For a foreigner he knew Pest well, but his knowledge only led him now by its loneliest avenue. He stood for a long while, his back to the empty market-place—which glowed by day with the red and orange of autumn ripeness—his elbows on the broad stone embankment, gazing out across the swirling2 river on which the starlight slid and shivered in darting3 streaks4 of gold.
He hated himself for what had taken place that evening, as he had often with equal reason hated himself before.
Somehow he seemed to lack the personal seriousness which saved men from treating their own affairs with the humorous tolerance5 which they extended to their neighbours! Life appeared to him the same comic spectacle from whatever point one saw it. Fate was often just as funny when it killed as when it crowned you, and however intimately they might annoy him, he never could keep back a laugh at its queer ways.
It was Fate's whim6 at present to make him look like a scoundrel by a deed that was probably as decent as any he would ever do, and the irony7 of his ill-luck so tickled8 him that, in laughing at it, he had become really abominable9.
A sentimentalist with a sense of humour cut, as he could see, a very poor figure; it were better, so far as appearances went, to be a pompous10 fool.
Self-esteem is so widespread a virtue11 that the world, whatever it may say, is always impressed even by ridiculous dignity, and its one universally unconvincing spectacle is the man laughing at himself. Besides, when a man finds himself absurd, what is he likely to think imposing12?
Yet, for all his humour, Caragh sighed. For the moment, as on many previous moments, he craved13 the solemn personal point of view to make life seem for once of some importance and give him a taste of undiluted tears.
His reflections were interrupted by something rubbing against his leg.
It proved to be a little white dog, and he addressed some whimsical advice to it about the time of night before looking out again upon the river. But as the animal made no sign of movement, but merely shivered against his ankle, he lifted it up and set it on the parapet before him.
From an inspection14 there he found it to be all but starved, with just strength enough to stand.
He was indifferent to dogs, and felt that the wisest course, as he explained to it, would be to drop the trembling creature into the water and out of a world that had used it so ill.
But he was very far from indifferent to the waif-like loneliness that gazed at him from its eyes, and, tucking it resignedly under his wrap, he turned back to the hotel.
He spent an hour there, feeding it with some biscuits that remained from his raft journey, soaked in whisky and water, and then, since the little thing refused to rest but on the bed, he made the best of its odorous presence beside him, and only cursed his own soft-heartedness when waked occasionally by its tongue.
On the morrow he began to show Ethel Vernon the city, and for two days she was too interested and fatigued15 to find fault with him. She had discovered the terrier, and enthusiastically adopted it, to Caragh's relief, being as devoted16 to dogs as he was apathetic17.
But on the third evening, when they were sitting again together upon the balcony after a quiet afternoon, she spoke18 her disappointment.
The night was as splendidly blue as it had been when they sat there before; and she, dressed in black, with blue-black sequins woven over her bodice and scattered19 upon her skirt, looked to be robed in some dark cluster of starlight in her corner of the balcony.
They had been talking of matters in which neither took much interest; then after a long pause she said quietly, "Why are you so different?"
"I?" he exclaimed.
"Oh, please don't pretend," she sighed. "What is it?"
"The other night?" she repeated. "What, when we were here?"
"Yes," he said.
She reflected for a moment. "About that girl, the one in Ireland? Do you mean that?"
"I do," he said.
"Do you mean it was true?" she asked with increasing tenseness.
"Quite true," he said.
"But you were laughing," she protested incredulously. "I took it for a joke."
"I'm always laughing," he said grimly; "but I wish I hadn't been then. It was so serious that I couldn't be. But it's no good explaining that; you can't understand."
Her mind was set on something different—on something to her of more moment than a man's absurd reasons for being trivial. It was some time before she spoke.
"You asked her to marry you?" she pondered slowly, only half in question, as though scarcely able to realize what he had done.
"I did," he said; "how else should we be engaged?"
"Oh, dozens of ways," she answered: "she might have asked you."
"Would I have asked her otherwise?" he demanded.
"Oh, yes," she sighed; "very possibly. Men often propose because they can think of nothing else to say. And have you wanted to be married long?"
"What do you mean?" he said.
The light little head was tilted24 sideways in old fascinating way. It was not so dark but he might have seen it had he not been staring at the stars. He might even have noticed, had he looked closer, how wide her eyes were, and how unsteady the small mouth.
"Why three months?" he said.
"Wasn't it three months ago we were at Bramley Park?" she went on reflectively. "Can you still remember what you told me there?"
"Was it different from what I'd told you everywhere?" he parried.
"No—o!" she murmured, with a long wavering breath; "not until to-night. You said you could never, while I lived, think of marrying another woman."
"We were," she said. "And you had your hand on mine. You put it there; you put it there as you spoke. Were you thinking how wonderfully easy it was to fool a woman?"
"I've never fooled you, nor tried to fool you," he answered quietly. "I've cared for you too much for that. No, not in the common way; but because you've always been such an honest and good friend to me. Some women insist on being fooled; they make any sort of truth to them impossible. You made a lie."
"So it seems now," she said wistfully.
"No," he replied, "it seems now just the opposite. But I can't help that."
"You could have helped it ... once," she said.
"Oh, we can always help things once," he objected.
"Did you know her when we were at Bramley?"
"Yes, very slightly."
"Very slightly, only three months ago," she repeated incredulously.
"Yes," he said.
"When did you want to marry her?" she asked at length.
He hesitated in his turn.
"I can't tell you that," he said.
"Why?" she questioned. "Don't you know?"
"I know perfectly," he said.
"Well?" she queried. Then, as he made no response, "Haven't I the right to know?"
"I can't say," he answered. "I haven't the right to tell you."
"Why?"
"It isn't only mine to tell," he said.
"It's hers, you mean?" she exclaimed. "Everything's hers, I suppose, now; everything that you once could call your own! Did you ever share your life with me in that fashion?"
"You forget," he said gravely. "She shares herself."
Ethel Vernon leaned towards him fiercely. "Do you mean——" she began impetuously, and stopped.
He turned and looked steadily27 into her angry eyes. Her quick breath spread the starlight to a vague and smoky blueness among the gleaming sequins on her breast. "Yes," he said, "that is probably what I do mean. First or last, whatever you may call her, it's the woman's self that counts."
She remained for a moment with her eyes still passionately28 alight, and something visible even in the dusk upon her face which she would and would not say. Then her mouth hardened, and she flung herself back in her chair.
"I hate you," she cried.
"No," he said with a sigh; "you hate the fact. Every woman does whom it doesn't profit."
There was nothing said between them for some minutes, and Caragh could hear the silk ripple29 as her foot swung to and fro among the ruchings of her skirt. The sound brought back another silence, when she had sat beside him on an English summer evening in a dusk almost as deep; brought back the hour from that scented30 night when, with the spells of strangeness still upon her charm, he had listened to her ankles' silken whisper, and felt in the dark the unendurable sweetness of her presence rob his life of its desires.
He was carried so far by the memory that the change in her voice startled him when she spoke again.
"What did you tell her about me," she demanded.
"I didn't tell her anything," he said.
"She hasn't asked about your past?"
"Not yet."
"You think she won't?"
"Oh, no, I don't," he smiled.
"And when she does! Will you tell her the usual lie?"
"Did I tell it to you?"
"You didn't ask me to marry you," she thrust back. "One treats the woman differently that one's going to share."
"Yes," he admitted doubtfully, "it's very possible one does. Only I think the sharing works the other way. One tells her the truth in common honesty."
"Never!" she exclaimed. "You tell her the truth in transcendental lunacy, and wish you'd bitten your tongue out five minutes later when you see she thinks you a sweep."
He turned towards her with a smile. "I'm afraid my transcendental lunacies are about done," he said.
She laughed. "To judge by the last of them," she retorted.
"The last of them!" he exclaimed reprovingly. "You shouldn't speak of marriage by so wild a name."
"I don't," she said shortly; "only of yours. Will you swear to me that you love her?"
"Willingly," he answered, "if you're unwise enough to ask."
"To ask for an oath which would have no meaning?"
"None whatever," he replied. "What would you expect?"
"The truth!" she said. "Isn't it due to me?"
"Yes," he admitted, "and you've had it; though it hasn't been easy. Consider if a man is likely to relish31 the sort of confession32 that I've made to you?"
"You couldn't very well avoid it," she reminded him.
"Oh, yes, I could," he said. "I might have quarrelled with you—you're uncommonly33 easy to quarrel with—and then ... when you heard of my engagement you'd have put it down to pique35."
"You thought of doing that?" she asked distrustfully.
"Yes, I thought of that and of a dozen other ways of—well, of taking you in," he admitted, "and of getting out of it myself."
"It doesn't sound very brave," she said softly.
"No, it sounds uncommon34 paltry36, I've no doubt," he agreed. "I funked it, and I tried to think it would have been kinder as well as pleasanter to keep you in the dark. Would it?"
She shook her head.
"Well, I don't know," he reflected doubtfully; "I fancy you'd sooner have thought that you had done it than that I had, however little you might have liked it. And you'd have been a bit sorry for me, instead of thinking me a beast."
"I'm sorry for you as it is," she answered quietly.
"What do you mean?" he exclaimed.
"I don't believe you love her," she said unsteadily.
She shook her head again—the little tossing shake which reminded Caragh sharply of how she used to tease him, through the curls that sometimes fall across her eyes. He was looking at the stars before she spoke again.
"I think there's one thing you might tell me which wouldn't hurt her if I knew," she said persuadingly. "Was it because you'd come to care less for me that ... that you ... that you asked her?"
He rose from his seat, and leant against the iron trellis of the balcony, looking out across the river.
"Was it?" she pleaded.
"No!" he said to the night. He turned presently and took a step to enter the room. "Time I went," he said, checking his progress as he passed her chair.
She laid her fingers upon his sleeve. "Morrie!" she whispered.
He stooped and kissed her face, while her detaining hand slipped with a soft pressure into his.
Then she let it go, and sat, listening, as the sound of his footsteps died away beyond the room; sat gazing out at the moving sky, with a face from which the light had faded, till Henry Vernon's voice surprised her dreams.
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1
quay
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| n.码头，靠岸处 | |
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2
swirling
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| v.旋转，打旋( swirl的现在分词 ) | |
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darting
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| v.投掷，投射( dart的现在分词 )；向前冲，飞奔 | |
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streaks
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| n.（与周围有所不同的）条纹( streak的名词复数 )；（通常指不好的）特征（倾向）；（不断经历成功或失败的）一段时期v.快速移动( streak的第三人称单数 )；使布满条纹 | |
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5
tolerance
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| n.宽容；容忍，忍受；耐药力；公差 | |
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whim
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| n.一时的兴致，突然的念头；奇想，幻想 | |
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irony
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| n.反语，冷嘲；具有讽刺意味的事，嘲弄 | |
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tickled
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| （使）发痒( tickle的过去式和过去分词 )； （使）愉快，逗乐 | |
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9
abominable
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| adj.可厌的，令人憎恶的 | |
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10
pompous
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| adj.傲慢的，自大的；夸大的；豪华的 | |
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virtue
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| n.德行，美德；贞操；优点；功效，效力 | |
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12
imposing
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| adj.使人难忘的，壮丽的，堂皇的，雄伟的 | |
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13
craved
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| 渴望，热望( crave的过去式 )； 恳求，请求 | |
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14
inspection
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| n.检查，审查，检阅 | |
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15
fatigued
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| adj. 疲乏的 | |
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devoted
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| adj.忠诚的，忠实的，热心的，献身于...的 | |
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apathetic
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| adj.冷漠的，无动于衷的 | |
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18
spoke
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| 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 | |
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19
scattered
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| adj.分散的，稀疏的；散步的；疏疏落落的 | |
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doggedly
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| adv.顽强地，固执地 | |
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stoutly
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| adv.牢固地，粗壮的 | |
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mused
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| v.沉思，冥想( muse的过去式和过去分词 )；沉思自语说（某事） | |
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23
queried
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| v.质疑，对…表示疑问( query的过去式和过去分词 )；询问 | |
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24
tilted
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| v. 倾斜的 | |
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assented
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| 同意，赞成( assent的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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26
nervously
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| adv.神情激动地，不安地 | |
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steadily
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| adv.稳定地；不变地；持续地 | |
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passionately
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| ad.热烈地，激烈地 | |
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29
ripple
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| n.涟波，涟漪，波纹，粗钢梳；vt.使...起涟漪，使起波纹； vi.呈波浪状，起伏前进 | |
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30
scented
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| adj.有香味的；洒香水的；有气味的v.嗅到(scent的过去分词) | |
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31
relish
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| n.滋味，享受，爱好，调味品；vt.加调味料，享受，品味；vi.有滋味 | |
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32
confession
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| n.自白，供认，承认 | |
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33
uncommonly
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| adv. 稀罕(极，非常) | |
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34
uncommon
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| adj.罕见的，非凡的，不平常的 | |
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35
pique
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| v.伤害…的自尊心，使生气 n.不满，生气 | |
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36
paltry
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| adj.无价值的，微不足道的 | |
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37
shrug
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| v.耸肩(表示怀疑、冷漠、不知等) | |
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