chapter 50

An hour later she stretched out a bare arm and tickled¹ my ear and said: "Would you consider marrying me?" "It wouldn't last six months." "Well, for God's sake," she said, "suppose it didn't. Wouldn't it be worth it? What do you expect from life — full coverage² against all possible risks?" "I'm forty-two years old. I'm spoiled by independence. You're spoiled a little—not too much—by money." "I'm thirty-six. It's no disgrace to have money and no disgrace to marry it. Most of those who have it don't deserve it and don't know how to behave with it. But it won't be long. We'll have another war and at the end of that nobody will have any money—except the crooks³ and the chiselers. We'll all be taxed to nothing, the rest of us." I stroked her hair and wound some of it around my finger. "You may be right." "We could fly to Paris and have a wonderful time." She raised herself on an elbow and looked down at me. I could see the shine of her eyes but I couldn't read her expression. "Do you have something against marriage?" "For two people in a hundred it's wonderful. The rest just work at it. After twenty years all the guy has left is a work bench in the garage. American girls are terrific. American wives take in too damn much territory. Besides—" "I want some champagne⁴." "Besides," I said, "it would be just an incident to you. The first divorce is the only tough one. After that its merely a problem in economics. No problem to you. Ten years from now you might pass me on the street and wonder where the hell you had seen me before. If you noticed me at all." "You self-sufficient, self-satisfied, self-confident, untouchable bastard⁵. I want some champagne." "This way you will remember me." 'conceited⁷ too. A mass of conceit⁶. Slightly bruised⁸ at the moment. You think I'll remember you? No matter how many men I marry or sleep with, you think I'll remember you? Why should I?" "Sorry. I overstated my case. I'll get you some champagne." "Aren't we sweet and reasonable?" she said sarcastically⁹. "I'm a rich woman, darling, and I shall be infinitely¹⁰ richer. I could buy you the world if it were worth buying. What have you now? An empty house to come home to, with not even a dog or cat, a small stuffy¹¹ office to sit in and wait. Even if I divorced you I'd never let you go back to that." "How would you stop me? I'm no Terry Lennox." "Please. Don't let's talk about him. Nor about that golden icicle, the Wade¹² woman. Nor about her poor drunken sunken husband. Do you want to be the only man who turned me down? What kind of pride is that? I've paid you the greatest compliment I know how to pay. I've asked you to marry me." "You paid me a greater compliment." She began to cry. "You fool, you utter fool!" Her cheeks were wet. I could feel the tears on them. "Suppose it lasted six months or a year or two years. What would you have lost except the dust on your office desk and the dirt on your venetian blinds and the loneliness of a pretty empty kind of life?" "You still want some champagne?" "All right." I pulled her close and she cried against my shoulder. She wasn't in love with me and we both knew it. She wasn't crying over me. It was just time for her to shed a few tears. Then she pulled away and I got out of bed and she went into the bathroom to fix her face. I got the champagne. When she came back she was smiling. "I'm sorry I blubbered," she said. "In six months from now I won't even remember your name. Bring it into the living room. I want to see lights." I did what she said. She sat on the davenport as before. I put the champagne in front of her. She looked at the glass but didn't touch it. "I'll introduce myself," I said. "We'll have a drink together." "Like tonight?" "It won't ever be like tonight again." She raised her glass of champagne, drank a little of it slowly, turned her body on the davenport and threw the rest in my face. Then she began to cry again. I got a handkerchief out and wiped my face off and wiped hers for her. "I don't know why I did that," she said. "But for God's sake don't say I'm a woman and a woman never knows why she does anything." I poured some more champagne into her glass and laughed at her. She drank it slowly and then turned the other way and fell across my knees. . "I'm tired," she said. "You'll have to carry me this time." After a while she went to sleep. In the morning she was still asleep when I got up and made coffee. I showered and shaved and dressed. She woke up then. We had breakfast together. I called a cab and carried her overnight case down the steps. We said goodbye. I watched the cab out of sight. I went back up the steps and into the bedroom and pulled the bed to pieces and remade it. There was a long dark hair on one of the pillows. There was a lump of lead at the pit of my stomach. The French have a phrase for it. The bastards¹³ have a phrase for everything and they are always right. To say goodbye is to die a little.

1 tickled   

（使）发痒( tickle的过去式和过去分词 )； （使）愉快，逗乐

参考例句：

• We were tickled pink to see our friends on television. 在电视中看到我们的一些朋友，我们高兴极了。
• I tickled the baby's feet and made her laugh. 我胳肢孩子的脚，使她发笑。

2 coverage   

n.报导，保险范围，保险额，范围，覆盖

参考例句：

• There's little coverage of foreign news in the newspaper.报纸上几乎没有国外新闻报道。
• This is an insurance policy with extensive coverage.这是一项承保范围广泛的保险。

3 crooks   

n.骗子( crook的名词复数 )；罪犯；弯曲部分；（牧羊人或主教用的）弯拐杖v.弯成钩形( crook的第三人称单数 )

参考例句：

• The police are getting after the crooks in the city. 警察在城里追捕小偷。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• The cops got the crooks. 警察捉到了那些罪犯。 来自《简明英汉词典》

4 champagne   

n.香槟酒；微黄色

参考例句：

• There were two glasses of champagne on the tray.托盘里有两杯香槟酒。
• They sat there swilling champagne.他们坐在那里大喝香槟酒。

5 bastard   

n.坏蛋，混蛋；私生子

参考例句：

• He was never concerned about being born a bastard.他从不介意自己是私生子。
• There was supposed to be no way to get at the bastard.据说没有办法买通那个混蛋。

6 conceit   

n.自负，自高自大

参考例句：

• As conceit makes one lag behind,so modesty helps one make progress.骄傲使人落后，谦虚使人进步。
• She seems to be eaten up with her own conceit.她仿佛已经被骄傲冲昏了头脑。

7 conceited   

adj.自负的，骄傲自满的

参考例句：

• He could not bear that they should be so conceited.他们这样自高自大他受不了。
• I'm not as conceited as so many people seem to think.我不像很多人认为的那么自负。

8 bruised   

[医]青肿的，瘀紫的

参考例句：

• his bruised and bloodied nose 他沾满血的青肿的鼻子
• She had slipped and badly bruised her face. 她滑了一跤，摔得鼻青脸肿。

9 sarcastically   

adv.挖苦地，讽刺地

参考例句：

• 'What a surprise!' Caroline murmured sarcastically.“太神奇了!”卡罗琳轻声挖苦道。
• Pierce mocked her and bowed sarcastically. 皮尔斯嘲笑她，讽刺地鞠了一躬。

10 infinitely   

adv.无限地，无穷地

参考例句：

• There is an infinitely bright future ahead of us.我们有无限光明的前途。
• The universe is infinitely large.宇宙是无限大的。

11 stuffy   

adj.不透气的，闷热的

参考例句：

• It's really hot and stuffy in here.这里实在太热太闷了。
• It was so stuffy in the tent that we could sense the air was heavy with moisture.帐篷里很闷热，我们感到空气都是潮的。

12 wade   

v.跋涉，涉水；n.跋涉

参考例句：

• We had to wade through the river to the opposite bank.我们只好涉水过河到对岸。
• We cannot but wade across the river.我们只好趟水过去。

13 bastards   

私生子( bastard的名词复数 )； 坏蛋； 讨厌的事物； 麻烦事 （认为别人走运或不幸时说）家伙

参考例句：

• Those bastards don't care a damn about the welfare of the factory! 这批狗养的，不顾大局！ 来自子夜部分
• Let the first bastards to find out be the goddam Germans. 就让那些混账的德国佬去做最先发现的倒霉鬼吧。 来自演讲部分