The land fronting the main road was destined5 not for cottages, but for residences, semi-detached or detached. Osmond Orgreave had a good deal of this land under his control. He did not own it, he hawked6 it. Like all provincial7, and most London, architects, he was a land-broker in addition to being an architect. Before obtaining a commission to build a house, he frequently had to create the commission himself by selling a convenient plot, and then persuading the purchaser that if he wished to retain the respect of the community he must put on the plot a house worthy8 of the plot. The Orgreave family all had expensive tastes, and it was Osmond Orgreave’s task to find most of the money needed for the satisfaction of those tastes. He always did find it, because the necessity was upon him, but he did not always find it easily. Janet would say sometimes, “We mustn’t be so hard on father this month; really, lately we’ve never seen him with his cheque-book out of his hand.” Undoubtedly9 the clothes on Janet’s back were partly responsible for the celerity with which building land at Bleakridge was ‘developed,’ just after the installation of steam-cars in Trafalgar Road.
Two.
Mr Orgreave sold a corner plot to Darius. He had had his eye on Darius for a long time before he actually shot him down; but difficulties connected with the paring of estimates for printing had somewhat estranged10 them. Orgreave had had to smooth out these difficulties, offer to provide a portion of the purchase money on mortgage from another client, produce a plan for a new house that surpassed all records of cheapness, produce a plan for the transforming of Darius’s present residence into business premises11, talk poetically12 about the future of printing in the Five Towns, and lastly, demonstrate by digits13 that Darius would actually save money by becoming a property-owner—he had had to do all this, and more, before Darius would buy.
The two were regular cronies for about a couple of months—that is to say, between the payment of the preliminary deposit and the signing of the contract for building the house. But, the contract signed, their relations were once more troubled. Orgreave had nothing to fear, then, and besides, he was using his diplomacy14 elsewhere. The house went up to an accompaniment of scenes in which only the proprietor15 was irate16. Osmond Orgreave could not be ruffled17; he could not be deprived of his air of having done a favour to Darius Clayhanger; his social and moral superiority, his real aloofness18, remained absolutely unimpaired. The clear image of him as a fine gentleman was never dulled nor distorted even in the mind of Darius. Nevertheless Darius ‘hated the sight’ of the house ere the house was roofed in. But this did not diminish his pride in the house. He wished he had never ‘set eyes on’ Osmond Orgreave. Yes! But the little boy from the Bastille was immensely content at the consequences of having set eyes on Osmond Orgreave. The little boy from the Bastille was achieving the supreme19 peak of greatness—he was about to live away from business. Soon he would be ‘going down to business’ of a morning. Soon he would be receiving two separate demand-notes for rates. Soon he would be on a plane with the vainest earthenware20 manufacturer of them all. Ages ago he had got as far as a house with a lobby to it. Now, it would be a matter of two establishments. Beneath all his discontents, moodiness21, temper, and biliousness22, lay this profound satisfaction of the little boy from the Bastille.
Moreover, in any case, he would have been obliged to do something heroic, if only to find the room more and more imperiously demanded by his printing business.
Three.
On the Saturday afternoon of Janet Orgreave’s visit to the shop, Edwin went up to Bleakridge to inspect the house, and in particular the coloured ‘lights’ in the upper squares of the drawing-room and dining-room windows. He had a key to the unpainted front door, and having climbed over various obstacles and ascended23 an inclined bending plank24, he entered and stood in the square hall of the deserted25, damp, and inchoate26 structure.
The house was his father’s only in name. In emotional fact it was Edwin’s house, because he alone was capable of possessing it by enjoying it. To Darius, to Bursley in general, it was just a nice house, of red brick with terra-cotta facings and red tiles, in the second-Victorian Style, the style that had broken away from Georgian austerity and first-Victorian stucco and smugness, and wandered off vaguely28 into nothing in particular. To the plebeian29 in Darius it was of course grandiose30, and vast; to Edwin also, in a less degree. But to Edwin it was not a house, it was a work of art, it was an epic31 poem, it was an emanation of the soul. He did not realise this. He did not realise how the house had informed his daily existence. All that he knew about himself in relation to the house was that he could not keep away from it. He went and had a look at it, nearly every morning before breakfast, when the workmen were fresh and lyrical.
When the news came down to the younger generation that Darius had bought land and meant to build on the land, Edwin had been profoundly moved between apprehension32 and hope; his condition had been one of simple but intense expectant excitement. He wondered what his own status would be in the great enterprise of house-building. All depended on Mr Orgreave. Would Mr Orgreave, of whom he had seen scarcely anything in seven years, remember that he was intelligently interested in architecture? Or would Mr Orgreave walk right over him and talk exclusively to his father? He had feared, he had had a suspicion, that Mr Orgreave was an inconstant man.
Mr Orgreave had remembered in the handsomest way. When the plans were being discussed, Mr Orgreave with one word, a tone, a glance, had raised Edwin to the consultative level of his father. He had let Darius see that Edwin was in his opinion worthy to take part in discussions, and quite privately33 he had let Edwin see that Darius must not be treated too seriously. Darius, who really had no interest in ten thousand exquisitely34 absorbing details, had sometimes even said, with impatience35, “Oh! Settle it how you like, with Edwin.”
Edwin’s own suggestions never seemed very brilliant, and Mr Orgreave was always able to prove to him that they were inadvisable; but they were never silly, like most of his father’s. And he acquired leading ideas that transformed his whole attitude towards architecture. For example, he had always looked on a house as a front-wall diversified36 by doors and windows, with rooms behind it. But when Mr Orgreave produced his first notions for the new house Edwin was surprised to find that he had not even sketched37 the front. He had said, “We shall be able to see what the elevation38 looks like when we’ve decided39 the plan a bit.” And Edwin saw in a flash that the front of a house was merely the expression of the inside of it, merely a result, almost accidental. And he was astounded40 and disgusted that he, with his professed41 love of architecture and his intermittent42 study of it, had not perceived this obvious truth for himself. He never again looked at a house in the old irrational43 way.
Then, when examining the preliminary sketch-plan, he had put his finger on a square space and asked what room that was. “That isn’t a room; that’s the hall,” said Mr Orgreave. “But it’s square!” Edwin exclaimed. He thought that in houses (houses to be lived in) the hall or lobby must necessarily be long and narrow. Now suddenly he saw no reason why a hall should not be square. Mr Orgreave had made no further remark about halls at the time, but another day, without any preface, he re-opened the subject to Edwin, in a tone good-naturedly informing, and when he had done Edwin could see that the shape of the hall depended on the shape of the house, and that halls had only been crushed and pulled into something long and narrow because the disposition44 of houses absolutely demanded this ugly negation45 of the very idea of a hall. Again, he had to begin to think afresh, to see afresh. He conceived a real admiration46 for Osmond Orgreave; not more for his original and yet common-sense manner of regarding things, than for his aristocratic deportment, his equality to every situation, and his extraordinary skill in keeping his dignity and his distance during encounters with Darius. (At the same time, when Darius would grumble47 savagely48 that Osmond Orgreave ‘was too clever by half,’ Edwin could not deny that.) Edwin’s sisters got a good deal of Mr Orgreave, through Edwin; he could never keep Mr Orgreave very long to himself. He gave away a great deal of Mr Orgreave’s wisdom without mentioning the origin of the gift. Thus occasionally Clara would say cuttingly, “I know where you’ve picked that up. You’ve picked that up from Mr Orgreave.” The young man Benbow to whom the infant Clara had been so queerly engaged, also received from Edwin considerable quantities of Mr Orgreave. But the fellow was only a decent, dull, pushing, successful ass1, and quite unable to assimilate Mr Orgreave; Edwin could never comprehend how Clara, so extremely difficult to please, so carping and captious49, could mate herself to a fellow like Benbow. She had done so, however; they were recently married. Edwin was glad that that was over; for it had disturbed him in his attentions to the house.
Four.
When the house began to ‘go up,’ Edwin lived in an ecstasy50 of contemplation. I say with deliberateness an ‘ecstasy.’ He had seen houses go up before; he knew that houses were constructed brick by brick, beam by beam, lath by lath, tile by tile; he knew that they did not build themselves. And yet, in the vagueness of his mind, he had never imaginatively realised that a house was made with hands, and hands that could err27. With its exact perpendiculars51 and horizontals, its geometric regularities52, and its Chinese preciseness of fitting, a house had always seemed to him—again in the vagueness of his mind—as something superhuman. The commonest cornice, the most ordinary pillar of a staircase-balustrade—could that have been accomplished53 in its awful perfection of line and contour by a human being? How easy to believe that it was ‘not made with hands’!
But now he saw. He had to see. He saw a hole in the ground, with water at the bottom, and the next moment that hole was a cellar; not an amateur cellar, a hole that would do at a pinch for a cellar, but a professional cellar. He appreciated the brains necessary to put a brick on another brick, with just the right quantity of mortar54 in between. He thought the house would never get itself done—one brick at a time—and each brick cost a farthing—slow, careful; yes, and even finicking. But soon the bricklayers had to stand on plank-platforms in order to reach the raw top of the wall that was ever rising above them. The measurements, the rulings, the plumbings, the checkings! He was humbled55 and he was enlightened. He understood that a miracle is only the result of miraculous56 patience, miraculous nicety, miraculous honesty, miraculous perseverance57. He understood that there was no golden and magic secret of building. It was just putting one brick on another and against another—but to a hair’s breadth. It was just like anything else. For instance, printing! He saw even printing in a new light.
And when the first beams were bridged across two walls...
The funny thing was that the men’s fingers were thicky and clumsy. Never could such fingers pick up a pin! And still they would manoeuvre58 a hundredweight of timber to a pin’s point.
Five.
He stood at the drawing-room bay-window (of which each large pane59 had been marked with the mystic sign of a white circle by triumphant60 glaziers), and looked across the enclosed fragment of clayey field that ultimately would be the garden. The house was at the corner of Trafalgar Road and a side-street that had lobbied cottages down its slope. The garden was oblong, with its length parallel to Trafalgar Road, and separated from the pavement only by a high wall. The upper end of the garden was blocked by the first of three new houses which Osmond Orgreave was building in a terrace. These houses had their main fronts on the street; they were quite as commodious61 as the Clayhangers’, but much inferior in garden-space; their bits of flower-plots lay behind them. And away behind their flower-plots, with double entrance-gates in another side street, stretched the grounds of Osmond Orgreave, his house in the sheltered middle thereof. He had got, cheaply, one of the older residential properties of the district, Georgian, of a recognisable style, relic62 of the days when manufacturers formed a class entirely63 apart from their operatives; even as far back as 1880 any operative might with luck become an employer. The south-east corner of the Clayhanger garden touched the north-west corner of the domains64 of Orgreave; for a few feet the two gardens were actually contiguous, with naught65 but an old untidy thorn hedge between them; this hedge was to be replaced by a wall that would match the topmost of the lobbied cottages which bounded the view of the Clayhangers to the east.
From the bay-window Edwin could see over the hedge, and also through it, on to the croquet lawn of the Orgreaves. Croquet was then in its first avatar; nothing was more dashing than croquet. With rag-balls and home-made mallets the Clayhanger children had imitated croquet in their yard in the seventies. The Orgreaves played real croquet; one of them had shone in a tournament at Buxton. Edwin noticed a figure on the gravel66 between the lawn and the hedge. He knew it to be Janet, by the crimson67 frock. But he had no notion that Janet had stationed herself in that quarter with intent to waylay68 him. He could not have credited her with such a purpose. Nor could his modesty69 have believed that he was important enough to employ the talent of the Orgreaves for agreeable chicane. The fact was that Janet had been espying70 him for a quarter of an hour. When at length she waved her hand to him, it did not occur to him to suppose that she was waving her hand to him; he merely wondered what peculiar71 thing she was doing. Then he blushed as she waved again, and he knew first from the blood in his face that Janet was making a signal, and that it was to himself that the signal was directed: his body had told his mind; this was very odd.
Of course he was obliged to go out; and he went, muttering to himself.
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1
ass
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| n.驴；傻瓜，蠢笨的人 | |
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crest
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| n.顶点；饰章；羽冠；vt.达到顶点；vi.形成浪尖 | |
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residential
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| adj.提供住宿的；居住的；住宅的 | |
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depreciated
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| v.贬值，跌价，减价( depreciate的过去式和过去分词 )；贬低，蔑视，轻视 | |
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destined
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| adj.命中注定的；(for)以…为目的地的 | |
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hawked
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| 通过叫卖主动兜售（hawk的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
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7
provincial
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| adj.省的，地方的；n．外省人，乡下人 | |
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worthy
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| adj.(of)值得的，配得上的；有价值的 | |
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undoubtedly
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| adv.确实地，无疑地 | |
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10
estranged
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| adj.疏远的，分离的 | |
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premises
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| n.建筑物，房屋 | |
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poetically
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| adv.有诗意地，用韵文 | |
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13
digits
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| n.数字( digit的名词复数 )；手指，足趾 | |
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14
diplomacy
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| n.外交；外交手腕，交际手腕 | |
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15
proprietor
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| n.所有人；业主；经营者 | |
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16
irate
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| adj.发怒的，生气 | |
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17
ruffled
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| adj. 有褶饰边的, 起皱的 动词ruffle的过去式和过去分词 | |
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18
aloofness
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| 超然态度 | |
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19
supreme
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| adj.极度的，最重要的；至高的，最高的 | |
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20
earthenware
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| n.土器，陶器 | |
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21
moodiness
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| n.喜怒无常；喜怒无常，闷闷不乐；情绪 | |
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22
biliousness
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| [医] 胆汁质 | |
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23
ascended
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| v.上升，攀登( ascend的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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plank
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| n.板条，木板，政策要点，政纲条目 | |
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25
deserted
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| adj.荒芜的，荒废的，无人的，被遗弃的 | |
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26
inchoate
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| adj.才开始的，初期的 | |
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27
err
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| vi.犯错误，出差错 | |
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vaguely
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| adv.含糊地，暖昧地 | |
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29
plebeian
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| adj.粗俗的；平民的；n.平民；庶民 | |
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30
grandiose
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| adj.宏伟的，宏大的，堂皇的，铺张的 | |
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31
epic
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| n.史诗，叙事诗；adj.史诗般的，壮丽的 | |
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apprehension
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| n.理解，领悟；逮捕，拘捕；忧虑 | |
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33
privately
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| adv.以私人的身份，悄悄地，私下地 | |
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34
exquisitely
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| adv.精致地；强烈地；剧烈地；异常地 | |
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35
impatience
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| n.不耐烦，急躁 | |
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36
diversified
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| adj.多样化的，多种经营的v.使多样化，多样化( diversify的过去式和过去分词 )；进入新的商业领域 | |
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37
sketched
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| v.草拟（sketch的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
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38
elevation
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| n.高度；海拔；高地；上升；提高 | |
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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
astounded
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| v.使震惊(astound的过去式和过去分词)；愕然；愕；惊讶 | |
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41
professed
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| 公开声称的，伪称的，已立誓信教的 | |
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42
intermittent
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| adj.间歇的，断断续续的 | |
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43
irrational
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| adj.无理性的，失去理性的 | |
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44
disposition
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| n.性情，性格；意向，倾向；排列，部署 | |
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45
negation
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| n.否定；否认 | |
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admiration
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| n.钦佩，赞美，羡慕 | |
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47
grumble
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| vi.抱怨；咕哝；n.抱怨，牢骚；咕哝，隆隆声 | |
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48
savagely
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| adv. 野蛮地，残酷地 | |
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49
captious
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| adj.难讨好的，吹毛求疵的 | |
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50
ecstasy
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| n.狂喜，心醉神怡，入迷 | |
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51
perpendiculars
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| n.垂直的，成直角的( perpendicular的名词复数 )；直立的 | |
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52
regularities
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| 规则性( regularity的名词复数 )； 正规； 有规律的事物； 端正 | |
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53
accomplished
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| adj.有才艺的；有造诣的；达到了的 | |
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54
mortar
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| n.灰浆，灰泥；迫击炮；v.把…用灰浆涂接合 | |
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55
humbled
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| adj. 卑下的，谦逊的，粗陋的 vt. 使 ... 卑下，贬低 | |
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56
miraculous
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| adj.像奇迹一样的，不可思议的 | |
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57
perseverance
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| n.坚持不懈，不屈不挠 | |
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58
manoeuvre
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| n.策略，调动；v.用策略，调动 | |
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59
pane
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| n.窗格玻璃，长方块 | |
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60
triumphant
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| adj.胜利的，成功的；狂欢的，喜悦的 | |
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61
commodious
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| adj.宽敞的；使用方便的 | |
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62
relic
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| n.神圣的遗物，遗迹，纪念物 | |
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63
entirely
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| ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地 | |
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domains
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| n.范围( domain的名词复数 )；领域；版图；地产 | |
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naught
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| n.无，零 [=nought] | |
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gravel
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| n.砂跞；砂砾层；结石 | |
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67
crimson
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| n./adj.深(绯)红色(的)；vi.脸变绯红色 | |
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waylay
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| v.埋伏，伏击 | |
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69
modesty
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| n.谦逊，虚心，端庄，稳重，羞怯，朴素 | |
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espying
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| v.看到( espy的现在分词 ) | |
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peculiar
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| adj.古怪的，异常的；特殊的，特有的 | |
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