He met Fielding at the railway station on his return, agreed to dine with him, and then started taxing him by the oblique5 method, outwardly merry. An avowed6 European scandal there was—Mr. McBryde and Miss Derek. Miss Derek’s faithful attachment7 to Chandrapore was now explained: Mr. McBryde had been caught in her room, and his wife was divorcing him. “That pure-minded fellow. However, he will blame the Indian climate. Everything is our fault really. Now, have I not discovered an important piece of news for you, Cyril?”
“Not very,” said Fielding, who took little interest in distant sins. “Listen to mine.” Aziz’ face lit up. “At the conference, it was settled. . . .”
“This evening will do for schoolmastery. I should go straight to the Minto now, the cholera8 looks bad. We begin to have local cases as well as imported. In fact, the whole of life is somewhat sad. The new Civil Surgeon is the same as the last, but does not yet dare to be. That is all any administrative9 change amounts to. All my suffering has won nothing for us. But look here, Cyril, while I remember it. There’s gossip about you as well as McBryde. They say that you and Miss Quested became also rather too intimate friends. To speak perfectly10 frankly11, they say you and she have been guilty of impropriety.”
“They would say that.”
“It’s all over the town, and may injure your reputation. You know, everyone is by no means your supporter. I have tried all I could to silence such a story.”
“Don’t bother. Miss Quested has cleared out at last.”
“It is those who stop in the country, not those who leave it, whom such a story injures. Imagine my dismay and anxiety. I could scarcely get a wink12 of sleep. First my name was coupled with her and now it is yours.”
“Don’t use such exaggerated phrases.”
“As what?”
“As dismay and anxiety.”
“Have I not lived all my life in India? Do I not know what produces a bad impression here?” His voice shot up rather crossly.
“Yes, but the scale, the scale. You always get the scale wrong, my dear fellow. A pity there is this rumour, but such a very small pity—so small that we may as well talk of something else.”
“You mind for Miss Quested’s sake, though. I can see from your face.”
“As far as I do mind. I travel light.”
“Cyril, that boastfulness about travelling light will be your ruin. It is raising up enemies against you on all sides, and makes me feel excessively uneasy.”
“What enemies?”
Since Aziz had only himself in mind, he could not reply. Feeling a fool, he became angrier. “I have given you list after list of the people who cannot be trusted in this city. In your position I should have the sense to know I was surrounded by enemies. You observe I speak in a low voice. It is because I see your sais is new. How do I know he isn’t a spy?” He lowered his voice: “Every third servant is a spy.”
“Now, what is the matter?” he asked, smiling.
“Do you contradict my last remark?”
“It simply doesn’t affect me. Spies are as thick as mosquitoes, but it’s years before I shall meet the one that kills me. You’ve something else in your mind.”
“I’ve not; don’t be ridiculous.”
“You have. You’re cross with me about something or other.”
Any direct attack threw him out of action. Presently he said: “So you and Madamsell Adela used to amuse one another in the evening, naughty boy.”
Those drab and high-minded talks had scarcely made for dalliance. Fielding was so startled at the story being taken seriously, and so disliked being called a naughty boy, that he lost his head and cried: “You little rotter! Well, I’m damned. Amusement indeed. Is it likely at such a time?”
“Oh, I beg your pardon, I’m sure. The licentious13 Oriental imagination was at work,” he replied, speaking gaily14, but cut to the heart; for hours after his mistake he bled inwardly.
“You see, Aziz, the circumstances . . . also the girl was still engaged to Heaslop, also I never felt . . .”
“Yes, yes; but you didn’t contradict what I said, so I thought it was true. Oh dear, East and West. Most misleading. Will you please put your little rotter down at his hospital?”
“You’re not offended?”
“Most certainly I am not.”
“If you are, this must be cleared up later on.”
“It has been,” he answered, dignified15. “I believe absolutely what you say, and of that there need be no further question.”
“But the way I said it must be cleared up. I was unintentionally rude. Unreserved regrets.”
“The fault is entirely16 mine.”
Tangles17 like this still interrupted their intercourse18. A pause in the wrong place, an intonation19 misunderstood, and a whole conversation went awry20. Fielding had been startled, not shocked, but how convey the difference? There is always trouble when two people do not think of sex at the same moment, always mutual21 resentment22 and surprise, even when the two people are of the same race. He began to recapitulate23 his feelings about Miss Quested. Aziz cut him short with: “But I believe you, I believe. Mohammed Latif shall be severely24 punished for inventing this.”
“Oh, leave it alone, like all gossip—it’s merely one of those half-alive things that try to crowd out real life. Take no notice, it’ll vanish, like poor old Mrs. Moore’s tombs.”
“Mohammed Latif has taken to intriguing25. We are already much displeased26 with him. Will it satisfy you if we send him back to his family without a present?”
“We’ll discuss M.L. at dinner.”
His eyes went clotted27 and hard. “Dinner. This is most unlucky—— I forgot. I have promised to dine with Das.”
“Bring Das to me.”
“He will have invited other friends.”
“You are coming to dinner with me as arranged,” said Fielding, looking away. “I don’t stand this. You are coming to dinner with me. You come.”
They had reached the hospital now. Fielding continued round the Maidan alone. He was annoyed with himself, but counted on dinner to pull things straight. At the post office he saw the Collector. Their vehicles were parked side by side while their servants competed in the interior of the building. “Good morning; so you are back,” said Turton icily. “I should be glad if you will put in your appearance at the club this evening.”
“I have accepted re-election, sir. Do you regard it as necessary I should come? I should be glad to be excused; indeed, I have a dinner engagement this evening.”
“It is not a question of your feelings, but of the wish of the Lieutenant-Governor. Perhaps you will ask me whether I speak officially. I do. I shall expect you this evening at six. We shall not interfere28 with your subsequent plans.”
He attended the grim little function in due course. The skeletons of hospitality rattled—“Have a peg29, have a drink.” He talked for five minutes to Mrs. Blakiston, who was the only surviving female. He talked to McBryde, who was defiant30 about his divorce, conscious that he had sinned as a sahib. He talked to Major Roberts, the new Civil Surgeon; and to young Milner, the new City Magistrate31; but the more the club changed, the more it promised to be the same thing. “It is no good,” he thought, as he returned past the mosque32, “we all build upon sand; and the more modern the country gets, the worse’ll be the crash. In the old eighteenth century, when cruelty and injustice33 raged, an invisible power repaired their ravages34. Everything echoes now; there’s no stopping the echo. The original sound may be harmless, but the echo is always evil.” This reflection about an echo lay at the verge35 of Fielding’s mind. He could never develop it. It belonged to the universe that he had missed or rejected. And the mosque missed it too. Like himself, those shallow arcades36 provided but a limited asylum37. “There is no God but God” doesn’t carry us far through the complexities38 of matter and spirit; it is only a game with words, really, a religious pun, not a religious truth.
He found Aziz overtired and dispirited, and he determined39 not to allude40 to their misunderstanding until the end of the evening; it would be more acceptable then. He made a clean breast about the club—said he had only gone under compulsion, and should never attend again unless the order was renewed. “In other words, probably never; for I am going quite soon to England.”
“I thought you might end in England,” he said very quietly, then changed the conversation. Rather awkwardly they ate their dinner, then went out to sit in the Mogul garden-house.
“I am only going for a little time. On official business. My service is anxious to get me away from Chandrapore for a bit. It is obliged to value me highly, but does not care for me. The situation is somewhat humorous.”
“What is the nature of the business? Will it leave you much spare time?”
“Enough to see my friends.”
“I expected you to make such a reply. You are a faithful friend. Shall we now talk about something else?”
“Willingly. What subject?”
“Poetry,” he said, with tears in his eyes. “Let us discuss why poetry has lost the power of making men brave. My mother’s father was also a poet, and fought against you in the Mutiny. I might equal him if there was another mutiny. As it is, I am a doctor, who has won a case and has three children to support, and whose chief subject of conversation is official plans.”
“Let us talk about poetry.” He turned his mind to the innocuous subject. “You people are sadly circumstanced. Whatever are you to write about? You cannot say, ‘The rose is faded,’ for evermore. We know it’s faded. Yet you can’t have patriotic41 poetry of the ‘India, my India’ type, when it’s nobody’s India.”
“I like this conversation. It may lead to something interesting.”
“You are quite right in thinking that poetry must touch life. When I knew you first, you used it as an incantation.”
“I was a child when you knew me first. Everyone was my friend then. The Friend: a Persian expression for God. But I do not want to be a religious poet either.”
“I hoped you would be.”
“Why, when you yourself are an atheist42?”
“There is something in religion that may not be true, but has not yet been sung.”
“Explain in detail.”
“Something that the Hindus have perhaps found.”
“Let them sing it.”
“Hindus are unable to sing.”
“Cyril, you sometimes make a sensible remark. That will do for poetry for the present. Let us now return to your English visit.”
“We haven’t discussed poetry for two seconds,” said the other, smiling.
But Aziz was addicted43 to cameos. He held the tiny conversation in his hand, and felt it epitomized his problem. For an instant he recalled his wife, and, as happens when a memory is intense, the past became the future, and he saw her with him in a quiet Hindu jungle native state, far away from foreigners. He said: “I suppose you will visit Miss Quested.”
“If I have time. It will be strange seeing her in Hampstead.”
“What is Hampstead?”
“An artistic44 and thoughtful little suburb of London——”
“And there she lives in comfort: you will enjoy seeing her. . . . Dear me, I’ve got a headache this evening. Perhaps I am going to have cholera. With your permission, I’ll leave early.”
“When would you like the carriage?”
“Don’t trouble—I’ll bike.”
“But you haven’t got your bicycle. My carriage fetched you—let it take you away.”
“Sound reasoning,” he said, trying to be gay. “I have not got my bicycle. But I am seen too often in your carriage. I am thought to take advantage of your generosity45 by Mr. Ram46 Chand.” He was out of sorts and uneasy. The conversation jumped from topic to topic in a broken-backed fashion. They were affectionate and intimate, but nothing clicked tight.
“Aziz, you have forgiven me the stupid remark I made this morning?”
“When you called me a little rotter?”
“Yes, to my eternal confusion. You know how fond I am of you.”
“That is nothing, of course, we all of us make mistakes. In a friendship such as ours a few slips are of no consequence.”
But as he drove off, something depressed47 him—a dull pain of body or mind, waiting to rise to the surface. When he reached the bungalow48 he wanted to return and say something very affectionate; instead, he gave the sais a heavy tip, and sat down gloomily on the bed, and Hassan massaged49 him incompetently50. The eye-flies had colonized51 the top of an almeira; the red stains on the durry were thicker, for Mohammed Latif had slept here during his imprisonment52 and spat53 a good deal; the table drawer was scarred where the police had forced it open; everything in Chandrapore was used up, including the air. The trouble rose to the surface now: he was suspicious; he suspected his friend of intending to marry Miss Quested for the sake of her money, and of going to England for that purpose.
“Huzoor?”—for he had muttered.
“Look at those flies on the ceiling. Why have you not drowned them?”
“Huzoor, they return.”
“Like all evil things.”
To divert the conversation, Hassan related how the kitchen-boy had killed a snake, good, but killed it by cutting it in two, bad, because it becomes two snakes.
“When he breaks a plate, does it become two plates?”
“Glasses and a new teapot will similarly be required, also for myself a coat.”
Aziz sighed. Each for himself. One man needs a coat, another a rich wife; each approaches his goal by a clever detour54. Fielding had saved the girl a fine of twenty thousand rupees, and now followed her to England. If he desired to marry her, all was explained; she would bring him a larger dowry. Aziz did not believe his own suspicions—better if he had, for then he would have denounced and cleared the situation up. Suspicion and belief could in his mind exist side by side. They sprang from different sources, and need never intermingle. Suspicion in the Oriental is a sort of malignant55 tumour56, a mental malady57, that makes him self-conscious and unfriendly suddenly; he trusts and mistrusts at the same time in a way the Westerner cannot comprehend. It is his demon58, as the Westerner’s is hypocrisy59. Aziz was seized by it, and his fancy built a satanic castle, of which the foundation had been laid when he talked at Dilkusha under the stars. The girl had surely been Cyril’s mistress when she stopped in the College—Mohammed Latif was right. But was that all? Perhaps it was Cyril who followed her into the cave. . . . No; impossible. Cyril hadn’t been on the Kawa Dol at all. Impossible. Ridiculous. Yet the fancy left him trembling with misery60. Such treachery—if true—would have been the worst in Indian history; nothing so vile61, not even the murder of Afzul Khan by Sivaji. He was shaken, as though by a truth, and told Hassan to leave him.
Next day he decided to take his children back to Mussoorie. They had come down for the trial, that he might bid them farewell, and had stayed on at Hamidullah’s for the rejoicings. Major Roberts would give him leave, and during his absence Fielding would go off to England. The idea suited both his beliefs and his suspicions. Events would prove which was right, and preserve, in either case, his dignity.
Fielding was conscious of something hostile, and because he was really fond of Aziz his optimism failed him. Travelling light is less easy as soon as affection is involved. Unable to jog forward in the serene62 hope that all would come right, he wrote an elaborate letter in the rather modern style: “It is on my mind that you think me a prude about women. I had rather you thought anything else of me. If I live impeccably now, it is only because I am well on the forties—a period of revision. In the eighties I shall revise again. And before the nineties come—I shall be revised! But, alive or dead, I am absolutely devoid63 of morals. Do kindly64 grasp this about me.” Aziz did not care for the letter at all. It hurt his delicacy65. He liked confidences, however gross, but generalizations66 and comparisons always repelled67 him. Life is not a scientific manual. He replied coldly, regretting his inability to return from Mussoorie before his friend sailed: “But I must take my poor little holiday while I can. All must be economy henceforward, all hopes of Kashmir have vanished for ever and ever. When you return I shall be slaving far away in some new post.”
And Fielding went, and in the last gutterings of Chandrapore—heaven and earth both looking like toffee—the Indian’s bad fancies were confirmed. His friends encouraged them, for though they had liked the Principal, they felt uneasy at his getting to know so much about their private affairs. Mahmoud Ali soon declared that treachery was afoot. Hamidullah murmured, “Certainly of late he no longer addressed us with his former frankness,” and warned Aziz “not to expect too much—he and she are, after all, both members of another race.” “Where are my twenty thousand rupees?” he thought. He was absolutely indifferent to money—not merely generous with it, but promptly68 paying his debts when he could remember to do so—yet these rupees haunted his mind, because he had been tricked about them, and allowed them to escape overseas, like so much of the wealth of India. Cyril would marry Miss Quested—he grew certain of it, all the unexplained residue69 of the Marabar contributing. It was the natural conclusion of the horrible senseless picnic, and before long he persuaded himself that the wedding had actually taken place.
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1
decided
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| adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的 | |
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tragic
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| adj.悲剧的，悲剧性的，悲惨的 | |
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rumour
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| n.谣言，谣传，传闻 | |
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middle-aged
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| adj.中年的 | |
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oblique
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| adj.斜的，倾斜的，无诚意的，不坦率的 | |
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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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attachment
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| n.附属物，附件；依恋；依附 | |
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cholera
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| n.霍乱 | |
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administrative
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| adj.行政的，管理的 | |
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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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frankly
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| adv.坦白地，直率地；坦率地说 | |
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wink
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| n.眨眼，使眼色，瞬间；v.眨眼，使眼色，闪烁 | |
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licentious
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| adj.放纵的，淫乱的 | |
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gaily
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| adv.欢乐地，高兴地 | |
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dignified
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| a.可敬的，高贵的 | |
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entirely
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| ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地 | |
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tangles
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| （使）缠结， （使）乱作一团( tangle的第三人称单数 ) | |
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intercourse
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| n.性交；交流，交往，交际 | |
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intonation
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| n.语调，声调；发声 | |
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awry
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| adj.扭曲的，错的 | |
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mutual
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| adj.相互的，彼此的；共同的，共有的 | |
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resentment
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| n.怨愤，忿恨 | |
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recapitulate
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| v.节述要旨，择要说明 | |
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severely
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| adv.严格地；严厉地；非常恶劣地 | |
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intriguing
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| adj.有趣的；迷人的v.搞阴谋诡计(intrigue的现在分词)；激起…的好奇心 | |
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displeased
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| a.不快的 | |
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clotted
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| adj.凝结的v.凝固( clot的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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interfere
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| v.(in)干涉，干预；(with)妨碍，打扰 | |
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peg
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| n.木栓，木钉；vt.用木钉钉，用短桩固定 | |
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defiant
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| adj.无礼的，挑战的 | |
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magistrate
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| n.地方行政官，地方法官，治安官 | |
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mosque
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| n.清真寺 | |
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injustice
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| n.非正义，不公正，不公平，侵犯（别人的）权利 | |
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ravages
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| 劫掠后的残迹，破坏的结果，毁坏后的残迹 | |
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verge
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| n.边，边缘；v.接近，濒临 | |
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arcades
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| n.商场( arcade的名词复数 )；拱形走道（两旁有商店或娱乐设施）；连拱廊；拱形建筑物 | |
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asylum
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| n.避难所，庇护所，避难 | |
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complexities
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| 复杂性(complexity的名词复数)； 复杂的事物 | |
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determined
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| adj.坚定的；有决心的 | |
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allude
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| v.提及，暗指 | |
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patriotic
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| adj.爱国的，有爱国心的 | |
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atheist
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| n.无神论者 | |
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addicted
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| adj.沉溺于....的，对...上瘾的 | |
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artistic
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| adj.艺术(家)的，美术(家)的；善于艺术创作的 | |
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generosity
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| n.大度，慷慨，慷慨的行为 | |
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ram
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| (random access memory)随机存取存储器 | |
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depressed
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| adj.沮丧的，抑郁的，不景气的，萧条的 | |
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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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massaged
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| 按摩，推拿( massage的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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incompetently
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| adv.无能力地 | |
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colonized
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| 开拓殖民地，移民于殖民地( colonize的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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imprisonment
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| n.关押，监禁，坐牢 | |
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spat
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| n.口角，掌击；v.发出呼噜呼噜声 | |
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54
detour
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| n.绕行的路，迂回路；v.迂回，绕道 | |
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malignant
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| adj.恶性的，致命的；恶意的，恶毒的 | |
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tumour
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| n.(tumor)(肿)瘤，肿块 | |
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57
malady
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| n.病，疾病(通常做比喻) | |
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58
demon
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| n.魔鬼，恶魔 | |
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hypocrisy
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| n.伪善，虚伪 | |
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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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61
vile
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| adj.卑鄙的，可耻的，邪恶的；坏透的 | |
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62
serene
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| adj. 安详的，宁静的，平静的 | |
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devoid
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| adj.全无的，缺乏的 | |
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64
kindly
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| adj.和蔼的，温和的，爽快的；adv.温和地，亲切地 | |
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delicacy
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| n.精致，细微，微妙，精良；美味，佳肴 | |
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66
generalizations
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| 一般化( generalization的名词复数 )； 普通化； 归纳； 概论 | |
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67
repelled
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| v.击退( repel的过去式和过去分词 )；使厌恶；排斥；推开 | |
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68
promptly
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| adv.及时地，敏捷地 | |
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69
residue
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| n.残余，剩余，残渣 | |
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