He could hardly discern her till, glancing inquiringly, he said, "What--Miss Henchard--and are ye up so airly?"
She asked him to pardon her for waylaying6 him at such an unseemly time. "But I am anxious to mention something," she said. "And I wished not to alarm Mrs. Farfrae by calling."
"Yes?" said he, with the cheeriness of a superior. "And what may it be? It's very kind of ye, I'm sure."
She now felt the difficulty of conveying to his mind the exact aspect of possibilities in her own. But she somehow began, and introduced Henchard's name. "I sometimes fear," she said with an effort, "that he may be betrayed into some attempt to--insult you, sir.
"But we are the best of friends?"
"Or to play some practical joke upon you, sir. Remember that he has been hardly used."
"But we are quite friendly?"
"Or to do something--that would injure you--hurt you--wound you." Every word cost her twice its length of pain. And she could see that Farfrae was still incredulous. Henchard, a poor man in his employ, was not to Farfrae's view the Henchard who had ruled him. Yet he was not only the same man, but that man with his sinister7 qualities, formerly8 latent, quickened into life by his buffetings.
Farfrae, happy, and thinking no evil, persisted in making light of her fears. Thus they parted, and she went homeward, journeymen now being in the street, waggoners going to the harness-makers for articles left to be repaired, farm-horses going to the shoeing-smiths, and the sons of labour showing themselves generally on the move. Elizabeth entered her lodging9 unhappily, thinking she had done no good, and only made herself appear foolish by her weak note of warning.
But Donald Farfrae was one of those men upon whom an incident is never absolutely lost. He revised impressions from a subsequent point of view, and the impulsive10 judgment11 of the moment was not always his permanent one. The vision of Elizabeth's earnest face in the rimy dawn came back to him several times during the day. Knowing the solidity of her character he did not treat her hints altogether as idle sounds.
But he did not desist from a kindly12 scheme on Henchard's account that engaged him just then; and when he met Lawyer Joyce, the town-clerk, later in the day, he spoke13 of it as if nothing had occurred to damp it.
"About that little seedsman's shop," he said, "the shop overlooking the churchyard, which is to let. It is not for myself I want it, but for our unlucky fellow-townsman Henchard. It would be a new beginning for him, if a small one; and I have told the Council that I would head a private subscription15 among them to set him up in it--that I would be fifty pounds, if they would make up the other fifty among them."
"Yes, yes; so I've heard; and there's nothing to say against it for that matter," the town-clerk replied, in his plain, frank way. "But, Farfrae, others see what you don't. Henchard hates 'ee--ay, hates 'ee; and 'tis right that you should know it. To my knowledge he was at the Three Mariners16 last night, saying in public that about you which a man ought not to say about another."
"Is that so--ah, is that so?" said Farfrae, looking down. "Why should he do it?" added the young man bitterly; "what harm have I done him that he should try to wrong me?"
"God only knows," said Joyce, lifting his eyebrows17. "It shows much long-suffering in you to put up with him, and keep him in your employ."
"But I cannet discharge a man who was once a good friend to me. How can I forget that when I came here 'twas he enabled me to make a footing for mysel'? No, no. As long as I've a day's work to offer he shall do it if he chooses. 'Tis not I who will deny him such a little as that. But I'll drop the idea of establishing him in a shop till I can think more about it."
It grieved Farfrae much to give up this scheme. But a damp having been thrown over it by these and other voices in the air, he went and countermanded18 his orders. The then occupier of the shop was in it when Farfrae spoke to him and feeling it necessary to give some explanation of his withdrawal19 from the negotiation20 Donald mentioned Henchard's name, and stated that the intentions of the Council had been changed.
The occupier was much disappointed, and straight-way informed Henchard, as soon as he saw him, that a scheme of the Council for setting him up in a shop had been knocked on the head by Farfrae. And thus out of error enmity grew.
When Farfrae got indoors that evening the tea-kettle was singing on the high hob of the semi-egg-shaped grate. Lucetta, light as a sylph, ran forward and seized his hands, whereupon Farfrae duly kissed her.
"Oh!" she cried playfully, turning to the window. "See--the blinds are not drawn21 down, and the people can look in--what a scandal!"
When the candles were lighted, the curtains drawn, and the twain sat at tea, she noticed that he looked serious. Without directly inquiring why she let her eyes linger solicitously22 on his face.
"Who has called?" he absently asked. "Any folk for me?"
"No," said Lucetta. "What's the matter, Donald?"
"Well--nothing worth talking of," he responded sadly.
"Then, never mind it. You will get through it, Scotchmen are always lucky."
"No--not always!" he said, shaking his head gloomily as he contemplated23 a crumb24 on the table. "I know many who have not been so! There was Sandy Macfarlane, who started to America to try his fortune, and he was drowned; and Archibald Leith, he was murdered! And poor Willie Dunbleeze and Maitland Macfreeze--they fell into bad courses, and went the way of all such!"
"Why--you old goosey--I was only speaking in a general sense, of course! You are always so literal. Now when we have finished tea, sing me that funny song about high-heeled shoon and siller tags, and the one-and-forty wooers."
"No, no. I couldna sing to-night! It's Henchard--he hates me; so that I may not be his friend if I would. I would understand why there should be a wee bit of envy; but I cannet see a reason for the whole intensity25 of what he feels. Now, can you, Lucetta? It is more like old-fashioned rivalry26 in love than just a bit of rivalry in trade."
Lucetta had grown somewhat wan14. "No," she replied.
"I give him employment--I cannet refuse it. But neither can I blind myself to the fact that with a man of passions such as his, there is no safeguard for conduct!"
"What have you heard--O Donald, dearest?" said Lucetta in alarm. The words on her lips were "anything about me?"--but she did not utter them. She could not, however, suppress her agitation27, and her eyes filled with tears.
"No, no--it is not so serious as ye fancy," declared Farfrae soothingly28; though he did not know its seriousness so well as she.
"I wish you would do what we have talked of," mournfully remarked Lucetta. "Give up business, and go away from here. We have plenty of money, and why should we stay?"
Farfrae seemed seriously disposed to discuss this move, and they talked thereon till a visitor was announced. Their neighbour Alderman Vatt came in.
"You've heard, I suppose of poor Doctor Chalkfield's death? Yes--died this afternoon at five," said Mr. Vatt Chalkfield was the Councilman who had succeeded to the Mayoralty in the preceding November.
Farfrae was sorry at the intelligence, and Mr. Vatt continued: "Well, we know he's been going some days, and as his family is well provided for we must take it all as it is. Now I have called to ask 'ee this--quite privately29. If I should nominate 'ee to succeed him, and there should be no particular opposition30, will 'ee accept the chair?"
"But there are folk whose turn is before mine; and I'm over young, and may be thought pushing!" said Farfrae after a pause.
"Not at all. I don't speak for myself only, several have named it. You won't refuse?"
"We thought of going away," interposed Lucetta, looking at Farfrae anxiously.
"It was only a fancy," Farfrae murmured. "I wouldna refuse if it is the wish of a respectable majority in the Council."
"Very well, then, look upon yourself as elected. We have had older men long enough."
When he was gone Farfrae said musingly31, "See now how it's ourselves that are ruled by the Powers above us! We plan this, but we do that. If they want to make me Mayor I will stay, and Henchard must rave32 as he will."
From this evening onward33 Lucetta was very uneasy. If she had not been imprudence incarnate34 she would not have acted as she did when she met Henchard by accident a day or two later. It was in the bustle35 of the market, when no one could readily notice their discourse36.
"Michael," said she, "I must again ask you what I asked you months ago--to return me any letters or papers of mine that you may have--unless you have destroyed them? You must see how desirable it is that the time at Jersey37 should be blotted38 out, for the good of all parties."
"Why, bless the woman!--I packed up every scrap39 of your handwriting to give you in the coach--but you never appeared."
She explained how the death of her aunt had prevented her taking the journey on that day. "And what became of the parcel then?" she asked.
He could not say--he would consider. When she was gone he recollected40 that he had left a heap of useless papers in his former dining-room safe--built up in the wall of his old house--now occupied by Farfrae. The letters might have been amongst them.
A grotesque41 grin shaped itself on Henchard's face. Had that safe been opened?
On the very evening which followed this there was a great ringing of bells in Casterbridge, and the combined brass42, wood, catgut, and leather bands played round the town with more prodigality43 of percussion-notes than ever. Farfrae was Mayor--the two-hundredth odd of a series forming an elective dynasty dating back to the days of Charles I--and the fair Lucetta was the courted of the town....But, Ah! the worm i' the bud--Henchard; what he could tell!
He, in the meantime, festering with indignation at some erroneous intelligence of Farfrae's opposition to the scheme for installing him in the little seed-shop, was greeted with the news of the municipal election (which, by reason of Farfrae's comparative youth and his Scottish nativity--a thing unprecedented44 in the case--had an interest far beyond the ordinary). The bell-ringing and the band-playing, loud as Tamerlane's trumpet45, goaded46 the downfallen Henchard indescribably: the ousting47 now seemed to him to be complete.
The next morning he went to the corn-yard as usual, and about eleven o'clock Donald entered through the green door, with no trace of the worshipful about him. The yet more emphatic48 change of places between him and Henchard which this election had established renewed a slight embarrassment49 in the manner of the modest young man; but Henchard showed the front of one who had overlooked all this; and Farfrae met his amenities50 half-way at once.
"I was going to ask you," said Henchard, "about a packet that I may possibly have left in my old safe in the diningroom." He added particulars.
"If so, it is there now," said Farfrae. "I have never opened the safe at all as yet; for I keep ma papers at the bank, to sleep easy o' nights."
"It was not of much consequence--to me," said Henchard. "But I'll call for it this evening, if you don't mind?"
It was quite late when he fulfilled his promise. He had primed himself with grog, as he did very frequently now, and a curl of sardonic51 humour hung on his lip as he approached the house, as though he were contemplating52 some terrible form of amusement. Whatever it was, the incident of his entry did not diminish its force, this being his first visit to the house since he had lived there as owner. The ring of the bell spoke to him like the voice of a familiar drudge53 who had been bribed54 to forsake55 him; the movements of the doors were revivals56 of dead days.
Farfrae invited him into the dining-room, where he at once unlocked the iron safe built into the wall, HIS, Henchard's safe, made by an ingenious locksmith under his direction. Farfrae drew thence the parcel, and other papers, with apologies for not having returned them.
"Never mind," said Henchard drily. "The fact is they are letters mostly....Yes," he went on, sitting down and unfolding Lucetta's passionate57 bundle, "here they be. That ever I should see 'em again! I hope Mrs. Farfrae is well after her exertions58 of yesterday?"
"She has felt a bit weary; and has gone to bed airly on that account.
Henchard returned to the letters, sorting them over with interest, Farfrae being seated at the other end of the dining-table. "You don't forget, of course," he resumed, "that curious chapter in the history of my past which I told you of, and that you gave me some assistance in? These letters are, in fact, related to that unhappy business. Though, thank God, it is all over now."
"What became of the poor woman?" asked Farfrae.
"Luckily she married, and married well," said Henchard. "So that these reproaches she poured out on me do not now cause me any twinges, as they might otherwise have done....Just listen to what an angry woman will say!"
Farfrae, willing to humour Henchard, though quite uninterested, and bursting with yawns, gave well-mannered attention.
"'For me,'" Henchard read, "'there is practically no future. A creature too unconventionally devoted59 to you--who feels it impossible that she can be the wife of any other man; and who is yet no more to you than the first woman you meet in the street--such am I. I quite acquit60 you of any intention to wrong me, yet you are the door through which wrong has come to me. That in the event of your present wife's death you will place me in her position is a consolation61 so far as it goes--but how far does it go? Thus I sit here, forsaken62 by my few acquaintance, and forsaken by you!'"
"That's how she went on to me," said Henchard, "acres of words like that, when what had happened was what I could not cure."
"Yes," said Farfrae absently, "it is the way wi' women." But the fact was that he knew very little of the sex; yet detecting a sort of resemblance in style between the effusions of the woman he worshipped and those of the supposed stranger, he concluded that Aphrodite ever spoke thus, whosesoever the personality she assumed.
Henchard unfolded another letter, and read it through likewise, stopping at the subscription as before. "Her name I don't give," he said blandly63. "As I didn't marry her, and another man did, I can scarcely do that in fairness to her."
"Tr-rue, tr-rue," said Farfrae. "But why didn't you marry her when your wife Susan died?" Farfrae asked this and the other questions in the comfortably indifferent tone of one whom the matter very remotely concerned.
"Ah--well you may ask that!" said Henchard, the new-moonshaped grin adumbrating64 itself again upon his mouth. "In spite of all her protestations, when I came forward to do so, as in generosity65 bound, she was not the woman for me."
"She had already married another--maybe?"
Henchard seemed to think it would be sailing too near the wind to descend66 further into particulars, and he answered "Yes."
"The young lady must have had a heart that bore transplanting very readily!"
"She had, she had," said Henchard emphatically.
He opened a third and fourth letter, and read. This time he approached the conclusion as if the signature were indeed coming with the rest. But again he stopped short. The truth was that, as may be divined, he had quite intended to effect a grand catastrophe67 at the end of this drama by reading out the name, he had come to the house with no other thought. But sitting here in cold blood he could not do it.
Such a wrecking68 of hearts appalled69 even him. His quality was such that he could have annihilated70 them both in the heat of action; but to accomplish the deed by oral poison was beyond the nerve of his enmity.
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1
dense
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| a.密集的，稠密的，浓密的；密度大的 | |
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borough
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| n.享有自治权的市镇；(英)自治市镇 | |
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boughs
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| 大树枝( bough的名词复数 ) | |
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wafted
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| v.吹送，飘送，（使）浮动( waft的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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simultaneously
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| adv.同时发生地，同时进行地 | |
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waylaying
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| v.拦截，拦路( waylay的现在分词 ) | |
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sinister
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| adj.不吉利的，凶恶的，左边的 | |
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formerly
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| adv.从前，以前 | |
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lodging
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| n.寄宿，住所；(大学生的)校外宿舍 | |
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impulsive
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| adj.冲动的，刺激的；有推动力的 | |
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judgment
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| n.审判；判断力，识别力，看法，意见 | |
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kindly
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| adj.和蔼的，温和的，爽快的；adv.温和地，亲切地 | |
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spoke
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| n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说 | |
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wan
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| (wide area network)广域网 | |
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subscription
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| n.预订，预订费，亲笔签名，调配法，下标（处方） | |
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mariners
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| 海员，水手（mariner的复数形式） | |
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eyebrows
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| 眉毛( eyebrow的名词复数 ) | |
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countermanded
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| v.取消（命令），撤回( countermand的过去分词 ) | |
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withdrawal
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| n.取回，提款；撤退，撤军；收回，撤销 | |
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negotiation
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| n.谈判，协商 | |
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drawn
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| v.拖，拉，拔出；adj.憔悴的，紧张的 | |
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solicitously
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| adv.热心地，热切地 | |
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contemplated
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| adj. 预期的 动词contemplate的过去分词形式 | |
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crumb
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| n.饼屑，面包屑，小量 | |
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intensity
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| n.强烈，剧烈；强度；烈度 | |
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rivalry
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| n.竞争，竞赛，对抗 | |
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agitation
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| n.搅动；搅拌；鼓动，煽动 | |
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soothingly
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| adv.抚慰地，安慰地；镇痛地 | |
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privately
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| adv.以私人的身份，悄悄地，私下地 | |
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opposition
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| n.反对，敌对 | |
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musingly
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| adv.沉思地，冥想地 | |
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rave
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| vi.胡言乱语；热衷谈论；n.热情赞扬 | |
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onward
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| adj.向前的，前进的；adv.向前，前进，在先 | |
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incarnate
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| adj.化身的，人体化的，肉色的 | |
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bustle
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| v.喧扰地忙乱，匆忙，奔忙；n.忙碌；喧闹 | |
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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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jersey
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| n.运动衫 | |
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blotted
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| 涂污( blot的过去式和过去分词 )； （用吸墨纸）吸干 | |
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scrap
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| n.碎片；废料；v.废弃，报废 | |
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recollected
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| adj.冷静的；镇定的；被回忆起的；沉思默想的v.记起，想起( recollect的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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grotesque
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| adj.怪诞的，丑陋的；n.怪诞的图案，怪人（物） | |
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brass
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| n.黄铜；黄铜器，铜管乐器 | |
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prodigality
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| n.浪费，挥霍 | |
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unprecedented
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| adj.无前例的，新奇的 | |
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trumpet
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| n.喇叭，喇叭声；v.吹喇叭，吹嘘 | |
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goaded
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| v.刺激( goad的过去式和过去分词 )；激励；（用尖棒）驱赶；驱使（或怂恿、刺激）某人 | |
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ousting
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| 驱逐( oust的现在分词 )； 革职； 罢黜； 剥夺 | |
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emphatic
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| adj.强调的，着重的；无可置疑的，明显的 | |
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embarrassment
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| n.尴尬；使人为难的人(事物)；障碍；窘迫 | |
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amenities
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| n.令人愉快的事物；礼仪；礼节；便利设施；礼仪( amenity的名词复数 )；便利设施；（环境等的）舒适；（性情等的）愉快 | |
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sardonic
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| adj.嘲笑的，冷笑的，讥讽的 | |
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contemplating
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| 深思，细想，仔细考虑( contemplate的现在分词 )； 注视，凝视； 考虑接受（发生某事的可能性）； 深思熟虑，沉思，苦思冥想 | |
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53
drudge
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| n.劳碌的人；v.做苦工，操劳 | |
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bribed
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| v.贿赂( bribe的过去式和过去分词 )；向（某人）行贿，贿赂 | |
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55
forsake
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| vt.遗弃，抛弃；舍弃，放弃 | |
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56
revivals
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| n.复活( revival的名词复数 )；再生；复兴；（老戏多年后）重新上演 | |
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57
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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exertions
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| n.努力( exertion的名词复数 )；费力；（能力、权力等的）运用；行使 | |
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devoted
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| adj.忠诚的，忠实的，热心的，献身于...的 | |
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60
acquit
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| vt.宣判无罪；(oneself)使(自己)表现出 | |
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consolation
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| n.安慰，慰问 | |
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62
Forsaken
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| adj. 被遗忘的, 被抛弃的 动词forsake的过去分词 | |
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63
blandly
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| adv.温和地，殷勤地 | |
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adumbrating
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| v.约略显示，勾画出…的轮廓( adumbrate的现在分词 ) | |
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65
generosity
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| n.大度，慷慨，慷慨的行为 | |
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66
descend
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| vt./vi.传下来，下来，下降 | |
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67
catastrophe
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| n.大灾难，大祸 | |
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68
wrecking
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| 破坏 | |
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69
appalled
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| v.使惊骇，使充满恐惧( appall的过去式和过去分词)adj.惊骇的；丧胆的 | |
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annihilated
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| v.（彻底）消灭( annihilate的过去式和过去分词 )；使无效；废止；彻底击溃 | |
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