He spends that night in the Springers' house, sleeping with Janice. Her sleep is so solid. A thin snore out of her black mouth sharpens the moonlight and keeps him awake. He gets up on an elbow and studies her face; it is frightening in the moonlight, small and so vague in the dark it could be anybody. He resents her sleep. When, in first light, he feels her weight stir and slide off the bed, he turns his face deeper into the pillow, retracts1 his head half under the covers, and goes back to sleep stubbornly. The thought that today is the day of the funeral somehow drugs him.
During this stolen doze2 he has a vivid dream. He is alone on a large sporting field, or vacant lot, littered with small pebbles3. In the sky two perfect discs, identical in size but the one a dense4 white and the other slightly transparent5, move toward each other slowly; the pale one is directly above the dense one. At the moment they touch he feels frightened and a voice like over a loudspeaker at a track meet announces, "The cowslip swallows up the elder." The downward gliding6 of the top one continues steadily7 until the other, though the stronger, is totally eclipsed, and just one circle is before his eyes, pale and pure. He understands: "the cowslip" is the moon, and "the elder" the sun, and that what he has witnessed is the explanation of death: lovely life eclipsed by lovely death. Intensely relieved and excited, he realizes he must go forth8 from this field and found a new religion. There is a feeling of the discs, and the echo of the voice, bending over him importunately9, and he opens his eyes. Janice stands by the bed in a brown skirt and a pink sleeveless blouse. There is a drab thickness of fat under her chin he has never noticed before. He is surprised to be on his back; he almost always sleeps on his stomach. He realizes it was a dream, that he has nothing to tell the world. The knot regathers in his chest. In getting out of bed he kisses the back of her hand, which is hanging by her side helpless and raw.
She makes him breakfast, the cereal drowned in milk, the coffee scalded in her style. With Nelson they walk over to the apartment to get clothes for the funeral. Rabbit resents her being able to walk; he liked her best when she was unconscious. What kind of second?rate grief is it that permits them to walk? The sense of their thick bodies just going on, wrapping their hearts in numbness10 and small needs, angers him. They walk with their child through streets they walked as children. The gutter11 along Potter Avenue where the slime?rimmed12 ice?plant water used to run is dry. The houses, many of them no longer lived in by the people whose faces he all knew, are like the houses in a town you see from the train, their brick faces stem in posing the riddle13, Why does anyone live here? Why was he set down here; why is this particular ordinary town for him the center and index of a universe that contains great prairies, mountains, deserts, forests, cities, seas? This childish mystery ? the mystery of "any place," prelude14 to the ultimate, "Why am I me?" ? re?ignites panic in his heart. Coldness spreads through his body. The details of the street ? the ragged15 margin16 where the pavement and grass struggle, the tarry scarred trunks of the telephone poles ? no longer speak to him. He is no one; it is as if he stepped outside of his body and brain a moment to watch the engine run and stepped into nothingness, for this "he" had been merely a refraction, a vibration17 within the engine, and now can't get back in. He feels he is behind the windows of the houses they walk by, watching this three?cornered family stroll along solidly with no sign that their universe has convulsed other than the woman's quiet tears. Janice's tears have come as gently as dew comes; the sight of the morning?fresh streets seems to have sprung them.
When they get inside the apartment she gives a sharp sigh and collapses18 against him. Perhaps she didn't expect the place to be full of sunshine; buttresses19 of dust drifting in milky20 light slant21 from the middle of the floor to the tops of the windows. The door to his closet is near the entry door so they needn't go very deep into the apartment at first. He opens the closet door as far as he can without bumping the television set and reaches far in and unzips a plastic zippered22 storage bag and takes out his blue suit, a winter suit made of wool, but the only dark one he owns. His gray carsalesman's suit is too pale. Nelson, happy to be here, ranges through the apartment, going into the bathroom, finding an old rubber panda in his bedroom that he wants to take along. His exploring drains enough of the menace from the rooms for them to go into their bedroom, where Janice's clothes hang. On the way she indicates a chair. "Here I sat," she tells him, "Monday morning, watching the sun come up." Her voice is lifeless; he doesn't know what she wants him to say and says nothing. He is holding his breath.
Yet in the bedroom there is a pretty moment. She takes off her skin and blouse to try on an old black suit she has, and as she moves about in her slip, barefoot on the carpet, she reminds him of the girl he knew, with her narrow ankles and wrists and small shy head. The black suit, bought when she was in high school, doesn't fit; her stomach is still too big from having the baby. And maybe her mother's plumpness is beginning. Standing23 there trying to get the waist of the suit skirt to link at her side, the tops of her breasts, swollen24 with untaken milk, pushing above her bra, she does have a plumpness, a fullness that call to him. He thinks Mine, my woman, but then she turns and her smeared25 frantic26 face blots27 out his pride of possession. She becomes a liability that painfully weights the knot below his chest. This is the wild woman he must steer28 with care down a lifelong path, away from Monday morning. "It won't do it!" she screams, and jerks her legs out of the skirt and flings it, great twirling bat, across the room.
"You have nothing else?"
"What am I going to do?"
"Come on. Let's get out of here and go back to your place. This place is making you nervous."
"But we're going to have to live here!"
"Yeah, but not today. Come on."
"We can't live here," she says.
"I know we can't."
"But where can we live?"
"We'll figure it out. Come on."
She stumbles into her skirt and puts her blouse over her arms and turns away from him meekly29 and asks, "Button my back." Buttoning the pink cloth down her quiet spine30 makes him cry; the hotness in his eyes works up to a sting and he sees the little babyish buttons through a cluster of discs of watery31 light like petals32 of apple blossoms. Water hesitates on his lids and then runs down his cheeks; the wetness is delicious. He wishes he could cry for hours, for just this tiny spill relieves him. But a man's tears are grudging33 and his stop before they are out of the apartment. As he closes the door he feels he has spent his whole life opening and closing this door.
Nelson takes the rubber panda along and every time he makes it squeak34 Rabbit's stomach aches. The town now is bleached35 by a sun nearing the height of noon.
收听单词发音 |
1
retracts
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| v.撤回或撤消( retract的第三人称单数 )；拒绝执行或遵守；缩回；拉回 | |
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doze
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| v.打瞌睡；n.打盹，假寐 | |
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pebbles
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| [复数]鹅卵石； 沙砾； 卵石，小圆石( pebble的名词复数 ) | |
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dense
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| a.密集的，稠密的，浓密的；密度大的 | |
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transparent
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| adj.明显的，无疑的；透明的 | |
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gliding
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| v. 滑翔 adj. 滑动的 | |
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steadily
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| adv.稳定地；不变地；持续地 | |
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forth
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| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
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importunately
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numbness
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| n.无感觉，麻木，惊呆 | |
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gutter
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| n.沟，街沟，水槽，檐槽，贫民窟 | |
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rimmed
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| adj.有边缘的，有框的v.沿…边缘滚动；给…镶边 | |
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riddle
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| n.谜，谜语，粗筛；vt.解谜，给…出谜，筛，检查，鉴定，非难，充满于；vi.出谜 | |
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prelude
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| n.序言，前兆，序曲 | |
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ragged
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| adj.衣衫褴褛的，粗糙的，刺耳的 | |
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margin
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| n.页边空白；差额；余地，余裕；边，边缘 | |
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vibration
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| n.颤动，振动；摆动 | |
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collapses
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| 折叠( collapse的第三人称单数 )； 倒塌； 崩溃； （尤指工作劳累后）坐下 | |
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buttresses
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| n.扶壁，扶垛( buttress的名词复数 )v.用扶壁支撑，加固( buttress的第三人称单数 ) | |
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milky
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| adj.牛奶的，多奶的；乳白色的 | |
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slant
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| v.倾斜，倾向性地编写或报道；n.斜面，倾向 | |
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zippered
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| v.拉上拉链( zipper的过去式和过去分词 )；用拉链扣上 | |
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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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swollen
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| adj.肿大的，水涨的；v.使变大，肿胀 | |
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smeared
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| 弄脏； 玷污； 涂抹； 擦上 | |
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frantic
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| adj.狂乱的，错乱的，激昂的 | |
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blots
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| 污渍( blot的名词复数 )； 墨水渍； 错事； 污点 | |
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28
steer
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| vt.驾驶，为…操舵；引导；vi.驾驶 | |
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meekly
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| adv.温顺地，逆来顺受地 | |
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spine
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| n.脊柱，脊椎；(动植物的)刺；书脊 | |
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31
watery
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| adj.有水的，水汪汪的；湿的，湿润的 | |
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petals
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| n.花瓣( petal的名词复数 ) | |
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33
grudging
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| adj.勉强的，吝啬的 | |
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34
squeak
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| n.吱吱声，逃脱；v.（发出）吱吱叫，侥幸通过；（俚）告密 | |
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35
bleached
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| 漂白的，晒白的，颜色变浅的 | |
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