I had known him long enough to know why he worked so faithfully, so energetically and without rest—it was because Mathilde had a voice. It was because of her voice that his coats were worn till they were out of fashion 356and almost out at elbows. But for a sister whose voice needed only a little training to rival that of the nightingale, one might do such things without incurring5 reproach.
“You will believe, madame, that I did not know you las’ night at the opera? I remark’ to Mathilde, ‘tiens! Mademoiselle Montreville,’ an’ I only rec’nize my mistake when I finally adjust my opera glass.... I guarantee you will be satisfied, madame. In a year from now you will come an’ thank me for having secu’ you that bargain in a poult-desoie.... Yes, yes; as you say, Tolville was in voice. But,” with a shrug6 of the narrow shoulders and a smile of commiseration7 that wrinkled the lean olive cheeks beneath the thin beard, “but to hear that cavatina render’ as I have heard it render’ by Mathilde, is another affair! A quality, madame, that moves, that penetrates8. Perhaps not yet enough volume, but that will accomplish itself with time, when she will become more robus’ in health. It is my intention to sen’ her for the summer to Gran’ Isle9; that good air an’ surf bathing will work miracles. An artiste, voyez vous, it is not to be treated like a human being 357of every day; it needs des petits soins; perfec’ res’ of body an’ mind; good red wine an’ plenty ... oh yes, madame, the stage; that is our intention; but never with my consent in light opera. Patience is what I counsel to Mathilde. A little more stren’th; a little dev’lopment of the chest to give that soupçon of compass which is lacking, an’ gran’ opera is what I aspire10 for my sister.”
I was curious to know Mathilde and to hear her sing; and thought it a great pity that a voice so marvelous as she doubtless possessed11 should not gain the notice that might prove the step toward the attainment12 of her ambition. It was such curiosity and a half-formed design or desire to interest myself in her career that prompted me to inform Cavanelle that I should greatly like to meet his sister; and I asked permission to call upon her the following Sunday afternoon.
Cavanelle was charmed. He otherwise would not have been Cavanelle. Over and over I was given the most minute directions for finding the house. The green car—or was it the yellow or blue one? I can no longer remember. But it was near Goodchildren 358street, and would I kindly13 walk this way and turn that way? At the corner was an ice dealer’s. In the middle of the block, their house—one-story; painted yellow; a knocker; a banana tree nodding over the side fence. But indeed, I need not look for the banana tree, the knocker, the number or anything, for if I but turn the corner in the neighborhood of five o’clock I would find him planted at the door awaiting me.
And there he was! Cavanelle himself; but seeming to me not himself; apart from the entourage with which I was accustomed to associate him. Every line of his mobile face, every gesture emphasized the welcome which his kind eyes expressed as he ushered14 me into the small parlor15 that opened upon the street.
“Oh, not that chair, madame! I entreat16 you. This one, by all means. Thousan’ times more comfortable.”
“Mathilde! Strange; my sister was here but an instant ago. Mathilde! Où es tu donc?” Stupid Cavanelle! He did not know when I had already guessed it—that Mathilde had retired17 to the adjoining room at my approach, and would appear after a sufficient delay 359to give an appropriate air of ceremony to our meeting.
And what a frail18 little piece of mortality she was when she did appear! At beholding19 her I could easily fancy that when she stepped outside of the yellow house, the zephyrs20 would lift her from her feet and, given a proper adjustment of the balloon sleeves, gently waft21 her in the direction of Goodchildren street, or wherever else she might want to go.
Hers was no physique for grand opera—certainly no stage presence; apparently22 so slender a hold upon life that the least tension might snap it. The voice which could hope to overcome these glaring disadvantages would have to be phenomenal.
Mathilde spoke23 English imperfectly, and with embarrassment24, and was glad to lapse25 into French. Her speech was languid, unaffectedly so; and her manner was one of indolent repose26; in this respect offering a striking contrast to that of her brother. Cavanelle seemed unable to rest. Hardly was I seated to his satisfaction than he darted27 from the room and soon returned followed by a limping 360old black woman bringing in a sirop d’orgeat and layer cake on a tray.
Mathilde’s face showed feeble annoyance28 at her brother’s want of savoir vivre in thus introducing the refreshments29 at so early a stage of my visit.
The servant was one of those cheap black women who abound30 in the French quarter, who speak Creole patois31 in preference to English, and who would rather work in a petit ménage in Goodchildren street for five dollars a month than for fifteen in the fourth district. Her presence, in some unaccountable manner, seemed to reveal to me much of the inner working of this small household. I pictured her early morning visit to the French market, where picayunes were doled32 out sparingly, and lagniappes gathered in with avidity.
I could see the neatly33 appointed dinner table; Cavanelle extolling34 his soup and bouillie in extravagant35 terms; Mathilde toying with her papabotte or chicken-wing, and pouring herself a demi-verre from her very own half-bottle of St. Julien; Pouponne, as they called her, mumbling36 and grumbling37 through habit, and serving them as faithfully as a dog 361through instinct. I wondered if they knew that Pouponne “played the lottery” with every spare “quarter” gathered from a judicious38 management of lagniappe. Perhaps they would not have cared, or have minded, either, that she as often consulted the Voudoo priestess around the corner as her father confessor.
My thoughts had followed Pouponne’s limping figure from the room, and it was with an effort I returned to Cavanelle twirling the piano stool this way and that way. Mathilde was languidly turning over musical scores, and the two warmly discussing the merits of a selection which she had evidently decided39 upon.
The girl seated herself at the piano. Her hands were thin and anæmic, and she touched the keys without firmness or delicacy40. When she had played a few introductory bars, she began to sing. Heaven only knows what she sang; it made no difference then, nor can it make any now.
The day was a warm one, but that did not prevent a creepy chilliness41 seizing hold of me. The feeling was generated by disappointment, 362anger, dismay and various other disagreeable sensations which I cannot find names for. Had I been intentionally42 deceived and misled? Was this some impertinent pleasantry on the part of Cavanelle? Or rather had not the girl’s voice undergone some hideous43 transformation44 since her brother had listened to it? I dreaded45 to look at him, fearing to see horror and astonishment46 depicted47 on his face. When I did look, his expression was earnestly attentive48 and beamed approval of the strains to which he measured time by a slow, satisfied motion of the hand.
The voice was thin to attenuation49, I fear it was not even true. Perhaps my disappointment exaggerated its simple deficiencies into monstrous50 defects. But it was an unsympathetic voice that never could have been a blessing51 to possess or to listen to.
I cannot recall what I said at parting—doubtless conventional things which were not true. Cavanelle politely escorted me to the car, and there I left him with a hand-clasp which from my side was tender with sympathy and pity.
“Poor Cavanelle! poor Cavanelle!” The words kept beating time in my brain to the 363jingle of the car bells and the regular ring of the mules’ hoofs52 upon the cobble stones. One moment I resolved to have a talk with him in which I would endeavor to open his eyes to the folly53 of thus casting his hopes and the substance of his labor54 to the winds. The next instant I had decided that chance would possibly attend to Cavanelle’s affair less clumsily than I could. “But all the same,” I wondered, “is Cavanelle a fool? is he a lunatic? is he under a hypnotic spell?” And then—strange that I did not think of it before—I realized that Cavanelle loved Mathilde intensely, and we all know that love is blind, but a god just the same.
Two years passed before I saw Cavanelle again. I had been absent that length of time from the city. In the meanwhile Mathilde had died. She and her little voice—the apotheosis55 of insignificance—were no more. It was perhaps a year after my visit to her that I read an account of her death in a New Orleans paper. Then came a momentary56 pang57 of commiseration for my good Cavanelle. Chance had surely acted here the part of a skillful though 364merciless surgeon; no temporizing58, no half measures. A deep, sharp thrust of the scalpel; a moment of agonizing59 pain; then rest, rest; convalescence60; health; happiness! Yes, Mathilde had been dead a year and I was prepared for great changes in Cavanelle.
He had lived like a hampered61 child who does not recognize the restrictions62 hedging it about, and lives a life of pathetic contentment in the midst of them. But now all that was altered. He was, doubtless, regaling himself with the half-bottles of St. Julien, which were never before for him; with, perhaps, an occasional petit souper at Moreau’s, and there was no telling what little pleasures beside.
Cavanelle would certainly have bought himself a suit of clothes or two of modern fit and finish. I would find him with a brightened eye, a fuller cheek, as became a man of his years; perchance, even, a waxed moustache! So did my imagination run rampant63 with me.
And after all, the hand which I clasped across the counter was that of the self-same Cavanelle I had left. It was no fuller, no firmer. There were even some additional lines visible through the thin, brown beard.
365“Ah, my poor Cavanelle! you have suffered a grievous loss since we parted.” I saw in his face that he remembered the circumstances of our last meeting, so there was no use in avoiding the subject. I had rightly conjectured64 that the wound had been a cruel one, but in a year such wounds heal with a healthy soul.
He could have talked for hours of Mathilde’s unhappy taking-off, and if the subject had possessed for me the same touching65 fascination66 which it held for him, doubtless, we would have done so, but—
“And how is it now, mon ami? Are you living in the same place? running your little ménage as before, my poor Cavanelle?”
“Oh, yes, madame, except that my Aunt Félicie is making her home with me now. You have heard me speak of my aunt—No? You never have heard me speak of my Aunt Félicie Cavanelle of Terrebonne! That, madame, is a noble woman who has suffer’ the mos’ cruel affliction, and deprivation67, since the war.—No, madame, not in good health, unfortunately, by any means. It is why I esteem68 that a blessed privilege to give her declining 366years those little comforts, ces petits soins, that is a woman’s right to expec’ from men.”
I knew what “des petits soins” meant with Cavanelle; doctors’ visits, little jaunts69 across the lake, friandises of every description showered upon “Aunt Félicie,” and he himself relegated70 to the soup and bouillie which typified his prosaic71 existence.
I was unreasonably72 exasperated73 with the man for awhile, and would not even permit myself to notice the beauty in texture74 and design of the mousseline de laine which he had spread across the counter in tempting75 folds. I was forced to restrain a brutal76 desire to say something stinging and cruel to him for his fatuity77.
However, before I had regained78 the street, the conviction that Cavanelle was a hopeless fool seemed to reconcile me to the situation and also afforded me some diversion.
But even this estimate of my poor Cavanelle was destined79 not to last. By the time I had seated myself in the Prytania street car and passed up my nickel, I was convinced that Cavanelle was an angel.
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1
nuance
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| n.(意义、意见、颜色)细微差别 | |
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complexion
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| n.肤色；情况，局面；气质，性格 | |
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3
delightful
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| adj.令人高兴的，使人快乐的 | |
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4
humbug
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| n.花招，谎话，欺骗 | |
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incurring
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| 遭受，招致，引起( incur的现在分词 ) | |
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6
shrug
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| v.耸肩(表示怀疑、冷漠、不知等) | |
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7
commiseration
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| n.怜悯，同情 | |
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8
penetrates
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| v.穿过( penetrate的第三人称单数 )；刺入；了解；渗透 | |
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9
isle
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| n.小岛，岛 | |
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aspire
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| vi.(to，after)渴望，追求，有志于 | |
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11
possessed
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| adj.疯狂的；拥有的，占有的 | |
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12
attainment
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| n.达到，到达；［常pl.］成就，造诣 | |
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13
kindly
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| adj.和蔼的，温和的，爽快的；adv.温和地，亲切地 | |
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14
ushered
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| v.引，领，陪同( usher的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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15
parlor
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| n.店铺，营业室；会客室，客厅 | |
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16
entreat
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| v.恳求，恳请 | |
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17
retired
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| adj.隐退的，退休的，退役的 | |
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18
frail
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| adj.身体虚弱的；易损坏的 | |
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19
beholding
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| v.看，注视( behold的现在分词 )；瞧；看呀；（叙述中用于引出某人意外的出现）哎哟 | |
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20
zephyrs
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| n.和风，微风( zephyr的名词复数 ) | |
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21
waft
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| v.飘浮，飘荡；n.一股；一阵微风；飘荡 | |
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22
apparently
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| adv.显然地；表面上，似乎 | |
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23
spoke
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| n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说 | |
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24
embarrassment
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| n.尴尬；使人为难的人(事物)；障碍；窘迫 | |
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25
lapse
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| n.过失，流逝，失效，抛弃信仰，间隔；vi.堕落，停止，失效，流逝；vt.使失效 | |
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26
repose
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| v.(使)休息；n.安息 | |
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27
darted
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| v.投掷，投射( dart的过去式和过去分词 )；向前冲，飞奔 | |
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28
annoyance
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| n.恼怒，生气，烦恼 | |
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29
refreshments
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| n.点心,便餐;(会议后的)简单茶点招 待 | |
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abound
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| vi.大量存在；(in，with)充满，富于 | |
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patois
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| n.方言；混合语 | |
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32
doled
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| 救济物( dole的过去式和过去分词 )； 失业救济金 | |
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33
neatly
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| adv.整洁地，干净地，灵巧地，熟练地 | |
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34
extolling
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| v.赞美( extoll的现在分词 )；赞颂，赞扬，赞美( extol的现在分词 ) | |
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35
extravagant
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| adj.奢侈的；过分的；(言行等)放肆的 | |
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36
mumbling
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| 含糊地说某事，叽咕，咕哝( mumble的现在分词 ) | |
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37
grumbling
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| adj. 喃喃鸣不平的, 出怨言的 | |
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38
judicious
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| adj.明智的，明断的，能作出明智决定的 | |
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39
decided
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| adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的 | |
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40
delicacy
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| n.精致，细微，微妙，精良；美味，佳肴 | |
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41
chilliness
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| n.寒冷，寒意，严寒 | |
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42
intentionally
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| ad.故意地，有意地 | |
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43
hideous
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| adj.丑陋的，可憎的，可怕的，恐怖的 | |
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44
transformation
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| n.变化；改造；转变 | |
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45
dreaded
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| adj.令人畏惧的；害怕的v.害怕，恐惧，担心( dread的过去式和过去分词) | |
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46
astonishment
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| n.惊奇，惊异 | |
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47
depicted
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| 描绘，描画( depict的过去式和过去分词 )； 描述 | |
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48
attentive
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| adj.注意的，专心的；关心(别人)的，殷勤的 | |
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49
attenuation
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| n.变薄；弄细；稀薄化；减少 | |
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50
monstrous
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| adj.巨大的；恐怖的；可耻的，丢脸的 | |
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51
blessing
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| n.祈神赐福；祷告；祝福，祝愿 | |
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52
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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53
folly
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| n.愚笨，愚蠢，蠢事，蠢行，傻话 | |
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54
labor
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| n.劳动，努力，工作，劳工；分娩；vi.劳动，努力，苦干；vt.详细分析；麻烦 | |
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55
apotheosis
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| n.神圣之理想；美化；颂扬 | |
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56
momentary
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| adj.片刻的，瞬息的；短暂的 | |
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57
pang
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| n.剧痛，悲痛，苦闷 | |
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58
temporizing
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| v.敷衍( temporize的现在分词 )；拖延；顺应时势；暂时同意 | |
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59
agonizing
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| adj.痛苦难忍的；使人苦恼的v.使极度痛苦；折磨(agonize的ing形式) | |
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convalescence
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| n.病后康复期 | |
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61
hampered
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| 妨碍，束缚，限制( hamper的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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restrictions
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| 约束( restriction的名词复数 )； 管制； 制约因素； 带限制性的条件（或规则） | |
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63
rampant
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| adj.(植物)蔓生的；狂暴的，无约束的 | |
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64
conjectured
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| 推测，猜测，猜想( conjecture的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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65
touching
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| adj.动人的，使人感伤的 | |
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66
fascination
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| n.令人着迷的事物，魅力，迷恋 | |
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67
deprivation
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| n.匮乏；丧失；夺去，贫困 | |
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68
esteem
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| n.尊敬，尊重；vt.尊重，敬重；把…看作 | |
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69
jaunts
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| n.游览( jaunt的名词复数 ) | |
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70
relegated
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| v.使降级( relegate的过去式和过去分词 )；使降职；转移；把…归类 | |
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71
prosaic
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| adj.单调的，无趣的 | |
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72
unreasonably
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| adv. 不合理地 | |
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73
exasperated
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| adj.恼怒的 | |
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74
texture
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| n.(织物)质地；(材料)构造；结构；肌理 | |
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75
tempting
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| a.诱人的, 吸引人的 | |
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76
brutal
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| adj.残忍的，野蛮的，不讲理的 | |
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77
fatuity
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| n.愚蠢，愚昧 | |
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78
regained
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| 复得( regain的过去式和过去分词 )； 赢回； 重回； 复至某地 | |
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79
destined
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| adj.命中注定的；(for)以…为目的地的 | |
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