This journey on New Year's Eve was a premeditated act of vengeance6 which she had kept in her heart ever since Godfrey, in a fit of passion, had told her he would sooner die than acknowledge her as his wife. There would be a great party at the Red House on New Year's Eve, she knew: her husband would be smiling and smiled upon, hiding her existence in the darkest corner of his heart. But she would mar7 his pleasure: she would go in her dingy8 rags, with her faded face, once as handsome as the best, with her little child that had its father's hair and eyes, and disclose herself to the Squire9 as his eldest10 son's wife. It is seldom that the miserable11 can help regarding their misery13 as a wrong inflicted14 by those who are less miserable. Molly knew that the cause of her dingy rags was not her husband's neglect, but the demon15 Opium16 to whom she was enslaved, body and soul, except in the lingering mother's tenderness that refused to give him her hungry child. She knew this well; and yet, in the moments of wretched unbenumbed consciousness, the sense of her want and degradation17 transformed itself continually into bitterness towards Godfrey. He was well off; and if she had her rights she would be well off too. The belief that he repented18 his marriage, and suffered from it, only aggravated19 her vindictiveness21. Just and self-reproving thoughts do not come to us too thickly, even in the purest air, and with the best lessons of heaven and earth; how should those white-winged delicate messengers make their way to Molly's poisoned chamber22, inhabited by no higher memories than those of a barmaid's paradise of pink ribbons and gentlemen's jokes?
She had set out at an early hour, but had lingered on the road, inclined by her indolence to believe that if she waited under a warm shed the snow would cease to fall. She had waited longer than she knew, and now that she found herself belated in the snow-hidden ruggedness23 of the long lanes, even the animation24 of a vindictive20 purpose could not keep her spirit from failing. It was seven o'clock, and by this time she was not very far from Raveloe, but she was not familiar enough with those monotonous25 lanes to know how near she was to her journey's end. She needed comfort, and she knew but one comforter—the familiar demon in her bosom26; but she hesitated a moment, after drawing out the black remnant, before she raised it to her lips. In that moment the mother's love pleaded for painful consciousness rather than oblivion—pleaded to be left in aching weariness, rather than to have the encircling arms benumbed so that they could not feel the dear burden. In another moment Molly had flung something away, but it was not the black remnant—it was an empty phial. And she walked on again under the breaking cloud, from which there came now and then the light of a quickly veiled star, for a freezing wind had sprung up since the snowing had ceased. But she walked always more and more drowsily27, and clutched more and more automatically the sleeping child at her bosom.
Slowly the demon was working his will, and cold and weariness were his helpers. Soon she felt nothing but a supreme28 immediate29 longing30 that curtained off all futurity—the longing to lie down and sleep. She had arrived at a spot where her footsteps were no longer checked by a hedgerow, and she had wandered vaguely31, unable to distinguish any objects, notwithstanding the wide whiteness around her, and the growing starlight. She sank down against a straggling furze bush, an easy pillow enough; and the bed of snow, too, was soft. She did not feel that the bed was cold, and did not heed33 whether the child would wake and cry for her. But her arms had not yet relaxed their instinctive34 clutch; and the little one slumbered35 on as gently as if it had been rocked in a lace-trimmed cradle.
But the complete torpor36 came at last: the fingers lost their tension, the arms unbent; then the little head fell away from the bosom, and the blue eyes opened wide on the cold starlight. At first there was a little peevish38 cry of "mammy", and an effort to regain39 the pillowing arm and bosom; but mammy's ear was deaf, and the pillow seemed to be slipping away backward. Suddenly, as the child rolled downward on its mother's knees, all wet with snow, its eyes were caught by a bright glancing light on the white ground, and, with the ready transition of infancy40, it was immediately absorbed in watching the bright living thing running towards it, yet never arriving. That bright living thing must be caught; and in an instant the child had slipped on all-fours, and held out one little hand to catch the gleam. But the gleam would not be caught in that way, and now the head was held up to see where the cunning gleam came from. It came from a very bright place; and the little one, rising on its legs, toddled41 through the snow, the old grimy shawl in which it was wrapped trailing behind it, and the queer little bonnet43 dangling44 at its back—toddled on to the open door of Silas Marner's cottage, and right up to the warm hearth45, where there was a bright fire of logs and sticks, which had thoroughly46 warmed the old sack (Silas's greatcoat) spread out on the bricks to dry. The little one, accustomed to be left to itself for long hours without notice from its mother, squatted47 down on the sack, and spread its tiny hands towards the blaze, in perfect contentment, gurgling and making many inarticulate communications to the cheerful fire, like a new-hatched gosling beginning to find itself comfortable. But presently the warmth had a lulling48 effect, and the little golden head sank down on the old sack, and the blue eyes were veiled by their delicate half-transparent lids.
But where was Silas Marner while this strange visitor had come to his hearth? He was in the cottage, but he did not see the child. During the last few weeks, since he had lost his money, he had contracted the habit of opening his door and looking out from time to time, as if he thought that his money might be somehow coming back to him, or that some trace, some news of it, might be mysteriously on the road, and be caught by the listening ear or the straining eye. It was chiefly at night, when he was not occupied in his loom49, that he fell into this repetition of an act for which he could have assigned no definite purpose, and which can hardly be understood except by those who have undergone a bewildering separation from a supremely50 loved object. In the evening twilight51, and later whenever the night was not dark, Silas looked out on that narrow prospect52 round the Stone-pits, listening and gazing, not with hope, but with mere53 yearning54 and unrest.
This morning he had been told by some of his neighbours that it was New Year's Eve, and that he must sit up and hear the old year rung out and the new rung in, because that was good luck, and might bring his money back again. This was only a friendly Raveloe-way of jesting with the half-crazy oddities of a miser12, but it had perhaps helped to throw Silas into a more than usually excited state. Since the on-coming of twilight he had opened his door again and again, though only to shut it immediately at seeing all distance veiled by the falling snow. But the last time he opened it the snow had ceased, and the clouds were parting here and there. He stood and listened, and gazed for a long while—there was really something on the road coming towards him then, but he caught no sign of it; and the stillness and the wide trackless snow seemed to narrow his solitude55, and touched his yearning with the chill of despair. He went in again, and put his right hand on the latch56 of the door to close it—but he did not close it: he was arrested, as he had been already since his loss, by the invisible wand of catalepsy, and stood like a graven image, with wide but sightless eyes, holding open his door, powerless to resist either the good or the evil that might enter there.
When Marner's sensibility returned, he continued the action which had been arrested, and closed his door, unaware57 of the chasm58 in his consciousness, unaware of any intermediate change, except that the light had grown dim, and that he was chilled and faint. He thought he had been too long standing32 at the door and looking out. Turning towards the hearth, where the two logs had fallen apart, and sent forth59 only a red uncertain glimmer60, he seated himself on his fireside chair, and was stooping to push his logs together, when, to his blurred61 vision, it seemed as if there were gold on the floor in front of the hearth. Gold!—his own gold—brought back to him as mysteriously as it had been taken away! He felt his heart begin to beat violently, and for a few moments he was unable to stretch out his hand and grasp the restored treasure. The heap of gold seemed to glow and get larger beneath his agitated62 gaze. He leaned forward at last, and stretched forth his hand; but instead of the hard coin with the familiar resisting outline, his fingers encountered soft warm curls. In utter amazement63, Silas fell on his knees and bent37 his head low to examine the marvel64: it was a sleeping child—a round, fair thing, with soft yellow rings all over its head. Could this be his little sister come back to him in a dream—his little sister whom he had carried about in his arms for a year before she died, when he was a small boy without shoes or stockings? That was the first thought that darted65 across Silas's blank wonderment. Was it a dream? He rose to his feet again, pushed his logs together, and, throwing on some dried leaves and sticks, raised a flame; but the flame did not disperse66 the vision—it only lit up more distinctly the little round form of the child, and its shabby clothing. It was very much like his little sister. Silas sank into his chair powerless, under the double presence of an inexplicable67 surprise and a hurrying influx68 of memories. How and when had the child come in without his knowledge? He had never been beyond the door. But along with that question, and almost thrusting it away, there was a vision of the old home and the old streets leading to Lantern Yard—and within that vision another, of the thoughts which had been present with him in those far-off scenes. The thoughts were strange to him now, like old friendships impossible to revive; and yet he had a dreamy feeling that this child was somehow a message come to him from that far-off life: it stirred fibres that had never been moved in Raveloe—old quiverings of tenderness—old impressions of awe69 at the presentiment70 of some Power presiding over his life; for his imagination had not yet extricated71 itself from the sense of mystery in the child's sudden presence, and had formed no conjectures72 of ordinary natural means by which the event could have been brought about.
But there was a cry on the hearth: the child had awaked, and Marner stooped to lift it on his knee. It clung round his neck, and burst louder and louder into that mingling73 of inarticulate cries with "mammy" by which little children express the bewilderment of waking. Silas pressed it to him, and almost unconsciously uttered sounds of hushing tenderness, while he bethought himself that some of his porridge, which had got cool by the dying fire, would do to feed the child with if it were only warmed up a little.
He had plenty to do through the next hour. The porridge, sweetened with some dry brown sugar from an old store which he had refrained from using for himself, stopped the cries of the little one, and made her lift her blue eyes with a wide quiet gaze at Silas, as he put the spoon into her mouth. Presently she slipped from his knee and began to toddle42 about, but with a pretty stagger that made Silas jump up and follow her lest she should fall against anything that would hurt her. But she only fell in a sitting posture74 on the ground, and began to pull at her boots, looking up at him with a crying face as if the boots hurt her. He took her on his knee again, but it was some time before it occurred to Silas's dull bachelor mind that the wet boots were the grievance75, pressing on her warm ankles. He got them off with difficulty, and baby was at once happily occupied with the primary mystery of her own toes, inviting76 Silas, with much chuckling77, to consider the mystery too. But the wet boots had at last suggested to Silas that the child had been walking on the snow, and this roused him from his entire oblivion of any ordinary means by which it could have entered or been brought into his house. Under the prompting of this new idea, and without waiting to form conjectures, he raised the child in his arms, and went to the door. As soon as he had opened it, there was the cry of "mammy" again, which Silas had not heard since the child's first hungry waking. Bending forward, he could just discern the marks made by the little feet on the virgin78 snow, and he followed their track to the furze bushes. "Mammy!" the little one cried again and again, stretching itself forward so as almost to escape from Silas's arms, before he himself was aware that there was something more than the bush before him—that there was a human body, with the head sunk low in the furze, and half-covered with the shaken snow.
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1
draughts
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| n. <英>国际跳棋 | |
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2
galled
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| v.使…擦痛( gall的过去式和过去分词 )；擦伤；烦扰；侮辱 | |
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fretted
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| 焦躁的，附有弦马的，腐蚀的 | |
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mingle
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| vt.使混合，使相混；vi.混合起来；相交往 | |
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irritation
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| n.激怒，恼怒，生气 | |
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vengeance
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| n.报复，报仇，复仇 | |
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mar
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| vt.破坏，毁坏，弄糟 | |
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dingy
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| adj.昏暗的，肮脏的 | |
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squire
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| n.护卫, 侍从, 乡绅 | |
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eldest
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| adj.最年长的，最年老的 | |
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miserable
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| adj.悲惨的，痛苦的；可怜的，糟糕的 | |
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miser
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| n.守财奴，吝啬鬼 (adj.miserly) | |
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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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inflicted
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| 把…强加给，使承受，遭受( inflict的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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demon
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| n.魔鬼，恶魔 | |
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16
opium
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| n.鸦片；adj.鸦片的 | |
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17
degradation
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| n.降级；低落；退化；陵削；降解；衰变 | |
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18
repented
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| 对（自己的所为）感到懊悔或忏悔( repent的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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19
aggravated
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| 使恶化( aggravate的过去式和过去分词 )； 使更严重； 激怒； 使恼火 | |
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20
vindictive
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| adj.有报仇心的，怀恨的，惩罚的 | |
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21
vindictiveness
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| 恶毒；怀恨在心 | |
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22
chamber
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| n.房间，寝室；会议厅；议院；会所 | |
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23
ruggedness
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| 险峻，粗野； 耐久性； 坚固性 | |
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animation
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| n.活泼，兴奋，卡通片／动画片的制作 | |
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monotonous
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| adj.单调的，一成不变的，使人厌倦的 | |
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26
bosom
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| n.胸，胸部；胸怀；内心；adj.亲密的 | |
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27
drowsily
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| adv.睡地，懒洋洋地，昏昏欲睡地 | |
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28
supreme
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| adj.极度的，最重要的；至高的，最高的 | |
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immediate
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| adj.立即的；直接的，最接近的；紧靠的 | |
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longing
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| n.（for）渴望 | |
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vaguely
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| adv.含糊地，暖昧地 | |
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32
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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33
heed
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| v.注意，留意；n.注意，留心 | |
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instinctive
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| adj.(出于)本能的；直觉的；(出于)天性的 | |
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slumbered
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| 微睡，睡眠（slumber的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
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torpor
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| n.迟钝；麻木；（动物的）冬眠 | |
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37
bent
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| n.爱好，癖好；adj.弯的；决心的，一心的 | |
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38
peevish
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| adj.易怒的，坏脾气的 | |
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39
regain
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| vt.重新获得，收复，恢复 | |
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40
infancy
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| n.婴儿期；幼年期；初期 | |
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41
toddled
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| v.（幼儿等）东倒西歪地走( toddle的过去式和过去分词 )；蹒跚行走；溜达；散步 | |
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42
toddle
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| v.（如小孩）蹒跚学步 | |
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43
bonnet
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| n.无边女帽；童帽 | |
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44
dangling
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| 悬吊着( dangle的现在分词 )； 摆动不定； 用某事物诱惑…； 吊胃口 | |
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45
hearth
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| n.壁炉炉床，壁炉地面 | |
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46
thoroughly
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| adv.完全地，彻底地，十足地 | |
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47
squatted
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| v.像动物一样蹲下( squat的过去式和过去分词 )；非法擅自占用（土地或房屋）；为获得其所有权；而占用某片公共用地。 | |
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48
lulling
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| vt.使镇静，使安静（lull的现在分词形式） | |
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49
loom
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| n.织布机，织机；v.隐现，(危险、忧虑等)迫近 | |
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50
supremely
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| adv.无上地，崇高地 | |
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51
twilight
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| n.暮光，黄昏；暮年，晚期，衰落时期 | |
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52
prospect
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| n.前景，前途；景色，视野 | |
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53
mere
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| adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过 | |
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54
yearning
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| a.渴望的；向往的；怀念的 | |
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55
solitude
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| n. 孤独; 独居,荒僻之地,幽静的地方 | |
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56
latch
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| n.门闩，窗闩；弹簧锁 | |
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57
unaware
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| a.不知道的，未意识到的 | |
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58
chasm
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| n.深坑，断层，裂口，大分岐，利害冲突 | |
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59
forth
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| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
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60
glimmer
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| v.发出闪烁的微光；n.微光，微弱的闪光 | |
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61
blurred
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| v.（使）变模糊( blur的过去式和过去分词 )；（使）难以区分；模模糊糊；迷离 | |
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62
agitated
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| adj.被鼓动的，不安的 | |
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63
amazement
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| n.惊奇，惊讶 | |
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64
marvel
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| vi.(at)惊叹vt.感到惊异；n.令人惊异的事 | |
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65
darted
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| v.投掷，投射( dart的过去式和过去分词 )；向前冲，飞奔 | |
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66
disperse
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| vi.使分散；使消失；vt.分散；驱散 | |
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67
inexplicable
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| adj.无法解释的，难理解的 | |
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68
influx
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| n.流入，注入 | |
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69
awe
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| n.敬畏，惊惧；vt.使敬畏，使惊惧 | |
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70
presentiment
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| n.预感，预觉 | |
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71
extricated
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| v.使摆脱困难，脱身( extricate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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72
conjectures
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| 推测，猜想( conjecture的名词复数 ) | |
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73
mingling
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| adj.混合的 | |
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74
posture
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| n.姿势，姿态，心态，态度；v.作出某种姿势 | |
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75
grievance
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| n.怨愤，气恼，委屈 | |
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76
inviting
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| adj.诱人的，引人注目的 | |
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77
chuckling
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| 轻声地笑( chuckle的现在分词 ) | |
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78
virgin
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| n.处女，未婚女子；adj.未经使用的；未经开发的 | |
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