And then came an incredible incident, so incredible that next day she still had great difficulty in deciding whether it was an actuality or a dream. She heard a little very familiar sound. It was the last sound she would have expected to hear and she turned sharply when she heard it. The paper-covered door in the wall of her husband's apartment opened softly, paused, opened some more and his little undignified head appeared. His hair was already tumbled from his pillow.
He regarded her steadfastly7 for some moments with an expression between shame and curiosity and smouldering rage, and then allowed his body, clad now in purple-striped pyjamas8, to follow his head into her room. He advanced guiltily.
"Elly," he whispered. "Elly!"
She caught her dressing-gown about her and stood up.
"I want my freedom," she said, after a little pause.
"Don't be silly, Elly," he whispered in a tone of remonstrance12 and advancing slowly towards her. "Make it up. Chuck all these ideas."
She shook her head.
"We've got to get along together. You can't go going about just anywhere. We've got—we've got to be reasonable."
He halted, three paces away from her. His eyes weren't sorrowful eyes, or friendly eyes; they were just shiftily eager eyes. "Look here," he said. "It's all nonsense.... Elly, old girl; let's—let's make it up."
She looked at him and it dawned upon her that she had always imagined herself to be afraid of him and that indeed she wasn't. She shook her head obstinately13.
"It isn't reasonable," he said. "Here, we've been the happiest of people——Anything in reason I'll let you have." He paused with an effect of making an offer.
"I want my autonomy," she said.
"Autonomy!" he echoed. "Autonomy! What's autonomy? Autonomy!"
"I come in here to make it up," he said, with a voice charged with griefs, "after all you've done, and you go and you talk of autonomy!"
His feelings passed beyond words. An extremity16 of viciousness flashed into his face. He gave vent1 to a snarl17 of exasperation18, "Ya-ap!" he said, he raised his clenched19 fists and seemed on the verge20 of assault, and then with a gesture between fury and despair, he wheeled about and the purple-striped pyjamas danced in passionate21 retreat from her room.
"Autonomy!..."
A slam, a noise of assaulted furniture, and then silence.
Lady Harman stood for some moments regarding the paper-covered door that had closed behind him. Then she bared her white forearm and pinched it—hard.
It wasn't a dream! This thing had happened.
12
At a quarter to three in the morning, Lady Harman was surprised to find herself wide awake. It was exactly a quarter to three when she touched the stud of the ingenious little silver apparatus22 upon the table beside her bed which reflected a luminous23 clock-face upon the ceiling. And her mind was no longer resting in the attitude of thought but extraordinarily24 active. It was active, but as she presently began to realize it was not progressing. It was spinning violently round and round the frenzied25 figure of a little man in purple-striped pyjamas retreating from her presence, whirling away from her like something blown before a gale26. That seemed to her to symbolize27 the completeness of the breach28 the day had made between her husband and herself.
She felt as a statesman might feel who had inadvertently—while conducting some trivial negotiations—declared war.
She was profoundly alarmed. She perceived ahead of her abundant possibilities of disagreeable things. And she wasn't by any means as convinced of the righteousness of her cause as a happy warrior29 should be. She had a natural disposition30 towards truthfulness31 and it worried her mind that while she was struggling to assert her right to these common social freedoms she should be tacitly admitting a kind of justice in her husband's objections by concealing32 the fact that her afternoon's companion was a man. She tried not to recognize the existence of a doubt, but deep down in her mind there did indeed lurk33 a weakening uncertainty34 about the right of a woman to free conversation with any man but her own. Her reason disowned that uncertainty with scorn. But it wouldn't go away for all her reason. She went about in her mind doing her utmost to cut that doubt dead....
She tried to go back to the beginning and think it all out. And as she was not used to thinking things out, the effort took the form of an imaginary explanation to Mr. Brumley of the difficulties of her position. She framed phrases. "You see, Mr. Brumley," she imagined herself to be saying, "I want to do my duty as a wife, I have to do my duty as a wife. But it's so hard to say just where duty leaves off and being a mere35 slave begins. I cannot believe that blind obedience36 is any woman's duty. A woman needs—autonomy." Then her mind went off for a time to a wrestle37 with the exact meaning of autonomy, an issue that had not arisen hitherto in her mind.... And as she planned out such elucidations, there grew more and more distinct in her mind a kind of idealized Mr. Brumley, very grave, very attentive38, wonderfully understanding, saying illuminating39 helpful tonic40 things, that made everything clear, everything almost easy. She wanted someone of that quality so badly. The night would have been unendurable if she could not have imagined Mr. Brumley of that quality. And imagining him of that quality her heart yearned41 for him. She felt that she had been terribly inexpressive that afternoon, she had shirked points, misstated points, and yet he had been marvellously understanding. Ever and again his words had seemed to pierce right through what she had been saying to what she had been thinking. And she recalled with peculiar42 comfort a kind of abstracted calculating look that had come at times into his eyes, as though his thoughts were going ever so much deeper and ever so much further than her blundering questionings could possibly have taken them. He weighed every word, he had a guarded way of saying "Um...."
Her thoughts came back to the dancing little figure in purple-striped pyjamas. She had a scared sense of irrevocable breaches43. What would he do to-morrow? What should she do to-morrow? Would he speak to her at breakfast or should she speak first to him?... She wished she had some money. If she could have foreseen all this she would have got some money before she began....
So her mind went on round and round and the dawn was breaking before she slept again.
13
Mr. Brumley, also, slept little that night. He was wakefully mournful, recalling each ungraceful incident of the afternoon's failure in turn and more particularly his dispute with the ticket clerk, and thinking over all the things he might have done—if only he hadn't done the things he had done. He had made an atrocious mess of things. He felt he had hopelessly shattered the fair fabric44 of impressions of him that Lady Harman had been building up, that image of a wise humane45 capable man to whom a woman would gladly turn; he had been flurried, he had been incompetent46, he had been ridiculously incompetent, and it seemed to him that life was a string of desolating47 inadequacies and that he would never smile again.
The probable reception of Lady Harman by her husband never came within his imaginative scope. Nor did the problems of social responsibility that Lady Harman had been trying to put to him exercise him very greatly. The personal disillusionment was too strong for that.
About half-past four a faint ray of comfort came with the consideration that after all a certain practical incapacity is part of the ensemble48 of a literary artist, and then he found himself wondering what flowers of wisdom Montaigne might not have culled49 from such a day's experience; he began an imitative essay in his head and he fell asleep upon this at last at about ten minutes past five in the morning.
There were better things than this in the composition of Mr. Brumley, we shall have to go deep into these reserves before we have done with him, but when he had so recently barked the shins of his self-esteem they had no chance at all.
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1
vent
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| n.通风口，排放口；开衩；vt.表达，发泄 | |
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2
lapsing
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| v.退步( lapse的现在分词 )；陷入；倒退；丧失 | |
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3
vaguely
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| adv.含糊地，暖昧地 | |
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4
stunned
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| adj. 震惊的，惊讶的 动词stun的过去式和过去分词 | |
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5
defiance
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| n.挑战，挑衅，蔑视，违抗 | |
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6
evoked
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| [医]诱发的 | |
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7
steadfastly
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| adv.踏实地，不变地；岿然；坚定不渝 | |
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8
pyjamas
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| n.（宽大的）睡衣裤 | |
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9
curiously
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| adv.有求知欲地；好问地；奇特地 | |
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10
abashed
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| adj.窘迫的，尴尬的v.使羞愧，使局促，使窘迫( abash的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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11
furtive
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| adj.鬼鬼崇崇的，偷偷摸摸的 | |
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12
remonstrance
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| n抗议，抱怨 | |
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13
obstinately
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| ad.固执地，顽固地 | |
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14
distressful
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| adj.苦难重重的，不幸的，使苦恼的 | |
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15
suspense
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| n.（对可能发生的事）紧张感，担心，挂虑 | |
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16
extremity
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| n.末端，尽头；尽力；终极；极度 | |
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17
snarl
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| v.吼叫，怒骂，纠缠，混乱；n.混乱，缠结，咆哮 | |
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18
exasperation
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| n.愤慨 | |
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19
clenched
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| v.紧握，抓紧，咬紧( clench的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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20
verge
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| n.边，边缘；v.接近，濒临 | |
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21
passionate
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| adj.热情的，热烈的，激昂的，易动情的，易怒的，性情暴躁的 | |
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22
apparatus
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| n.装置，器械；器具，设备 | |
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23
luminous
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| adj.发光的，发亮的；光明的；明白易懂的；有启发的 | |
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24
extraordinarily
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| adv.格外地；极端地 | |
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25
frenzied
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| a.激怒的；疯狂的 | |
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26
gale
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| n.大风，强风，一阵闹声（尤指笑声等） | |
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27
symbolize
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| vt.作为...的象征，用符号代表 | |
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28
breach
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| n.违反，不履行；破裂；vt.冲破，攻破 | |
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29
warrior
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| n.勇士，武士，斗士 | |
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30
disposition
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| n.性情，性格；意向，倾向；排列，部署 | |
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31
truthfulness
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| n. 符合实际 | |
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32
concealing
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| v.隐藏，隐瞒，遮住( conceal的现在分词 ) | |
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33
lurk
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| n.潜伏，潜行；v.潜藏，潜伏，埋伏 | |
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34
uncertainty
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| n.易变，靠不住，不确知，不确定的事物 | |
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35
mere
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| adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过 | |
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36
obedience
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| n.服从，顺从 | |
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37
wrestle
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| vi.摔跤，角力；搏斗；全力对付 | |
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38
attentive
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| adj.注意的，专心的；关心(别人)的，殷勤的 | |
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39
illuminating
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| a.富于启发性的，有助阐明的 | |
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40
tonic
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| n./adj.滋补品，补药，强身的，健体的 | |
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41
yearned
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| 渴望，切盼，向往( yearn的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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42
peculiar
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| adj.古怪的，异常的；特殊的，特有的 | |
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43
breaches
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| 破坏( breach的名词复数 )； 破裂； 缺口； 违背 | |
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44
fabric
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| n.织物，织品，布；构造，结构，组织 | |
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45
humane
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| adj.人道的，富有同情心的 | |
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46
incompetent
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| adj.无能力的，不能胜任的 | |
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47
desolating
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| 毁坏( desolate的现在分词 )； 极大地破坏； 使沮丧； 使痛苦 | |
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48
ensemble
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| n.合奏(唱)组；全套服装；整体，总效果 | |
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49
culled
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| v.挑选，剔除( cull的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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