The days went by at the White Sulphur on the wings of incessant1 gayety. Literally2 the nights were filled with music, and the only cares that infested3 the day appeared in the anxious faces of the mothers as the campaign became more intricate and uncertain. King watched this with the double interest of spectator and player. The artist threw himself into the melee4 with abandon, and pacified5 his conscience by an occasional letter to Miss Lamont, in which he confessed just as many of his conquests and defeats as he thought it would be good for her to know.
The colored people, who are a conspicuous7 part of the establishment, are a source of never-failing interest and amusement. Every morning the mammies and nurses with their charges were seated in a long, shining row on a part of the veranda8 where there was most passing and repassing, holding a sort of baby show, the social consequence of each one depending upon the rank of the family who employed her, and the dress of the children in her charge. High-toned conversation on these topics occupied these dignified9 and faithful mammies, upon whom seemed to rest to a considerable extent the maintenance of the aristocratic social traditions. Forbes had heard that while the colored people of the South had suspended several of the ten commandments, the eighth was especially regarded as nonapplicable in the present state of society. But he was compelled to revise this opinion as to the White Sulphur. Nobody ever locked a door or closed a window. Cottages most remote were left for hours open and without guard, miscellaneous articles of the toilet were left about, trunks were not locked, waiters, chambermaids, porters, washerwomen, were constantly coming and going, having access to the rooms at all hours, and yet no guest ever lost so much as a hairpin10 or a cigar. This fashion of trust and of honesty so impressed the artist that he said he should make an attempt to have it introduced elsewhere. This sort of esprit de corps11 among the colored people was unexpected, and he wondered if they are not generally misunderstood by writers who attribute to them qualities of various kinds that they do not possess. The negro is not witty12 or consciously humorous, or epigrammatic. The humor of his actions and sayings lies very much in a certain primitive13 simplicity15. Forbes couldn't tell, for instance, why he was amused at a remark he heard one morning in the store. A colored girl sauntered in, looking about vacantly. "You ain't got no cotton, is you?" "Why, of course we have cotton." "Well" (the girl only wanted an excuse to say something), "I only ast, is you?"
Sports of a colonial and old English flavor that have fallen into disuse elsewhere varied16 the life at the White. One day the gentlemen rode in a mule17-race, the slowest mule to win, and this feat6 was followed by an exhibition of negro agility18 in climbing the greased pole and catching19 the greased pig; another day the cavaliers contended on the green field surrounded by a brilliant array of beauty and costume, as two Amazon baseball nines, the one nine arrayed in yellow cambric frocks and sun-bonnets, and the other in bright red gowns--the whiskers and big boots and trousers adding nothing whatever to the illusion of the female battle.
The two tables, King's and the Benson's, united in an expedition to the Old Sweet, a drive of eighteen miles. Mrs. Farquhar arranged the affair, and assigned the seats in the carriages. It is a very picturesque20 drive, as are all the drives in this region, and if King did not enjoy it, it was not because Mrs. Farquhar was not even more entertaining than usual. The truth is that a young man in love is poor company for himself and for everybody else. Even the object of his passion could not tolerate him unless she returned it. Irene and Mr. Meigs rode in the carriage in advance of his, and King thought the scenery about the tamest he had ever seen, the roads bad, the horses slow. His ill-humor, however, was concentrated on one spot; that was Mr. Meigs's back; he thought he had never seen a more disagreeable back, a more conceited21 back. It ought to have been a delightful22 day; in his imagination it was to be an eventful day. Indeed, why shouldn't the opportunity come at the Old Sweet, at the end of the drive?--there was something promising23 in the name. Mrs. Farquhar was in a mocking mood all the way. She liked to go to the Old Sweet, she said, because it was so intolerably dull; it was a sensation. She thought, too, that it might please Miss Benson, there was such a fitness in the thing--the old sweet to the Old Sweet. "And he is not so very old either," she added; "just the age young girls like. I should think Miss Benson in danger--seriously, now--if she were three or four years younger."
The Old Sweet is, in fact, a delightful old-fashioned resort, respectable and dull, with a pretty park, and a crystal pond that stimulates24 the bather like a glass of champagne25, and perhaps has the property of restoring youth. King tried the spring, which he heard Mrs. Farquhar soberly commending to Mr. Meigs; and after dinner he manoeuvred for a half-hour alone with Irene. But the fates and the women were against him. He had the mortification26 to see her stroll away with Mr. Meigs to a distant part of the grounds, where they remained in confidential27 discourse28 until it was time to return.
In the rearrangement of seats Mrs. Farquhar exchanged with Irene. Mrs. Farquhar said that it was very much like going to a funeral each way. As for Irene, she was in high, even feverish29 spirits, and rattled30 away in a manner that convinced King that she was almost too happy to contain herself.
Notwithstanding the general chaff31, the singing, and the gayety of Irene, the drive seemed to him intolerably long. At the half-way house, where in the moonlight the horses drank from a shallow stream, Mr. Meigs came forward to the carriage and inquired if Miss Benson was sufficiently32 protected against the chilliness33 of the night. King had an impulse to offer to change seats with him; but no, he would not surrender in the face of the enemy. It would be more dignified to quietly leave the Springs the next day.
It was late at night when the party returned. The carriage drove to the Benson cottage; King helped Irene to alight, coolly bade her good-night, and went to his barracks. But it was not a good night to sleep. He tossed about, he counted every step of the late night birds on his gallery; he got up and lighted a cigar, and tried dispassionately to think the matter over. But thinking was of no use. He took pen and paper; he would write a chill letter of farewell; he would write a manly34 avowal35 of his passion; he would make such an appeal that no woman could resist it. She must know, she did know--what was the use of writing? He sat staring at the blank prospect36. Great heavens! what would become of his life if he lost the only woman in the world? Probably the world would go on much the same. Why, listen to it! The band was playing on the lawn at four o'clock in the morning. A party was breaking up after a night of german and a supper, and the revelers were dispersing37. The lively tunes39 of "Dixie," "Marching through Georgia," and "Home, Sweet Home," awoke the echoes in all the galleries and corridors, and filled the whole encampment with a sad gayety. Dawn was approaching. Good-nights and farewells and laughter were heard, and the voice of a wanderer explaining to the trees, with more or less broken melody, his fixed40 purpose not to go home till morning.
Stanhope King might have had a better though still a sleepless41 night if he had known that Mr. Meigs was packing his trunks at that hour to the tune38 of "Home, Sweet Home," and if he had been aware of the scene at the Benson cottage after he bade Irene good-night. Mrs. Benson had a light burning, and the noise of the carriage awakened42 her. Irene entered the room, saw that her mother was awake, shut the door carefully, sat down on the foot of the bed, said, "It's all over, mother," and burst into the tears of a long-repressed nervous excitement.
"What's over, child?" cried Mrs. Benson, sitting bolt-upright in bed.
"Mr. Meigs. I had to tell him that it couldn't be. And he is one of the best men I ever knew."
"You don't tell me you've gone and refused him, Irene?"
"Please don't scold me. It was no use. He ought to have seen that I did not care for him, except as a friend. I'm so sorry!"
"You are the strangest girl I ever saw." And Mrs. Benson dropped back on the pillow again, crying herself now, and muttering, "I'm sure I don't know what you do want."
When King came out to breakfast he encountered Mr. Benson, who told him that their friend Mr. Meigs had gone off that morning--had a sudden business call to Boston. Mr. Benson did not seem to be depressed43 about it. Irene did not appear, and King idled away the hours with his equally industrious44 companion under the trees. There was no german that morning, and the hotel band was going through its repertoire45 for the benefit of a champagne party on the lawn. There was nothing melancholy46 about this party; and King couldn't help saying to Mrs. Farquhar that it hardly represented his idea of the destitution47 and depression resulting from the war; but she replied that they must do something to keep up their spirits.
"And I think," said the artist, who had been watching, from the little distance at which they sat, the table of the revelers, "that they will succeed. Twenty-six bottles of champagne, and not many more guests! What a happy people, to be able to enjoy champagne before twelve o'clock!"
"Oh, you never will understand us!" said Mrs. Farquhar; "there is nothing spontaneous in you."
"We do not begin to be spontaneous till after dinner," said King.
"And then it is all calculated. Think of Mr. Forbes counting the bottles! Such a dreadfully mercenary spirit! Oh, I have been North. Because you are not so open as we are, you set up for being more virtuous48."
"And you mean," said King, "that frankness and impulse cover a multitude of--"
"I don't mean anything of the sort. I just mean that conventionality isn't virtue49. You yourself confessed that you like the Southern openness right much, and you like to come here, and you like the Southern people as they are at home."
"Well?"
"And now will you tell me, Mr. Prim14, why it is that almost all Northern people who come South to live become more Southern than the Southerners themselves; and that almost all Southern people who go North to live remain just as Southern as ever?"
"No. Nor do I understand any more than Dr. Johnson did why the Scotch50, who couldn't scratch a living at home, and came up to London, always kept on bragging51 about their native land and abused the metropolis52."
This sort of sparring went on daily, with the result of increasing friendship between the representatives of the two geographical53 sections, and commonly ended with the declaration on Mrs. Farquhar's part that she should never know that King was not born in the South except for his accent; and on his part that if Mrs. Farquhar would conceal54 her delightful Virginia inflection she would pass everywhere at the North for a Northern woman.
"I hear," she said, later, as they sat alone, "that Mr. Meigs has beat a retreat, saving nothing but his personal baggage. I think Miss Benson is a great goose. Such a chance for an establishment and a position! You didn't half appreciate him."
"I'm afraid I did not."
"Well, it is none of my business; but I hope you understand the responsibility of the situation. If you do not, I want to warn you about one thing: don't go strolling off before sunset in the Lovers' Walk. It is the most dangerous place. It is a fatal place. I suppose every turn in it, every tree that has a knoll55 at the foot where two persons can sit, has witnessed a tragedy, or, what is worse, a comedy. There are legends enough about it to fill a book. Maybe there is not a Southern woman living who has not been engaged there once at least. I'll tell you a little story for a warning. Some years ago there was a famous belle56 here who had the Springs at her feet, and half a dozen determined57 suitors. One of them, who had been unable to make the least impression on her heart, resolved to win her by a stratagem58. Walking one evening on the hill with her, the two stopped just at a turn in the walk--I can show you the exact spot, with a chaperon--and he fell into earnest discourse with her. She was as cool and repellant as usual. Just then he heard a party approaching; his chance had come. The moment the party came in sight he suddenly kissed her. Everybody saw it. The witnesses discreetly59 turned back. The girl was indignant. But the deed was done. In half an hour the whole Springs would know it. She was compromised. No explanations could do away with the fact that she had been kissed in Lovers' Walk. But the girl was game, and that evening the engagement was announced in the drawing-room. Isn't that a pretty story?"
However much Stanhope might have been alarmed at this recital60, he betrayed nothing of his fear that evening when, after walking to the spring with Irene, the two sauntered along and unconsciously, as it seemed, turned up the hill into that winding61 path which has been trodden by generations of lovers with loitering steps--steps easy to take and so hard to retrace62! It is a delightful forest, the walk winding about on the edge of the hill, and giving charming prospects63 of intervales, stream, and mountains. To one in the mood for a quiet hour with nature, no scene could be more attractive.
The couple walked on, attempting little conversation, both apparently64 prepossessed and constrained65. The sunset was spoken of, and when Irene at length suggested turning back, that was declared to be King's object in ascending66 the hill to a particular point; but whether either of them saw the sunset, or would have known it from a sunrise, I cannot say. The drive to the Old Sweet was pleasant. Yes, but rather tiresome67. Mr. Meigs had gone away suddenly. Yes; Irene was sorry his business should have called him away. Was she very sorry? She wouldn't lie awake at night over it, but he was a good friend. The time passed very quickly here. Yes; one couldn't tell how it went; the days just melted away; the two weeks seemed like a day. They were going away the next day. King said he was going also.
"And," he added, as if with an effort, "when the season is over, Miss Benson, I am going to settle down to work."
"I'm glad of that," she said, turning upon him a face glowing with approval.
"Yes, I have arranged to go on with practice in my uncle's office. I remember what you said about a dilettante68 life."
"Why, I never said anything of the kind."
"But you looked it. It is all the same."
They had come to the crown of the hill, and stood looking over the intervales to the purple mountains. Irene was deeply occupied in tying up with grass a bunch of wild flowers. Suddenly he seized her hand.
"Irene!"
"No, no," she cried, turning away. The flowers dropped from her hand.
"You must listen, Irene. I love you--I love you."
She turned her face towards him; her lips trembled; her eyes were full of tears; there was a great look of wonder and tenderness in her face.
"Is it all true?"
She was in his arms. He kissed her hair, her eyes--ah me! it is the old story. It had always been true. He loved her from the first, at Fortress69 Monroe, every minute since. And she--well, perhaps she could learn to love him in time, if he was very good; yes, maybe she had loved him a little at Fortress Monroe. How could he? what was there in her to attract him? What a wonder it was that she could tolerate him! What could she see in him?
So this impossible thing, this miracle, was explained? No, indeed! It had to be inquired into and explained over and over again, this absolutely new experience of two people loving each other.
She could speak now of herself, of her doubt that he could know his own heart and be stronger than the social traditions, and would not mind, as she thought he did at Newport--just a little bit--the opinions of other people. I do not by any means imply that she said all this bluntly, or that she took at all the tone of apology; but she contrived70, as a woman can without saying much, to let him see why she had distrusted, not the sincerity71, but the perseverance72 of his love. There would never be any more doubt now. What a wonder it all is.
The two parted--alas73! alas! till supper-time!
I don't know why scoffers make so light of these partings--at the foot of the main stairs of the hotel gallery, just as Mrs. Farquhar was descending74. Irene's face was radiant as she ran away from Mrs. Farquhar.
"Bless you, my children! I see my warning was in vain, Mr. King. It is a fatal walk. It always was in our family. Oh, youth! youth!" A shade of melancholy came over her charming face as she turned alone towards the spring.
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incessant
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| adj.不停的，连续的 | |
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literally
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| adv.照字面意义，逐字地；确实 | |
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infested
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| adj.为患的，大批滋生的（常与with搭配）v.害虫、野兽大批出没于( infest的过去式和过去分词 )；遍布于 | |
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melee
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| n.混战；混战的人群 | |
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pacified
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| 使（某人）安静( pacify的过去式和过去分词 )； 息怒； 抚慰； 在（有战争的地区、国家等）实现和平 | |
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feat
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| n.功绩；武艺，技艺；adj.灵巧的，漂亮的，合适的 | |
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conspicuous
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| adj.明眼的，惹人注目的；炫耀的，摆阔气的 | |
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veranda
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| n.走廊；阳台 | |
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dignified
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| a.可敬的，高贵的 | |
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hairpin
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| n.簪,束发夹，夹发针 | |
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corps
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| n.(通信等兵种的)部队；(同类作的)一组 | |
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witty
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| adj.机智的，风趣的 | |
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primitive
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| adj.原始的；简单的；n.原(始)人，原始事物 | |
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prim
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| adj.拘泥形式的，一本正经的；n.循规蹈矩，整洁；adv.循规蹈矩地，整洁地 | |
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simplicity
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| n.简单，简易；朴素；直率，单纯 | |
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varied
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| adj.多样的，多变化的 | |
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mule
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| n.骡子，杂种，执拗的人 | |
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agility
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| n.敏捷，活泼 | |
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catching
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| adj.易传染的，有魅力的，迷人的，接住 | |
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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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conceited
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| adj.自负的，骄傲自满的 | |
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delightful
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| adj.令人高兴的，使人快乐的 | |
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promising
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| adj.有希望的，有前途的 | |
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stimulates
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| v.刺激( stimulate的第三人称单数 )；激励；使兴奋；起兴奋作用，起刺激作用，起促进作用 | |
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champagne
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| n.香槟酒；微黄色 | |
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mortification
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| n.耻辱，屈辱 | |
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confidential
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| adj.秘（机）密的，表示信任的，担任机密工作的 | |
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discourse
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| n.论文，演说；谈话；话语；vi.讲述，著述 | |
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feverish
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| adj.发烧的，狂热的，兴奋的 | |
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rattled
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| 慌乱的，恼火的 | |
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chaff
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| v.取笑，嘲笑；n.谷壳 | |
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sufficiently
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| adv.足够地，充分地 | |
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chilliness
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| n.寒冷，寒意，严寒 | |
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manly
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| adj.有男子气概的；adv.男子般地，果断地 | |
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avowal
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| n.公开宣称，坦白承认 | |
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prospect
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| n.前景，前途；景色，视野 | |
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dispersing
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| adj. 分散的 动词disperse的现在分词形式 | |
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tune
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| n.调子；和谐，协调；v.调音，调节，调整 | |
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tunes
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| n.曲调，曲子( tune的名词复数 )v.调音( tune的第三人称单数 )；调整；（给收音机、电视等）调谐；使协调 | |
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fixed
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| adj.固定的，不变的，准备好的；(计算机)固定的 | |
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sleepless
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| adj.不睡眠的，睡不著的，不休息的 | |
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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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depressed
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| adj.沮丧的，抑郁的，不景气的，萧条的 | |
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industrious
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| adj.勤劳的，刻苦的，奋发的 | |
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repertoire
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| n.(准备好演出的)节目，保留剧目；(计算机的)指令表，指令系统， <美>(某个人的)全部技能；清单，指令表 | |
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melancholy
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| n.忧郁，愁思；adj.令人感伤（沮丧）的，忧郁的 | |
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destitution
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| n.穷困，缺乏，贫穷 | |
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virtuous
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| adj.有品德的，善良的，贞洁的，有效力的 | |
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virtue
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| n.德行，美德；贞操；优点；功效，效力 | |
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scotch
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| n.伤口，刻痕；苏格兰威士忌酒；v.粉碎，消灭，阻止；adj.苏格兰(人)的 | |
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bragging
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| v.自夸，吹嘘( brag的现在分词 )；大话 | |
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metropolis
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| n.首府；大城市 | |
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geographical
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| adj.地理的；地区(性)的 | |
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conceal
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| v.隐藏，隐瞒，隐蔽 | |
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knoll
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| n.小山，小丘 | |
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belle
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| n.靓女 | |
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determined
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| adj.坚定的；有决心的 | |
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stratagem
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| n.诡计，计谋 | |
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discreetly
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| ad.(言行)审慎地，慎重地 | |
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recital
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| n.朗诵，独奏会，独唱会 | |
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winding
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| n.绕，缠，绕组，线圈 | |
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retrace
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| v.折回；追溯，探源 | |
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prospects
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| n.希望，前途(恒为复数) | |
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apparently
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| adv.显然地；表面上，似乎 | |
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constrained
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| adj.束缚的,节制的 | |
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ascending
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| adj.上升的，向上的 | |
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tiresome
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| adj.令人疲劳的，令人厌倦的 | |
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dilettante
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| n.半瓶醋，业余爱好者 | |
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fortress
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| n.堡垒，防御工事 | |
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contrived
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| adj.不自然的，做作的；虚构的 | |
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sincerity
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| n.真诚，诚意；真实 | |
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perseverance
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| n.坚持不懈，不屈不挠 | |
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alas
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| int.唉(表示悲伤、忧愁、恐惧等) | |
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descending
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| n. 下行 adj. 下降的 | |
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