | |
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8
rococo
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| n.洛可可；adj.过分修饰的 | |
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9
spacious
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| adj.广阔的，宽敞的 | |
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10
portentous
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| adj.不祥的，可怕的，装腔作势的 | |
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meticulous
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| adj.极其仔细的，一丝不苟的 | |
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12
tact
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| n.机敏，圆滑，得体 | |
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13
vault
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| n.拱形圆顶，地窖，地下室 | |
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14
aged
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| adj.年老的，陈年的 | |
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15
velvet
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| n.丝绒，天鹅绒；adj.丝绒制的，柔软的 | |
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16
irritation
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| n.激怒，恼怒，生气 | |
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17
awfully
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| adv.可怕地，非常地，极端地 | |
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18
manly
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| adj.有男子气概的；adv.男子般地，果断地 | |
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19
middle-aged
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| adj.中年的 | |
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20
surmounted
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| 战胜( surmount的过去式和过去分词 )； 克服（困难）； 居于…之上； 在…顶上 | |
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curiously
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| adv.有求知欲地；好问地；奇特地 | |
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22
bard
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| n.吟游诗人 | |
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voluptuously
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| adv.风骚地，体态丰满地 | |
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24
utterance
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| n.用言语表达，话语，言语 | |
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25
conversational
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| adj.对话的，会话的 | |
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26
decided
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| adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的 | |
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27
contented
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| adj.满意的，安心的，知足的 | |
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28
frigid
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| adj.寒冷的，凛冽的；冷淡的；拘禁的 | |
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29
discreet
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| adj.(言行)谨慎的；慎重的；有判断力的 | |
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30
bust
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| vt.打破；vi.爆裂；n.半身像；胸部 | |
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31
varied
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| adj.多样的，多变化的 | |
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32
gadding
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| n.叮搔症adj.蔓生的v.闲逛( gad的现在分词 )；游荡；找乐子；用铁棒刺 | |
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33
abrupt
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| adj.突然的，意外的；唐突的，鲁莽的 | |
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34
malady
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| n.病，疾病(通常做比喻) | |
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35
consolation
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| n.安慰，慰问 | |
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36
dallied
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| v.随随便便地对待( dally的过去式和过去分词 )；不很认真地考虑；浪费时间；调情 | |
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37
racing
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| n.竞赛，赛马；adj.竞赛用的，赛马用的 | |
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38
possessed
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| adj.疯狂的；拥有的，占有的 | |
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39
dictated
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| v.大声讲或读( dictate的过去式和过去分词 )；口授；支配；摆布 | |
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40
villa
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| n.别墅，城郊小屋 | |
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41
entailed
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| 使…成为必要( entail的过去式和过去分词 )； 需要； 限定继承； 使必需 | |
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42
insignificant
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| adj.无关紧要的，可忽略的，无意义的 | |
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43
billiards
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| n.台球 | |
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44
tune
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| n.调子；和谐，协调；v.调音，调节，调整 | |
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45
eddy
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| n.漩涡，涡流 | |
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46
Christian
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| adj.基督教徒的；n.基督教徒 | |
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47
vaguely
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| adv.含糊地，暖昧地 | |
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48
portentously
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49
transformations
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| n.变化( transformation的名词复数 )；转换；转换；变换 | |
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50
gaudy
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| adj.华而不实的；俗丽的 | |
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51
flick
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| n.快速的轻打，轻打声，弹开；v.轻弹，轻轻拂去，忽然摇动 | |
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52
forth
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| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
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53
amorous
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| adj.多情的；有关爱情的 | |
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54
descant
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| v.详论，絮说；n.高音部 | |
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55
confidential
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| adj.秘（机）密的，表示信任的，担任机密工作的 | |
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56
hoisted
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| 把…吊起，升起( hoist的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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