They scarcely spoke7, riding away together, man and wife. Sitting there, so close to him, she seemed so dear ... so dear ... and life so precious.... Why should he have to endanger it now just when he was beginning to appreciate[194] it, for the sake of that man’s villainy! The poignant8 silence struggled and surged about them, his rage, her fear, their love fighting together with no relief in expression, her beseeching9, warning eyes searching the face he tried to keep averted10.
No one at his mother’s had heard of Peter’s return. That was proved by the fact that no one began talking about it. Chirstie had had fever the day before, Wully announced to them shortly. He was worried about her. He had to go over to the store, and he thought she had better be left where she could have some care. He said he and John could “bach it” a few days. She spoke up sharply and demanded that he come for her by evening at least. He had to promise that much, to keep her from exciting suspicion. It was plain she meant to take no denial. Her eyes implored him to be careful.
Lightened of his encumbrances11, he drove away. He was praying that circumstances might be made to serve him, so that he could get his task over secretly. If not, then Peter would find that no woman could help him now! He drove straight along towards his aunt’s, grimly, not having to nurse his wrath12, having only to restrain it. He wasn’t made for anger, as he knew. It had even as a little boy always made him ill. It had exhausted13 him now. He felt limp. And he must be strong and calm for what was coming. He let his horses take their own gait. The heat of the sun, after the rain of the night, was making the[195] country one great steam bath. He wiped the sweat from his forehead.
He came to the McTaggerts’ corner. John had seen that man so far home the night before. If John had known then all that story, what a chance he would have had. Thank God he hadn’t known! But when he did know, to-day, now, in a few hours, he would stand by Wully with what a sincere strength! Of course John couldn’t be expected to stay and look after the farm while Wully was taken—where? Maybe Andy would do that. And Chirstie would have to stay at his mother’s until—what? His happiness was scarcely more now than a sickening faint memory. He could do what he had to do. The McLaughlins could always do that. And do it well!
He could see the little Keith house now. He drove on towards it. There was no one working in the hayfield. There was no one hoeing corn. No sign of life but a tethered colt in the path. He drove up, and got out of the wagon. He tied his steaming horses to the barn. He hadn’t taken his gun into his hands yet, when the door opened, and his aunt came out.
She was ready for some work in the garden apparently14. She wore a kind of sunbonnet made by sewing a ruffle15 of old calico part way round a man’s old cap, to protect her neck from the sun. She saw Wully, and her face lightened with a greeting.
“Is it you, Wully!” she exclaimed. “And how’s[196] Chirstie the day? We missed you yesterday. She had too much fever, I doubt——”
“She’s better. She’s at mother’s. Where’s everybody?”
“Your uncle’s at the McNairs’.”
“I want to see Peter!”
“What Peter?” she asked with a start.
“Your Peter!”
“My Peter!”
“Yes!” She needn’t think she could work that!
“Did you think he was here, Wully?” she asked, hurt.
“John saw him last night,” he cried accusingly.
“What John?”
“Our John! He saw him last night!”
“Saw who?”
“Saw your Peter!” Could it be——
“Saw my Peter!”
“He came home with him last night as far as the McTaggerts’!”
“Last night!”
“Yes!”
“With my Peter!”
Peter had never got home. There was no doubt about that.
Suddenly she put her hand up to her head, and gave a moan.
[197]“He’s destroyed! He never got to me!”
She started and ran past Wully in the path, and had climbed into his wagon before he could stop her. She gave his hitched19 horses such a slap with the lines that they plunged20 strongly. He sprang to get them before they broke away. He jumped to his place and seized the lines.
“You can’t go with me!” he shouted at her. He couldn’t throw her out of the wagon, and the horses were all he could manage, thanks to her excitement. As if in obedience21 to the thoughts of the humans behind them, they were racing22 down the path towards the McCreaths’, over which Wully had just come.
“You can’t come with me!” he cried again.
“He’ll have stopped at the McCreaths’!” she said, moaning. Moaning ... and making little sounds of speed to his team, which couldn’t possibly have been tearing ahead more madly. She sat rocking back and forth24, and making sounds which unmanned him, overwrought as he was by his own excitement and hatred25. Through the steaming slough26 they plunged and splashed. He didn’t care now how quickly they came to their destination. He gave up trying to control the horses. Anything to get away from that noise she was making, that anguished27 crooning. Never was a man with murder in his heart so undone28 by the grief he intended augmenting29.
The sandy-haired bewhiskered McCreath had[198] stopped still in his dooryard to watch the runaway30 team coming up. When he saw who it was, he dropped the hoe in his hand, and came on out down the path to meet the evident crisis. Wully pulled up the panting horses, and before they had stopped, Libby Keith cried to the man approaching,
“Where is he? Where’s my Peter?”
At first he could not understand so impossible a question. She scrambled31 perilously32 down, and started on a run for the house, with him following.
“Where is he?” she cried again, turning on him. Then McCreath understood. She was mad, the poor body. He said gently;
“He isn’t here, you know, Libby. Peter isn’t here.”
“He is!” she cried. “He’s come! They seen him!”
Wully had followed them. McCreath turned to him, and got a nod in confirmation33. They were at the door, now, and Mrs. McCreath had come that far to see what the disturbance34 was. McCreath cried heartily35 to his wife;
Tears sprang quickly to Aggie’s eyes.
“Where is he!” Libby cried at the same moment.
“Not here!” Libby repeated.
“John saw him last night,” Wully cried angrily.
“Where?” they all demanded.
[199]John had seen him at O’Brien’s, and as far on the way home as the McTaggerts’ corner. And they had supposed he must have turned in at the McCreaths’ when the storm came up.
“He’s at the McTaggerts’, then!” McCreath seemed sure of it. But Libby Keith couldn’t wait till the words were out of his mouth. She was down the path again, and climbing up into the wagon, and the McCreaths were following her, breathing out their congratulations. They didn’t know when any news had pleased them as much as that. They were that glad for her. They were shouting after the galloping38 team in vain.
And again he had to sit by her, as she went on again, crooning and whimpering, making noises like a shot rabbit. He would drive his horses till they fell in their tracks to get away from that torture.
On the corner, where the little path from the Keiths’ joined the wider road, the McTaggerts were building a house. Three men were working on the roof of it, and from the vantage of the height they watched the team flying towards them. They speculated about it. They came down.
“Where’s my Peter?” she shouted to them before they could hear her. She kept shouting it as she climbed down.
They stared at her.
They hadn’t seen anything of her Peter.
They had to go all over that again. John McLaughlin[200] had seen him at this corner last night. Where was he now?
Wully wouldn’t be balked39. Libby Keith wouldn’t be cheated. The McTaggerts stood looking at the two blankly.
Where was Jimmy McTaggert, who had been drinking with Peter last night? He ought to know.
Jimmy McTaggert was wakened from the sleep that followed his holiday spree, and dragged to the light of the morning, half clothed.
He remembered nothing. Wully turned from him wrathfully. Where was his older brother? Let Gib be brought. Gib wouldn’t have been too drunk to remember. Gib was in a far field. A boy went for him horseback. They made Libby sit down. They stood around dazed. Wully went on explaining what he knew again and again. It seemed hours before Gib appeared.
There stood Gib before them, telling the truth, and making it believed. They had come with John from O’Brien’s to be sure, and at the corner John had ridden on home, and Peter had turned and gone walking down the path towards home. That was all that Gib knew about it. Peter had walked right along, not staggering, or seeming drunk.
The men stood looking blankly at one another, fumbling40 among possibilities, in quietness—for one second.
Then Libby cried out.
[201]“He’s fallen! He’s destroyed!” She started down the path, towards the road calling him, making a more terrible sound than ever—a stronger sound.
“Lammie!” she cried. “Where are you? Mother’s coming!” Some place between that corner and her home she thought him lying helpless, dying maybe. Lying drunk, the men thought, and nodded significantly to each other. It flashed through Wully’s bewildered mind that he had probably started back towards Chirstie. Or maybe back to O’Brien’s, someone suggested. Mrs. McTaggert was running after Libby Keith. The men started to help her search. In decency41 they could do no less. They tried to soothe42 her. He would be sleeping somewhere. Had she looked in her own barn? Could it be, they wondered vaguely43, thinking of her other children, that had happened ... anything tragic44?
Wully had to join them. After all, she was mad, stark45 mad and shrieking46 over the prairies, and she wasn’t a McTaggert that they should have to care for her. She was his father’s sister, and he must see what became of her. Down the road she ran, calling out to her son, and commanding them. They were to go for her husband. They were to get her brothers, her neighbors, to send men on horses to look for him. Some of them turned back to obey her. Wully ran along with her.
Beating along both sides of the road they went, tramping down the grasses, calling him—calling[202] till Wully felt tears running down his face. Not that he pitied her. He cursed her. He was saying to himself, “God damn you, stop that noise!” And to her, habit-bound as he was, and shrinking from the pain of her voice, “Let me do the shouting, Auntie! Let me call for you!” He didn’t know his voice when he lifted it. So how could Peter know who was begging him for an answer! Oh, if only he might come across him there, fallen, and make an end of this horror! Sometimes he stayed a distance from her in this wild hope. Sometimes he had to support her to keep her from falling. Down through the slough they went, splashing and bedraggled. Mrs. McTaggert, with a baby in her arms, followed as best she might. The slough was shallow where the path crossed it, but how deep the waters might be on either side, no one knew. Libby Keith stretched out her arms dramatically towards them.
“Lammie! Mother’s coming!” she implored.
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1
covertly
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| adv.偷偷摸摸地 | |
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implored
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| 恳求或乞求（某人）( implore的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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fervency
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| n.热情的；强烈的；热烈 | |
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wagon
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| n.四轮马车，手推车，面包车；无盖运货列车 | |
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conceal
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| v.隐藏，隐瞒，隐蔽 | |
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thoroughly
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| adv.完全地，彻底地，十足地 | |
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7
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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8
poignant
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| adj.令人痛苦的，辛酸的，惨痛的 | |
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9
beseeching
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| adj.恳求似的v.恳求，乞求（某事物）( beseech的现在分词 ) | |
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10
averted
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| 防止，避免( avert的过去式和过去分词 )； 转移 | |
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11
encumbrances
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| n.负担( encumbrance的名词复数 )；累赘；妨碍；阻碍 | |
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12
wrath
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| n.愤怒，愤慨，暴怒 | |
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13
exhausted
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| adj.极其疲惫的，精疲力尽的 | |
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14
apparently
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| adv.显然地；表面上，似乎 | |
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15
ruffle
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| v.弄皱，弄乱；激怒，扰乱；n.褶裥饰边 | |
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16
skunk
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| n.臭鼬，黄鼠狼；v.使惨败，使得零分；烂醉如泥 | |
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17
stammered
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| v.结巴地说出( stammer的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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18
standing
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| n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的 | |
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19
hitched
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| （免费）搭乘他人之车( hitch的过去式和过去分词 )； 搭便车； 攀上； 跃上 | |
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20
plunged
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| v.颠簸( plunge的过去式和过去分词 )；暴跌；骤降；突降 | |
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21
obedience
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| n.服从，顺从 | |
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racing
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| n.竞赛，赛马；adj.竞赛用的，赛马用的 | |
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23
heeded
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| v.听某人的劝告，听从( heed的过去式和过去分词 )；变平，使（某物）变平( flatten的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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24
forth
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| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
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25
hatred
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| n.憎恶，憎恨，仇恨 | |
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26
slough
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| v.蜕皮，脱落，抛弃 | |
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27
anguished
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| adj.极其痛苦的v.使极度痛苦(anguish的过去式) | |
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28
undone
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| a.未做完的，未完成的 | |
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29
augmenting
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| 使扩张 | |
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30
runaway
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| n.逃走的人，逃亡，亡命者；adj.逃亡的，逃走的 | |
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31
scrambled
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| v.快速爬行( scramble的过去式和过去分词 )；攀登；争夺；（军事飞机）紧急起飞 | |
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32
perilously
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| adv.充满危险地，危机四伏地 | |
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33
confirmation
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| n.证实，确认，批准 | |
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34
disturbance
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| n.动乱，骚动；打扰，干扰；(身心)失调 | |
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35
heartily
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| adv.衷心地，诚恳地，十分，很 | |
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36
aggie
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| n.农校，农科大学生 | |
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37
kindly
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| adj.和蔼的，温和的，爽快的；adv.温和地，亲切地 | |
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38
galloping
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| adj. 飞驰的, 急性的 动词gallop的现在分词形式 | |
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39
balked
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| v.畏缩不前，犹豫( balk的过去式和过去分词 )；（指马）不肯跑 | |
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40
fumbling
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| n. 摸索,漏接 v. 摸索,摸弄,笨拙的处理 | |
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41
decency
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| n.体面，得体，合宜，正派，庄重 | |
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42
soothe
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| v.安慰；使平静；使减轻；缓和；奉承 | |
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43
vaguely
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| adv.含糊地，暖昧地 | |
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44
tragic
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| adj.悲剧的，悲剧性的，悲惨的 | |
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45
stark
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| adj.荒凉的；严酷的；完全的；adv.完全地 | |
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46
shrieking
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| v.尖叫( shriek的现在分词 ) | |
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47
sobbed
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| 哭泣，啜泣( sob的过去式和过去分词 )； 哭诉，呜咽地说 | |
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