The sound shrilled6 sweetly through the house, through all the empty rooms, and through the thick silence of that one which was not empty, but where a flag was spread over a rough box of boards, and Ellton sat by the window with a little black prayer-book in his hand. He was going over the service for the burial of the dead, because there was no chaplain, and it fell to him to read it. Now and then one of the officers came in alone or with his wife and stood about aimlessly, then went away again. But for the rest, the house was quite forsaken8.
Felipa was not there. At the earliest, she could not return for a couple of days, and by then Landor's body[Pg 283] would be laid in the dreary9 little graveyard10, with its wooden headboards and crosses, and its neglected graves among the coyote and snake holes. The life of the service would be going on just as usual, after the little passing excitement was at an end. For it was an excitement. No one in the garrison11 would have had it end like this, but since what will be will be, and the right theory of life is to make the most of what offers and to hasten—as the philosopher has said—to laugh at all things for fear we may have cause to weep, there was a certain expectation, decently kept down, in the air.
It rose to a subdued12 pitch as there came the gradual rattling13 of wheels and the slow tramp of many feet. A buckboard, from which the seats had been removed, came up the line, and behind it marched the troops and companies, Landor's own troop in advance. They halted in front of his quarters, and four officers came down the steps with the long box between them. The mocking-bird's trill died away to a questioning twitter.
The box was laid in the buckboard, and covered with the flag once more. Then the mules14 started, with a rattle15 of traces and of the wheels, and the tramp of feet began again. The drums thrummed regularly and slowly, the heart beats of the service, and the fifes took up the dead march in a weird16, shrill7 Banshee wail17. They went down the line, the commandant with the surgeon and the officers first, and after them the buckboard, with its bright-draped burden. Then Landor's horse, covered with black cloths, the empty[Pg 284] saddle upon its back. It nosed at the pockets of the man who led it. It had been taught to find sugar in pockets. And then the troops, the cavalry18 with the yellow plumes19 of their helmets drooping20, and the infantry21 with the spikes22 glinting, marching with eyes cast down and muskets23 reversed. A gap, then the soldiers' urchins24 from the laundress row, in for anything that might be doing.
The roll of the drums and the whistle of the fifes died away in the distance. There was a long silence, followed by three volleys of musketry, the salute25 over the open grave. And then taps was pealed26 in notes of brass27 up to the blue sky, a long farewell, a challenge aforetime to the trumpet28 of the Last Day. They turned and came marching back. The drums and fifes played "Yankee Doodle" in sarcastic29 relief. The men walked briskly with their guns at carry arms, the black-draped horse curved its neck and pranced30 until the empty stirrups danced. The incident was over—closed. The post picked up its life and went on. Two afternoons later the ambulance which had been sent for Felipa came into the post. She stepped out from it in front of the Elltons' quarters so majestic31 and awe-inspiring in her black garments that Mrs. Ellton was fairly subdued. She felt real grief. It showed in her white face and the nervous quiver of her lips. "I am going out to the graveyard," she told Mrs. Ellton almost at once. Mrs. Ellton prepared to accompany her, but she insisted that she was going alone, and did so, to the universal consternation32.
[Pg 285]
In the late afternoon the lonely dark figure crossed the open and dropped down on the new grave, not in an agony of tears, but as if there was some comfort to be gotten out of contact with the mere33 soil. The old feeling of loneliness, which had always tinged34 her character with a covert35 defiance36, was overwhelming her. She belonged to no one now. She had no people. She was an outcast from two races, feared of each because of the other's blood. The most forsaken man or woman may claim at least the kinship of his kind, but she had no kind. She crouched37 on the mound38 and looked at the sunset as she had looked that evening years before, but her eyes were not fearless now. As a trapped animal of the plains might watch a prairie fire licking nearer and nearer, making its slow way up to him in spurts39 of flame and in dull, thick clouds of smoke that must stifle40 him before long, so she watched the dreary future rolling in about her. But gradually the look changed to one farther away, and alight with hope. She had realized that there was, after all, some one to whom she belonged, some one to whom she could go and, for the first time in her life, be loved and allowed to love.
It had not occurred to her for some hours after Mrs. Campbell had told her of Landor's death that she was free now to give herself to Cairness. She had gasped41, indeed, when she did remember it, and had put the thought away, angrily and self-reproachfully. But it returned now, and she felt that she might cling to it. She had been grateful, and she had been faithful, too.[Pg 286] She remembered only that Landor had been kind to her, and forgot that for the last two years she had borne with much harsh coldness, and with a sort of contempt which she felt in her unanalyzing mind to have been entirely42 unmerited. Gradually she raised herself until she sat quite erect43 by the side of the mound, the old exultation44 of her half-wild girlhood shining in her face as she planned the future, which only a few minutes before had seemed so hopeless.
And when the retreat gun boomed in the distance, she stood up, shaking the earth and grasses from her gown, and started to carry out her plans. A storm was blowing up again. Clouds were massing in the sky, and night was rising rather than the sun setting. There was a cold, greenish light above the snow peak, and darkness crept up from the earth and down from the gray clouds that banked upon the northern horizon and spread fast across the heavens. A bleak45, whining46 wind rustled47 the leaves of the big trees down by the creek48, and caught up the dust of the roadway in little eddies49 and whirls, as Felipa, with a new purpose in her step, swung along it back to the post.
She would not be induced to go near her own house that night. When Ellton suggested it, she turned white and horrified50. It had not occurred to him before that a woman so fearless of everything in the known world might be in abject51 terror of the unknown.
"It's her nature," he told his wife. "Underneath52 she is an Apache, and they burn the wigwams and all the traps of their dead; sometimes even the whole [Pg 287]village he lived in." Mrs. Ellton said that poor Captain Landor had had a good deal to endure.
The two children whom Felipa had taken in charge two years before had been left in the care of the sergeant53 of Landor's troop and his wife, and they manifested no particular pleasure at seeing her again. They were half afraid of her, so severely54 black and tall and quiet. They had been playing with the soldier's children, and were anxious to be away again. The young of the human race are short of memory, and their gratefulness does not endure for long. There is no caress55 so sweet, so hard to win, as the touch of a child's soft hand, and none that has behind it less of nearly all that we prize in affection. It is sincere while it lasts, and no longer, and it must be bought either with a price or with a wealth of love. You may lavish56 the best that is within you to obtain a kiss from baby lips, and if they rest warm and moist upon your cheek for a moment, the next they are more eager for a sweetmeat than for all your adoration57.
"Yes," whispered the little girl, squirming in Felipa's arms, "I am dlad you's come. Let me doe."
"Kiss me," said Felipa.
The child brushed at her cheek and struggled away. "Come, Billy," she called to the brother who had saved her life; and that small, freckle-faced hero, whose nose was badly skinned from a fall, flung his arms around his benefactress's neck perfunctorily and escaped, rejoicing.
The Elltons' pretty child was like its mother, [Pg 288]gentler and more caressing58. It lay placidly59 in her arms and patted her lips when she tried to talk, with the tips of its rosy60 fingers. She caught them between her teeth and mumbled61 them, and the child chuckled62 gleefully. But by and by it was taken away to bed, and then Felipa was alone with its father and mother. Through the tiresome63 evening she felt oppressed and angrily nervous. The Elltons had always affected64 her so.
She asked for the full particulars of her husband's death, and when Ellton had told her, sat looking straight before her at the wall. "It was very like Jack," she said finally, in a low voice, "his whole life was like that." And then she turned squarely to the lieutenant65. "Where is Mr. Cairness? Where did they take him?" She was surprised at herself that she had not thought of that before.
He told her that he had gone on to Arizona, to Tombstone, he believed. "By the way," he added, "did you hear that Brewster has married a rich Jewish widow down in Tucson?"
"Yes, I heard it," she said indifferently. "Was Mr. Cairness really much hurt?"
"Very much," said Ellton; "it was a sharp cut on the forehead—went through the bone, and he was unconscious, off and on, for two or three days. He seemed to take it hard. He went off yesterday, and he wasn't fit to travel either, but he would do it for some reason. I think he was worse cut up about Landor than anything, though he wasn't able to go to the funeral. I like[Pg 289] Cairness. He's an all-round decent fellow; but after all, his life was bought too dear."
Felipa did not answer.
He did not try to discuss her plans for the future with her that night; but two days afterward66, when she had disposed of all her household goods and had packed the few things that remained, they sat upon two boxes in the bare hallway, resting; and he broached67 it.
"I am going to ask the quartermaster to store my things for the present, and of course the first sergeant's wife will look out for the children," she said.
But that was not exactly what he wanted to know, and he insisted. "But what is going to become of you? Are you going back to the Campbells?" He had asked her to stay with his wife and himself as long as she would, but she had refused.
"No," she said, "I told the Campbells I would not go to them."
And he could get nothing definite from her beyond that. It annoyed him, of course; Felipa had a gift for repulsing68 kindness and friendship. It was because she would not lie and could not evade69. Therefore, she preserved a silence that was, to say the least of it, exasperating70 to the well-intentioned.
Early in the morning of the day she was to leave she went to the graveyard alone again. She was beginning to realize more than she had at first that Landor was quite gone. She missed him, in a way. He had been a strong influence in her life, and there was a lack of the pressure now. But despite the form of religion to[Pg 290] which she clung, she had no hope of meeting him in any future life, and no real wish to do so.
She stood by the mound for a little while thinking of him, of how well he had lived and died, true to his standard of duty, absolutely true, but lacking after all that spirit of love without which our actions profit so little and die with our death. She had a clearer realization71 of it than ever before. It came to her that Charles Cairness's life, wandering, aimless, disjointed as it was, and her own, though it fell far below even her own not impossibly high ideals, were to more purpose, had in them more of the vital force of creation, were less wasted, than his had been. To have known no enthusiasms—which are but love, in one form or another—is to have failed to give that impulse to the course of events which every man born into the world should hold himself bound to give, as the human debt to the Eternal.
Felipa felt something of this, and it lessened72 the vague burden of self-reproach she had been carrying. She was almost cheerful when she got back to the post. Through the last breakfast, which the Elltons took for granted must be a sad one, and conscientiously73 did their best to make so, she had some difficulty in keeping down to their depression.
It was not until they all, from the commandant down to the recruits of Landor's troop, came to say good-by that she felt the straining and cutting of the strong tie of the service, which never quite breaks though it be stretched over rough and long years and almost [Pg 291]forgotten. The post blacksmith to whom she had been kind during an illness, the forlorn sickly little laundress whose baby she had eased in dying, the baker74 to whose motherless child she had been good—all came crowding up the steps. They were sincerely sorry to have her go. She had been generous and possessed75 of that charity which is more than faith or hope. It was the good-bys of Landor's men that were the hardest for her. He had been proud of his troop, and it had been devoted76 to him. She broke down utterly77 and cried when it came to them, and tears were as hard for her as for a man. But with the officers and their women, it rose up between her and them that they would so shortly despise and condemn78 her, that they would not touch her hands could they but know her thoughts.
Ellton was going with her to the railroad. They were to travel with a mounted escort, as she had come, on account of the uncertain state of the country. And they must cross, as she had done in coming also, the road over the malpais, where Landor had fallen. As the hoofs79 of the mules and the tires of the wheels began to slip and screech80 on the smooth-worn lava81, and the ambulance rattled82 and creaked up the incline, Ellton leaned forward and pointed83 silently to a hollow in the gray rock a few yards away. It was where Landor had pitched forward over the body of the mounted chief of scouts84. Felipa nodded gravely, but she did not speak, nor yet weep. Ellton, already thrown back upon himself by her persistent85 silence with regard to her [Pg 292]intentions, recoiled86 even more. He thought her hard beyond all his previous experience of women.
"I will write to you where you are to send my mail," she told him, when the train was about to pull out. He bowed stiffly, and raising his hat was gone. She looked after him as he went across the cinder87 bed to the ambulance which was to take him back, and wondered what would have been the look upon his nice, open face, if she had told him her plans, after all. But she was the only one who knew them.
And Cairness himself was startled and utterly unprepared when the Reverend Taylor opened the door of the room where he lay and let her pass in. The little parson uttered no word, but there was a look on his face which said that now the questions he had put with no result were answered. It was for this that Cairness had given the best of his life.
Cairness lay white and still, looking up at her. He was very weak and dazed, and for the instant he could only remember, absurdly enough, the Andromaque he had seen a French actress play once in his very early youth when he had been taken with all the children of the Lycée, where he was then at school, to the theatre on a Thursday afternoon. The Andromaque had been tall and dark and superb, and all in black, like that woman in the doorway88 there.
And then his thoughts shot back to the present with quick pain. She should not have come here, not so soon. He had taken a long, hard trip that had nearly ended in his death, to avoid this very thing, this [Pg 293]meeting, which, just because it made him so terribly happy, seemed a treachery, a sacrilege. Had she less delicacy89 of feeling than himself? Or had she more love? It was that, he saw it in her beautiful eyes which were growing wide and frightened at his silence. He took his hand from under the sheets and stretched it out to her. She went to him and dropped on her knees beside the bed, and threw her arms about him. He moved his weak head closer to her shoulder, and pressing her fingers to his face gave a choking sob90. He was happy, so very happy. And nothing mattered but just this.
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收听单词发音
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1
rustling
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| n. 瑟瑟声，沙沙声 adj. 发沙沙声的 | |
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sparse
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| adj.稀疏的，稀稀落落的，薄的 | |
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forage
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| n.(牛马的)饲料，粮草；v.搜寻，翻寻 | |
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4
monotonous
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| adj.单调的，一成不变的，使人厌倦的 | |
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exultantly
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| adv.狂欢地，欢欣鼓舞地 | |
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shrilled
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| （声音）尖锐的，刺耳的，高频率的( shrill的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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7
shrill
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| adj.尖声的；刺耳的；v尖叫 | |
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8
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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dreary
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| adj.令人沮丧的，沉闷的，单调乏味的 | |
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graveyard
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| n.坟场 | |
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garrison
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| n.卫戍部队；驻地，卫戍区；vt.派(兵)驻防 | |
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subdued
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| adj. 屈服的，柔和的，减弱的 动词subdue的过去式和过去分词 | |
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13
rattling
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| adj. 格格作响的, 活泼的, 很好的 adv. 极其, 很, 非常 动词rattle的现在分词 | |
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14
mules
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| 骡( mule的名词复数 )； 拖鞋； 顽固的人； 越境运毒者 | |
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15
rattle
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| v.飞奔，碰响；激怒；n.碰撞声；拨浪鼓 | |
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weird
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| adj.古怪的，离奇的；怪诞的，神秘而可怕的 | |
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wail
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| vt./vi.大声哀号，恸哭；呼啸，尖啸 | |
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cavalry
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| n.骑兵；轻装甲部队 | |
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plumes
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| 羽毛( plume的名词复数 )； 羽毛饰； 羽毛状物； 升上空中的羽状物 | |
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drooping
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| adj. 下垂的，无力的 动词droop的现在分词 | |
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infantry
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| n.[总称]步兵(部队) | |
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spikes
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| n.穗( spike的名词复数 )；跑鞋；（防滑）鞋钉；尖状物v.加烈酒于( spike的第三人称单数 )；偷偷地给某人的饮料加入（更多）酒精（ 或药物）；把尖状物钉入；打乱某人的计划 | |
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muskets
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| n.火枪，（尤指）滑膛枪( musket的名词复数 ) | |
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urchins
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| n.顽童( urchin的名词复数 )；淘气鬼；猬；海胆 | |
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salute
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| vi.行礼，致意，问候，放礼炮；vt.向…致意，迎接，赞扬；n.招呼，敬礼，礼炮 | |
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pealed
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| v.（使）（钟等）鸣响，（雷等）发出隆隆声( peal的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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brass
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| n.黄铜；黄铜器，铜管乐器 | |
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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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sarcastic
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| adj.讥讽的，讽刺的，嘲弄的 | |
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pranced
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| v.（马）腾跃( prance的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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majestic
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| adj.雄伟的，壮丽的，庄严的，威严的，崇高的 | |
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consternation
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| n.大为吃惊，惊骇 | |
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mere
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| adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过 | |
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tinged
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| v.（使）发丁丁声( ting的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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covert
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| adj.隐藏的；暗地里的 | |
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defiance
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| n.挑战，挑衅，蔑视，违抗 | |
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crouched
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| v.屈膝，蹲伏( crouch的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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mound
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| n.土墩，堤，小山；v.筑堤，用土堆防卫 | |
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spurts
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| 短暂而突然的活动或努力( spurt的名词复数 )； 突然奋起 | |
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stifle
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| vt.使窒息；闷死；扼杀；抑止，阻止 | |
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41
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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42
entirely
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| ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地 | |
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erect
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| n./v.树立，建立，使竖立；adj.直立的，垂直的 | |
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exultation
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| n.狂喜，得意 | |
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bleak
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| adj.(天气)阴冷的；凄凉的；暗淡的 | |
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46
whining
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| n. 抱怨，牢骚 v. 哭诉，发牢骚 | |
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47
rustled
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| v.发出沙沙的声音( rustle的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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creek
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| n.小溪，小河，小湾 | |
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49
eddies
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| （水、烟等的）漩涡，涡流( eddy的名词复数 ) | |
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horrified
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| a.(表现出)恐惧的 | |
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51
abject
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| adj.极可怜的，卑屈的 | |
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52
underneath
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| adj.在...下面，在...底下；adv.在下面 | |
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53
sergeant
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| n.警官，中士 | |
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54
severely
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| adv.严格地；严厉地；非常恶劣地 | |
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55
caress
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| vt./n.爱抚，抚摸 | |
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56
lavish
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| adj.无节制的；浪费的；vt.慷慨地给予，挥霍 | |
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adoration
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| n.爱慕，崇拜 | |
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58
caressing
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| 爱抚的，表现爱情的，亲切的 | |
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placidly
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| adv.平稳地，平静地 | |
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rosy
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| adj.美好的，乐观的，玫瑰色的 | |
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mumbled
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| 含糊地说某事，叽咕，咕哝( mumble的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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62
chuckled
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| 轻声地笑( chuckle的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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tiresome
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| adj.令人疲劳的，令人厌倦的 | |
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affected
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| adj.不自然的，假装的 | |
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lieutenant
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| n.陆军中尉，海军上尉；代理官员，副职官员 | |
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afterward
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| adv.后来；以后 | |
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broached
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| v.谈起( broach的过去式和过去分词 )；打开并开始用；用凿子扩大（或修光）；（在桶上）钻孔取液体 | |
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repulsing
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| v.击退( repulse的现在分词 )；驳斥；拒绝 | |
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evade
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| vt.逃避，回避；避开，躲避 | |
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exasperating
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| adj. 激怒的 动词exasperate的现在分词形式 | |
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realization
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| n.实现；认识到，深刻了解 | |
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lessened
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| 减少的，减弱的 | |
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conscientiously
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| adv.凭良心地；认真地，负责尽职地；老老实实 | |
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baker
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| n.面包师 | |
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possessed
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| adj.疯狂的；拥有的，占有的 | |
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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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utterly
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| adv.完全地，绝对地 | |
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condemn
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| vt.谴责，指责；宣判(罪犯)，判刑 | |
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hoofs
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| n.（兽的）蹄，马蹄( hoof的名词复数 )v.（兽的）蹄，马蹄( hoof的第三人称单数 ) | |
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screech
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| n./v.尖叫；(发出)刺耳的声音 | |
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lava
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| n.熔岩，火山岩 | |
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rattled
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| 慌乱的，恼火的 | |
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pointed
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| adj.尖的，直截了当的 | |
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scouts
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| 侦察员[机，舰]( scout的名词复数 )； 童子军； 搜索； 童子军成员 | |
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persistent
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| adj.坚持不懈的，执意的；持续的 | |
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recoiled
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| v.畏缩( recoil的过去式和过去分词 )；退缩；报应；返回 | |
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cinder
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| n.余烬，矿渣 | |
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doorway
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| n.门口，(喻)入门；门路，途径 | |
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delicacy
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| n.精致，细微，微妙，精良；美味，佳肴 | |
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sob
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| n.空间轨道的轰炸机；呜咽，哭泣 | |
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