Some of the ranches5 near Wested’s were owned by New York men who brought their families out there in the summer. Ralph had heard about the dances they gave, and he way counting on being one of the guests. He asked Claude to give him his dress suit, since Claude wouldn’t be needing it any more.
“You can have it if you want it,” said Claude indifferently “But it won’t fit you.”
“I’ll take it in to Fritz and have the pants cut off a little and the shoulders taken in,” his brother replied lightly.
Claude was impassive. “Go ahead. But if that old Dutch man takes a whack7 at it, it will look like the devil.”
“I think I’ll let him try. Father won’t say anything about what I’ve ordered for the house, but he isn’t much for glad rags, you know.” Without more ado he threw Claude’s black clothes into the back seat of the Ford8 and ran into town to enlist9 the services of the German tailor.
Mr. Wheeler, when he returned, thought Ralph had been rather free in expenditures10, but Ralph told him it wouldn’t do to take over the new place too modestly. “The ranchers out there are all high-fliers. If we go to squeezing nickels, they won’t think we mean business.”
The country neighbours, who were always amused at the Wheelers’ doings, got almost as much pleasure out of Ralph’s lavishness11 as he did himself. One said Ralph had shipped a new piano out to Yucca county, another heard he had ordered a billiard table. August Yoeder, their prosperous German neighbour, asked grimly whether he could, maybe, get a place as hired man with Ralph. Leonard Dawson, who was to be married in October, hailed Claude in town one day and shouted;
“My God, Claude, there’s nothing left in the furniture store for me and Susie! Ralph’s bought everything but the coffins12. He must be going to live like a prince out there.”
“I don’t know anything about it,” Claude answered coolly. “It’s not my enterprise.”
“No, you’ve got to stay on the old place and make it pay the debts, I understand.” Leonard jumped into his car, so that Claude wouldn’t have a chance to reply.
Mrs. Wheeler, too, when she observed the magnitude of these preparations, began to feel that the new arrangement was not fair to Claude, since he was the older boy and much the steadier. Claude had always worked hard when he was at home, and made a good field hand, while Ralph had never done much but tinker with machinery13 and run errands in his car. She couldn’t understand why he was selected to manage an undertaking14 in which so much money was invested.
“Why, Claude,” she said dreamily one day, “if your father were an older man, I would almost think his judgment15 had begun to fail. Won’t we get dreadfully into debt at this rate?”
“Don’t say anything, Mother. It’s Father’s money. He shan’t think I want any of it.”
“I wish I could talk to Bayliss. Has he said anything?”
“Not to me, he hasn’t.”
Ralph and Mr. Wheeler took another flying trip to Colorado, and when they came back Ralph began coaxing16 his mother to give him bedding and table linen17. He said he wasn’t going to live like a savage18, even in the sand hills. Mahailey was outraged19 to see the linen she had washed and ironed and taken care of for so many years packed into boxes. She was out of temper most of the time now, and went about muttering to herself.
The only possessions Mahailey brought with her when she came to live with the Wheelers, were a feather bed and three patchwork20 quilts, interlined with wool off the backs of Virginia sheep, washed and carded by hand. The quilts had been made by her old mother, and given to her for a marriage portion. The patchwork on each was done in a different design; one was the popular “log-cabin” pattern, another the “laurel-leaf,” the third the “blazing star.” This quilt Mahailey thought too good for use, and she had told Mrs. Wheeler that she was saving it “to give Mr. Claude when he got married.”
She slept on her feather bed in winter, and in summer she put it away in the attic21. The attic was reached by a ladder which, because of her weak back, Mrs. Wheeler very seldom climbed. Up there Mahailey had things her own way, and thither22 she often retired23 to air the bedding stored away there, or to look at the pictures in the piles of old magazines. Ralph facetiously24 called the attic “Mahailey’s library.”
One day, while things were being packed for the western ranch6, Mrs. Wheeler, going to the foot of the ladder to call Mahailey, narrowly escaped being knocked down by a large feather bed which came plumping through the trap door. A moment later Mahailey herself descended25 backwards26, holding to the rungs with one hand, and in the other arm carrying her quilts.
“Why, Mahailey,” gasped27 Mrs. Wheeler. “It’s not winter yet; whatever are you getting your bed for?”
“I’m just a-goin’ to lay on my fedder bed,” she broke out, “or direc’ly I won’t have none. I ain’t a-goin’ to have Mr. Ralph carryin’ off my quilts my mudder pieced fur me.”
Mrs. Wheeler tried to reason with her, but the old woman took up her bed in her arms and staggered down the hall with it, muttering and tossing her head like a horse in fly-time.
That afternoon Ralph brought a barrel and a bundle of straw into the kitchen and told Mahailey to carry up preserves and canned fruit, and he would pack them. She went obediently to the cellar, and Ralph took off his coat and began to line the barrel with straw. He was some time in doing this, but still Mahailey had not returned. He went to the head of the stairs and whistled.
“I’m a-comin’, Mr. Ralph, I’m a-comin’! Don’t hurry me, I don’t want to break nothin’.”
Ralph waited a few minutes. “What are you doing down there, Mahailey?” he fumed28. “I could have emptied the whole cellar by this time. I suppose I’ll have to do it myself.”
“I’m a-comin’. You’d git yourself all dusty down here.” She came breathlessly up the stairs, carrying a hamper29 basket full of jars, her hands and face streaked30 with black.
“Well, I should say it is dusty!” Ralph snorted. “You might clean your fruit closet once in awhile, you know, Mahailey. You ought to see how Mrs. Dawson keeps hers. Now, let’s see.” He sorted the jars on the table. “Take back the grape jelly. If there’s anything I hate, it’s grape jelly. I know you have lots of it, but you can’t work it off on me. And when you come up, don’t forget the pickled peaches. I told you particularly, the pickled peaches!”
“We ain’t got no pickled peaches.” Mahailey stood by the cellar door, holding a corner of her apron31 up to her chin, with a queer, animal look of stubbornness in her face.
“No pickled peaches? What nonsense, Mahailey! I saw you making them here, only a few weeks ago.”
“I know you did, Mr. Ralph, but they ain’t none now. I didn’t have no luck with my peaches this year. I must ‘a’ let the air git at ’em. They all worked on me, an’ I had to throw ’em out.”
Ralph was thoroughly32 annoyed. “I never heard of such a thing, Mahailey! You get more careless every year. Think of wasting all that fruit and sugar! Does mother know?”
Mahailey’s low brow clouded. “I reckon she does. I don’t wase your mudder’s sugar. I never did wase nothin’,” she muttered. Her speech became queerer than ever when she was angry.
Ralph dashed down the cellar stairs, lit a lantern, and searched the fruit closet. Sure enough, there were no pickled peaches. When he came back and began packing his fruit, Mahailey stood watching him with a furtive33 expression, very much like the look that is in a chained coyote’s eyes when a boy is showing him off to visitors and saying he wouldn’t run away if he could.
“Go on with your work,” Ralph snapped. “Don’t stand there watching me!”
That evening Claude was sitting on the windmill platform, down by the barn, after a hard day’s work ploughing for winter wheat. He was solacing34 himself with his pipe. No matter how much she loved him, or how sorry she felt for him, his mother could never bring herself to tell him he might smoke in the house. Lights were shining from the upstairs rooms on the hill, and through the open windows sounded the singing snarl35 of a phonograph. A figure came stealing down the path. He knew by her low, padding step that it was Mahailey, with her apron thrown over her head. She came up to him and touched him on the shoulder in a way which meant that what she had to say was confidential36.
“Mr. Claude, Mr. Ralph’s done packed up a barr’l of your mudder’s jelly an’ pickles37 to take out there.”
“That’s all right, Mahailey. Mr. Wested was a widower38, and I guess there wasn’t anything of that sort put up at his place.”
She hesitated and bent39 lower. “He asked me fur them pickled peaches I made fur you, but I didn’t give him none. I hid ’em all in my old cook-stove we done put down cellar when Mr. Ralph bought the new one. I didn’t give him your mudder’s new preserves, nudder. I give him the old last year’s stuff we had left over, and now you an’ your mudder’ll have plenty.” Claude laughed. “Oh, I don’t care if Ralph takes all the fruit on the place, Mahailey!”
She shrank back a little, saying confusedly, “No, I know you don’t, Mr. Claude. I know you don’t.”
“I surely ought not to take it out on her,” Claude thought, when he saw her disappointment. He rose and patted her on the back. “That’s all right, Mahailey. Thank you for saving the peaches, anyhow.”
She shook her finger at him. “Don’t you let on!”
He promised, and watched her slipping back over the zigzag40 path up the hill.
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收听单词发音
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1
outfit
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| n.（为特殊用途的）全套装备，全套服装 | |
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bridles
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| 约束( bridle的名词复数 )； 限动器； 马笼头； 系带 | |
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3
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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4
monologues
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| n.（戏剧）长篇独白( monologue的名词复数 )；滔滔不绝的讲话；独角戏 | |
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5
ranches
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| 大农场， （兼种果树，养鸡等的）大牧场( ranch的名词复数 ) | |
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ranch
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| n.大牧场，大农场 | |
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7
whack
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| v.敲击，重打，瓜分；n.重击，重打，尝试，一份 | |
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Ford
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| n.浅滩，水浅可涉处；v.涉水，涉过 | |
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9
enlist
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| vt.谋取(支持等)，赢得；征募；vi.入伍 | |
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10
expenditures
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| n.花费( expenditure的名词复数 )；使用；（尤指金钱的）支出额；（精力、时间、材料等的）耗费 | |
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11
lavishness
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| n.浪费，过度 | |
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12
coffins
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| n.棺材( coffin的名词复数 )；使某人早亡[死，完蛋，垮台等]之物 | |
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13
machinery
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| n.(总称)机械，机器；机构 | |
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14
undertaking
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| n.保证，许诺，事业 | |
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15
judgment
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| n.审判；判断力，识别力，看法，意见 | |
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16
coaxing
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| v.哄，用好话劝说( coax的现在分词 )；巧言骗取；哄劝，劝诱；“锻炼”效应 | |
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17
linen
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| n.亚麻布，亚麻线，亚麻制品；adj.亚麻布制的，亚麻的 | |
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18
savage
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| adj.野蛮的；凶恶的，残暴的；n.未开化的人 | |
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19
outraged
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| a.震惊的，义愤填膺的 | |
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patchwork
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| n.混杂物；拼缝物 | |
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attic
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| n.顶楼，屋顶室 | |
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22
thither
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| adv.向那里；adj.在那边的，对岸的 | |
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23
retired
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| adj.隐退的，退休的，退役的 | |
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24
facetiously
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| adv.爱开玩笑地；滑稽地，爱开玩笑地 | |
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25
descended
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| a.为...后裔的，出身于...的 | |
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26
backwards
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| adv.往回地，向原处，倒，相反，前后倒置地 | |
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27
gasped
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| v.喘气( gasp的过去式和过去分词 )；喘息；倒抽气；很想要 | |
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28
fumed
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| 愤怒( fume的过去式和过去分词 )； 大怒； 发怒； 冒烟 | |
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29
hamper
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| vt.妨碍，束缚，限制；n.(有盖的)大篮子 | |
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30
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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apron
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| n.围裙；工作裙 | |
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32
thoroughly
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| adv.完全地，彻底地，十足地 | |
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33
furtive
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| adj.鬼鬼崇崇的，偷偷摸摸的 | |
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34
solacing
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| v.安慰，慰藉( solace的现在分词 ) | |
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35
snarl
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| v.吼叫，怒骂，纠缠，混乱；n.混乱，缠结，咆哮 | |
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36
confidential
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| adj.秘（机）密的，表示信任的，担任机密工作的 | |
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37
pickles
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| n.腌菜( pickle的名词复数 )；处于困境；遇到麻烦；菜酱 | |
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38
widower
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| n.鳏夫 | |
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39
bent
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| n.爱好，癖好；adj.弯的；决心的，一心的 | |
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40
zigzag
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| n.曲折，之字形；adj.曲折的，锯齿形的；adv.曲折地，成锯齿形地；vt.使曲折；vi.曲折前行 | |
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