Very quietly, with difficulty restraining her own emotion so as not to excite him further, Ethel had related to Ernest the story of her remarkable1 interview with Reginald Clarke. In the long silence that ensued, the wings of his soul brushed against hers for the first time, and Love by a thousand tender chains of common suffering welded their beings into one.
Caressingly2 the ivory of her fingers passed through the gold of his hair and over his brow, as if to banish3 the demon-eyes that stared at him across the hideous4 spaces of the past. In a rush a thousand incidents came back to him, mute witnesses of a damning truth. His play, the dreams that tormented5 him, his own inability to concentrate his mind upon his novel which hitherto he had ascribed to nervous disease--all, piling fact on fact, became one monstrous6 monument of Reginald Clarke's crime. At last Ernest understood the parting words of Abel Felton and the look in Ethel's eye on the night when he had first linked his fate with the other man's. Walkham's experience, too, and Reginald's remarks on the busts7 of Shakespeare and Balzac unmistakably pointed8 toward the new and horrible spectre that Ethel's revelation had raised in place of his host.
And then, again, the other Reginald appeared, crowned with the lyric9 wreath. From his lips golden cadences10 fell, sweeter than the smell of many flowers or the sound of a silver bell. He was once more the divine master, whose godlike features bore no trace of malice11 and who had raised him to a place very near his heart.
"No," he cried, "it is impossible. It's all a dream, a horrible nightmare."
"But he has himself confessed it," she interjected.
"Perhaps he has spoken in symbols. We all absorb to some extent other men's ideas, without robbing them and wrecking12 their thought-life. Reginald may be unscrupulous in the use of his power of impressing upon others the stamp of his master-mind. So was Shakespeare. No, no, no! You are mistaken; we were both deluded13 for the moment by his picturesque14 account of a common, not even a discreditable, fact. He may himself have played with the idea, but surely he cannot have been serious."
"And your own experience, and Abel Felton's and mine--can they, too, be dismissed with a shrug15 of the shoulder?"
"But, come to think of it, the whole theory seems absurd. It is unscientific. It is not even a case of mesmerism. If he had said that he hypnotised his victims, the matter would assume a totally different aspect. I admit that something is wrong somewhere, and that the home of Reginald Clarke is no healthful abode16 for me. But you must also remember that probably we are both unstrung to the point of hysteria."
But to Ethel his words carried no conviction.
"You are still under his spell," she cried, anxiously.
A little shaken in his confidence, Ernest resumed: "Reginald is utterly17 incapable18 of such an action, even granting that he possessed19 the terrible power of which you speak. A man of his splendid resources, a literary Midas at whose very touch every word turns into gold, is under no necessity to prey20 on the thoughts of others. Circumstances, I admit, are suspicious. But in the light of common day this fanciful theory shrivels into nothing. Any court of law would reject our evidence as madness. It is too utterly fantastic, utterly alien to any human experience."
"Is it though?" Ethel replied with peculiar21 intonation22.
"Why, what do you mean?"
"Surely," she answered, "you must know that in the legends of every nation we read of men and women who were called vampires24. They are beings, not always wholly evil, whom every night some mysterious impulse leads to steal into unguarded bedchambers, to suck the blood of the sleepers25 and then, having waxed strong on the life of their victims, cautiously to retreat. Thence comes it that their lips are very red. It is even said that they can find no rest in the grave, but return to their former haunts long after they are believed to be dead. Those whom they visit, however, pine away for no apparent reason. The physicians shake their wise heads and speak of consumption. But sometimes, ancient chronicles assure us, the people's suspicions were aroused, and under the leadership of a good priest they went in solemn procession to the graves of the persons suspected. And on opening the tombs it was found that their coffins26 had rotted away and the flowers in their hair were black. But their bodies were white and whole; through no empty sockets27 crept the vermin, and their sucking lips were still moist with a little blood."
Ernest was carried away in spite of himself by her account, which vividly28 resembled his own experience. Still he would not give in.
"All this is impressive. I admit it is very impressive. But you yourself speak of such stories as legends. They are unfounded upon any tangible29 fact, and you cannot expect a man schooled in modern sciences to admit, as having any possible bearing upon his life, the crude belief of the Middle Ages!"
"Why not?" she responded. "Our scientists have proved true the wildest theories of mediaeval scholars. The transmutation of metals seems to-day no longer an idle speculation30, and radium has transformed into potential reality the dream of perpetual motion. The fundamental notions of mathematics are being undermined. One school of philosophers claims that the number of angles in a triangle is equal to more than two right angles; another propounds31 that it is less. Even great scientists who have studied the soul of nature are turning to spiritism. The world is overcoming the shallow scepticism of the nineteenth century. Life has become once more wonderful and very mysterious. But it also seems that, with the miracles of the old days, their terrors, their nightmares and their monsters have come back in a modern guise32."
Ernest became even more thoughtful. "Yes," he observed, "there is something in what you say." Then, pacing the room nervously33, he exclaimed: "And still I find it impossible to believe your explanation. Reginald a vampire23! It seems so ludicrous. If you had told me that such creatures exist somewhere, far away, I might have discussed the matter; but in this great city, in the shadow of the Flatiron Building--no!"
She replied with warmth: "Yet they exist--always have existed. Not only in the Middle Ages, but at all times and in all regions. There is no nation but has some record of them, in one form or another. And don't you think if we find a thought, no matter how absurd it may seem to us, that has ever occupied the minds of men--if we find, I say, such a perennially34 recurrent thought, are we not justified35 in assuming that it must have some basis in the actual experience of mankind?"
Ernest's brow became very clouded, and infinite numbers of hidden premature36 wrinkles began to show. How wan37 he looked and how frail38! He was as one lost in a labyrinth39 in which he saw no light, convinced against his will, or rather, against his scientific conviction, that she was not wholly mistaken.
"Still," he observed triumphantly40, "your vampires suck blood; but Reginald, if vampire he be, preys41 upon the soul. How can a man suck from another man's brain a thing as intangible, as quintessential as thought?"
"Ah," she replied, "you forget, thought is more real than blood!"
收听单词发音 |
1
remarkable
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| adj.显著的，异常的，非凡的，值得注意的 | |
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caressingly
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| 爱抚地，亲切地 | |
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banish
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| vt.放逐，驱逐；消除，排除 | |
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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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tormented
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| 饱受折磨的 | |
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monstrous
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| adj.巨大的；恐怖的；可耻的，丢脸的 | |
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busts
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| 半身雕塑像( bust的名词复数 )； 妇女的胸部； 胸围； 突击搜捕 | |
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pointed
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| adj.尖的，直截了当的 | |
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lyric
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| n.抒情诗，歌词；adj.抒情的 | |
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cadences
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| n.（声音的）抑扬顿挫( cadence的名词复数 )；节奏；韵律；调子 | |
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malice
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| n.恶意，怨恨，蓄意；[律]预谋 | |
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wrecking
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| 破坏 | |
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deluded
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| v.欺骗，哄骗( delude的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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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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shrug
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| v.耸肩(表示怀疑、冷漠、不知等) | |
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abode
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| n.住处，住所 | |
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utterly
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| adv.完全地，绝对地 | |
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incapable
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| adj.无能力的，不能做某事的 | |
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possessed
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| adj.疯狂的；拥有的，占有的 | |
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prey
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| n.被掠食者，牺牲者，掠食；v.捕食，掠夺，折磨 | |
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peculiar
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| adj.古怪的，异常的；特殊的，特有的 | |
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intonation
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| n.语调，声调；发声 | |
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vampire
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| n.吸血鬼 | |
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vampires
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| n.吸血鬼( vampire的名词复数 )；吸血蝠；高利贷者；（舞台上的）活板门 | |
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sleepers
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| n.卧铺（通常以复数形式出现）；卧车( sleeper的名词复数 )；轨枕；睡觉（呈某种状态）的人；小耳环 | |
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coffins
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| n.棺材( coffin的名词复数 )；使某人早亡[死，完蛋，垮台等]之物 | |
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sockets
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| n.套接字，使应用程序能够读写与收发通讯协定(protocol)与资料的程序( Socket的名词复数 )；孔( socket的名词复数 )；（电器上的）插口；托座；凹穴 | |
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vividly
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| adv.清楚地，鲜明地，生动地 | |
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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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speculation
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| n.思索，沉思；猜测；投机 | |
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propounds
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| v.提出（问题、计划等）供考虑[讨论]，提议( propound的第三人称单数 ) | |
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guise
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| n.外表，伪装的姿态 | |
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nervously
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| adv.神情激动地，不安地 | |
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perennially
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| adv.经常出现地；长期地；持久地；永久地 | |
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justified
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| a.正当的，有理的 | |
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premature
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| adj.比预期时间早的；不成熟的，仓促的 | |
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wan
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| (wide area network)广域网 | |
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frail
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| adj.身体虚弱的；易损坏的 | |
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labyrinth
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| n.迷宫；难解的事物；迷路 | |
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triumphantly
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| ad.得意洋洋地；得胜地；成功地 | |
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preys
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| v.掠食( prey的第三人称单数 )；掠食；折磨；（人）靠欺诈为生 | |
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