At the present time no one I know has the slightest desire to hit Samuel Meredith; possibly this is because a man over fifty is liable to be rather severely1 cracked at the impact of a hostile fist, but, for my part, I am inclined to think that all his hitable qualities have quite vanished. But it is certain that at various times in his life hitable qualities were in his face, as surely as kissable qualities have ever lurked2 in a girl’s lips.
I’m sure every one has met a man like that, been casually3 introduced, even made a friend of him, yet felt he was the sort who aroused passionate4 dislike — expressed by some in the involuntary clinching5 of fists, and in others by mutterings about “takin’ a poke” and “landin’ a swift smash in ee eye.” In the juxtaposition6 of Samuel Meredith’s features this quality was so strong that it influenced his entire life.
What was it? Not the shape, certainly, for he was a pleasant- looking man from earliest youth: broad-bowed with gray eyes that were frank and friendly. Yet I’ve heard him tell a room full of reporters angling for a “success” story that he’d be ashamed to tell them the truth that they wouldn’t believe it, that it wasn’t one story but four, that the public would not want to read about a man who had been walloped into prominence7.
It all started at Phillips Andover Academy when he was fourteen. He had been brought up on a diet of caviar and bell-boys’ legs in half the capitals of Europe, and it was pure luck that his mother had nervous prostration8 and had to delegate his education to less tender, less biassed9 hands.
At Andover he was given a roommate named Gilly Hood10. Gilly was thirteen, undersized, and rather the school pet. From the September day when Mr. Meredith’s valet stowed Samuel’s clothing in the best bureau and asked, on departing, “hif there was hanything helse, Master Samuel?” Gilly cried out that the faculty11 had played him false. He felt like an irate12 frog in whose bowl has been put goldfish.
“Good gosh!” he complained to his sympathetic contemporaries, “he’s a damn stuck-up Willie. He said, ‘Are the crowd here gentlemen?’ and I said, ‘No, they’re boys,’ and he said age didn’t matter, and I said, ‘Who said it did?’ Let him get fresh with me, the ole pieface!”
For three weeks Gilly endured in silence young Samuel’s comments on the clothes and habits of Gilly’s personal friends, endured French phrases in conversation, endured a hundred half-feminine meannesses that show what a nervous mother can do to a boy, if she keeps close enough to him — then a storm broke in the aquarium13.
Samuel was out. A crowd had gathered to hear Gilly be wrathful about his roommate’s latest sins.
“He said, ‘Oh, I don’t like the windows open at night,’ he said, ‘except only a little bit,’” complained Gilly.
“Don’t let him boss you.”
“Boss me? You bet he won’t. I open those windows, I guess, but the darn fool won’t take turns shuttin’ ’em in the morning.”
“Make him, Gilly, why don’t you?”
“I’m going to.” Gilly nodded his head in fierce agreement. “Don’t you worry. He needn’t think I’m any ole butler.”
“Le’s see you make him.”
At this point the darn fool entered in person and included the crowd in one of his irritating smiles. Two boys said, “‘Lo, Mer’dith”; the others gave him a chilly14 glance and went on talking to Gilly. But Samuel seemed unsatisfied.
“Would you mind not sitting on my bed?” he suggested politely to two of Gilly’s particulars who were perched very much at ease.
“Huh?”
“My bed. Can’t you understand English?”
This was adding insult to injury. There were several comments on the bed’s sanitary15 condition and the evidence within it of animal life.
“S’matter with your old bed?” demanded Gilly truculently16.
“The bed’s all right, but ——”
Gilly interrupted this sentence by rising and walking up to Samuel. He paused several inches away and eyed him fiercely.
“You an’ your crazy ole bed,” he began. “You an’ your crazy ——”
“Go to it, Gilly,” murmured some one.
“Show the darn fool ——”
Samuel returned the gaze coolly.
“Well,” he said finally, “it’s my bed —— ”
He got no further, for Gilly hauled of and hit him succinctly17 in the nose.
“Yea! Gilly!”
Just let him touch you — he’ll see!”
The group closed in on them and for the first time in his life Samuel realized the insuperable inconvenience of being passionately19 detested20. He gazed around helplessly at the glowering21, violently hostile faces. He towered a head taller than his roommate, so if he hit back he’d be called a bully and have half a dozen more fights on his hands within five minutes; yet if he didn’t he was a coward. For a moment he stood there facing Gilly’s blazing eyes, and then, with a sudden choking sound, he forced his way through the ring and rushed from the room.
The month following bracketed the thirty most miserable22 days of his life. Every waking moment he was under the lashing23 tongues of his contemporaries; his habits and mannerisms became butts24 for intolerable witticisms25 and, of course, the sensitiveness of adolescence26 was a further thorn. He considered that he was a natural pariah27; that the unpopularity at school would follow him through life. When he went home for the Christmas holidays he was so despondent28 that his father sent him to a nerve specialist. When he returned to Andover he arranged to arrive late so that he could be alone in the bus during the drive from station to school.
Of course when he had learned to keep his mouth shut every one promptly29 forgot all about him. The next autumn, with his realization30 that consideration for others was the discreet31 attitude, he made good use of the clean start given him by the shortness of boyhood memory. By the beginning of his senior year Samuel Meredith was one of the best-liked boys of his class — and no one was any stronger for him than his first friend and constant companion, Gilly Hood.
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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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lurked
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| vi.潜伏，埋伏（lurk的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
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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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passionate
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| adj.热情的，热烈的，激昂的，易动情的，易怒的，性情暴躁的 | |
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clinching
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| v.（尤指两人）互相紧紧抱[扭]住( clinch的现在分词 )；解决（争端、交易），达成（协议） | |
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juxtaposition
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| n.毗邻，并置，并列 | |
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prominence
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| n.突出；显著；杰出；重要 | |
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prostration
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| n. 平伏, 跪倒, 疲劳 | |
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biassed
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| （统计试验中）结果偏倚的，有偏的 | |
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hood
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| n.头巾，兜帽，覆盖；v.罩上，以头巾覆盖 | |
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faculty
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| n.才能；学院，系；(学院或系的)全体教学人员 | |
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irate
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| adj.发怒的，生气 | |
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aquarium
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| n.水族馆，养鱼池，玻璃缸 | |
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chilly
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| adj.凉快的，寒冷的 | |
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sanitary
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| adj.卫生方面的，卫生的，清洁的，卫生的 | |
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truculently
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succinctly
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| adv.简洁地；简洁地，简便地 | |
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bully
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| n.恃强欺弱者，小流氓；vt.威胁，欺侮 | |
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passionately
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| ad.热烈地，激烈地 | |
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detested
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| v.憎恶，嫌恶，痛恨( detest的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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glowering
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| v.怒视( glower的现在分词 ) | |
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miserable
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| adj.悲惨的，痛苦的；可怜的，糟糕的 | |
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lashing
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| n.鞭打；痛斥；大量；许多v.鞭打( lash的现在分词 )；煽动；紧系；怒斥 | |
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butts
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| 笑柄( butt的名词复数 )； （武器或工具的）粗大的一端； 屁股； 烟蒂 | |
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witticisms
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| n.妙语，俏皮话( witticism的名词复数 ) | |
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adolescence
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| n.青春期，青少年 | |
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pariah
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| n.被社会抛弃者 | |
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despondent
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| adj.失望的，沮丧的，泄气的 | |
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promptly
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| adv.及时地，敏捷地 | |
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30
realization
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| n.实现；认识到，深刻了解 | |
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31
discreet
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| adj.(言行)谨慎的；慎重的；有判断力的 | |
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