CHAPTER V

 It was summer-time, six months later, and mowers and haymakers were at work in the meads.  The manor-house, being opposite them, frequently formed a peg¹ for conversation during these operations; and the doings of the squire², and the squire’s young wife, the curate’s sister—who was at present the admired of most of them, and the interest of all—met with their due amount of criticism.

 

Rosa was happy, if ever woman could be said to be so.  She had not learnt the fate of her father, and sometimes wondered—perhaps with a sense of relief—why he did not write to her from his supposed home in Canada.  Her brother Joshua had been presented to a living in a small town, shortly after her marriage, and Cornelius had thereupon succeeded to the vacant curacy of Narrobourne.

 

These two had awaited in deep suspense³ the discovery of their father’s body; and yet the discovery had not been made.  Every day they expected a man or a boy to run up from the meads with the intelligence; but he had never come.  Days had accumulated to weeks and months; the wedding had come and gone: Joshua had tolled⁴ and read himself in at his new parish; and never a shout of amazement⁵ over the millwright’s remains⁶.

 

But now, in June, when they were mowing⁷ the meads, the hatches had to be drawn⁸ and the water let out of its channels for the convenience of the mowers.  It was thus that the discovery was made.  A man, stooping low with his scythe⁹, caught a view of the culvert lengthwise, and saw something entangled¹⁰ in the recently bared weeds of its bed.  A day or two after there was an inquest; but the body was unrecognizable.  Fish and flood had been busy with the millwright; he had no watch or marked article which could be identified; and a verdict of the accidental drowning of a person unknown settled the matter.

 

As the body was found in Narrobourne parish, there it had to be buried.  Cornelius wrote to Joshua, begging him to come and read the service, or to send some one; he himself could not do it.  Rather than let in a stranger Joshua came, and silently scanned the coroner’s order handed him by the undertaker:—

 

‘I, Henry Giles, Coroner for the Mid-Division of Outer Wessex, do hereby order the Burial of the Body now shown to the Inquest Jury as the Body of an Adult Male Person Unknown . . . ,’ etc.

 

Joshua Halborough got through the service in some way, and rejoined his brother Cornelius at his house.  Neither accepted an invitation to lunch at their sister’s; they wished to discuss parish matters together.  In the afternoon she came down, though they had already called on her, and had not expected to see her again.  Her bright eyes, brown hair, flowery bonnet¹¹, lemon-coloured gloves, and flush beauty, were like an irradiation into the apartment, which they in their gloom could hardly bear.

 

‘I forgot to tell you,’ she said, ‘of a curious thing which happened to me a month or two before my marriage—something which I have thought may have had a connection with the accident to the poor man you have buried to-day.  It was on that evening I was at the manor-house waiting for you to fetch me; I was in the winter-garden with Albert, and we were sitting silent together, when we fancied we heard a cry.  We opened the door, and while Albert ran to fetch his hat, leaving me standing¹² there, the cry was repeated, and my excited senses made me think I heard my own name.  When Albert came back all was silent, and we decided¹³ that it was only a drunken shout, and not a cry for help.  We both forgot the incident, and it never has occurred to me till since the funeral to-day that it might have been this stranger’s cry.  The name of course was only fancy, or he might have had a wife or child with a name something like mine, poor man!’

 

When she was gone the brothers were silent till Cornelius said, ‘Now mark this, Joshua.  Sooner or later she’ll know.’

 

‘How?’

 

‘From one of us.  Do you think human hearts are iron-cased safes, that you suppose we can keep this secret for ever?’

 

‘Yes, I think they are, sometimes,’ said Joshua.

 

‘No.  It will out.  We shall tell.’

 

‘What, and ruin her—kill her?  Disgrace her children, and pull down the whole auspicious¹⁴ house of Fellmer about our ears?  No!  May I—drown where he was drowned before I do it!  Never, never.  Surely you can say the same, Cornelius!’

 

Cornelius seemed fortified¹⁵, and no more was said.  For a long time after that day he did not see Joshua, and before the next year was out a son and heir was born to the Fellmers.  The villagers rang the three bells every evening for a week and more, and were made merry by Mr. Fellmer’s ale; and when the christening came on Joshua paid Narrobourne another visit.

 

Among all the people who assembled on that day the brother clergymen were the least interested.  Their minds were haunted by a spirit in kerseymere in the evening they walked together in the fields.

 

‘She’s all right,’ said Joshua.  ‘But here are you doing journey-work, Cornelius, and likely to continue at it till the end of the day, as far as I can see.  I, too, with my petty living—what am I after all? . . . To tell the truth, the Church is a poor forlorn hope for people without influence, particularly when their enthusiasm begins to flag.  A social regenerator¹⁶ has a better chance outside, where he is unhampered by dogma and tradition.  As for me, I would rather have gone on mending mills, with my crust of bread and liberty.’

 

Almost automatically they had bent¹⁷ their steps along the margin¹⁸ of the river; they now paused.  They were standing on the brink¹⁹ of the well-known weir²⁰.  There were the hatches, there was the culvert; they could see the pebbly²¹ bed of the stream through the pellucid²² water.  The notes of the church-bells were audible, still jangled by the enthusiastic villagers.

 

‘Why see—it was there I hid his walking-stick!’ said Joshua, looking towards the sedge.  The next moment, during a passing breeze, something flashed white on the spot to which the attention of Cornelius was drawn.

 

From the sedge rose a straight little silver-poplar, and it was the leaves of this sapling which caused the flicker²³ of whiteness.

 

‘His walking-stick has grown!’ Joshua added.  ‘It was a rough one—cut from the hedge, I remember.’

 

At every puff²⁴ of wind the tree turned white, till they could not bear to look at it; and they walked away.

 

‘I see him every night,’ Cornelius murmured . . . ‘Ah, we read our Hebrews to little account, Jos!  Υπέμεινε σταυρον, αισχυνης καταφρονησας.  To have endured the cross, despising the shame—there lay greatness!  But now I often feel that I should like to put an end to trouble here in this self-same spot.’

 

‘I have thought of it myself,’ said Joshua.

 

‘Perhaps we shall, some day,’ murmured his brother.  ‘Perhaps,’ said Joshua moodily²⁵.

 

With that contingency²⁶ to consider in the silence of their nights and days they bent their steps homewards.

 

December 1888.

该作者的其它作品
《忧郁的双眸 A Pair of Blue Eyes》
《韦塞克斯的故事 Wessex Tales》
《无名的裘德 Jude the Obscure》
《Tess of the D‘Urbervilles德伯家的苔丝》

1 peg   

n.木栓，木钉；vt.用木钉钉，用短桩固定

参考例句：

• Hang your overcoat on the peg in the hall.把你的大衣挂在门厅的挂衣钩上。
• He hit the peg mightily on the top with a mallet.他用木槌猛敲木栓顶。

2 squire   

n.护卫, 侍从, 乡绅

参考例句：

• I told him the squire was the most liberal of men.我告诉他乡绅是世界上最宽宏大量的人。
• The squire was hard at work at Bristol.乡绅在布里斯托尔热衷于他的工作。

3 suspense   

n.（对可能发生的事）紧张感，担心，挂虑

参考例句：

• The suspense was unbearable.这样提心吊胆的状况实在叫人受不了。
• The director used ingenious devices to keep the audience in suspense.导演用巧妙手法引起观众的悬念。

4 tolled   

鸣钟（toll的过去式与过去分词形式）

参考例句：

• Bells were tolled all over the country at the King's death. 全国为国王之死而鸣钟。
• The church bell tolled the hour. 教堂的钟声报时。

5 amazement   

n.惊奇，惊讶

参考例句：

• All those around him looked at him with amazement.周围的人都对他投射出惊异的眼光。
• He looked at me in blank amazement.他带着迷茫惊诧的神情望着我。

6 remains   

n.剩余物，残留物；遗体，遗迹

参考例句：

• He ate the remains of food hungrily.他狼吞虎咽地吃剩余的食物。
• The remains of the meal were fed to the dog.残羹剩饭喂狗了。

7 mowing   

n.割草，一次收割量，牧草地v.刈，割( mow的现在分词 )

参考例句：

• The lawn needs mowing. 这草坪的草该割了。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》
• "Do you use it for mowing?" “你是用它割草么？” 来自汉英文学 - 中国现代小说

8 drawn   

v.拖，拉，拔出；adj.憔悴的，紧张的

参考例句：

• All the characters in the story are drawn from life.故事中的所有人物都取材于生活。
• Her gaze was drawn irresistibly to the scene outside.她的目光禁不住被外面的风景所吸引。

9 scythe   

n. 长柄的大镰刀，战车镰； v. 以大镰刀割

参考例句：

• He's cutting grass with a scythe.他正在用一把大镰刀割草。
• Two men were attempting to scythe the long grass.两个人正试图割掉疯长的草。

10 entangled   

adj.卷入的；陷入的；被缠住的；缠在一起的v.使某人（某物/自己）缠绕，纠缠于（某物中），使某人（自己）陷入（困难或复杂的环境中）( entangle的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• The bird had become entangled in the wire netting. 那只小鸟被铁丝网缠住了。
• Some military observers fear the US could get entangled in another war. 一些军事观察家担心美国会卷入另一场战争。 来自《简明英汉词典》

11 bonnet   

n.无边女帽；童帽

参考例句：

• The baby's bonnet keeps the sun out of her eyes.婴孩的帽子遮住阳光，使之不刺眼。
• She wore a faded black bonnet garnished with faded artificial flowers.她戴着一顶褪了色的黑色无边帽，帽上缀着褪了色的假花。

12 standing   

n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的

参考例句：

• After the earthquake only a few houses were left standing.地震过后只有几幢房屋还立着。
• They're standing out against any change in the law.他们坚决反对对法律做任何修改。

13 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。

14 auspicious   

adj.吉利的；幸运的，吉兆的

参考例句：

• The publication of my first book was an auspicious beginning of my career.我的第一本书的出版是我事业吉祥的开始。
• With favorable weather conditions it was an auspicious moment to set sail.风和日丽，正是扬帆出海的黄道吉日。

15 fortified   

adj. 加强的

参考例句：

• He fortified himself against the cold with a hot drink. 他喝了一杯热饮御寒。
• The enemy drew back into a few fortified points. 敌人收缩到几个据点里。

16 regenerator   

n.收革者，交流换热器，再生器；蓄热器

参考例句：

• Cooling coils are introduced into the regenerator to control the temperature and remove the excess heat. 在再生器中放进冷却盘管能控制温度，也能除去过多的热量。 来自辞典例句
• Regenerator is a crucial component in the liquid desiccant air conditioning system. 再生器是溶液除湿空调系统中的重要传热传质部件。 来自互联网

17 bent   

n.爱好，癖好；adj.弯的；决心的，一心的

参考例句：

• He was fully bent upon the project.他一心扑在这项计划上。
• We bent over backward to help them.我们尽了最大努力帮助他们。

18 margin   

n.页边空白；差额；余地，余裕；边，边缘

参考例句：

• We allowed a margin of 20 minutes in catching the train.我们有20分钟的余地赶火车。
• The village is situated at the margin of a forest.村子位于森林的边缘。

19 brink   

n.(悬崖、河流等的)边缘，边沿

参考例句：

• The tree grew on the brink of the cliff.那棵树生长在峭壁的边缘。
• The two countries were poised on the brink of war.这两个国家处于交战的边缘。

20 weir   

n.堰堤，拦河坝

参考例句：

• The discharge from the weir opening should be free.从堰开口处的泻水应畅通。
• Big Weir River,restraining tears,has departed!大堰河，含泪地去了！

21 pebbly   

多卵石的，有卵石花纹的

参考例句：

• Sometimes the water spread like a sheen over the pebbly bed. 有时河水泛流在圆石子的河床上，晶莹发光。
• The beach is pebbly. 这个海滩上有许多卵石。

22 pellucid   

adj.透明的，简单的

参考例句：

• She has a pair of pellucid blue eyes.她有一双清澈的蓝眼睛。
• They sat there watching the water of the pellucid stream rush by.他们坐在那儿望著那清澈的溪水喘急流过。

23 flicker   

vi./n.闪烁，摇曳，闪现

参考例句：

• There was a flicker of lights coming from the abandoned house.这所废弃的房屋中有灯光闪烁。
• At first,the flame may be a small flicker,barely shining.开始时，光辉可能是微弱地忽隐忽现，几乎并不灿烂。

24 puff   

n.一口(气)；一阵(风)；v.喷气，喘气

参考例句：

• He took a puff at his cigarette.他吸了一口香烟。
• They tried their best to puff the book they published.他们尽力吹捧他们出版的书。

25 moodily   

adv.喜怒无常地；情绪多变地；心情不稳地；易生气地

参考例句：

• Pork slipped from the room as she remained staring moodily into the distance. 阿宝从房间里溜了出来，留她独个人站在那里瞪着眼睛忧郁地望着远处。 来自辞典例句
• He climbed moodily into the cab, relieved and distressed. 他忧郁地上了马车，既松了一口气，又忧心忡忡。 来自互联网

26 contingency   

n.意外事件，可能性

参考例句：

• We should be prepared for any contingency.我们应该对任何应急情况有所准备。
• A fire in our warehouse was a contingency that we had not expected.库房的一场大火是我们始料未及的。