Next morning Mr. Hanson informed him coldly of the necessity of punching the time-clock at seven every morning, and delivered him for instruction into the hands of a fellow worker, one Charley Moore.
Charley was twenty-six, with that faint musk1 of weakness hanging about him that is often mistaken for the scent2 of evil. It took no psychological examiner to decide that he had drifted into indulgence and laziness as casually3 as he had drifted into life, and was to drift out. He was pale and his clothes stank4 of smoke; he enjoyed burlesque5 shows, billiards6, and Robert Service, and was always looking back upon his last intrigue7 or forward to his next one. In his youth his taste had run to loud ties, but now it seemed to have faded, like his vitality8, and was expressed in pale-lilac four-in-hands and indeterminate gray collars. Charley was listlessly struggling that losing struggle against mental, moral, and physical an?mia that takes place ceaselessly on the lower fringe of the middle classes.
The first morning he stretched himself on a row of cereal cartons and carefully went over the limitations of the Theron G. Macy Company.
“It’s a piker organization. My Gosh! Lookit what they give me. I’m quittin’ in a coupla months. Hell! Me stay with this bunch!”
The Charley Moores are always going to change jobs next month. They do, once or twice in their careers, after which they sit around comparing their last job with the present one, to the infinite disparagement9 of the latter.
“What do you get?” asked Dalyrimple curiously10.
“Me? I get sixty.” This rather defiantly11.
“Did you start at sixty?”
“Me? No, I started at thirty-five. He told me he’d put me on the road after I learned the stock. That’s what he tells ’em all.”
“How long’ve you been here?” asked Dalyrimple with a sinking sensation.
“Me? Four years. My last year, too, you bet your boots.”
Dalyrimple rather resented the presence of the store detective as he resented the time-clock, and he came into contact with him almost immediately through the rule against smoking. This rule was a thorn in his side. He was accustomed to his three or four cigarettes in a morning, and after three days without it he followed Charley Moore by a circuitous12 route up a flight of back stairs to a little balcony where they indulged in peace. But this was not for long. One day in his second week the detective met him in a nook of the stairs, on his descent, and told him sternly that next time he’d be reported to Mr. Macy. Dalyrimple felt like an errant schoolboy.
Unpleasant facts came to his knowledge. There were “cave- dwellers” in the basement who had worked there for ten or fifteen years at sixty dollars a month, rolling barrels and carrying boxes through damp, cement-walled corridors, lost in that echoing half-darkness between seven and five-thirty and, like himself, compelled several times a month to work until nine at night.
At the end of a month he stood in line and received forty dollars. He pawned13 a cigarette-case and a pair of field-glasses and managed to live — to eat, sleep, and smoke. It was, however, a narrow scrape; as the ways and means of economy were a closed book to him and the second month brought no increase, he voiced his alarm.
“If you’ve got a drag with old Macy, maybe he’ll raise you,” was Charley’s disheartening reply. “But he didn’t raise ME till I’d been here nearly two years.”
“I’ve got to live,” said Dalyrimple simply. “I could get more pay as a laborer15 on the railroad but, Golly, I want to feel I’m where there’s a chance to get ahead.”
Charles shook his head sceptically and Mr. Macy’s answer next day was equally unsatisfactory.
Dalyrimple had gone to the office just before closing time.
“Mr. Macy, I’d like to speak to you.”
“Why — yes.” The unhumorous smile appeared. The voice vas faintly resentful.
“I want to speak to you in regard to more salary.”
Mr. Macy nodded.
“Well,” he said doubtfully, “I don’t know exactly what you’re doing. I’ll speak to Mr. Hanson.”
He knew exactly what Dalyrimple was doing, and Dalyrimple knew he knew.
“I’m in the stock-room — and, sir, while I’m here I’d like to ask you how much longer I’ll have to stay there.”
“Why — I’m not sure exactly. Of course it takes some time to learn the stock.”
“You told me two months when I started.”
“Yes. Well, I’ll speak to Mr. Hanson.”
Dalyrimple paused irresolute16.
“Thank you, sir.”
Two days later he again appeared in the office with the result of a count that had been asked for by Mr. Hesse, the bookkeeper. Mr. Hesse was engaged and Dalyrimple, waiting, began idly fingering in a ledger17 on the stenographer’s desk.
Half unconsciously he turned a page — he caught sight of his name — it was a salary list:
Dalyrimple
Demming
Donahoe
Everett
His eyes stopped —
Everett. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .$60
So Tom Everett, Macy’s weak-chinned nephew, had started at sixty — and in three weeks he had been out of the packing-room and into the office.
So that was it! He was to sit and see man after man pushed over him: sons, cousins, sons of friends, irrespective of their capabilities18, while HE was cast for a pawn14, with “going on the road” dangled19 before his eyes — put of with the stock remark: I’ll see; I’ll look into it.” At forty, perhaps, he would be a bookkeeper like old Hesse, tired, listless Hesse with a dull routine for his stint20 and a dull background of boarding-house conversation.
This was a moment when a genii should have pressed into his hand the book for disillusioned21 young men. But the book has not been written.
A great protest swelling22 into revolt surged up in him. Ideas half forgotten, chaoticly perceived and assimilated, filled his mind. Get on — that was the rule of life — and that was all. How he did it, didn’t matter — but to be Hesse or Charley Moore.
“I won’t!” he cried aloud.
The bookkeeper and the stenographers looked up in surprise.
“What?”
For a second Dalyrimple stared — then walked up to the desk.
“Here’s that data,” he said brusquely. “I can’t wait any longer.”
Mr. Hesse’s face expressed surprise.
It didn’t matter what he did — just so he got out of this rut. In a dream he stepped from the elevator into the stock-room, and walking to an unused aisle23, sat down on a box, covering his face with his hands.
His brain was whirring with the frightful24 jar of discovering a platitude25 for himself.
“I’ve got to get out of this,” he said aloud and then repeated, “I’ve got to get out”— and he didn’t mean only out of Macy’s wholesale26 house.
When he left at five-thirty it was pouring rain, but he struck off in the opposite direction from his boarding-house, feeling, in the first cool moisture that oozed27 soggily through his old suit, an odd exultation28 and freshness. He wanted a world that was like walking through rain, even though he could not see far ahead of him, but fate had put him in the world of Mr. Macy’s fetid storerooms and corridors. At first merely the overwhelming need of change took him, then half-plans began to formulate29 in his imagination.
“I’ll go East — to a big city — meet people — bigger people — people who’ll help me. Interesting work somewhere. My God, there MUST be.”
With sickening truth it occurred to him that his facility for meeting people was limited. Of all places it was here in his own town that he should be known, was known — famous — before the water of oblivion had rolled over him.
You had to cut corners, that was all. Pull — relationship — wealthy marriages ——
For several miles the continued reiteration31 of this preoccupied32 him and then he perceived that the rain had become thicker and more opaque33 in the heavy gray of twilight34 and that the houses were falling away. The district of full blocks, then of big houses, then of scattering35 little ones, passed and great sweeps of misty36 country opened out on both sides. It was hard walking here. The sidewalk had given place to a dirt road, streaked37 with furious brown rivulets38 that splashed and squashed around his shoes.
Cutting corners — the words began to fall apart, forming curious phrasings — little illuminated39 pieces of themselves. They resolved into sentences, each of which had a strangely familiar ring.
Cutting corners meant rejecting the old childhood principles that success came from faithfulness to duty, that evil was necessarily punished or virtue40 necessarily rewarded — that honest poverty was happier than corrupt41 riches.
It meant being hard.
This phrase appealed to him and he repeated it over and over. It had to do somehow with Mr. Macy and Charley Moore — the attitudes, the methods of each of them.
He stopped and felt his clothes. He was drenched42 to the skin. He looked about him and, selecting a place in the fence where a tree sheltered it, perched himself there.
In my credulous43 years — he thought — they told me that evil was a sort of dirty hue44, just as definite as a soiled collar, but it seems to me that evil is only a manner of hard luck, or heredity-and-environment, or “being found out.” It hides in the vacillations of dubs45 like Charley Moore as certainly as it does in the intolerance of Macy, and if it ever gets much more tangible46 it becomes merely an arbitrary label to paste on the unpleasant things in other people’s lives.
In fact — he concluded — it isn’t worth worrying over what’s evil and what isn’t. Good and evil aren’t any standard to me — and they can be a devil of a bad hindrance47 when I want something. When I want something bad enough, common sense tells me to go and take it — and not get caught.
And then suddenly Dalyrimple knew what he wanted first. He wanted fifteen dollars to pay his overdue48 board bill.
With a furious energy he jumped from the fence, whipped off his coat, and from its black lining49 cut with his knife a piece about five inches square. He made two holes near its edge and then fixed50 it on his face, pulling his hat down to hold it in place. It flapped grotesquely51 and then dampened and clung clung to his forehead and cheeks.
Now . . . The twilight had merged52 to dripping dusk . . . black as pitch. He began to walk quickly back toward town, not waiting to remove the mask but watching the road with difficulty through the jagged eye-holes. He was not conscious of any nervousness . . . the only tension was caused by a desire to do the thing as soon as possible.
He reached the first sidewalk, continued on until he saw a hedge far from any lamp-post, and turned in behind it. Within a minute he heard several series of footsteps — he waited — it was a woman and he held his breath until she passed . . . and then a man, a laborer. The next passer, he felt, would be what he wanted . . . the laborer’s footfalls died far up the drenched street . . . other steps grew nears grew suddenly louder.
“Put up your hands!”
The man stopped, uttered an absurd little grunt54, and thrust pudgy arms skyward.
Dalyrimple went through the waistcoat.
“Now, you shrimp,” he said, setting his hand suggestively to his own hip30 pocket, “you run, and stamp — loud! If I hear your feet stop I’ll put a shot after you!”
Then he stood there in sudden uncontrollable laughter as audibly frightened footsteps scurried55 away into the night.
After a moment he thrust the roll of bills into his pocket, snatched of his mask, and running quickly across the street, darted56 down an alley57.
收听单词发音 |
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musk
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| n.麝香, 能发出麝香的各种各样的植物，香猫 | |
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scent
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| n.气味，香味，香水，线索，嗅觉；v.嗅，发觉 | |
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casually
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| adv.漠不关心地，无动于衷地，不负责任地 | |
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stank
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| n. (英)坝，堰，池塘 动词stink的过去式 | |
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burlesque
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| v.嘲弄，戏仿；n.嘲弄，取笑，滑稽模仿 | |
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billiards
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| n.台球 | |
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intrigue
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| vt.激起兴趣，迷住；vi.耍阴谋；n.阴谋，密谋 | |
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vitality
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| n.活力，生命力，效力 | |
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disparagement
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| n.轻视，轻蔑 | |
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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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defiantly
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| adv.挑战地，大胆对抗地 | |
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circuitous
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| adj.迂回的路的，迂曲的，绕行的 | |
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pawned
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| v.典当，抵押( pawn的过去式和过去分词 )；以（某事物）担保 | |
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pawn
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| n.典当，抵押，小人物，走卒；v.典当，抵押 | |
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laborer
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| n.劳动者，劳工 | |
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irresolute
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| adj.无决断的，优柔寡断的，踌躇不定的 | |
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ledger
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| n.总帐，分类帐；帐簿 | |
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capabilities
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| n.能力( capability的名词复数 )；可能；容量；[复数]潜在能力 | |
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dangled
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| 悬吊着( dangle的过去式和过去分词 )； 摆动不定； 用某事物诱惑…； 吊胃口 | |
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stint
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| v.节省，限制，停止；n.舍不得化，节约，限制；连续不断的一段时间从事某件事 | |
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disillusioned
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| a.不再抱幻想的，大失所望的，幻想破灭的 | |
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swelling
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| n.肿胀 | |
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aisle
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| n.（教堂、教室、戏院等里的）过道，通道 | |
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frightful
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| adj.可怕的；讨厌的 | |
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platitude
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| n.老生常谈，陈词滥调 | |
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wholesale
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| n.批发；adv.以批发方式；vt.批发，成批出售 | |
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oozed
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| v.（浓液等）慢慢地冒出，渗出( ooze的过去式和过去分词 )；使（液体）缓缓流出；（浓液）渗出，慢慢流出 | |
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exultation
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| n.狂喜，得意 | |
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formulate
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| v.用公式表示；规划；设计；系统地阐述 | |
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hip
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| n.臀部，髋；屋脊 | |
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reiteration
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| n. 重覆, 反覆, 重说 | |
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preoccupied
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| adj.全神贯注的，入神的；被抢先占有的；心事重重的v.占据（某人）思想，使对…全神贯注，使专心于( preoccupy的过去式) | |
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opaque
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| adj.不透光的；不反光的，不传导的；晦涩的 | |
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twilight
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| n.暮光，黄昏；暮年，晚期，衰落时期 | |
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scattering
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| n.[物]散射；散乱，分散；在媒介质中的散播adj.散乱的；分散在不同范围的；广泛扩散的；（选票）数量分散的v.散射(scatter的ing形式)；散布；驱散 | |
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misty
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| adj.雾蒙蒙的，有雾的 | |
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streaked
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| adj.有条斑纹的，不安的v.快速移动( streak的过去式和过去分词 )；使布满条纹 | |
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rivulets
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| n.小河，小溪( rivulet的名词复数 ) | |
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illuminated
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| adj.被照明的；受启迪的 | |
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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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corrupt
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| v.贿赂，收买；adj.腐败的，贪污的 | |
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42
drenched
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| adj.湿透的；充满的v.使湿透( drench的过去式和过去分词 )；在某人（某物）上大量使用（某液体） | |
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credulous
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| adj.轻信的，易信的 | |
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hue
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| n.色度；色调；样子 | |
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45
dubs
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| v.给…起绰号( dub的第三人称单数 )；把…称为；配音；复制 | |
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46
tangible
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| adj.有形的，可触摸的，确凿的，实际的 | |
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hindrance
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| n.妨碍，障碍 | |
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48
overdue
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| adj.过期的，到期未付的；早该有的，迟到的 | |
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lining
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| n.衬里，衬料 | |
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50
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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51
grotesquely
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| adv. 奇异地,荒诞地 | |
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52
merged
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| （使）混合( merge的过去式和过去分词 )； 相融； 融入； 渐渐消失在某物中 | |
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53
braced
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| adj.拉牢的v.支住( brace的过去式和过去分词 )；撑牢；使自己站稳；振作起来 | |
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54
grunt
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| v.嘟哝；作呼噜声；n.呼噜声，嘟哝 | |
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55
scurried
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| v.急匆匆地走( scurry的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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56
darted
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| v.投掷，投射( dart的过去式和过去分词 )；向前冲，飞奔 | |
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alley
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| n.小巷，胡同；小径，小路 | |
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