CHAPTER XXIX

Lucian settled down into a groove-like existence. He read when he liked and worked when he felt any particular inclination¹ to do so; he amused himself at times with the life which a man of his temperament² may live in Paris, but always with the air of one who looks on. He made a few new friends and sometimes visited old ones. Now and then he entertained in a quiet, old-fashioned way. He was very indulgent and caressing³ to a certain coterie⁴ of young people who believed in him as a great master and elevated his poetry to the dignity of a cult⁵. He was always a distinguished⁶ figure when he showed himself at the opera or the theatre, and people still pointed⁷ him out on the boulevards and shook their heads and said what a pity it was that one so young and handsome and talented should carry so heavy a burden. In this way he may be said to have become quite an institution of Paris, and Americans stipulated⁸ with their guides that he should be pointed out to them at the first opportunity.

Whatever else engaged Lucian’s attention or his time, he never forgot his daily visit to the quiet house in the suburbs where Haidee still played with dolls or laughed gleefully at her attendants. He permitted nothing to interfere¹⁰ with this duty, which he regarded as a penance¹¹ for his sins of omission¹² to Haidee in days gone by. Others might forsake¹³ Paris for the sea or the mountains; Lucian remained there all the year round for two years, making his daily pilgrimage. He saw the same faces every day, and heard the same report, but he never saw his wife. Life became curiously¹⁴ even and regular, but it never oppressed him. He had informed himself at the very beginning of this period that this was a thing to be endured, and he endured it as pleasantly and{232} bravely as possible. During those two years he published two new volumes, of a somewhat new note, which sold better in a French translation than in the English original, and at Mr. Harcourt’s urgent request he wrote a romantic drama. It filled the Athen?um during the whole of a London season, and the financial results were gratifying in a high degree, for the glamour¹⁵ and mystery of the affaire Damerel were still powerful, and Lucian had become a personality and a force by reason of his troubles.

At the end of two years, the doctor to whose care Haidee had been entrusted¹⁶ called Lucian into his private room one day and told him that he had grave news to communicate. His patient, he said, was dying—slowly, but very surely. But there was more than that: before her death she would recover her reason. She would probably recall everything that had taken place; it was more than possible that she would have painfully clear recollections of the scene, whatever it might be, that had immediately preceded her sudden loss of sanity¹⁷. It was but right, said the doctor, that Mr. Damerel should know of this, but did Mr. Damerel wish to be with his wife when this development occurred? It might be a painful experience, and death must soon follow it. It was for Mr. Damerel to decide. Lucian decided¹⁸ on the instant. He had carried an image of Haidee in his mind for two years, and it had become fixed¹⁹ on his mental vision with such firmness that he could not think of her as anything but what he imagined her to be. He told the doctor that he would wish to know as soon as his wife regained²⁰ her reason—it was his duty, he said, to be with her. After that, every visit to the private asylum²¹ was made with anxious wonder if the tortured brain had cleared.

It was not until the following spring—two and a half years after the tragedy of the Bristol—that Lucian saw Haidee. He scarcely knew the woman to whom they took him. They had deluged²² him with warnings as to the change in her, but he had not expected to find her a{233} grey-haired, time-worn woman, and he had difficulty in preserving his composure when he saw her. He did not know it, but her reason had returned some time before, and she had become fully⁹ cognisant of her surroundings and of what was going to happen. More than that, she had asked for a priest and had enjoyed ghostly consolation²³. She gazed at Lucian with a curious wistfulness, and yet there was something strangely sullen²⁴ in her manner.

‘I wanted to see you,’ she said, after a time. ‘I know I’m going to die very soon, and there are things I want to say. I remember all that happened, you know. Oh yes, it’s quite clear to me now, but somehow it doesn’t trouble me—I was mad enough when I did it.’

‘Don’t speak of that,’ he said. ‘Forget it all.’

She shook her head.

‘Never mind,’ she went on. ‘What I wanted to say was, that I’m sorry that—well, you know.’

Lucian gazed at her with a sickening fear creeping closely round his heart. He had forced the truth away from him: he was to hear it at last from the lips of a dying woman.

‘You were to blame, though,’ she said presently. ‘You ought not to have let me go alone on his yacht or to the Highlands. It was so easy to go wrong there.’

Lucian could not control a sharp cry.

‘Don’t!’ he said, ‘don’t! You don’t know what you’re saying. It can’t be that—that you wrote the truth in that letter? It was—hallucination.’

She looked at him out of dull eyes.

‘I want you to say you forgive me,’ she said. ‘The priest—he said I ought to ask your forgiveness.’

Lucian bowed his head.

‘Yes,’ he said, ‘I forgive all you wish. Try not to think of it any more.’

He was saying over and over to himself that she was still disordered of mind, that the sin she was confessing was imaginary; but deeper than his insistence²⁵ on this lay a dull consciousness that he was hearing the truth.{234} He stood watching her curiously. She suddenly looked up at him, and he saw a strange gleam in her eyes.

‘After all,’ she said, half spitefully, ‘you came between him and me at the beginning.’

Lucian never saw his wife again. A month later she was dead. All the time of the burial service he was thinking that it would have been far better if she had never recovered her reason. For two years he had cherished a dream of her that had assumed tender and pathetic tones. It had become a part of him; the ugly reality of the last grim moments of her life stood out in violent contrast to its gentleness and softness. When the earth was thrown upon the coffin²⁶, he was wondering at the wide difference which exists between the real and the unreal, and whether the man is most truly blessed who walks amongst stern verities²⁷ or dreams amidst the poppy-beds of illusion. One thing was certain: the face of truth was not always beautiful, nor her voice always soothing²⁸ to the ear.

1 inclination   

n.倾斜；点头；弯腰；斜坡；倾度；倾向；爱好

参考例句：

• She greeted us with a slight inclination of the head.她微微点头向我们致意。
• I did not feel the slightest inclination to hurry.我没有丝毫着急的意思。

2 temperament   

n.气质，性格，性情

参考例句：

• The analysis of what kind of temperament you possess is vital.分析一下你有什么样的气质是十分重要的。
• Success often depends on temperament.成功常常取决于一个人的性格。

3 caressing   

爱抚的，表现爱情的，亲切的

参考例句：

• The spring wind is gentle and caressing. 春风和畅。
• He sat silent still caressing Tartar, who slobbered with exceeding affection. 他不声不响地坐在那里，不断抚摸着鞑靼，它由于获得超常的爱抚而不淌口水。

4 coterie   

n.(有共同兴趣的)小团体，小圈子

参考例句：

• The name is known to only a small coterie of collectors.这个名字只有收藏家的小圈子才知道。
• Mary and her coterie gave a party to which we were not invited.玛利和她的圈内朋友举行派对，我们没被邀请。

5 cult   

n.异教，邪教；时尚，狂热的崇拜

参考例句：

• Her books aren't bestsellers,but they have a certain cult following.她的书算不上畅销书，但有一定的崇拜者。
• The cult of sun worship is probably the most primitive one.太阳崇拜仪式或许是最为原始的一种。

6 distinguished   

adj.卓越的，杰出的，著名的

参考例句：

• Elephants are distinguished from other animals by their long noses.大象以其长长的鼻子显示出与其他动物的不同。
• A banquet was given in honor of the distinguished guests.宴会是为了向贵宾们致敬而举行的。

7 pointed   

adj.尖的，直截了当的

参考例句：

• He gave me a very sharp pointed pencil.他给我一支削得非常尖的铅笔。
• She wished to show Mrs.John Dashwood by this pointed invitation to her brother.她想通过对达茨伍德夫人提出直截了当的邀请向她的哥哥表示出来。

8 stipulated   

vt.& vi.规定；约定adj.[法]合同规定的

参考例句：

• A delivery date is stipulated in the contract. 合同中规定了交货日期。
• Yes, I think that's what we stipulated. 对呀，我想那是我们所订定的。 来自辞典例句

9 fully   

adv.完全地，全部地，彻底地；充分地

参考例句：

• The doctor asked me to breathe in,then to breathe out fully.医生让我先吸气，然后全部呼出。
• They soon became fully integrated into the local community.他们很快就完全融入了当地人的圈子。

10 interfere   

v.(in)干涉，干预；(with)妨碍，打扰

参考例句：

• If we interfere, it may do more harm than good.如果我们干预的话，可能弊多利少。
• When others interfere in the affair,it always makes troubles. 别人一卷入这一事件，棘手的事情就来了。

11 penance   

n.（赎罪的）惩罪

参考例句：

• They had confessed their sins and done their penance.他们已经告罪并做了补赎。
• She knelt at her mother's feet in penance.她忏悔地跪在母亲脚下。

12 omission   

n.省略，删节；遗漏或省略的事物，冗长

参考例句：

• The omission of the girls was unfair.把女孩排除在外是不公平的。
• The omission of this chapter from the third edition was a gross oversight.第三版漏印这一章是个大疏忽。

13 forsake   

vt.遗弃，抛弃；舍弃，放弃

参考例句：

• She pleaded with her husband not to forsake her.她恳求丈夫不要抛弃她。
• You must forsake your bad habits.你必须革除你的坏习惯。

14 curiously   

adv.有求知欲地；好问地；奇特地

参考例句：

• He looked curiously at the people.他好奇地看着那些人。
• He took long stealthy strides. His hands were curiously cold.他迈着悄没声息的大步。他的双手出奇地冷。

15 glamour   

n.魔力，魅力；vt.迷住

参考例句：

• Foreign travel has lost its glamour for her.到国外旅行对她已失去吸引力了。
• The moonlight cast a glamour over the scene.月光给景色增添了魅力。

16 entrusted   

v.委托，托付( entrust的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• He entrusted the task to his nephew. 他把这任务托付给了他的侄儿。
• She was entrusted with the direction of the project. 她受委托负责这项计划。 来自《简明英汉词典》

17 sanity   

n.心智健全，神智正常，判断正确

参考例句：

• I doubt the sanity of such a plan.我怀疑这个计划是否明智。
• She managed to keep her sanity throughout the ordeal.在那场磨难中她始终保持神志正常。

18 decided   

adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的

参考例句：

• This gave them a decided advantage over their opponents.这使他们比对手具有明显的优势。
• There is a decided difference between British and Chinese way of greeting.英国人和中国人打招呼的方式有很明显的区别。

19 fixed   

adj.固定的，不变的，准备好的；(计算机)固定的

参考例句：

• Have you two fixed on a date for the wedding yet?你们俩选定婚期了吗？
• Once the aim is fixed,we should not change it arbitrarily.目标一旦确定，我们就不应该随意改变。

20 regained   

复得( regain的过去式和过去分词 )； 赢回； 重回； 复至某地

参考例句：

• The majority of the people in the world have regained their liberty. 世界上大多数人已重获自由。
• She hesitated briefly but quickly regained her poise. 她犹豫片刻，但很快恢复了镇静。

21 asylum   

n.避难所，庇护所，避难

参考例句：

• The people ask for political asylum.人们请求政治避难。
• Having sought asylum in the West for many years,they were eventually granted it.他们最终获得了在西方寻求多年的避难权。

22 deluged   

v.使淹没( deluge的过去式和过去分词 )；淹没；被洪水般涌来的事物所淹没；穷于应付

参考例句：

• The minister was deluged with questions. 部长穷于应付像洪水般涌来的问题。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• They deluged me with questions. 他们向我连珠发问。 来自《简明英汉词典》

23 consolation   

n.安慰，慰问

参考例句：

• The children were a great consolation to me at that time.那时孩子们成了我的莫大安慰。
• This news was of little consolation to us.这个消息对我们来说没有什么安慰。

24 sullen   

adj.愠怒的，闷闷不乐的，(天气等)阴沉的

参考例句：

• He looked up at the sullen sky.他抬头看了一眼阴沉的天空。
• Susan was sullen in the morning because she hadn't slept well.苏珊今天早上郁闷不乐，因为昨晚没睡好。

25 insistence   

n.坚持；强调；坚决主张

参考例句：

• They were united in their insistence that she should go to college.他们一致坚持她应上大学。
• His insistence upon strict obedience is correct.他坚持绝对服从是对的。

26 coffin   

n.棺材，灵柩

参考例句：

• When one's coffin is covered,all discussion about him can be settled.盖棺论定。
• The coffin was placed in the grave.那口棺材已安放到坟墓里去了。

27 verities   

n.真实( verity的名词复数 )；事实；真理；真实的陈述

参考例句：

• the eternal verities of life 生命永恒的真理

28 soothing   

adj.慰藉的；使人宽心的；镇静的

参考例句：

• Put on some nice soothing music.播放一些柔和舒缓的音乐。
• His casual, relaxed manner was very soothing.他随意而放松的举动让人很快便平静下来。