Birds were chirping1, the fog had begun to thin, and a raccoon scurried2 across the bungalow3 porch when Jeremy’s cell phone rang. The harsh gray light of early morning passed through the torn curtains, smacking4 him in the eye like a prizefighter’s punch.
A quick glance at the clock showed it was 8:00 a.m., way too early to talk to anyone, especially after pulling an all-nighter. He was getting too old for nights like that, and he winced5 before groping for the phone.
“Jeremy? Is that you? Where have you been? Why haven’t you called? I’ve been trying to reach you!”
Nate, Jeremy thought, closing his eyes again. Good God, Nate.
Meanwhile, Nate was going on. He had to be a long-lost relative of the mayor, Jeremy thought. Put these two in a room, hook them up to a generator7 while they talked, and they could power Brooklyn for a month.
“You said you were going to keep in touch!”
Jeremy forced himself to sit upright on the side of his bed, though his body was aching.
“Sorry, Nate,” he said. “I’ve just been tied up, and the reception isn’t too good down here.”
“You’ve got to keep me filled in! I tried calling you all day yesterday, but I kept getting put through to your voice mail. You can’t imagine what’s going on. I’ve got producers hounding me left and right, coming to me for ideas about what you might want to discuss. And things are really moving. One of them suggested that you do a piece on these high-protein diets. You know, the ones that tell you that it’s okay to eat all the bacon and steaks you want and still lose weight.”
Jeremy shook his head, trying to keep up.
“Wait? What are you talking about? Who wants me to talk about what diet?”
“GMA. Who did you think I was talking about? Of course, I said I’d have to get back to them, but I think you’d be a natural at this.”
The man sometimes gave Jeremy a headache, and he rubbed his forehead.
“I have no interest in talking about a new diet, Nate. I’m a science journalist, not Oprah.”
“So you put your own spin on it. That’s what you do, right? And diets have something to do with chemistry and science. Am I right or am I right? Hell, you know I’m right, and you know me—when I’m right, I’m right. And besides, I’m just tossing out ideas here—”
“I saw the lights,” Jeremy interrupted.
“I mean, if you have something better, then we can talk. But I’m flying blind here, and this diet thing might be a way to get your foot—”
“I saw the lights,” Jeremy said again, raising his voice.
Jeremy continued to rub his temples. “Yeah, those lights.”
“When? Why didn’t you call me? This gives me something to run with. Oh, please tell me you got it on film.”
“I did, but I haven’t seen the tapes yet, so I don’t know how they turned out.”
“So the lights are for real?”
“Yeah. But I think I found out where they’re coming from, too.”
“So it’s not real . . .”
“Listen, Nate, I’m tired, so listen for a second, will you? I went to the cemetery last night and saw the lights. And to be honest, I can see why some people consider them to be ghosts, because of the way they appear. There’s a pretty interesting legend attached to them, and the town even has a tour planned for the weekend to capitalize on it. But after I left the cemetery, I went looking for the source and I’m pretty sure I found it. All I have to do is figure out how and why it happens when it does, but I have some ideas about that, too, and hopefully, I’ll have it figured out by later today.”
Nate, for a rare moment, had nothing to say. Like the trained professional he was, however, he recovered quickly.
“Okay, okay, give me a second to figure out the best way to play this. I’m thinking of the television folks here . . .”
Who else would he be thinking of? Jeremy wondered.
“Okay, how’s this?” Nate was going on. “We open with the legend itself, sort of setting the scene. Misty9 cemetery, a close-up on some of the graves, maybe a quick shot of a black raven10 looking ominous11, you talking in voice-over . . .”
The man was the master of Hollywood clichés, and Jeremy glanced at the clock again, thinking it was way too early for this.
“I’m tired, Nate. How about this? You think about it and let me know later, okay?”
“Yeah, yeah. I can do that. That’s what I’m here for, right? To make your life easier. Hey, do you think I should call Alvin?”
“I’m not sure yet. Let me see the tapes first, and then I’ll talk to Alvin, and we’ll see what he thinks.”
“Right,” he said, his voice rising in enthusiasm. “Good plan, good idea! And this is great news! A genuine ghost story! They’re going to love this! I told you they were hot and heavy about the idea, didn’t I? Believe me, I told them you’d come through with this story and that you wouldn’t be interested in talking about the latest diet fad12. But now that we have a bargaining chip, they’re going to go crazy. I can’t wait to tell them, and listen, I’ll be calling you in just a couple of hours, so make sure you keep your phone on. Things could be moving quickly . . .”
“Good-bye, Nate. I’ll talk to you later.”
Jeremy rolled back onto the bed and pulled the pillow over his head, but finding it impossible to fall back to sleep, he groaned13 as he got up and made his way to the bathroom, doing his best to ignore the stuffed creatures that seemed to be watching his every move. Still, he was getting used to them, and as he undressed, he hung his towel on the outstretched paws of a badger14, thinking he might as well take advantage of the animal’s convenient pose.
Hopping15 into the shower, he turned the water as far as it would go and stayed under the single jet for twenty minutes, until his skin was pruned16. Only then did he begin to feel alive again. Sleeping less than two hours would do that to a person.
After throwing on his jeans, he grabbed the tapes and got in his car. The fog hung over the road like evaporating dry ice on a concert stage, and the sky had the same ugly tones as it had the day before, making him suspect that the lights would appear again tonight, which not only boded17 well for the tourists this weekend but also meant that he should probably call Alvin. Even if the tapes were okay, Alvin was magic with a camera, and he’d capture images that would no doubt make Nate’s finger swell18 up from making frantic19 calls.
His first step, though, was to see what he’d caught on camera, if only to see that he’d captured something. Not surprisingly, Greenleaf didn’t have a VCR, but he’d seen one in the rare-book room, and as he drove along the quiet road that led toward town, he wondered how Lexie would behave toward him when he got there. Would she go back to being distant and professional? Would the good feelings from their day together linger? Or would she simply remember their final moments on the porch, when he’d pushed too hard? He had no idea what was going to happen, even though he’d devoted20 much of the night to trying to figure it out.
Sure, he’d found the source of the light. Like most mysteries, it wasn’t that hard to solve if you knew what to look for, and a quick check of a Web site sponsored by NASA eliminated the only other possibility. The moon, he’d learned, couldn’t have been responsible for the lights. It was, in fact, a new moon, when the moon was hidden by the earth’s shadow, and he had a sneaking21 suspicion that the mysterious lights only occurred in this particular phase. It would make sense: without moonlight, even the faintest traces of other light would become that much more obvious, especially when reflected in the water droplets22 of the fog.
But as he’d stood in the chilly23 air with the answer within reach, all he could think about was Lexie. It seemed impossible that he’d only met her two days earlier. It made no sense. Of course, Einstein had postulated24 that time was relative, and he supposed that could explain it. How did the old saying about relativity go? A minute with a beautiful woman would pass in an instant, while a minute with your hand placed against a hot burner would feel like an eternity25? Yeah, he thought, that was it. Or close, anyway.
He again regretted his behavior on the porch, wishing for the hundredth time that he had taken her hint when he’d been thinking about kissing her. She’d made her feelings obvious and he’d ignored them. The regular Jeremy would have forgotten all about it already, shrugging the whole thing off as inconsequential. For some reason, this time it wasn’t so easy.
Though he’d dated a lot and hadn’t exactly become a hermit26 after Maria had left him, he had seldom done the spend-thewhole-day-talking-with-someone thing. Usually, it was just dinner or drinks and enough flirtatious conversation to loosen the inhibitions before the good part. Part of him knew it was time to grow up when it came to dating, maybe even try to settle down and live the sort of life his brothers did. His brothers readily concurred27, and so, of course, did their wives. They were of the widely shared opinion that he should get to know women before trying to sleep with them, and one had gone so far as to set him up on a date with a divorced neighbor who believed the same. Of course, she’d declined a second date, in large part because of the pass he’d made at her on the first. In the past few years, it just seemed easier to not get to know women too well, to keep them in the realm of perpetual strangers, when they could still project hope and potential on him.
And that was the thing. There wasn’t hope or potential. At least, not for the sort of life his brothers and sisters-in-law believed in, or even, he suspected, the kind Lexie wanted. His divorce from Maria had proved that. Lexie was a small-town girl with small-town dreams, and it wouldn’t be enough to be faithful and responsible and to have things in common. Most women wanted something else, a way of life he couldn’t give them. Not because he didn’t want to, not because he was enamored of the bachelor scene, but simply because it was impossible. Science could answer a lot of questions, science could solve a lot of problems, but it couldn’t change his particular reality. And the reality was that Maria had left him because he hadn’t been, nor ever could be, the kind of husband she’d wanted.
He admitted this painful truth to no one, of course. Not to his brothers, not to his parents, not to Lexie. And usually, even in quiet moments, not even to himself.
Though the library was open by the time he got there, Lexie wasn’t in yet, and he felt a pang28 of disappointment when he pushed open the office door only to find the room empty. She’d been in earlier, though: the rare-book room had been left unlocked, and when he turned on the light, he saw a note on the desk, along with the topography maps he’d mentioned. The note took only an instant to read:
I’m taking care of some personal things. Feel free to use the VCR. Lexie
No mention of yesterday or last night, no mention of wanting to make arrangements to see him again. Not even an acknowledgment above the signature. It wasn’t exactly chilly as far as notes went, but it didn’t leave him with the warm fuzzies, either.
Then again, he was probably reading too much into it. She might have been in a rush this morning, or she might have kept it short because she planned to be back soon. She did mention it was personal, and with women, that could mean anything from a doctor’s appointment to shopping for a friend’s birthday. There was just no way to tell.
And besides, he had work to do, he told himself. Nate was waiting and his career was on the line. Jeremy forced himself to focus on chasing the tail end of the story.
The audio recorders had picked up no unusual sounds, and neither the microwave nor the electromagnetic detector29 had registered the slightest energy variances30. The videotapes, however, had picked up everything he’d seen the night before, and he watched the images half a dozen times from every different angle. The cameras with the special light-filtering capacity showed the glowing fog most vividly31. Though the tapes might have been good enough to provide a small still to accompany his column, they were far from television quality. When viewed in real time, they had a sort of home-video feel to them, one that reminded him of cheesy tapes offered in proof of other supernatural events.
He made a note to purchase a real camera, no matter how much celery his editor would eat because of it.
But even if the tapes weren’t of the quality he’d hoped they would be, observing the way in which the lights had changed during the twenty-two seconds they were visible assured him again that he’d indeed found the answer. He popped the tapes out, perused32 the topography maps, and calculated the distance from Riker’s Hill to the river. He compared the earlier photographs he’d taken of the cemetery to photos of the cemetery he found in books about the town’s history, and came up with what he assumed to be a fairly accurate estimate regarding the rate that the cemetery was sinking. Though he wasn’t able to find any more information on the legend of Hettie Doubilet—the records from that period shed no light on the subject—he made a call to the state water bureau concerning the underground reservoir in this part of the state, and one to the department of mines, which had information on the quarries33 that had been dug earlier in the century. After that, he tapped a few words into a search engine of the Internet looking for the timetables he needed, and finally, after being put on hold for ten minutes, he spoke34 to a Mr. Larsen at the paper mill, who was eager to help in any way he could.
And with that, all the pieces had finally come together in a way that he could definitively prove.
The truth had been in front of everyone all along. Like most mysteries, the solution had been simple, and it made him wonder why no one had realized it before. Unless, of course, someone had, which opened the door to another angle on the story.
Nate, no doubt, would be thrilled, but despite the morning’s success, Jeremy felt little sense of accomplishment35. Instead, all he thought about was the fact that Lexie wasn’t around to either congratulate or tease him about it. Honestly, he didn’t care how she’d react as long as she was here to react, and he rose from his seat to check her office again.
For the most part, it looked the same as it had the day before. Stacks of documents were still piled on her desk, books were scattered36 haphazardly37, and the screen saver on her computer was etching and erasing38 colorful drawings. The answering machine, fashing with messages, sat next to a small potted plant.
Still, he couldn’t shake the feeling that without Lexie, the room may as well have been completely empty.
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收听单词发音
收听单词发音 |
1
chirping
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| 鸟叫，虫鸣( chirp的现在分词 ) | |
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2
scurried
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| v.急匆匆地走( scurry的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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bungalow
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| n.平房，周围有阳台的木造小平房 | |
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smacking
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| 活泼的，发出响声的，精力充沛的 | |
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winced
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| 赶紧避开，畏缩( wince的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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6
grumbled
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| 抱怨( grumble的过去式和过去分词 )； 发牢骚； 咕哝； 发哼声 | |
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7
generator
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| n.发电机，发生器 | |
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cemetery
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| n.坟墓，墓地，坟场 | |
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misty
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| adj.雾蒙蒙的，有雾的 | |
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raven
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| n.渡鸟，乌鸦；adj.乌亮的 | |
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ominous
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| adj.不祥的，不吉的，预兆的，预示的 | |
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12
fad
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| n.时尚；一时流行的狂热；一时的爱好 | |
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13
groaned
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| v.呻吟( groan的过去式和过去分词 )；发牢骚；抱怨；受苦 | |
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14
badger
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| v.一再烦扰，一再要求，纠缠 | |
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15
hopping
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| n. 跳跃 动词hop的现在分词形式 | |
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16
pruned
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| v.修剪（树木等）( prune的过去式和过去分词 )；精简某事物，除去某事物多余的部分 | |
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17
boded
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| v.预示，预告，预言( bode的过去式和过去分词 )；等待，停留( bide的过去分词 )；居住；（过去式用bided）等待 | |
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18
swell
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| vi.膨胀，肿胀；增长，增强 | |
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19
frantic
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| adj.狂乱的，错乱的，激昂的 | |
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20
devoted
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| adj.忠诚的，忠实的，热心的，献身于...的 | |
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21
sneaking
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| a.秘密的，不公开的 | |
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22
droplets
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| n.小滴( droplet的名词复数 ) | |
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23
chilly
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| adj.凉快的，寒冷的 | |
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24
postulated
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| v.假定，假设( postulate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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25
eternity
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| n.不朽，来世；永恒，无穷 | |
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26
hermit
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| n.隐士，修道者；隐居 | |
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27
concurred
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| 同意（concur的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
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28
pang
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| n.剧痛，悲痛，苦闷 | |
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29
detector
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| n.发觉者，探测器 | |
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30
variances
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| n.变化( variance的名词复数 )；不和；差异；方差 | |
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vividly
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| adv.清楚地，鲜明地，生动地 | |
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32
perused
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| v.读（某篇文字）( peruse的过去式和过去分词 )；（尤指）细阅；审阅；匆匆读或心不在焉地浏览（某篇文字） | |
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33
quarries
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| n.（采）石场( quarry的名词复数 )；猎物（指鸟，兽等）；方形石；（格窗等的）方形玻璃v.从采石场采得( quarry的第三人称单数 )；从（书本等中）努力发掘（资料等）；在采石场采石 | |
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34
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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35
accomplishment
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| n.完成，成就，（pl.）造诣，技能 | |
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36
scattered
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| adj.分散的，稀疏的；散步的；疏疏落落的 | |
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37
haphazardly
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| adv.偶然地，随意地，杂乱地 | |
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38
erasing
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| v.擦掉( erase的现在分词 )；抹去；清除 | |
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