'Yes, my name's Herbert. I think I know your face too, but I don't remember your name. My memory is very queer.'
'So it is, so it is. I beg your pardon, Villiers, I didn't think I was begging of an old college friend. Good-night.'
'My dear fellow, this haste is unnecessary. My rooms are close by, but we won't go there just yet. Suppose we walk up Shaftesbury Avenue a little way? But how in heaven's name have you come to this pass, Herbert?'
'It's a long story, Villiers, and a strange one too, but you can hear it if you like.'
'Come on, then. Take my arm, you don't seem very strong.'
The ill-assorted pair moved slowly up Rupert Street; the one in dirty, evil-looking rags, and the other attired2 in the regulation uniform of a man about town, trim, glossy3, and eminently4 well-to-do. Villiers had emerged from his restaurant after an excellent dinner of many courses, assisted by an ingratiating little flask[190] of Chianti, and, in that frame of mind which was with him almost chronic5, had delayed a moment by the door, peering round in the dimly-lighted street in search of those mysterious incidents and persons with which the streets of London teem6 in every quarter and at every hour. Villiers prided himself as a practised explorer of such obscure mazes7 and byways of London life, and in this unprofitable pursuit he displayed an assiduity which was worthy8 of more serious employment. Thus he stood beside the lamp-post surveying the passers-by with undisguised curiosity, and with that gravity only known to the systematic9 diner, had just enunciated10 in his mind the formula: 'London has been called the city of encounters; it is more than that, it is the city of Resurrections,' when these reflections were suddenly interrupted by a piteous whine11 at his elbow, and a deplorable appeal for alms. He looked around in some irritation12, and with a sudden shock found himself confronted with the embodied13 proof of his somewhat stilted14 fancies. There, close beside him, his face altered and disfigured by poverty and disgrace, his body barely covered by greasy15 ill-fitting rags, stood his old friend Charles Herbert, who had matriculated on the same day as himself, with whom he had been merry and wise for twelve revolving16 terms. Different occupations and varying interests had interrupted the friendship, and it was six years since Villiers had seen Herbert; and now he looked upon this wreck17 of a man with grief and dismay, mingled18 with a certain inquisitiveness19 as to what dreary20 chain of circumstance had dragged him down to such a doleful pass. Villiers felt together with compassion21 all the relish22 of the amateur[191] in mysteries, and congratulated himself on his leisurely23 speculations24 outside the restaurant.
They walked on in silence for some time, and more than one passer-by stared in astonishment25 at the unaccustomed spectacle of a well-dressed man with an unmistakable beggar hanging on to his arm, and, observing this, Villiers led the way to an obscure street in Soho. Here he repeated his question.
'How on earth has it happened, Herbert? I always understood you would succeed to an excellent position in Dorsetshire. Did your father disinherit you? Surely not?'
'No, Villiers; I came into all the property at my poor father's death; he died a year after I left Oxford26. He was a very good father to me, and I mourned his death sincerely enough. But you know what young men are; a few months later I came up to town and went a good deal into society. Of course I had excellent introductions, and I managed to enjoy myself very much in a harmless sort of way. I played a little, certainly, but never for heavy stakes, and the few bets I made on races brought me in money—only a few pounds, you know, but enough to pay for cigars and such petty pleasures. It was in my second season that the tide turned. Of course you have heard of my marriage?'
'No, I never heard anything about it.'
'Yes, I married, Villiers. I met a girl, a girl of the most wonderful and most strange beauty, at the house of some people whom I knew. I cannot tell you her age; I never knew it, but, so far as I can guess, I should think she must have been about nineteen when I made her acquaintance. My friends had come to[192] know her at Florence; she told them she was an orphan28, the child of an English father and an Italian mother, and she charmed them as she charmed me. The first time I saw her was at an evening party. I was standing29 by the door talking to a friend, when suddenly above the hum and babble30 of conversation I heard a voice which seemed to thrill to my heart. She was singing an Italian song. I was introduced to her that evening, and in three months I married Helen. Villiers, that woman, if I can call her woman, corrupted31 my soul. The night of the wedding I found myself sitting in her bedroom in the hotel, listening to her talk. She was sitting up in bed, and I listened to her as she spoke32 in her beautiful voice, spoke of things which even now I would not dare whisper in blackest night, though I stood in the midst of a wilderness33. You, Villiers, you may think you know life, and London, and what goes on day and night in this dreadful city; for all I can say you may have heard the talk of the vilest34, but I tell you you can have no conception of what I know, not in your most fantastic, hideous35 dreams can you have imaged forth36 the faintest shadow of what I have heard—and seen. Yes, seen. I have seen the incredible, such horrors that even I myself sometimes stop in the middle of the street, and ask whether it is possible for a man to behold37 such things and live. In a year, Villiers, I was a ruined man, in body and soul—in body and soul.'
'But your property, Herbert? You had land in Dorset.'
'I sold it all; the fields and woods, the dear old house—everything.'
'And the money?'[193]
'She took it all from me.'
'And then left you?'
'Yes; she disappeared one night. I don't know where she went, but I am sure if I saw her again it would kill me. The rest of my story is of no interest; sordid38 misery39, that is all. You may think, Villiers, that I have exaggerated and talked for effect; but I have not told you half. I could tell you certain things which would convince you, but you would never know a happy day again. You would pass the rest of your life, as I pass mine, a haunted man, a man who has seen hell.'
Villiers took the unfortunate man to his rooms, and gave him a meal. Herbert could eat little, and scarcely touched the glass of wine set before him. He sat moody40 and silent by the fire, and seemed relieved when Villiers sent him away with a small present of money.
'By the way, Herbert,' said Villiers, as they parted at the door, 'what was your wife's name? You said Helen, I think? Helen what?'
'The name she passed under when I met her was Helen Vaughan, but what her real name was I can't say. I don't think she had a name. No, no, not in that sense. Only human beings have names, Villiers; I can't say any more. Good-bye; yes, I will not fail to call if I see any way in which you can help me. Good-night.'
The man went out into the bitter night, and Villiers returned to his fireside. There was something about Herbert which shocked him inexpressibly; not his poor rags nor the marks which poverty had set upon his face, but rather an indefinite terror which hung[194] about him like a mist. He had acknowledged that he himself was not devoid41 of blame; the woman, he had avowed42, had corrupted him body and soul, and Villiers felt that this man, once his friend, had been an actor in scenes evil beyond the power of words. His story needed no confirmation43: he himself was the embodied proof of it. Villiers mused44 curiously45 over the story he had heard, and wondered whether he had heard both the first and the last of it. 'No,' he thought, 'certainly not the last, probably only the beginning. A case like this is like a nest of Chinese boxes; you open one after another and find a quainter46 workmanship in every box. Most likely poor Herbert is merely one of the outside boxes; there are stranger ones to follow.'
Villiers could not take his mind away from Herbert and his story, which seemed to grow wilder as the night wore on. The fire began to burn low, and the chilly47 air of the morning crept into the room; Villiers got up with a glance over his shoulder, and shivering slightly, went to bed.
A few days later he saw at his club a gentleman of his acquaintance, named Austin, who was famous for his intimate knowledge of London life, both in its tenebrous and luminous48 phases. Villiers, still full of his encounter in Soho and its consequences, thought Austin might possibly be able to shed some light on Herbert's history, and so after some casual talk he suddenly put the question:
'Do you happen to know anything of a man named Herbert—Charles Herbert?'
Austin turned round sharply and stared at Villiers with some astonishment.[195]
'Charles Herbert? Weren't you in town three years ago? No; then you have not heard of the Paul Street case? It caused a good deal of sensation at the time.'
'What was the case?'
'Well, a gentleman, a man of very good position, was found dead, stark49 dead, in the area of a certain house in Paul Street, off Tottenham Court Road. Of course the police did not make the discovery; if you happen to be sitting up all night and have a light in your window, the constable50 will ring the bell, but if you happen to be lying dead in somebody's area, you will be left alone. In this instance as in many others the alarm was raised by some kind of vagabond; I don't mean a common tramp, or a public-house loafer, but a gentleman, whose business or pleasure, or both, made him a spectator of the London streets at five o'clock in the morning. This individual was, as he said, "going home," it did not appear whence or whither, and had occasion to pass through Paul Street between four and five a. m. Something or other caught his eye at Number 20; he said, absurdly enough, that the house had the most unpleasant physiognomy he had ever observed, but, at any rate, he glanced down the area, and was a good deal astonished to see a man lying on the stones, his limbs all huddled51 together, and his face turned up. Our gentleman thought his face looked peculiarly ghastly, and so set off at a run in search of the nearest policeman. The constable was at first inclined to treat the matter lightly, suspecting common drunkenness; however, he came, and after looking at the man's face, changed his tone, quickly enough. The early bird, who had picked[196] up this fine worm, was sent off for a doctor, and the policeman rang and knocked at the door till a slatternly servant girl came down looking more than half asleep. The constable pointed52 out the contents of the area to the maid, who screamed loudly enough to wake up the street, but she knew nothing of the man; had never seen him at the house, and so forth. Meanwhile the original discoverer had come back with a medical man, and the next thing was to get into the area. The gate was open, so the whole quartet stumped53 down the steps. The doctor hardly needed a moment's examination; he said the poor fellow had been dead for several hours, and it was then the case began to get interesting. The dead man had not been robbed, and in one of his pockets were papers identifying him as—well, as a man of good family and means, a favourite in society, and nobody's enemy, so far as could be known. I don't give his name, Villiers, because it has nothing to do with the story, and because it's no good raking up these affairs about the dead when there are no relations living. The next curious point was that the medical men couldn't agree as to how he met his death. There were some slight bruises54 on his shoulders, but they were so slight that it looked as if he had been pushed roughly out of the kitchen door, and not thrown over the railings from the street or even dragged down the steps. But there were positively55 no other marks of violence about him, certainly none that would account for his death; and when they came to the autopsy56 there wasn't a trace of poison of any kind. Of course the police wanted to know all about the people at Number 20, and here[197] again, so I have heard from private sources, one or two other very curious points came out. It appears that the occupants of the house were a Mr. and Mrs. Charles Herbert; he was said to be a landed proprietor57, though it struck most people that Paul Street was not exactly the place to look for county gentry58. As for Mrs. Herbert, nobody seemed to know who or what she was, and, between ourselves, I fancy the divers59 after her history found themselves in rather strange waters. Of course they both denied knowing anything about the deceased, and in default of any evidence against them they were discharged. But some very odd things came out about them. Though it was between five and six in the morning when the dead man was removed, a large crowd had collected, and several of the neighbours ran to see what was going on. They were pretty free with their comments, by all accounts, and from these it appeared that Number 20 was in very bad odour in Paul Street. The detectives tried to trace down these rumours60 to some solid foundation of fact, but could not get hold of anything. People shook their heads and raised their eyebrows61 and thought the Herberts rather "queer," "would rather not be seen going into their house," and so on, but there was nothing tangible62. The authorities were morally certain that the man met his death in some way or another in the house and was thrown out by the kitchen door, but they couldn't prove it, and the absence of any indications of violence or poisoning left them helpless. An odd case, wasn't it? But curiously enough, there's something more that I haven't told you. I happened to know one of the doctors who[198] was consulted as to the cause of death, and some time after the inquest I met him, and asked him about it. "Do you really mean to tell me," I said, "that you were baffled by the case, that you actually don't know what the man died of?" "Pardon me," he replied, "I know perfectly63 well what caused death. Blank died of fright, of sheer, awful terror; I never saw features so hideously64 contorted in the entire course of my practice, and I have seen the faces of a whole host of dead." The doctor was usually a cool customer enough, and a certain vehemence65 in his manner struck me, but I couldn't get anything more out of him. I suppose the Treasury66 didn't see their way to prosecuting67 the Herberts for frightening a man to death; at any rate, nothing was done, and the case dropped out of men's minds. Do you happen to know anything of Herbert?'
'Well,' replied Villiers, 'he was an old college friend of mine.'
'You don't say so? Have you ever seen his wife?'
'No, I haven't. I have lost sight of Herbert for many years.'
'It's queer, isn't it, parting with a man at the college gate or at Paddington, seeing nothing of him for years, and then finding him pop up his head in such an odd place. But I should like to have seen Mrs. Herbert; people said extraordinary things about her.'
'What sort of things?'
'Well, I hardly know how to tell you. Every one who saw her at the police court said she was at once the most beautiful woman and the most repulsive68 they had ever set eyes on. I have spoken to a man who saw her, and I assure you he positively shuddered69 as he tried[199] to describe the woman, but he couldn't tell why. She seems to have been a sort of enigma70; and I expect if that one dead man could have told tales, he would have told some uncommonly71 queer ones. And there you are again in another puzzle; what could a respectable country gentleman like Mr. Blank (we'll call him that if you don't mind) want in such a very queer house as Number 20? It's altogether a very odd case, isn't it?'
'It is indeed, Austin; an extraordinary case. I didn't think, when I asked you about my old friend, I should strike on such strange metal. Well, I must be off; good-day.'
Villiers went away, thinking of his own conceit72 of the Chinese boxes; here was quaint27 workmanship indeed.
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1
recollect
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| v.回忆，想起，记起，忆起，记得 | |
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attired
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| adj.穿着整齐的v.使穿上衣服，使穿上盛装( attire的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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glossy
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| adj.平滑的；有光泽的 | |
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eminently
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| adv.突出地；显著地；不寻常地 | |
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chronic
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| adj.(疾病)长期未愈的，慢性的；极坏的 | |
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teem
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| vi.(with)充满，多产 | |
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mazes
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| 迷宫( maze的名词复数 )； 纷繁复杂的规则； 复杂难懂的细节； 迷宫图 | |
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worthy
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| adj.(of)值得的，配得上的；有价值的 | |
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systematic
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| adj.有系统的，有计划的，有方法的 | |
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enunciated
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| v.（清晰地）发音( enunciate的过去式和过去分词 )；确切地说明 | |
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whine
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| v.哀号，号哭；n.哀鸣 | |
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irritation
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| n.激怒，恼怒，生气 | |
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embodied
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| v.表现( embody的过去式和过去分词 )；象征；包括；包含 | |
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stilted
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| adj.虚饰的；夸张的 | |
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greasy
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| adj. 多脂的，油脂的 | |
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revolving
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| adj.旋转的，轮转式的；循环的v.（使）旋转( revolve的现在分词 )；细想 | |
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wreck
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| n.失事，遇难；沉船；vt.(船等)失事，遇难 | |
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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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dreary
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| adj.令人沮丧的，沉闷的，单调乏味的 | |
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compassion
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| n.同情，怜悯 | |
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relish
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| n.滋味，享受，爱好，调味品；vt.加调味料，享受，品味；vi.有滋味 | |
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leisurely
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| adj.悠闲的；从容的，慢慢的 | |
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speculations
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| n.投机买卖( speculation的名词复数 )；思考；投机活动；推断 | |
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astonishment
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| n.惊奇，惊异 | |
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Oxford
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| n.牛津（英国城市） | |
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quaint
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| adj.古雅的，离奇有趣的，奇怪的 | |
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orphan
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| n.孤儿；adj.无父母的 | |
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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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babble
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| v.含糊不清地说，胡言乱语地说，儿语 | |
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corrupted
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| （使）败坏( corrupt的过去式和过去分词 )； （使）腐化； 引起（计算机文件等的）错误； 破坏 | |
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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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wilderness
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| n.杳无人烟的一片陆地、水等，荒漠 | |
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vilest
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| adj.卑鄙的( vile的最高级 )；可耻的；极坏的；非常讨厌的 | |
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hideous
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| adj.丑陋的，可憎的，可怕的，恐怖的 | |
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forth
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| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
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behold
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| v.看，注视，看到 | |
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sordid
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| adj.肮脏的，不干净的，卑鄙的，暗淡的 | |
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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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moody
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| adj.心情不稳的，易怒的，喜怒无常的 | |
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devoid
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| adj.全无的，缺乏的 | |
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avowed
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| adj.公开声明的，承认的v.公开声明，承认( avow的过去式和过去分词) | |
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confirmation
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| n.证实，确认，批准 | |
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mused
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| v.沉思，冥想( muse的过去式和过去分词 )；沉思自语说（某事） | |
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curiously
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| adv.有求知欲地；好问地；奇特地 | |
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quainter
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| adj.古色古香的( quaint的比较级 )；少见的，古怪的 | |
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chilly
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| adj.凉快的，寒冷的 | |
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luminous
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| adj.发光的，发亮的；光明的；明白易懂的；有启发的 | |
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stark
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| adj.荒凉的；严酷的；完全的；adv.完全地 | |
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constable
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| n.(英国)警察，警官 | |
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51
huddled
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| 挤在一起（huddle的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
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pointed
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| adj.尖的，直截了当的 | |
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stumped
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| 僵直地行走，跺步行走( stump的过去式和过去分词 )； 把（某人）难住； 使为难； （选举前）在某一地区作政治性巡回演说 | |
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54
bruises
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| n.瘀伤，伤痕，擦伤( bruise的名词复数 ) | |
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positively
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| adv.明确地，断然，坚决地；实在，确实 | |
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autopsy
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| n.尸体解剖；尸检 | |
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proprietor
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| n.所有人；业主；经营者 | |
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gentry
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| n.绅士阶级，上层阶级 | |
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divers
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| adj.不同的；种种的 | |
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rumours
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| n.传闻( rumour的名词复数 )；风闻；谣言；谣传 | |
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eyebrows
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| 眉毛( eyebrow的名词复数 ) | |
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tangible
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| adj.有形的，可触摸的，确凿的，实际的 | |
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perfectly
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| adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地 | |
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64
hideously
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| adv.可怕地，非常讨厌地 | |
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vehemence
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| n.热切；激烈；愤怒 | |
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treasury
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| n.宝库；国库，金库；文库 | |
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67
prosecuting
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| 检举、告发某人( prosecute的现在分词 )； 对某人提起公诉； 继续从事（某事物）； 担任控方律师 | |
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68
repulsive
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| adj.排斥的，使人反感的 | |
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69
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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70
enigma
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| n.谜，谜一样的人或事 | |
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71
uncommonly
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| adv. 稀罕(极，非常) | |
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72
conceit
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| n.自负，自高自大 | |
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