It had taken him four years to gather the money for the site, and some of it he was paying from his own pocket. He was unmarried, and had therefore no reason to save. Still, he must be careful, for the sake of the parish: the church must be built, and some of the money would probably be wanted for that. Moreover, there were other calls. The benefice brought a trifle less than £200 a year, and out of that, so far as it would go, he paid (with some small outside help) £130 for rent of the temporary church and the adjacent rooms; the organist's salary; the rates and the gas-bills; the cost of cleaning, care, and repair; the sums needed for such relief as was impossible to be withheld2; and a thousand small things beside. While the Jagos speculated wildly among themselves as to the vast sums he must make by his job. For what toff would come and live in the Jago except for a consideration of solid gain? What other possible motive3 could there be, indeed?
Still, he had an influence among them such as they had never known before. For one thing, they feared in him what they took for a sort of supernatural insight. The mean cunning of the Jago, subtle as it was, and baffling to most strangers, foundered4 miserably5 before his relentless6 intelligence; and crafty7 rogues—'wide as Broad Street,' as their proverb went—at first sulked, faltered9 and prevaricated10 transparently11, but soon gave up all hope or effort to deceive him. Thus he was respected. Once he had made it plain that he was no common milch-cow in the matter of gratuities12: to be bamboozled13 for shillings, cajoled for coals, and bullied14 for blankets: then there became apparent in him qualities of charity and lovingkindness, well-judged and governed, that awoke in places a regard that was in a way akin15 to affection. And the familiar habit of the Jago slowly grew to call him Father Sturt.
Father Sturt was not to be overreached: that was the axiom gloomily accepted by all in the Jago who lived by what they accounted their wits. You could not juggle16 shillings and clothing (convertible into shillings) out of Father Sturt by the easy fee-faw-fum of repentance17 and salvation18 that served with so many. There were many of the Jagos (mightily despised by some of the sturdier ruffians) who sallied forth19 from time to time into neighbouring regions in pursuit of the profitable sentimentalist: discovering him—black-coated, earnest, green—sometimes a preacher, sometimes a layman20, sometimes one having authority on the committee of a charitable institution; dabbling21 in the East End on his own account, or administering relief for a mission, or disbursing22 a Mansion23 House Fund. He was of two chief kinds: the Merely-Soft,—the 'man of wool' as the Jago word went,—for whom any tale was good enough, delivered with the proper wistful misery25: and the Gullible-Cocksure, confident in a blind experience, who was quite as easy to tap, when approached with a becoming circumspection26. A rough and ready method, which served well in most cases with both sorts, was a profession of sudden religious awakening27. For this, one offered an aspect either of serene28 happiness or of maniacal29 exaltation, according to the customer's taste. A better way, but one demanding greater subtlety30, was the assumption of the part of Earnest Inquirer, hesitating on the brink31 of Salvation. For the attitude was capable of indefinite prolongation, and was ever productive of the boots, the coats, and the half-crowns used to coax32 weak brethren into the fold. But with Father Sturt, such trouble was worse than useless; it was, indeed, but to invite a humiliating snub. Thus, when Fluffy33 Pike first came to Father Sturt with the intelligence that he had at last found Grace, the Father Sturt asked if he had found it in a certain hamper34—a hamper hooked that morning from a railway van—and if it were of a quality likely to inspire an act of restoration to the goods office. Nothing was to be done with a man of this disgustingly practical turn of mind, and the Jagos soon ceased from trying.
Father Sturt had made more of the stable than the make-shift church he had found. He had organised a club in a stable adjoining, and he lived in the rooms over the shut-up shop. In the club he gathered the men of the Jago indiscriminately, with the sole condition of good behaviour on the premises35. And there they smoked, jumped, swung on horizontal bars, boxed, played at cards and bagatelle36, free from interference save when interference became necessary. For the women there were sewing-meetings and singing. And all governed with an invisible discipline, which, being brought to action, was found to be of iron.
Now there was ground on which might be built a worthier37 church; and Father Sturt had in mind a church which should have by its side a cleanly lodging-house, a night-shelter, a club, baths and washhouses. And at a stroke he would establish this habitation and wipe out the blackest spot in the Jago. For the new site comprised the whole of Jago Court and the houses that masked it in Old Jago Street.
This was a dream of the future—perhaps of the immediate38 future, if a certain new millionaire could only be interested in the undertaking—but of the future certainly. The money for the site alone had been hard enough to gather. In the first place the East London Elevation39 Mission and Pansophical Institute was asking very diligently40 for funds—and was getting them. It was to that, indeed, that people turned by habit when minded to invest in the amelioration of the East End. Then about this time there had arisen a sudden quacksalver, a Panjandrum of philanthropy, a mummer of the market-place, who undertook, for a fixed41 sum, to abolish poverty and sin together; and many, pleased with the new gaudery, poured out before him the money that had gone to maintain hospitals and to feed proved charities. So that gifts were scarce and hard to come by—indeed, were apt to be thought unnecessary, for was not misery to be destroyed out of hand? Moreover, Father Sturt wanted not for enemies among the Sentimental-Cocksure. He was callous42 and cynical43 in face of the succulent penitence44 of Fluffy Pike and his kind. He preferred the frank rogue8 before the calculating snivelmonger. He had a club at which boxing was allowed, and dominoes—flat ungodliness. He shook hands familiarly every day with the lowest characters: his tastes were vulgar and brutal45. And the company at his club was really dreadful. These things the Cocksure said, with shaking of heads; and these they took care should be known among such as might give Father Sturt money. Father Sturt!—the name itself was sheer papistry. And many comforted themselves by writing him anonymous46 letters, displaying hell before his eyes, and dealing47 him vivid damnation.
So Father Sturt tramped back to the Jago, and to the strain and struggle that ceased not for one moment of his life, though it left never a mark of success behind it. For the Jago was much as ever. Were the lump once leavened48 by the advent49 of any denizen50 a little less base than the rest, were a native once ridiculed52 and persuaded into a spell of work and clean living, then must Father Sturt hasten to drive him from the Jago ere its influence suck him under for ever; leaving for his own community none but the entirely53 vicious. And among these he spent his life: preaching little, in the common sense, for that were but idle vanity in this place; but working, alleviating54, growing into the Jago life, flinging scorn and ridicule51 on evil things, grateful for tiny negative successes—for keeping a few from ill-behaviour but for an hour; conscious that wherever he was not, iniquity55 flourished unreproved; and oppressed by the remembrance that albeit56 the Jago death-rate ruled full four times that of all London beyond, still the Jago rats bred and bred their kind unhindered, multiplying apace and infecting the world.
In Luck Row he came on Josh Perrott, making for home with something under the skirt of his coat 'How d'ye do, Josh?' said Father Sturt, clapping a hand on Josh's shoulder, and offering it as Josh turned about.
Josh, with a shifting of the object under his coat, hastened to tap his cap-peak with his forefinger57 before shaking hands. He grinned broadly, and looked this way and that, with mingled58 gratification and embarrassment59, as was the Jago way in such circumstances. Because one could never tell whether Father Sturt would exchange a mere24 friendly sentence or two, or, with concealed60 knowledge, put some disastrous61 question about a watch, or a purse, or a breast-pin, or what not.
'Very well, thanks, Father,' answered Josh, and grinned amiably62 at the wall beyond the vicar's elbow.
'And what have you been doing just lately?'
'Oo—odd jobs, Father.' Always the same answer, all over the Jago.
'Not quite such odd jobs as usual, I hope, Josh, eh?' Father Sturt smiled, and twitched63 Josh playfully by the button-hole as one might treat a child. 'I once heard of a very odd job in the Kingsland Road that got a fine young man six months' holiday. Eh, Josh?'
Josh Perrott wriggled64 and grinned sheepishly; tried to frown, failed, and grinned again. He had only been out a few weeks from that six moon. Presently he said:—'Awright, Father; you do rub it into a bloke, no mistake.'
The grin persisted as he looked first at the wall, then at the pavement, then down the street, but never in the parson's face.
'Ah, there's a deal of good in a blister65 sometimes, isn't there, Josh? What's that I see—a clock? Not another odd job, eh?'
It was indeed a small nickel-plated American clock which Josh had under his coat, and which he now partly uncovered with positive protests. 'No, s'elp me, Father, it's all straight—all fair trade, Father—jist a swop for somethink else, on me solemn davy. That's wot it is, Father—straight.'
'Well, I'm glad you thought to get it, Josh,' Father Sturt pursued, still twitching66 the button-hole. 'You never have been a punctual churchgoer, you know, Josh, and I'm glad you've made arrangements to improve. You'll have no excuse now, you know, and I shall expect you on Sunday morning—promptly. Don't forget: I shall be looking for you.' And Father Sturt shook hands again, and passed on, leaving Josh Perrott still grinning dubiously67, and striving to assimilate the invitation to church.
The clock was indeed an exchange, though not altogether an innocent one: the facts being these. Early that morning Josh had found himself scrambling68 hastily along a turning out of Brick Lane, accompanied by a parcel of nine or ten pounds of tobacco, and extremely conscious of the hasty scrambling of several other people round the corner. Some of these people turned that corner before Josh reached the next, so that his course was observed, and it became politic69 to get rid of his parcel before a possible heading-off in Meakin Street. There was one place where this might be done, and that was at Weech's. A muddy yard, one of a tangle70 of such places behind Meakin Street, abutted71 on Weech's back-fence; and it was no uncommon72 thing for a Jago on the crook73, hard pressed, to pitch his plunder74 over the fence, double out into the crowd, and call on Mr Aaron Weech for the purchase-money as soon as opportunity served. The manœuvre was a simple one, facilitated by the plan of the courts; but it was only adopted in extreme cases, because Mr Aaron Weech was at best but a mean paymaster, and with so much of the upper hand in the bargain as these circumstances conferred, was apt to be meaner than ever. But this case seemed to call for the stratagem75, and Josh made for the muddy yard, dropped the parcel over the fence, with a loud whistle, and backed off by the side passage in the regular way.
When he called on Mr Aaron Weech a few hours later, that talented tradesman, with liberal gestures, told out shillings singly in his hand, pausing after each as though that were the last. But Josh held his hand persistently76 open, till Mr Weech, having released the fifth shilling, stopped altogether, scandalised at such rapacity77. But still Josh was not satisfied, and as he was not quite so easy a customer to manage as the boys who commonly fenced at the shop, Mr Weech compromised, in the end, by throwing in a cheap clock. It had been in hand for a long time; and Josh was fain to take it, since he could get no more. And thus it was that Dicky, coming in at about five o'clock, was astonished to see on the mantel-piece, amid the greasy78 ruins of many candle ends, the clock that had belonged to the Ropers four years before.
该作者的其它作品
《The Hole in the Wall》
该作者的其它作品
《The Hole in the Wall》
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1
eastward
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| adv.向东；adj.向东的；n.东方，东部 | |
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withheld
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| withhold过去式及过去分词 | |
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motive
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| n.动机，目的；adv.发动的，运动的 | |
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foundered
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| v.创始人( founder的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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miserably
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| adv.痛苦地；悲惨地；糟糕地；极度地 | |
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relentless
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| adj.残酷的，不留情的，无怜悯心的 | |
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crafty
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| adj.狡猾的，诡诈的 | |
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rogue
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| n.流氓；v.游手好闲 | |
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faltered
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| （嗓音）颤抖( falter的过去式和过去分词 )； 支吾其词； 蹒跚； 摇晃 | |
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prevaricated
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| v.支吾( prevaricate的过去式和过去分词 )；搪塞；说谎 | |
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transparently
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| 明亮地，显然地，易觉察地 | |
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gratuities
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| n.报酬( gratuity的名词复数 )；小账；小费；养老金 | |
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13
bamboozled
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| v.欺骗，使迷惑( bamboozle的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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bullied
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| adj.被欺负了v.恐吓，威逼( bully的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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akin
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| adj.同族的，类似的 | |
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juggle
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| v.变戏法，纂改，欺骗，同时做；n.玩杂耍，纂改，花招 | |
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repentance
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| n.懊悔 | |
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salvation
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| n.（尤指基督）救世，超度，拯救，解困 | |
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forth
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| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
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layman
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| n.俗人，门外汉，凡人 | |
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dabbling
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| v.涉猎( dabble的现在分词 )；涉足；浅尝；少量投资 | |
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disbursing
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| v.支出，付出( disburse的现在分词 ) | |
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mansion
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| n.大厦，大楼；宅第 | |
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mere
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| adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过 | |
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misery
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| n.痛苦，苦恼，苦难；悲惨的境遇，贫苦 | |
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circumspection
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| n.细心，慎重 | |
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awakening
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| n.觉醒，醒悟 adj.觉醒中的；唤醒的 | |
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28
serene
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| adj. 安详的，宁静的，平静的 | |
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29
maniacal
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| adj.发疯的 | |
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subtlety
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| n.微妙，敏锐，精巧；微妙之处，细微的区别 | |
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brink
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| n.(悬崖、河流等的)边缘，边沿 | |
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coax
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| v.哄诱，劝诱，用诱哄得到，诱取 | |
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fluffy
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| adj.有绒毛的，空洞的 | |
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hamper
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| vt.妨碍，束缚，限制；n.(有盖的)大篮子 | |
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premises
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| n.建筑物，房屋 | |
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bagatelle
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| n.琐事；小曲儿 | |
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37
worthier
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| 应得某事物( worthy的比较级 )； 值得做某事； 可尊敬的； 有（某人或事物）的典型特征 | |
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38
immediate
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| adj.立即的；直接的，最接近的；紧靠的 | |
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elevation
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| n.高度；海拔；高地；上升；提高 | |
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40
diligently
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| ad.industriously;carefully | |
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fixed
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| adj.固定的，不变的，准备好的；(计算机)固定的 | |
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42
callous
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| adj.无情的，冷淡的，硬结的，起老茧的 | |
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43
cynical
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| adj.(对人性或动机)怀疑的，不信世道向善的 | |
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44
penitence
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| n.忏悔，赎罪；悔过 | |
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45
brutal
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| adj.残忍的，野蛮的，不讲理的 | |
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46
anonymous
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| adj.无名的；匿名的；无特色的 | |
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47
dealing
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| n.经商方法，待人态度 | |
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48
leavened
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| adj.加酵母的v.使（面团）发酵( leaven的过去式和过去分词 )；在…中掺入改变的因素 | |
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49
advent
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| n.(重要事件等的)到来，来临 | |
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50
denizen
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| n.居民，外籍居民 | |
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51
ridicule
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| v.讥讽，挖苦；n.嘲弄 | |
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52
ridiculed
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| v.嘲笑，嘲弄，奚落( ridicule的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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53
entirely
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| ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地 | |
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54
alleviating
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| 减轻，缓解，缓和( alleviate的现在分词 ) | |
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55
iniquity
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| n.邪恶；不公正 | |
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56
albeit
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| conj.即使；纵使；虽然 | |
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57
forefinger
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| n.食指 | |
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58
mingled
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| 混合，混入( mingle的过去式和过去分词 )； 混进，与…交往[联系] | |
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59
embarrassment
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| n.尴尬；使人为难的人(事物)；障碍；窘迫 | |
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60
concealed
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| a.隐藏的，隐蔽的 | |
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61
disastrous
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| adj.灾难性的，造成灾害的；极坏的，很糟的 | |
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62
amiably
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| adv.和蔼可亲地，亲切地 | |
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63
twitched
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| vt.& vi.（使）抽动，（使）颤动（twitch的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
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64
wriggled
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| v.扭动，蠕动，蜿蜒行进( wriggle的过去式和过去分词 )；（使身体某一部位）扭动；耍滑不做，逃避（应做的事等） | |
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65
blister
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| n.水疱；(油漆等的)气泡；v.(使)起泡 | |
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66
twitching
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| n.颤搐 | |
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67
dubiously
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| adv.可疑地，怀疑地 | |
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68
scrambling
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| v.快速爬行( scramble的现在分词 )；攀登；争夺；（军事飞机）紧急起飞 | |
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politic
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| adj.有智虑的；精明的；v.从政 | |
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70
tangle
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| n.纠缠；缠结；混乱；v.(使)缠绕；变乱 | |
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71
abutted
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| v.（与…）邻接( abut的过去式和过去分词 )；（与…）毗连；接触；倚靠 | |
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72
uncommon
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| adj.罕见的，非凡的，不平常的 | |
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crook
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| v.使弯曲；n.小偷，骗子，贼；弯曲(处) | |
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74
plunder
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| vt.劫掠财物，掠夺；n.劫掠物，赃物；劫掠 | |
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75
stratagem
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| n.诡计，计谋 | |
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76
persistently
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| ad.坚持地；固执地 | |
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77
rapacity
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| n.贪婪，贪心，劫掠的欲望 | |
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greasy
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| adj. 多脂的，油脂的 | |
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