On one particular evening, an ugly December night, black with fog, and raw with frost, Clarke hurried over his dinner, and scarcely deigned28 to observe his customary ritual of taking up the paper and laying it down again. He paced two or three times up and down the room, and opened the bureau, stood still a moment, and sat down. He leant back, absorbed in one of those dreams to which he was subject, and at length drew out his book, and opened it at the last entry. There were three or four pages densely29 covered with Clarke's round, set penmanship, and at the beginning he had written in a somewhat larger hand:
Singular Narrative30 told me by my Friend, Dr. Phillips. He assures me that all the facts related therein are strictly31 and wholly True, but refuses to give either the Surnames of the Persons concerned, or the Place where these Extraordinary Events occurred.
Mr. Clarke began to read over the account for the tenth time, glancing now and then at the pencil notes he had made when it was told him by his friend. It was one of his humours to pride himself on a certain literary ability; he thought well of his style, and took pains in arranging the circumstances in dramatic order. He read the following story:[182]—
The persons concerned in this statement are Helen V., who, if she is still alive, must now be a woman of twenty-three, Rachel M., since deceased, who was a year younger than the above, and Trevor W., an imbecile, aged27 eighteen. These persons were at the period of the story inhabitants of a village on the borders of Wales, a place of some importance in the time of the Roman occupation, but now a scattered32 hamlet, of not more than five hundred souls. It is situated33 on rising ground, about six miles from the sea, and is sheltered by a large and picturesque34 forest.
Some eleven years ago, Helen V. came to the village under rather peculiar35 circumstances. It is understood that she, being an orphan36, was adopted in her infancy37 by a distant relative, who brought her up in his own house till she was twelve years old. Thinking, however, that it would be better for the child to have playmates of her own age, he advertised in several local papers for a good home in a comfortable farmhouse38 for a girl of twelve, and this advertisement was answered by Mr. R., a well-to-do farmer in the above-mentioned village. His references proving satisfactory, the gentleman sent his adopted daughter to Mr. R., with a letter, in which he stipulated39 that the girl should have a room to herself, and stated that her guardians40 need be at no trouble in the matter of education, as she was already sufficiently41 educated for the position in life which she would occupy. In fact, Mr. R. was given to understand that the girl was to be allowed to find her own occupations, and to spend her time almost as she liked. Mr. R. duly met her at the nearest station, a town some seven miles away from his house, and seems to have remarked[183] nothing extraordinary about the child, except that she was reticent42 as to her former life and her adopted father. She was, however, of a very different type from the inhabitants of the village; her skin was a pale, clear olive, and her features were strongly marked, and of a somewhat foreign character. She appears to have settled down easily enough into farmhouse life, and became a favourite with the children, who sometimes went with her on her rambles43 in the forest, for this was her amusement. Mr. R. states that he has known her go out by herself directly after their early breakfast, and not return till after dusk, and that, feeling uneasy at a young girl being out alone for so many hours, he communicated with her adopted father, who replied in a brief note that Helen must do as she chose. In the winter, when the forest paths are impassable, she spent most of her time in her bedroom, where she slept alone, according to the instructions of her relative. It was on one of these expeditions to the forest that the first of the singular incidents with which this girl is connected occurred, the date being about a year after her arrival at the village. The preceding winter had been remarkably44 severe, the snow drifting to a great depth, and the frost continuing for an unexampled period, and the summer following was as noteworthy for its extreme heat. On one of the very hottest days in this summer, Helen V. left the farmhouse for one of her long rambles in the forest, taking with her, as usual, some bread and meat for lunch. She was seen by some men in the fields making for the old Roman Road, a green causeway which traverses the highest part of the wood, and they were astonished to observe that[184] the girl had taken off her hat, though the heat of the sun was already almost tropical. As it happened, a labourer, Joseph W. by name, was working in the forest near the Roman Road, and at twelve o'clock his little son, Trevor, brought the man his dinner of bread and cheese. After the meal, the boy, who was about seven years old at the time, left his father at work, and, as he said, went to look for flowers in the wood, and the man, who could hear him shouting with delight over his discoveries, felt no uneasiness. Suddenly, however, he was horrified46 at hearing the most dreadful screams, evidently the result of great terror, proceeding47 from the direction in which his son had gone, and he hastily threw down his tools and ran to see what had happened. Tracing his path by the sound, he met the little boy, who was running headlong, and was evidently terribly frightened, and on questioning him the man at last elicited48 that after picking a posy of flowers he felt tired, and lay down on the grass and fell asleep. He was suddenly awakened49, as he stated, by a peculiar noise, a sort of singing he called it, and on peeping through the branches he saw Helen V. playing on the grass with a 'strange naked man,' whom he seemed unable to describe more fully24. He said he felt dreadfully frightened, and ran away crying for his father. Joseph W. proceeded in the direction indicated by his son, and found Helen V. sitting on the grass in the middle of a glade50 or open space left by charcoal51 burners. He angrily charged her with frightening his little boy, but she entirely52 denied the accusation53 and laughed at the child's story of a 'strange man,' to which he himself[185] did not attach much credence54. Joseph W. came to the conclusion that the boy had woke up with a sudden fright, as children sometimes do, but Trevor persisted in his story, and continued in such evident distress55 that at last his father took him home, hoping that his mother would be able to soothe56 him. For many weeks, however, the boy gave his parents much anxiety; he became nervous and strange in his manner, refusing to leave the cottage by himself, and constantly alarming the household by waking in the night with cries of 'The man in the wood! father! father!'
In course of time, however, the impression seemed to have worn off, and about three months later he accompanied his father to the house of a gentleman in the neighbourhood, for whom Joseph W. occasionally did work. The man was shown into the study, and the little boy was left sitting in the hall, and a few minutes later, while the gentleman was giving W. his instructions, they were both horrified by a piercing shriek57 and the sound of a fall, and rushing out they found the child lying senseless on the floor, his face contorted with terror. The doctor was immediately summoned, and after some examination he pronounced the child to be suffering from a kind of fit, apparently58 produced by a sudden shock. The boy was taken to one of the bedrooms, and after some time recovered consciousness, but only to pass into a condition described by the medical man as one of violent hysteria. The doctor exhibited a strong sedative59, and in the course of two hours pronounced him fit to walk home, but in passing through the hall the paroxysms of fright returned and with additional violence. The father[186] perceived that the child was pointing at some object, and heard the old cry, 'The man in the wood,' and looking in the direction indicated saw a stone head of grotesque60 appearance, which had been built into the wall above one of the doors. It seems that the owner of the house had recently made alterations61 in his premises62, and on digging the foundation for some offices, the men had found a curious head, evidently of the Roman period, which had been placed in the hall in the manner described. The head is pronounced by the most experienced archaeologists of the district to be that of a faun or satyr.[1]
[1] Dr. Phillips tells me that he has seen the head in question, and assures me that he has never received such a vivid presentment of intense evil.
From whatever cause arising, this second shock seemed too severe for the boy Trevor, and at the present date he suffers from a weakness of intellect, which gives but little promise of amending63. The matter caused a good deal of sensation at the time, and the girl Helen was closely questioned by Mr. R., but to no purpose, she steadfastly64 denying that she had frightened or in any way molested65 Trevor.
The second event with which this girl's name is connected took place about six years ago, and is of a still more extraordinary character.
At the beginning of the summer of 1882 Helen contracted a friendship of a peculiarly intimate character with Rachel M., the daughter of a prosperous farmer in the neighbourhood. This girl, who was a year younger than Helen, was considered by most people to be the prettier of the two, though Helen's features had to a great extent softened66 as she became older.[187] The two girls, who were together on every available opportunity, presented a singular contrast, the one with her clear, olive skin and almost Italian appearance, and the other of the proverbial red and white of our rural districts. It must be stated that the payments made to Mr. R. for the maintenance of Helen were known in the village for their excessive liberality, and the impression was general that she would one day inherit a large sum of money from her relative. The parents of Rachel were therefore not averse45 from their daughter's friendship with the girl, and even encouraged the intimacy67, though they now bitterly regret having done so. Helen still retained her extraordinary fondness for the forest, and on several occasions Rachel accompanied her, the two friends setting out early in the morning, and remaining in the wood till dusk. Once or twice after these excursions Mrs. M. thought her daughter's manner rather peculiar; she seemed languid and dreamy, and as it has been expressed, 'different from herself,' but these peculiarities68 seem to have been thought too trifling69 for remark. One evening, however, after Rachel had come home, her mother heard a noise which sounded like suppressed weeping in the girl's room, and on going in found her lying, half undressed, upon the bed, evidently in the greatest distress. As soon as she saw her mother, she exclaimed, 'Ah, mother, mother, why did you let me go to the forest with Helen?' Mrs. M. was astonished at so strange a question, and proceeded to make inquiries70. Rachel told her a wild story. She said—
Clarke closed the book with a snap, and turned his chair towards the fire. When his friend sat one evening[188] in that very chair, and told his story, Clarke had interrupted him at a point a little subsequent to this, had cut short his words in a paroxysm of horror. 'My God!' he had exclaimed, 'think, think what you are saying. It is too incredible, too monstrous71; such things can never be in this quiet world, where men and women live and die, and struggle, and conquer, or maybe fail, and fall down under sorrow, and grieve and suffer strange fortunes for many a year; but not this, Phillips, not such things as this. There must be some explanation, some way out of the terror. Why, man, if such a case were possible, our earth would be a nightmare.'
But Phillips had told his story to the end, concluding:
'Her flight remains72 a mystery to this day; she vanished in broad sunlight; they saw her walking in a meadow, and a few moments later she was not there.'
Clarke tried to conceive the thing again, as he sat by the fire, and again his mind shuddered73 and shrank back, appalled74 before the sight of such awful, unspeakable elements enthroned as it were, and triumphant75 in human flesh. Before him stretched the long dim vista76 of the green causeway in the forest, as his friend had described it; he saw the swaying leaves and the quivering shadows on the grass, he saw the sunlight and the flowers, and far away, far in the long distance, the two figures moved toward him. One was Rachel, but the other?
Clarke had tried his best to disbelieve it all, but at[189] the end of the account, as he had written it in his book, he had placed the inscription77:
ET DIABOLUS INCARNATUS EST. ET HOMO FACTUS EST.
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1
mingled
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| 混合，混入( mingle的过去式和过去分词 )； 混进，与…交往[联系] | |
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inquisitiveness
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| 好奇，求知欲 | |
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recondite
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| adj.深奥的，难解的 | |
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4
judgment
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| n.审判；判断力，识别力，看法，意见 | |
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5
repudiated
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| v.（正式地）否认( repudiate的过去式和过去分词 )；拒绝接受；拒绝与…往来；拒不履行（法律义务） | |
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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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7
investigation
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| n.调查，调查研究 | |
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8
distinguished
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| adj.卓越的，杰出的，著名的 | |
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caustic
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| adj.刻薄的，腐蚀性的 | |
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10
shuddering
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| v.战栗( shudder的现在分词 )；发抖；（机器、车辆等）突然震动；颤动 | |
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11
lucrative
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| adj.赚钱的，可获利的 | |
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12
snug
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| adj.温暖舒适的，合身的，安全的；v.使整洁干净，舒适地依靠，紧贴；n.（英）酒吧里的私房 | |
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13
pretence
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| n.假装，作假；借口，口实；虚伪；虚饰 | |
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14
mere
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| adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过 | |
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15
palled
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| v.（因过多或过久而）生厌，感到乏味，厌烦( pall的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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16
hearth
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| n.壁炉炉床，壁炉地面 | |
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17
hover
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| vi.翱翔，盘旋；徘徊；彷徨，犹豫 | |
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18
lust
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| n.性(淫)欲；渴(欲)望；vi.对…有强烈的欲望 | |
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19
lighting
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| n.照明，光线的明暗，舞台灯光 | |
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20
pigeonholes
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| n.鸽舍出入口( pigeonhole的名词复数 )；小房间；文件架上的小间隔v.把…搁在分类架上( pigeonhole的第三人称单数 )；把…留在记忆中；缓办；把…隔成小格 | |
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21
teemed
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| v.充满( teem的过去式和过去分词 )；到处都是；（指水、雨等）暴降；倾注 | |
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22
morbid
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| adj.病的；致病的；病态的；可怕的 | |
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23
reposed
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| v.将（手臂等）靠在某人（某物）上( repose的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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24
fully
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| adv.完全地，全部地，彻底地；充分地 | |
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25
gems
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| growth； economy； management； and customer satisfaction 增长 | |
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26
memoirs
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| n.回忆录；回忆录传( mem,自oir的名词复数) | |
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27
aged
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| adj.年老的，陈年的 | |
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28
deigned
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| v.屈尊，俯就( deign的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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densely
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| ad.密集地；浓厚地 | |
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30
narrative
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| n.叙述，故事；adj.叙事的，故事体的 | |
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strictly
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| adv.严厉地，严格地；严密地 | |
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32
scattered
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| adj.分散的，稀疏的；散步的；疏疏落落的 | |
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33
situated
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| adj.坐落在...的，处于某种境地的 | |
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34
picturesque
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| adj.美丽如画的，（语言）生动的，绘声绘色的 | |
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35
peculiar
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| adj.古怪的，异常的；特殊的，特有的 | |
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36
orphan
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| n.孤儿；adj.无父母的 | |
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37
infancy
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| n.婴儿期；幼年期；初期 | |
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38
farmhouse
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| n.农场住宅（尤指主要住房） | |
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39
stipulated
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| vt.& vi.规定；约定adj.[法]合同规定的 | |
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40
guardians
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| 监护人( guardian的名词复数 )； 保护者，维护者 | |
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41
sufficiently
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| adv.足够地，充分地 | |
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42
reticent
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| adj.沉默寡言的；言不如意的 | |
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43
rambles
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| （无目的地）漫游( ramble的第三人称单数 )； （喻）漫谈； 扯淡； 长篇大论 | |
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44
remarkably
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| ad.不同寻常地，相当地 | |
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45
averse
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| adj.厌恶的；反对的，不乐意的 | |
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46
horrified
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| a.(表现出)恐惧的 | |
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47
proceeding
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| n.行动，进行，(pl.)会议录，学报 | |
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48
elicited
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| 引出，探出( elicit的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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49
awakened
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| v.（使）醒( awaken的过去式和过去分词 )；（使）觉醒；弄醒；（使）意识到 | |
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50
glade
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| n.林间空地，一片表面有草的沼泽低地 | |
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51
charcoal
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| n.炭，木炭，生物炭 | |
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52
entirely
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| ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地 | |
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53
accusation
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| n.控告，指责，谴责 | |
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54
credence
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| n.信用，祭器台，供桌，凭证 | |
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55
distress
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| n.苦恼，痛苦，不舒适；不幸；vt.使悲痛 | |
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56
soothe
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| v.安慰；使平静；使减轻；缓和；奉承 | |
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57
shriek
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| v./n.尖叫，叫喊 | |
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58
apparently
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| adv.显然地；表面上，似乎 | |
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59
sedative
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| adj.使安静的，使镇静的；n. 镇静剂，能使安静的东西 | |
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60
grotesque
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| adj.怪诞的，丑陋的；n.怪诞的图案，怪人（物） | |
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61
alterations
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| n.改动( alteration的名词复数 )；更改；变化；改变 | |
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62
premises
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| n.建筑物，房屋 | |
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63
amending
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| 改良，修改，修订( amend的现在分词 )； 改良，修改，修订( amend的第三人称单数 )( amends的现在分词 ) | |
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64
steadfastly
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| adv.踏实地，不变地；岿然；坚定不渝 | |
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65
molested
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| v.骚扰( molest的过去式和过去分词 )；干扰；调戏；猥亵 | |
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66
softened
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| （使）变软( soften的过去式和过去分词 )； 缓解打击； 缓和； 安慰 | |
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67
intimacy
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| n.熟悉，亲密，密切关系，亲昵的言行 | |
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68
peculiarities
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| n. 特质, 特性, 怪癖, 古怪 | |
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69
trifling
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| adj.微不足道的；没什么价值的 | |
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70
inquiries
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| n.调查( inquiry的名词复数 )；疑问；探究；打听 | |
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71
monstrous
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| adj.巨大的；恐怖的；可耻的，丢脸的 | |
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72
remains
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| n.剩余物，残留物；遗体，遗迹 | |
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73
shuddered
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| v.战栗( shudder的过去式和过去分词 )；发抖；（机器、车辆等）突然震动；颤动 | |
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74
appalled
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| v.使惊骇，使充满恐惧( appall的过去式和过去分词)adj.惊骇的；丧胆的 | |
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75
triumphant
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| adj.胜利的，成功的；狂欢的，喜悦的 | |
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76
vista
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| n.远景，深景，展望，回想 | |
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77
inscription
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| n.（尤指石块上的）刻印文字，铭文，碑文 | |
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