The smile that is not sister to a tear.’
ELLIOTT.
Margaret and her father walked home. The night was fine, the streets clean, and with her pretty white silk, like Leezie Lindsay’s gown o’ green satin, in the ballad1, ‘kilted up to her knee,’ she was off with her father — ready to dance along with the excitement of the cool, fresh night air.
‘I rather think Thornton is not quite easy in his mind about this strike. He seemed very anxious to-night.’
‘I should wonder if he were not. But he spoke2 with his usual coolness to the others, when they suggested different things, just before we came away.’
‘So he did after dinner as well. It would take a good deal to stir him from his cool manner of speaking; but his face strikes me as anxious.’
‘I should be, if I were he. He must know of the growing anger and hardly smothered3 hatred4 of his workpeople, who all look upon him as what the Bible calls a “hard man,”— not so much unjust as unfeeling; clear in judgment5, standing6 upon his “rights” as no human being ought to stand, considering what we and all our petty rights are in the sight of the Almighty7. I am glad you think he looks anxious. When I remember Boucher’s half mad words and ways, I cannot bear to think how coolly Mr. Thornton spoke.’
‘In the first place, I am not so convinced as you are about that man Boucher’s utter distress8; for the moment, he was badly off, I don’t doubt. But there is always a mysterious supply of money from these unions; and, from what you said, it was evident the man was of a passionate9, demonstrative nature, and gave strong expression to all he felt.’
‘Oh, papa!’
‘Well! I only want you to do justice to Mr. Thornton, who is, I suspect, of an exactly opposite nature — a man who is far too proud to show his feelings. Just the character I should have thought beforehand, you would have admired, Margaret.’
‘So I do — so I should; but I don’t feel quite so sure as you do of the existence of those feelings. He is a man of great strength of character — of unusual intellect, considering the few advantages he has had.’
‘Not so few. He has led a practical life from a very early age; has been called upon to exercise judgment and self-control. All that developes one part of the intellect. To be sure, he needs some of the knowledge of the past, which gives the truest basis for conjecture10 as to the future; but he knows this need — he perceives it, and that is something. You are quite prejudiced against Mr. Thornton, Margaret.’
‘He is the first specimen11 of a manufacturer — of a person engaged in trade — that I had ever the opportunity of studying, papa. He is my first olive: let me make a face while I swallow it. I know he is good of his kind, and by and by I shall like the kind. I rather think I am already beginning to do so. I was very much interested by what the gentlemen were talking about, although I did not understand half of it. I was quite sorry when Miss Thornton came to take me to the other end of the room, saying she was sure I should be uncomfortable at being the only lady among so many gentlemen. I had never thought about it, I was so busy listening; and the ladies were so dull, papa — oh, so dull! Yet I think it was clever too. It reminded me of our old game of having each so many nouns to introduce into a sentence.’
‘What do you mean, child?’ asked Mr. Hale.
‘Why, they took nouns that were signs of things which gave evidence of wealth — housekeepers12, under-gardeners, extent of glass, valuable lace, diamonds, and all such things; and each one formed her speech so as to bring them all in, in the prettiest accidental manner possible.’
‘You will be as proud of your one servant when you get her, if all is true about her that Mrs. Thornton says.’
‘To be sure, I shall. I felt like a great hypocrite to-night, sitting there in my white silk gown, with my idle hands before me, when I remembered all the good, thorough, house-work they had done today. They took me for a fine lady, I’m sure.’
‘Even I was mistaken enough to think you looked like a lady my dear,’ said Mr. Hale, quietly smiling.
But smiles were changed to white and trembling looks, when they saw Dixon’s face, as she opened the door.
‘Oh, master! — Oh, Miss Margaret! Thank God you are come! Dr. Donaldson is here. The servant next door went for him, for the charwoman is gone home. She’s better now; but, oh, sir! I thought she’d have died an hour ago.’
Mr. Hale caught Margaret’s arm to steady himself from falling. He looked at her face, and saw an expression upon it of surprise and extremest sorrow, but not the agony of terror that contracted his own unprepared heart. She knew more than he did, and yet she listened with that hopeless expression of awed13 apprehension14.
‘Oh! I should not have left her — wicked daughter that I am!’ moaned forth15 Margaret, as she supported her trembling father’s hasty steps up-stairs. Dr. Donaldson met them on the landing.
‘She is better now,’ he whispered. ‘The opiate has taken effect. The spasms16 were very bad: no wonder they frightened your maid; but she’ll rally this time.’
‘This time! Let me go to her!’ Half an hour ago, Mr. Hale was a middle-aged17 man; now his sight was dim, his senses wavering, his walk tottering18, as if he were seventy years of age.
Dr. Donaldson took his arm, and led him into the bedroom. Margaret followed close. There lay her mother, with an unmistakable look on her face. She might be better now; she was sleeping, but Death had signed her for his own, and it was clear that ere long he would return to take possession. Mr. Hale looked at her for some time without a word. Then he began to shake all over, and, turning away from Dr. Donaldson’s anxious care, he groped to find the door; he could not see it, although several candles, brought in the sudden affright, were burning and flaring19 there. He staggered into the drawing-room, and felt about for a chair. Dr. Donaldson wheeled one to him, and placed him in it. He felt his pulse.
‘Speak to him, Miss Hale. We must rouse him.’
‘Papa!’ said Margaret, with a crying voice that was wild with pain. ‘Papa! Speak to me!’ The speculation20 came again into his eyes, and he made a great effort.
‘Margaret, did you know of this? Oh, it was cruel of you!’
‘No, sir, it was not cruel!’ replied Dr. Donaldson, with quick decision. ‘Miss Hale acted under my directions. There may have been a mistake, but it was not cruel. Your wife will be a different creature tomorrow, I trust. She has had spasms, as I anticipated, though I did not tell Miss Hale of my apprehensions21. She has taken the opiate I brought with me; she will have a good long sleep; and tomorrow, that look which has alarmed you so much will have passed away.’
‘But not the disease?’
Dr. Donaldson glanced at Margaret. Her bent22 head, her face raised with no appeal for a temporary reprieve23, showed that quick observer of human nature that she thought it better that the whole truth should be told.
‘Not the disease. We cannot touch the disease, with all our poor vaunted skill. We can only delay its progress — alleviate24 the pain it causes. Be a man, sir — a Christian25. Have faith in the immortality26 of the soul, which no pain, no mortal disease, can assail27 or touch!’
But all the reply he got, was in the choked words, ‘You have never been married, Dr. Donaldson; you do not know what it is,’ and in the deep, manly28 sobs29, which went through the stillness of the night like heavy pulses of agony. Margaret knelt by him, caressing30 him with tearful caresses31. No one, not even Dr. Donaldson, knew how the time went by. Mr. Hale was the first to dare to speak of the necessities of the present moment.
‘What must we do?’ asked he. ‘Tell us both. Margaret is my staff — my right hand.’
Dr. Donaldson gave his clear, sensible directions. No fear for to-night — nay32, even peace for tomorrow, and for many days yet. But no enduring hope of recovery. He advised Mr. Hale to go to bed, and leave only one to watch the slumber33, which he hoped would be undisturbed. He promised to come again early in the morning. And with a warm and kindly34 shake of the hand, he left them. They spoke but few words; they were too much exhausted35 by their terror to do more than decide upon the immediate36 course of action. Mr. Hale was resolved to sit up through the night, and all that Margaret could do was to prevail upon him to rest on the drawing-room sofa. Dixon stoutly37 and bluntly refused to go to bed; and, as for Margaret, it was simply impossible that she should leave her mother, let all the doctors in the world speak of ‘husbanding resources,’ and ‘one watcher only being required.’ So, Dixon sat, and stared, and winked38, and drooped39, and picked herself up again with a jerk, and finally gave up the battle, and fairly snored. Margaret had taken off her gown and tossed it aside with a sort of impatient disgust, and put on her dressing-gown. She felt as if she never could sleep again; as if her whole senses were acutely vital, and all endued40 with double keenness, for the purposes of watching. Every sight and sound — nay, even every thought, touched some nerve to the very quick. For more than two hours, she heard her father’s restless movements in the next room. He came perpetually to the door of her mother’s chamber41, pausing there to listen, till she, not hearing his close unseen presence, went and opened it to tell him how all went on, in reply to the questions his baked lips could hardly form. At last he, too, fell asleep, and all the house was still. Margaret sate42 behind the curtain thinking. Far away in time, far away in space, seemed all the interests of past days. Not more than thirty-six hours ago, she cared for Bessy Higgins and her father, and her heart was wrung43 for Boucher; now, that was all like a dreaming memory of some former life; — everything that had passed out of doors seemed dissevered from her mother, and therefore unreal. Even Harley Street appeared more distinct; there she remembered, as if it were yesterday, how she had pleased herself with tracing out her mother’s features in her Aunt Shaw’s face — and how letters had come, making her dwell on the thoughts of home with all the longing44 of love. Helstone, itself, was in the dim past. The dull gray days of the preceding winter and spring, so uneventless and monotonous45, seemed more associated with what she cared for now above all price. She would fain have caught at the skirts of that departing time, and prayed it to return, and give her back what she had too little valued while it was yet in her possession. What a vain show Life seemed! How unsubstantial, and flickering46, and flitting! It was as if from some aerial belfry, high up above the stir and jar of the earth, there was a bell continually tolling47, ‘All are shadows! — all are passing! — all is past!’ And when the morning dawned, cool and gray, like many a happier morning before — when Margaret looked one by one at the sleepers48, it seemed as if the terrible night were unreal as a dream; it, too, was a shadow. It, too, was past.
Mrs. Hale herself was not aware when she awoke, how ill she had been the night before. She was rather surprised at Dr. Donaldson’s early visit, and perplexed49 by the anxious faces of husband and child. She consented to remain in bed that day, saying she certainly was tired; but, the next, she insisted on getting up; and Dr. Donaldson gave his consent to her returning into the drawing-room. She was restless and uncomfortable in every position, and before night she became very feverish50. Mr. Hale was utterly51 listless, and incapable52 of deciding on anything.
‘What can we do to spare mamma such another night?’ asked Margaret on the third day.
‘It is, to a certain degree, the reaction after the powerful opiates I have been obliged to use. It is more painful for you to see than for her to bear, I believe. But, I think, if we could get a water-bed it might be a good thing. Not but what she will be better tomorrow; pretty much like herself as she was before this attack. Still, I should like her to have a water-bed. Mrs. Thornton has one, I know. I’ll try and call there this afternoon. Stay,’ said he, his eye catching53 on Margaret’s face, blanched54 with watching in a sick room, ‘I’m not sure whether I can go; I’ve a long round to take. It would do you no harm to have a brisk walk to Marlborough Street, and ask Mrs. Thornton if she can spare it.’
‘Certainly,’ said Margaret. ‘I could go while mamma is asleep this afternoon. I’m sure Mrs. Thornton would lend it to us.’
Dr. Donaldson’s experience told them rightly. Mrs. Hale seemed to shake off the consequences of her attack, and looked brighter and better this afternoon than Margaret had ever hoped to see her again. Her daughter left her after dinner, sitting in her easy chair, with her hand lying in her husband’s, who looked more worn and suffering than she by far. Still, he could smile now-rather slowly, rather faintly, it is true; but a day or two before, Margaret never thought to see him smile again.
It was about two miles from their house in Crampton Crescent to Marlborough Street. It was too hot to walk very quickly. An August sun beat straight down into the street at three o’clock in the afternoon. Margaret went along, without noticing anything very different from usual in the first mile and a half of her journey; she was absorbed in her own thoughts, and had learnt by this time to thread her way through the irregular stream of human beings that flowed through Milton streets. But, by and by, she was struck with an unusual heaving among the mass of people in the crowded road on which she was entering. They did not appear to be moving on, so much as talking, and listening, and buzzing with excitement, without much stirring from the spot where they might happen to be. Still, as they made way for her, and, wrapt up in the purpose of her errand, and the necessities that suggested it, she was less quick of observation than she might have been, if her mind had been at ease, she had got into Marlborough Street before the full conviction forced itself upon her, that there was a restless, oppressive sense of irritation55 abroad among the people; a thunderous atmosphere, morally as well as physically56, around her. From every narrow lane opening out on Marlborough Street came up a low distant roar, as of myriads57 of fierce indignant voices. The inhabitants of each poor squalid dwelling58 were gathered round the doors and windows, if indeed they were not actually standing in the middle of the narrow ways — all with looks intent towards one point. Marlborough Street itself was the focus of all those human eyes, that betrayed intensest interest of various kinds; some fierce with anger, some lowering with relentless59 threats, some dilated60 with fear, or imploring61 entreaty62; and, as Margaret reached the small side-entrance by the folding doors, in the great dead wall of Marlborough mill-yard and waited the porter’s answer to the bell, she looked round and heard the first long far-off roll of the tempest; — saw the first slow-surging wave of the dark crowd come, with its threatening crest63, tumble over, and retreat, at the far end of the street, which a moment ago, seemed so full of repressed noise, but which now was ominously65 still; all these circumstances forced themselves on Margaret’s notice, but did not sink down into her preoccupied66 heart. She did not know what they meant — what was their deep significance; while she did know, did feel the keen sharp pressure of the knife that was soon to stab her through and through by leaving her motherless. She was trying to realise that, in order that, when it came, she might be ready to comfort her father.
The porter opened the door cautiously, not nearly wide enough to admit her.
‘It’s you, is it, ma’am?’ said he, drawing a long breath, and widening the entrance, but still not opening it fully67. Margaret went in. He hastily bolted it behind her.
‘Th’ folk are all coming up here I reckon?’ asked he.
‘I don’t know. Something unusual seemed going on; but this street is quite empty, I think.’
She went across the yard and up the steps to the house door. There was no near sound — no steam-engine at work with beat and pant — no click of machinery68, or mingling69 and clashing of many sharp voices; but far away, the ominous64 gathering70 roar, deep-clamouring.
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1
ballad
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| n.歌谣，民谣，流行爱情歌曲 | |
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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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3
smothered
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| （使）窒息， （使）透不过气( smother的过去式和过去分词 )； 覆盖； 忍住； 抑制 | |
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hatred
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| n.憎恶，憎恨，仇恨 | |
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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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standing
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| n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的 | |
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7
almighty
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| adj.全能的，万能的；很大的，很强的 | |
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distress
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| n.苦恼，痛苦，不舒适；不幸；vt.使悲痛 | |
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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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conjecture
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| n./v.推测，猜测 | |
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specimen
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| n.样本，标本 | |
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housekeepers
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| n.（女）管家( housekeeper的名词复数 ) | |
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awed
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| adj.充满敬畏的，表示敬畏的v.使敬畏，使惊惧( awe的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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apprehension
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| n.理解，领悟；逮捕，拘捕；忧虑 | |
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forth
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| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
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spasms
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| n.痉挛( spasm的名词复数 )；抽搐；（能量、行为等的）突发；发作 | |
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middle-aged
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| adj.中年的 | |
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tottering
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| adj.蹒跚的，动摇的v.走得或动得不稳( totter的现在分词 )；踉跄；蹒跚；摇摇欲坠 | |
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flaring
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| a.火焰摇曳的，过份艳丽的 | |
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speculation
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| n.思索，沉思；猜测；投机 | |
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apprehensions
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| 疑惧 | |
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bent
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| n.爱好，癖好；adj.弯的；决心的，一心的 | |
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reprieve
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| n.暂缓执行（死刑）；v.缓期执行；给…带来缓解 | |
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alleviate
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| v.减轻，缓和，缓解(痛苦等) | |
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Christian
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| adj.基督教徒的；n.基督教徒 | |
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immortality
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| n.不死，不朽 | |
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assail
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| v.猛烈攻击，抨击，痛斥 | |
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manly
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| adj.有男子气概的；adv.男子般地，果断地 | |
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sobs
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| 啜泣（声），呜咽（声）( sob的名词复数 ) | |
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caressing
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| 爱抚的，表现爱情的，亲切的 | |
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caresses
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| 爱抚，抚摸( caress的名词复数 ) | |
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nay
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| adv.不；n.反对票，投反对票者 | |
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slumber
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| n.睡眠，沉睡状态 | |
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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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exhausted
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| adj.极其疲惫的，精疲力尽的 | |
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immediate
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| adj.立即的；直接的，最接近的；紧靠的 | |
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stoutly
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| adv.牢固地，粗壮的 | |
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winked
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| v.使眼色( wink的过去式和过去分词 )；递眼色（表示友好或高兴等）；（指光）闪烁；闪亮 | |
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drooped
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| 弯曲或下垂，发蔫( droop的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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endued
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| v.授予，赋予（特性、才能等）( endue的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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chamber
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| n.房间，寝室；会议厅；议院；会所 | |
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sate
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| v.使充分满足 | |
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43
wrung
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| 绞( wring的过去式和过去分词 )； 握紧（尤指别人的手）； 把（湿衣服）拧干； 绞掉（水） | |
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longing
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| n.（for）渴望 | |
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monotonous
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| adj.单调的，一成不变的，使人厌倦的 | |
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flickering
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| adj.闪烁的，摇曳的，一闪一闪的 | |
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47
tolling
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| [财]来料加工 | |
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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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perplexed
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| adj.不知所措的 | |
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feverish
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| adj.发烧的，狂热的，兴奋的 | |
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51
utterly
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| adv.完全地，绝对地 | |
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52
incapable
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| adj.无能力的，不能做某事的 | |
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catching
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| adj.易传染的，有魅力的，迷人的，接住 | |
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54
blanched
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| v.使变白( blanch的过去式 )；使（植物）不见阳光而变白；酸洗（金属）使有光泽；用沸水烫（杏仁等）以便去皮 | |
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55
irritation
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| n.激怒，恼怒，生气 | |
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physically
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| adj.物质上，体格上，身体上，按自然规律 | |
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myriads
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| n.无数，极大数量( myriad的名词复数 ) | |
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58
dwelling
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| n.住宅，住所，寓所 | |
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relentless
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| adj.残酷的，不留情的，无怜悯心的 | |
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dilated
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| adj.加宽的，扩大的v.（使某物）扩大，膨胀，张大( dilate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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imploring
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| 恳求的，哀求的 | |
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entreaty
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| n.恳求，哀求 | |
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crest
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| n.顶点；饰章；羽冠；vt.达到顶点；vi.形成浪尖 | |
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64
ominous
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| adj.不祥的，不吉的，预兆的，预示的 | |
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65
ominously
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| adv.恶兆地，不吉利地；预示地 | |
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66
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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67
fully
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| adv.完全地，全部地，彻底地；充分地 | |
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68
machinery
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| n.(总称)机械，机器；机构 | |
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69
mingling
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| adj.混合的 | |
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70
gathering
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| n.集会，聚会，聚集 | |
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