Shelton grinned, said “Yes,” and went on looking. He was not fortunate. In the dining-room sat Mrs. Dennant, making up her list of books.
“Do give me your opinion, Dick,” she said. “Everybody 's readin' this thing of Katherine Asterick's; I believe it's simply because she's got a title.”
“One must read a book for some reason or other,” answered Shelton.
“Well,” returned Mrs. Dennant, “I hate doin' things just because other people do them, and I sha'n'. get it.”
“Good!”
Mrs. Dennant marked the catalogue.
“Here 's Linseed's last, of course; though I must say I don't care for him, but I suppose we ought to have it in the house. And there's Quality's 'The Splendid Diatribes3'. that 's sure to be good, he's always so refined. But what am I to do about this of Arthur Baal's? They say that he's a charlatan4, but everybody reads him, don't you know”; and over the catalogue Shelton caught the gleam of hare-like eyes.
Decision had vanished from her face, with its arched nose and slightly sloping chin, as though some one had suddenly appealed to her to trust her instincts. It was quite pathetic. Still, there was always the book's circulation to form her judgment5 by.
“I think I 'd better mark it,” she said, “don't you? Were you lookin' for Antonia? If you come across Bunyan in the garden, Dick, do say I want to see him; he's gettin' to be a perfect nuisance. I can understand his feelin's, but really he 's carryin' it too far.”
Primed with his message to the under-gardener, Shelton went. He took a despairing look into the billiard-room. Antonia was not there. Instead, a tall and fat-cheeked gentleman with a neat moustache, called Mabbey, was practising the spot-stroke. He paused as Shelton entered, and, pouting6 like a baby, asked in a sleepy voice,
“Play me a hundred up?”
The gentleman called Mabbey, plaintively8 feeling the places where his moustaches joined his pink and glossy9 cheeks, asked with an air of some surprise,
“What's your general game, then?”
“I really don't know,” said Shelton.
The gentleman called Mabbey chalked his cue, and, moving his round, knock-kneed legs in their tight trousers, took up his position for the stroke.
“What price that?” he said, as he regained10 the perpendicular11; and his well-fed eyes followed Shelton with sleepy inquisition. “Curious dark horse, Shelton,” they seemed to say.
Shelton hurried out, and was about to run down the lower lawn, when he was accosted12 by another person walking in the sunshine—a slight-built man in a turned-down collar, with a thin and fair moustache, and a faint bluish tint13 on one side of his high forehead, caused by a network of thin veins14. His face had something of the youthful, optimistic, stained-glass look peculiar15 to the refined English type. He walked elastically16, yet with trim precision, as if he had a pleasant taste in furniture and churches, and held the Spectator in his hand.
“Ah, Shelton!” he said in high-tuned tones, halting his legs in such an easy attitude that it was impossible to interrupt it: “come to take the air?”
Shelton's own brown face, nondescript nose, and his amiable17 but dogged chin contrasted strangely with the clear-cut features of the stained-glass man.
“I hear from Halidome that you're going to stand for Parliament,” the latter said.
Shelton, recalling Halidome's autocratic manner of settling other people's business, smiled.
“Do I look like it?” he asked.
The eyebrows18 quivered on the stained-glass man. It had never occurred to him, perhaps, that to stand for Parliament a man must look like it; he examined Shelton with some curiosity.
“Ah, well,” he said, “now you mention it, perhaps not.” His eyes, so carefully ironical19, although they differed from the eyes of Mabbey, also seemed to ask of Shelton what sort of a dark horse he was.
“You 're still in the Domestic Office, then?” asked Shelton.
The stained-glass man stooped to sniff20 a rosebush. “Yes,” he said; “it suits me very well. I get lots of time for my art work.”
“That must be very interesting,” said Shelton, whose glance was roving for Antonia; “I never managed to begin a hobby.”
“Never had a hobby!” said the stained-glass man, brushing back his hair (he was walking with no hat); “why, what the deuce d' you do?”
Shelton could not answer; the idea had never troubled him.
“I really don't know,” he said, embarrassed; “there's always something going on, as far as I can see.”
The stained-glass man placed his hands within his pockets, and his bright glance swept over his companion.
“A fellow must have a hobby to give him an interest in life,” he said.
“An interest in life?” repeated Shelton grimly; “life itself is good enough for me.”
“Oh!” replied the stained-glass man, as though he disapproved21 of regarding life itself as interesting.
“That's all very well, but you want something more than that. Why don't you take up woodcarving?”
“Wood-carving?”
“The moment I get fagged with office papers and that sort of thing I take up my wood-carving; good as a game of hockey.”
“I have n't the enthusiasm.”
“You 'll find not having a hobby does n't pay,” he said; “you 'll get old, then where 'll you be?”
It came as a surprise that he should use the words “it does n't pay,” for he had a kind of partially23 enamelled look, like that modern jewellery which really seems unconscious of its market value.
“You've given up the Bar? Don't you get awfully24 bored having nothing to do?” pursued the stained-glass man, stopping before an ancient sundial.
Shelton felt a delicacy25, as a man naturally would, in explaining that being in love was in itself enough to do. To do nothing is unworthy of a man! But he had never felt as yet the want of any occupation. His silence in no way disconcerted his acquaintance.
“That's a nice old article of virtue,” he said, pointing with his chin; and, walking round the sundial, he made its acquaintance from the other side. Its grey profile cast a thin and shortening shadow on the turf; tongues of moss26 were licking at its sides; the daisies clustered thick around its base; it had acquired a look of growing from the soil. “I should like to get hold of that,” the stained-glass man remarked; “I don't know when I 've seen a better specimen,” and he walked round it once again.
His eyebrows were still ironically arched, but below them his eyes were almost calculating, and below them, again, his mouth had opened just a little. A person with a keener eye would have said his face looked greedy, and even Shelton was surprised, as though he had read in the Spectator a confession27 of commercialism.
His companion turned impatiently, and his countenance29 looked wonderfully genuine.
“Couldn't I?” he said. “By Jove! I thought so. 1690! The best period.” He ran his forger30 round the sundial's edge. “Splendid line-clean as the day they made it. You don't seem to care much about that sort of thing”; and once again, as though accustomed to the indifference31 of Vandals, his face regained its mask.
They strolled on towards the kitchen gardens, Shelton still busy searching every patch of shade. He wanted to say “Can't stop,” and hurry off; but there was about the stained-glass man a something that, while stinging Shelton's feelings, made the showing of them quite impossible. “Feelings!” that person seemed to say; “all very well, but you want more than that. Why not take up wood-carving? . . . Feelings! I was born in England, and have been at Cambridge.”
“Are you staying long?” he asked Shelton. “I go on to Halidome's to-morrow; suppose I sha'n'. see you there? Good, chap, old Halidome! Collection of etchings very fine!”
“No; I 'm staying on,” said Shelton.
“Ah!” said the stained-glass man, “charming people, the Dennants!”
Shelton, reddening slowly, turned his head away; he picked a gooseberry, and muttered, “Yes.”
Shelton heard this praise of Antonia with an odd sensation; it gave him the reverse of pleasure, as though the words had cast new light upon her. He grunted33 hastily,
“I suppose you know that we 're engaged?”
“Really!” said the stained-glass man, and again his bright, clear, iron-committal glance swept over Shelton—“really! I didn't know. Congratulate you!”
It was as if he said: “You're a man of taste; I should say she would go well in almost any drawing-room!”
“Thanks,” said Shelton; “there she' is. If you'll excuse me, I want to speak to her.”
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1
descending
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| n. 下行 adj. 下降的 | |
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shrine
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| n.圣地，神龛，庙；v.将...置于神龛内，把...奉为神圣 | |
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3
diatribes
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| n.谩骂，讽刺( diatribe的名词复数 ) | |
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charlatan
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| n.骗子；江湖医生；假内行 | |
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5
judgment
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| n.审判；判断力，识别力，看法，意见 | |
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6
pouting
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| v.撅（嘴）( pout的现在分词 ) | |
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7
stammered
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| v.结巴地说出( stammer的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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8
plaintively
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| adv.悲哀地，哀怨地 | |
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9
glossy
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| adj.平滑的；有光泽的 | |
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10
regained
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| 复得( regain的过去式和过去分词 )； 赢回； 重回； 复至某地 | |
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11
perpendicular
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| adj.垂直的，直立的；n.垂直线，垂直的位置 | |
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12
accosted
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| v.走过去跟…讲话( accost的过去式和过去分词 )；跟…搭讪；（乞丐等）上前向…乞讨；（妓女等）勾搭 | |
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13
tint
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| n.淡色，浅色；染发剂；vt.着以淡淡的颜色 | |
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14
veins
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| n.纹理；矿脉( vein的名词复数 )；静脉；叶脉；纹理 | |
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15
peculiar
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| adj.古怪的，异常的；特殊的，特有的 | |
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16
elastically
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| adv.有弹性地，伸缩自如地 | |
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17
amiable
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| adj.和蔼可亲的，友善的，亲切的 | |
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18
eyebrows
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| 眉毛( eyebrow的名词复数 ) | |
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19
ironical
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| adj.讽刺的，冷嘲的 | |
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20
sniff
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| vi.嗅…味道；抽鼻涕；对嗤之以鼻，蔑视 | |
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21
disapproved
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| v.不赞成( disapprove的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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22
twitched
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| vt.& vi.（使）抽动，（使）颤动（twitch的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
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23
partially
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| adv.部分地，从某些方面讲 | |
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24
awfully
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| adv.可怕地，非常地，极端地 | |
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25
delicacy
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| n.精致，细微，微妙，精良；美味，佳肴 | |
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26
moss
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| n.苔，藓，地衣 | |
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27
confession
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| n.自白，供认，承认 | |
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28
uproot
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| v.连根拔起，拔除；根除，灭绝；赶出家园，被迫移开 | |
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29
countenance
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| n.脸色，面容；面部表情；vt.支持，赞同 | |
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30
forger
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| v.伪造；n.（钱、文件等的）伪造者 | |
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31
indifference
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| n.不感兴趣，不关心，冷淡，不在乎 | |
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32
eldest
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| adj.最年长的，最年老的 | |
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33
grunted
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| （猪等）作呼噜声( grunt的过去式和过去分词 )； （指人）发出类似的哼声； 咕哝着说 | |
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