Nevern understood the proposal and the man who made it so slightly, that, displeased3 by the prospective4 loss of an admirable housekeeper5, he began to pile up, breathlessly, inflated6 obstacles to its fulfilment.
Caragh heard him out.
"It's a confounded nuisance, of course, for you," he said; "these sort of things always are for somebody. That's why I've waited to get my side of it square before bothering you, so that you'd know for certain from the outset when your sister would be leaving you. We're not going to decide where to settle till we can look at places together, so that won't make for delay, but she refuses to be hurried over her kit7, as it's to provide six months' food for some pet school of hers in Ballindra, so I've given her till July. The only question is, would you sooner the wedding was over there or here?"
Arthur Nevern stared at the younger man's directness, but he discovered speedily that he might stare as he pleased.
The little that Lettice had was in her own right, and Caragh had asked no more with her from the man before him.
Nevern was thus left with nothing to refuse but his consent, and that, apparently8, was of no consequence to those who asked it.
He gave it at last as ungraciously as he could, and agreed later that the ceremony should be in London, in order to share its expense with an aunt of his who had offered her house.
He twitted Caragh with his impatience9, and Caragh smiled.
His smile touched a point of humour unlikely to tickle10 a future brother-in-law, but he suggested that a man's hurry to be married seldom appealed to his friends.
He might have added that the reasons for it in his own case did not appeal to himself, but they were too serious and disconcerting even for his sense of the ridiculous.
They were, put briefly11, the possible attraction of another woman; and it was his despairing self-contempt that goaded12 him to dispose, so high-handedly, of any obstacles to his marriage with Lettice Nevern.
It was particularly characteristic of him, that while reflecting almost every hour on some fantastic chance that might avert13 their union, he applied14 his foot with an almost unmannerly intolerance to any of the reasonable hindrances15 in its way. That was of a piece, no doubt, with his marked aversion from any form of moral hedging, and his preferred fondness for an honest lie.
He had stayed at Budapest for three days after his confession16, to keep Ethel Vernon company till her husband's engagements were at an end. He had asked her if she wished him to remain, and she had said indifferently that he must please himself. He did not please himself; but he did not go.
Caragh in his perverse18 fashion found them stimulating19. Ethel made not the faintest reference to what he had told her, but she treated him neither with the familiar plainness into which they had fallen, nor as a common and secure acquaintance.
There was about her bearing an extraordinary delicacy20 and distance such as a girl uses to deny herself to the man to whom, unconscious, she has, proudly and irretrievably, given her heart.
Having exhausted21 the interests of the town, they spent the time in long drives to the places she expressed a wish to see in the country; an occupation not pre-eminently adapted to an evasive relationship.
On the fourth morning she said to him, simply:
"I can't stand it any more. You must go."
"No," she said; "you've been extremely nice. Perhaps that's why. I don't know: I've tried not to know. Perhaps I may feel differently when I meet you again. I can't say. I daresay not. But I can't go on as we are. You don't mind my asking, do you? I don't think you wanted to stay. Why should you? I can make up something to Henry about your going: there's always the telegraph to account for things. And don't write, please, unless I ask you to. I'm going to try to forget you—if I can. What's the use of doing anything else? I've been a fool enough as it is."
There was in Caragh's eye the remembrance of days when it seemed as if that desired oblivion would be his to seek, days when his devotion had appeared to be quite obliterated23 from her memory by the surprising splendour of some one else.
That was, of course, the last thing of which he could remind her, but it was, too, the last he could forget.
He had accepted the real misery24 of those days without murmuring; at least he might use their ancient poison as an anodyne25 now. Not to excuse, nor to exalt26 himself, but to dilute27, as it were, now that he had to drink it, the cup of her indignation.
It made the sour of that seem, at least, not quite so much of his own mixing to remember that, twice at least in the last two years, he might have drifted from her on occasions when her attention was too engrossed28 by another to notice that he was gone.
He would have liked in the friendliest fashion to have led her memory to those days, to show her how dispensable he was; only, he reflected one never knew how a woman would take that sort of consolation29: he was not very sure if he would value it himself.
And when it came to his good-byes, he felt anything but fitted for the consoler's office. He had come to Pest bitterly grieved to lose a friend; but he left it like a baffled lover.
The shy strangeness of her manner and the proud distance in her eyes had brought again about Ethel Vernon the glamour30 of days when his heart beat quicker at her approach.
With every hour of indifference31 the old provocation32 in her presence grew. He felt that to stay would be but to yield to it again, and he heard with a dismal33 relief her sentence of exile.
He set himself rigidly34 to pack his things, yet where to go he could not determine. That invisible bond which tied him to the future made all the difference to a man's plans. The East beckoned—he was half way to it—and the green harbours of the Asian coast.
But that meant money, as he knew of old, and it was lack of money that had deferred35 his vow36. In all honesty he could not spend upon himself what he had half pledged to another. He turned disconsolately37 towards home.
He drifted about during the autumn from one shoot to another. It was his ordinary occupation for three months of the year, yet now it seemed unusual. It seemed outside a new continuity of existence which had begun for him.
But he devoted38 himself to settling his affairs, and was able in consequence, as has been narrated39, to propose himself as an unwelcome relative when Arthur Nevern was in town.
Caragh had looked forward doubtfully to meeting Lettice again, under conditions which might suit her so much less well as a background than the open downs and the sea. But his forebodings were gloomy enough to be disappointed.
She had some art in dress, as he had noted40 from her evening frocks, and if in the daytime she seemed for town sometimes a trifle decorative41, it was a decoration on which those who passed her bestowed42 an approving eye. She needed a certain amplitude43 to set her off. The big fur collar, and the expansive hat made the modelling of her face seem daintier than it was. With her hat off, her prettiness owed everything to the fair fine hair that curled almost to her eyes. Maurice had once brushed it back in a playful moment, but he never risked the disillusionment again. He needed every aid to his attachment44 that artifice45 could supply.
She seemed, on her part, to be aware that her beauty required management. It was not of a sort to be worn with a disdainful indifference as to how it might strike you.
It had to be looked after, or it didn't strike you at all. She kept a conscious eye upon her fringe, and she left occasionally, as Caragh had noticed, a harmless confederate with her complexion46 on the lapels of his coat.
He brushed off the powder with a mixed sense of regret and gratitude47. He was sorry she needed it but, since the need was there, better she had the wit to know it and the ambition to look her best. Better far than to suppose with an arrogant48 vanity that to his infatuation nothing could come amiss.
Of what, indeed, came most amiss she probably had not a suspicion. The breezy life of Ballindra had admitted few mental interests, and, in the country, character, which it develops, often has the air of mind. In Lettice, whose character was charming, the resemblance had deceived Caragh. But in London, where character sinks and mind is on the surface, his estimate was corrected.
He endured dreary49 plays in which she delighted; he sat bravely at ballad50 concerts; he listened without a groan51 to her enthusiasms upon domestic art; he tried to read the books she praised.
The outlook was depressing. The same fear touched him that must have fallen upon Babel. Here, for life was a companion who on its finer interests would never understand a word he said. He might, perhaps, bring her painfully to a sense of her unsuspected ineptitude52; might make her mechanically conscious of the commonplace; might shake her faith in ignorance as a standard of art. He might in fact taint53 the sincerity54 of her admirations. That was all.
In art—and art is but the tenderer appreciation55 of life—they would never use the same language, never understand each other's speech. The marvelling56 thrill of familiar strangeness, of joyous57 apprehension58, which the subtlety59 of art can wake in the initiate60, they would never share.
That was not much to miss, perhaps; but, when Caragh tried to think of something its absence would not affect, he stopped in dismay.
Yet apart from her appearance, in spite of her deficiencies, the girl's love wrought61 a change in him of which, with surprise, he found himself aware.
It became less of an effort to return her caresses62, and her kisses no longer made him feel guilty of impersonating her lover.
They never woke in his veins63 even a momentary64 ardour, and now, his pulse beat under them no whit65 the faster, but he had begun to grow susceptible66 to the quickened throb67 of hers. The shy renouncement68 of her self-restraint, as she let the secrets of her being pass, between queer little moods of resistance, into the strangeness of his power, moved him to a sense of protective tenderness he had never felt before.
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1
sufficiently
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| adv.足够地，充分地 | |
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plausible
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| adj.似真实的，似乎有理的，似乎可信的 | |
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displeased
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| a.不快的 | |
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prospective
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| adj.预期的，未来的，前瞻性的 | |
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housekeeper
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| n.管理家务的主妇，女管家 | |
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inflated
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| adj.（价格）飞涨的；（通货）膨胀的；言过其实的；充了气的v.使充气（于轮胎、气球等）( inflate的过去式和过去分词 )；（使）膨胀；（使）通货膨胀；物价上涨 | |
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kit
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| n.用具包，成套工具；随身携带物 | |
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apparently
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| adv.显然地；表面上，似乎 | |
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impatience
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| n.不耐烦，急躁 | |
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tickle
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| v.搔痒，胳肢；使高兴；发痒；n.搔痒，发痒 | |
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briefly
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| adv.简单地，简短地 | |
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goaded
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| v.刺激( goad的过去式和过去分词 )；激励；（用尖棒）驱赶；驱使（或怂恿、刺激）某人 | |
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avert
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| v.防止，避免；转移(目光、注意力等) | |
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applied
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| adj.应用的；v.应用，适用 | |
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hindrances
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| 阻碍者( hindrance的名词复数 )； 障碍物； 受到妨碍的状态 | |
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confession
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| n.自白，供认，承认 | |
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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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perverse
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| adj.刚愎的；坚持错误的，行为反常的 | |
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stimulating
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| adj.有启发性的，能激发人思考的 | |
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delicacy
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| n.精致，细微，微妙，精良；美味，佳肴 | |
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exhausted
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| adj.极其疲惫的，精疲力尽的 | |
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brute
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| n.野兽，兽性 | |
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obliterated
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| v.除去( obliterate的过去式和过去分词 )；涂去；擦掉；彻底破坏或毁灭 | |
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misery
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| n.痛苦，苦恼，苦难；悲惨的境遇，贫苦 | |
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anodyne
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| n.解除痛苦的东西，止痛剂 | |
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exalt
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| v.赞扬，歌颂，晋升，提升 | |
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dilute
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| vt.稀释，冲淡；adj.稀释的，冲淡的 | |
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engrossed
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| adj.全神贯注的 | |
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consolation
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| n.安慰，慰问 | |
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glamour
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| n.魔力，魅力；vt.迷住 | |
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indifference
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| n.不感兴趣，不关心，冷淡，不在乎 | |
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provocation
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| n.激怒，刺激，挑拨，挑衅的事物，激怒的原因 | |
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dismal
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| adj.阴沉的，凄凉的，令人忧郁的，差劲的 | |
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rigidly
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| adv.刻板地，僵化地 | |
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deferred
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| adj.延期的，缓召的v.拖延，延缓，推迟( defer的过去式和过去分词 )；服从某人的意愿，遵从 | |
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vow
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| n.誓(言)，誓约；v.起誓，立誓 | |
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disconsolately
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| adv.悲伤地，愁闷地；哭丧着脸 | |
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38
devoted
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| adj.忠诚的，忠实的，热心的，献身于...的 | |
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narrated
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| v.故事( narrate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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noted
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| adj.著名的，知名的 | |
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decorative
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| adj.装饰的，可作装饰的 | |
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42
bestowed
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| 赠给，授予( bestow的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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43
amplitude
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| n.广大；充足；振幅 | |
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attachment
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| n.附属物，附件；依恋；依附 | |
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artifice
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| n.妙计，高明的手段；狡诈，诡计 | |
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complexion
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| n.肤色；情况，局面；气质，性格 | |
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gratitude
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| adj.感激，感谢 | |
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arrogant
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| adj.傲慢的，自大的 | |
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dreary
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| adj.令人沮丧的，沉闷的，单调乏味的 | |
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ballad
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| n.歌谣，民谣，流行爱情歌曲 | |
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51
groan
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| vi./n.呻吟，抱怨；(发出)呻吟般的声音 | |
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52
ineptitude
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| n.不适当；愚笨，愚昧的言行 | |
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53
taint
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| n.污点；感染；腐坏；v.使感染；污染 | |
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54
sincerity
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| n.真诚，诚意；真实 | |
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appreciation
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| n.评价；欣赏；感谢；领会，理解；价格上涨 | |
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56
marvelling
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| v.惊奇，对…感到惊奇( marvel的现在分词 ) | |
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joyous
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| adj.充满快乐的；令人高兴的 | |
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apprehension
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| n.理解，领悟；逮捕，拘捕；忧虑 | |
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subtlety
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| n.微妙，敏锐，精巧；微妙之处，细微的区别 | |
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initiate
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| vt.开始，创始，发动；启蒙，使入门；引入 | |
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wrought
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| v.引起；以…原料制作；运转；adj.制造的 | |
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caresses
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| 爱抚，抚摸( caress的名词复数 ) | |
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63
veins
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| n.纹理；矿脉( vein的名词复数 )；静脉；叶脉；纹理 | |
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64
momentary
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| adj.片刻的，瞬息的；短暂的 | |
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whit
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| n.一点，丝毫 | |
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susceptible
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| adj.过敏的，敏感的；易动感情的，易受感动的 | |
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67
throb
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| v.震颤，颤动；(急速强烈地)跳动，搏动 | |
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renouncement
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| n.否认，拒绝 | |
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