“You’re a brick!” he exclaimed, emphatically slapping the youth’s shoulders, “a regular brick! The inspector1 told me they ought never to have sent you to such an hole, and I may tell you now that Chapman has been expecting you to throw it up ever since you went out. Well,” he went on as he drew his guest into the parlor2, chasing out a few of his children in order to gain space and silence, “and so you’re going to leave us for good, and be off to the old country again; I dare say you’re right. Australia is pretty much played out. Things are not what they were when I came out. There’ll be a bust-up some day, mark my words. Droughts and theology, deserts and dry bones, that will undo3 the place. What would old Buckle4 have said? Curious action of the climate, eh? But we brought the virus with us from the old land. Coelum non animum.”
During dinner Williams drew out the youth regarding his future movements: “So you think of going in for the law? I don’t know that you could do better. It’s the path to open a career for young talents. I was going in for the law once but my health broke down so they sent me out here — thirty years ago now. Well, perhaps you won’t regret the time you’ve spent in Australia when you’ve got your chambers5 in some old court in the Temple.”
The younger man rose, for he had various matters to settle in Ayr before the coach left. When he came back a few hours later out of the hot dusty road, he found the schoolmaster asleep over the “Stockwhip” with his head on his arms, and a jug6 of shandy gaff beside him. The youth refrained from rousing him; but as the coach rumbled7 heavily off, his last vision of Ayr was a glimpse of the wiry little man running down the street and waving his hat in farewell.
At Sydney, instead of seeking quarters in Castlereagh Street, he went to a boarding-house in the corner of Wynyard Square. It was a highly respectable establishment, even patronised by distinguished8 missionaries9 from Pacific islands; after breakfast every morning a gaunt young Scotchman offered up a long prayer in which with much fervent10 repetition he would insist that all our righteousness is but as filthy11 rags. The young schoolmaster adapted himself to the ways of the place with his usual calm tolerance12 of everything that had no hold on his own inner life, and made as little attempt to flee from the Scotchman’s filthy rags at this house as from the young woman’s chignon at the other.
In this brief camping-space on the road of life he lived as in a dream, making no attempt to reconcile the haunting thoughts of yesterday with the eager thoughts of tomorrow. On the morning after his arrival he strolled along the wharves13, into the Botanic Gardens, the Public Library, the long meandering14 curves of George Street, round by the University, bidding goodbye to his old haunts. On his way back he dropped in at his barber’s an old man in George Street to whom he had often been before. “And so you’re going home? To live at Croydon again? Ah, Croydon!” exclaimed the old man, “Ah, dear; many’s the time I’ve eaten walnuts15 at Croydon Fair. All done away with now, is it? Ah, dear, dear. Yes, the happiest days of my life were spent at Croydon, long before you were born. Ah, Croydon Fair. You don’t get such walnuts out here; dried up things. Ah, dear, dear.” And he left the chattering16 old man lost in memories to return to his room in Wynyard Square. As he looked out of the window at the hard bright sunlight stretching far along the street opposite, the old barber’s mood of reverie seemed to find an echo in him, and the child of the north gazed for the last time, half absently, half wistfully, at the things that were vanishing from his sight.
The leisurely17 voyage in a sailing ship gave him time to review his experiences. He associated a little with the other passengers, and more often quietly observed them: the silent suspicious clergyman stealing about with slippered18 feet; the jovial19, red-faced priest returning after a long life spent in the bush, with the bishop’s Latin letter in his pocket, to visit old Tipperary once more; the hot-eyed mate carrying on an intrigue20 with the second-class passenger who occupied a cabin alone with her little child; the grammar-school master eager to see for himself the strange beautiful old country described by Dickens and Washington Irving; the graceful21 Irish woman, pure of heart and free of tongue, sometimes desiring to thrust a skewer22 through that indiscreet member; the lanky23 lad who was going to Edinburgh to study medicine and the clergyman’s daughter, dark and bright-eyed, who crept in together between the lifeboats to spend long evening hours. He noted24 all these things, but they were only the setting to his own thoughts which went back, again and again, to Kanga Creek25. He knew where she was now; he could picture it all; the town on the Hawkesbury where her father was mayor, and her daily life there; household work in the morning, perhaps cleaning a grate or preparing dinner; then an hour’s singing at the piano; in the afternoon, most likely, a canter on horseback with her brothers, and in the evening, may be, a dance to which her friends would be called in — the bank manager, no doubt, the surveyor and the solicitor’s clerk — and she would be whirled round in a waltz, flushed and delighted, on the arms of one of these fellows who would then take her out to the cool verandah where she would bury her hot face in the frozen sweetness of a great slice of melon as she listened to his pretty speeches. Oh, he knew it all! She thought him a child, and as an inexperienced child he had behaved. And she lived in a cheerful, easy-going little world from which he was aloof26, and yet was filled with resentment27 at his aloofness28. He clenched29 his fists in his ulster pockets and pressed the nails into the flesh as he walked rapidly up and down the poop, striving to forget, to forget, his thoughts persistently30 on the future.
As the ship cut swiftly through the great blue foam-edged waves his thoughts were pressing into the future, reaching forward to the time when, as he could not know, he would look back to the days that were past as to the sweetest thing that life could give, when he would thirst for the strange solitudes31 that the black man has left and the white man has not yet taken for his own, and where the mystery of the early world is still alive, for the great silvery gums bursting out of their tattered32 garments of bark, for the tremulous fragrant33 gold of the drooping34 wattles in spring.
All this was long ago. A succession of teachers have kept school at Kanga Creek since these things happened. And the pale young man with the tight lips who is now schoolmaster at the Creek knows nothing of any alphabet of love once taught in that place. He works up his school, he drudges35 on as he awaits the inspector’s visit, he looks ambitiously forward to the promotion36 which will some day deliver him from the lonely and hated bush; to this end he works in schoolhours and out. Perhaps sometimes an intangible presence, the echo of a feminine voice, the rustle37 of a woman’s clothing, the faint fragrance38 of a woman’s body, may come out of the past to haunt the old schoolhouse and make the plodding39 schoolmaster restless, he cannot tell why. It may be only the breath of Nature expanding the rosebuds40 on the verandah posts or fashioning the little breasts of the girls whose prattling41 laughter arises from between the saplings below. But however that may be, surely in the autumn nights the great wind still tumbles among the hills like a sea, bearing into the valley the far rumor42 of the wide world outside, and the giant myrtles still mount high to be kissed by the rising moon, and the flowers spread abroad their prodigal43 loveliness. And the little birds still play at their early games of love.
The End
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1
inspector
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| n.检查员，监察员，视察员 | |
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2
parlor
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| n.店铺，营业室；会客室，客厅 | |
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3
undo
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| vt.解开，松开；取消，撤销 | |
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4
buckle
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| n.扣子，带扣；v.把...扣住，由于压力而弯曲 | |
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5
chambers
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| n.房间( chamber的名词复数 )；（议会的）议院；卧室；会议厅 | |
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6
jug
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| n.(有柄，小口，可盛水等的)大壶，罐，盂 | |
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7
rumbled
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| 发出隆隆声，发出辘辘声( rumble的过去式和过去分词 )； 轰鸣着缓慢行进； 发现…的真相； 看穿（阴谋） | |
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8
distinguished
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| adj.卓越的，杰出的，著名的 | |
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9
missionaries
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| n.传教士( missionary的名词复数 ) | |
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10
fervent
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| adj.热的，热烈的，热情的 | |
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11
filthy
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| adj.卑劣的；恶劣的，肮脏的 | |
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12
tolerance
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| n.宽容；容忍，忍受；耐药力；公差 | |
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13
wharves
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| n.码头，停泊处( wharf的名词复数 ) | |
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14
meandering
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| 蜿蜒的河流，漫步，聊天 | |
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15
walnuts
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| 胡桃（树）( walnut的名词复数 )； 胡桃木 | |
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16
chattering
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| n. （机器振动发出的）咔嗒声，(鸟等)鸣，啁啾 adj. 喋喋不休的，啾啾声的 动词chatter的现在分词形式 | |
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17
leisurely
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| adj.悠闲的；从容的，慢慢的 | |
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18
slippered
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| 穿拖鞋的 | |
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jovial
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| adj.快乐的，好交际的 | |
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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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21
graceful
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| adj.优美的，优雅的；得体的 | |
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22
skewer
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| n.（烤肉用的）串肉杆；v.用杆串好 | |
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23
lanky
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| adj.瘦长的 | |
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24
noted
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| adj.著名的，知名的 | |
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25
creek
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| n.小溪，小河，小湾 | |
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26
aloof
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| adj.远离的；冷淡的，漠不关心的 | |
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27
resentment
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| n.怨愤，忿恨 | |
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28
aloofness
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| 超然态度 | |
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29
clenched
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| v.紧握，抓紧，咬紧( clench的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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30
persistently
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| ad.坚持地；固执地 | |
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31
solitudes
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| n.独居( solitude的名词复数 )；孤独；荒僻的地方；人迹罕至的地方 | |
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32
tattered
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| adj.破旧的，衣衫破的 | |
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33
fragrant
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| adj.芬香的，馥郁的，愉快的 | |
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34
drooping
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| adj. 下垂的，无力的 动词droop的现在分词 | |
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35
drudges
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| n.做苦工的人，劳碌的人( drudge的名词复数 ) | |
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36
promotion
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| n.提升，晋级；促销，宣传 | |
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37
rustle
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| v.沙沙作响；偷盗(牛、马等)；n.沙沙声声 | |
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38
fragrance
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| n.芬芳，香味，香气 | |
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39
plodding
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| a.proceeding in a slow or dull way | |
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40
rosebuds
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| 蔷薇花蕾，妙龄少女，初入社交界的少女( rosebud的名词复数 ) | |
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41
prattling
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| v.（小孩般）天真无邪地说话( prattle的现在分词 )；发出连续而无意义的声音；闲扯；东拉西扯 | |
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42
rumor
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| n.谣言，谣传，传说 | |
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43
prodigal
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| adj.浪费的，挥霍的，放荡的 | |
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