Eve was a little flushed, and ready to fall into a reverie while looking along a vista3 of sudden possibilities. This frank and straightforward4 letter had brought a flutter of exultation5 into her life.
“Mr. Canterton wants me to do some flower pictures for him.”
“How nice, dear! And shall you?”
“Of course—if I can.”
“It must have been our subscription6 to——”
“Mother, is it likely?”
“I am sure Mrs. Canterton was most charming. Is he going to pay you for——”
“He doesn’t say anything about it.”
“He might not think it quite nice to say anything—just at first.”
“I really don’t know why it shouldn’t be nice to mention a thing that we all must have. He wants me to go and see him.”
Eve set off for Fernhill with a delightful7 sense of exhilaration. She was in a mood to laugh, especially at the incident of yesterday, and at the loss of those two half-crowns that had seemed so tragic8 and depressing. This might be her first big bit of luck, the beginning of a wider, finer life for which she yearned9. She was amused at her mother’s idea about Mrs. Canterton. Mrs. Canterton indeed! Why—the flow of her thoughts was sharply arrested, and held back by the uprising of a situation that suddenly appeared before her as something extraordinarily10 incongruous. These two people were married. This fussy11, sallow-faced, fidgeting egotist, and this big, meditative12, colour-loving man. What on earth were they doing living together in the same house. And what on earth was she herself doing letting her thoughts wander into affairs that did not concern her.
She suppressed the curious feeling of distaste the subject inspired in her, took a plunge13 into a cold bath of self-restraint, and came out close knit and vigorous. Eve Carfax had a very fastidious pride that detested14 anything that could be described as vulgarly curious. She wanted no one to finger her own intimate self, and she recoiled16 instinctively17 from any tendency on her own part towards taking back-door views of life. She was essentially18 clean, with an ideal whiteness that yet could flush humanly. But the idea of contemplating19 the soiled petals20 of other people’s ideals repelled21 her.
Eve entered the Fernhill Nurseries by the great oak gates that opened through a high hedge of arbor22 vitæ. She found herself in a large gravelled space, a kind of quadrangle surrounded by offices, storerooms, stables, and packing sheds, all built in the old English style of oak, white plaster, and red tiles. The extraordinary neatness of the place struck her. It was like a big forecourt to the mysteries beyond.
She had her hand on the office bell when Canterton came out, having seen her through the window. He was in white flannels23, and wearing a straw hat that deepened the colour of his eyes and skin.
“Good morning! We both appear to be punctual people.”
He was smiling, and looking at her attentively24.
“It was good of you to come up at once. I left it open. I think it would be a good idea if I took you over the whole place.”
“I should like to see everything. Do you know, Mr. Canterton, you have set me up on the high horse, and——”
“Well?”
“I know; just what a man feels before an exam., when he is pretty sure of himself.”
“I don’t know that I am sure of myself.”
“If you can paint other things as you painted that rose, I don’t think there is any need for you to worry.”
The quiet assurance of his praise sent a shiver of exultation through her. What an encouraging and comforting person he was. He just intimated that he believed you could do a thing very well, and the thing itself seemed half done.
“Then I’ll show you the whole place. I’m a bit of an egotist in my way.”
“It’s only showing someone what you have created.”
He took her everywhere, beginning with what he called “the administrative27 department.” She saw the great glass-houses, the stacks of bracken for packing, the piles of ash and chestnut28 stakes, the shed where three old men spent their time making big baskets and hampers29, the rows and rows of frames, the packing and dispatch sheds, the seed room, the little laboratory, with its microscopes and microtome and shelves of bottles, the office where several clerks were constantly at work.
Canterton was apologetic.
“I have a craze for showing everything.”
“It gives one insight. I like it.”
“It won’t tire you?”
“I think I am a very healthy young woman.”
He looked at the fresh face, and at the lithe30 though fragile figure, and felt somehow that the June day had an indefinable perfume.
“I should like to show you some of the young conifers.”
They were wonderful trees with wonderful names, quaint31, solemn, and diminutive32, yet with all the dignity of forests patriarchs. They grew in groves33 and companies, showing all manner of colours, dense34 metallic35 greens, soft blues36, golds, silvers, greys, green blacks, ambers. Each tree had beauties and characteristics of its own. They were diminutive models of a future maturity37, solemn children that would be cedars38, cypresses39, junipers, pines and yews41.
They delighted Eve.
“Oh, the little people, ready to grow up! I never knew there were such trees—and such colours.”
He saw the same look in her eyes as he had seen in the rosery, the same tenderness about the mouth.
“I walk about here sometimes and wonder where they will all go to.”
“Yes, isn’t it strange.”
“Some day I want to do a book on trees.”
“Do you? What’s the name of that dear Japanese-looking infant there?”
“What does it matter? I tried to study botany, but the jargon——”
“Yes, it is pretty hopeless. I played a joke once on some of our botanical friends; sent them a queer thing I had had sent from China, and labelled it Cantertoniana Gloria in Excelsis. They took it quite seriously.”
“The dears!”
Laughter passed between them, and an intimate flashing of the eyes that told how the joy of life welled up and met. They wandered on through acres of glowing maples43, golden privets and elders, purple leaved plums, arbutus, rhododendrons, azaleas, and all manner of flowering shrubs44. In one quiet corner an old gardener with a white beard was budding roses. Elsewhere men were hoeing the alleys45 between the straight rows of young forest trees, poplars, birches, elms, beeches46, ilexes, mountain ashes, chestnuts47, and limes. There were acres of fruit trees, acres of roses, acres of the commoner kind of evergreens48, great waves of glooming green rolling with a glisten49 of sunlight over the long slopes of the earth. Eve grew more silent. She was all eyes—all wonder. It seemed futile50 to exclaim when there was so much beauty everywhere.
They came at last to a pleasaunce that was the glory of the hour, an herbaceous garden in full bloom, with brick-paved paths, box edging, and here and there an old tree stump51 or a rough arch smothered52 with clematis, or honeysuckle. Delphiniums in every shade of blue rose like the crowded and tapering53 flèches of a mediæval city. There were white lilies, gaudy54 gaillardias blazing like suns, campanulas, violas, foxgloves, snapdragons, mauve erigeron, monkshood, English iris55, and scores of other plants. It was gorgeous, and yet full of subtle gradations of colour, like some splendid Persian carpet in which strange dyes merged56 and mingled57. Bees hummed everywhere. Old red brick walls, half covered with various kinds of ivy58, formed a mellow59 background. And away on the horizon floated the blue of the Surrey hills.
Eve stood motionless, lips slightly apart.
“Mr. Canterton!”
“You like it?”
“Am I to paint this?”
“I hope so.”
He laughed gently.
“Oh, you can do it!”
“Can I? And the old walls! I should not have thought the place was so old.”
“It isn’t. I bought my bricks. Some old cottages were being pulled down.”
“Thank God, sometimes, for money!”
She stood a moment, her chin raised, her eyes throwing long, level glances down the walks.
“Just as you like.”
“Please tell me exactly what you want.”
“I want you to begin here, and in the rosery. You see this book of mine is going to be a big thing, a treasure house for the real people who want to know. I shall need portraits of individual flowers, and studies of colour effects during the different months. I shall also want illustrations of many fine gardens that have been put at my service. That is to say, I may have to ask you to travel about a little, to paint some of the special things, such as the Ryecroft Dutch garden, and the Italian gardens at Latimer.”
As he spoke62 the horizon of her life seemed to broaden before her. It was like the breaking through of a winter dawn when the grey crevices63 of the east fill with sudden fire. Everything looked bigger, more wonderful, more alluring64.
“I had no idea——”
He was watching her face.
“Well?”
“That it was to be such a big thing.”
“It may take me two or three more years. I have allowed myself five years for the book.”
She drew in her breath.
“Mr. Canterton, I don’t know what to say. And I don’t think you realise what you are offering me. Just—life, more life. But it almost frightens me that you should think——”
His eyes smiled at her understandingly.
“Paint me a few trial pieces. Begin with one of the borders here, and a rose bed in the rosery that I will show you. Also, give me a study of trees, and another of rocks and plants in the rock garden.”
“I will begin at once.”
He looked beyond her towards the blue hills.
“Yes.”
“You can have an agreement if you like.”
She answered at once.
“No. I think, somehow, I would rather not. And please don’t propose anything till you have seen more of what I can do.”
Canterton led the way towards the rosery to show her the roses he wanted her to paint, and in passing through one of the tunnels in the yew40 hedge they were dashed into by a child who came flying like a blown leaf. It was Eve who received the rush of the impetuous figure. Her hands held Lynette to save her from falling.
“Hallo!”
Lynette’s face lifted to hers with surprise and laughter, and a questioning shyness. Eve kept her hold for the moment. They looked at each other with an impulse towards friendliness66.
“Lynette, old lady!”
“Daddy, Miss Vance has gone off——”
“Pop? Miss Carfax, let me introduce my daughter. Miss Lynette Canterton—Miss Carfax.”
Eve slid her hands from Lynette’s body, but the child’s hands clung and held hers.
“I’m so sorry. I hope it didn’t hurt? I don’t think I’ve seen you before.”
“Well, we rushed at each other when we did meet.”
“Is daddy showing you the garden?”
“Yes.”
“My name’s Lynette—not like linnet, you know, but Lyn-net.”
“And my name’s Eve—just Eve.”
They all laughed. Lynette kept hold of one of Eve’s hands, and held out her other one to Canterton.
“Daddy, do come down to the Wilderness67. I want to build a wagwim.”
“Or wigwam?”
“I like wagwim better. Do come.”
“Miss Canterton, I am most seriously occupied.”
She tossed her hair, and turned on Eve.
“You’ll come too, Miss Eve? Now I’ve invited you, daddy will have to come. Ask him.”
Eve looked at Canterton, and there was something strange in the eyes of both.
“Mr. Canterton, I am requested to ask you——”
“I surrender. I may as well tell you, Miss Carfax, that very few people are invited into the Wilderness. It is fairyland.”
“I appreciate it. Lynette, may I come and build a wagwim with you?”
“Yes, do. What a nice voice you’ve got.”
“Have I?”
Eve blushed queerly, and was intimately conscious of Canterton’s eyes looking at her with peculiar68 and half wondering intentness.
“I’m going to have dinner there. Mother is out, and Miss Vance is going to Guildford by train. And Sarah has given me two jam tarts69, and some cheese straws, and two bananas——”
Canterton tweaked her hair.
“That’s an idea. I’m on good terms with Sarah. We’ll have some lunch and a bottle of red wine sent down to the Wilderness and picnic in a wagwim, if the wagwim wams by lunch time.”
“Come along—come along, Miss Eve! I’ll show you the way! I’m so glad you like wagwims!”
So these three went down to the Wilderness together, into the green light of the larch70 wood, and into a world of laughter, mystery and joy.
点击
收听单词发音
收听单词发音 |
1
vapidly
|
|
| adv.乏味地；无滋味地；无趣味地；无生气地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
|
2
inquisitive
|
|
| adj.求知欲强的，好奇的，好寻根究底的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
3
vista
|
|
| n.远景，深景，展望，回想 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
4
straightforward
|
|
| adj.正直的，坦率的；易懂的，简单的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
5
exultation
|
|
| n.狂喜，得意 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
6
subscription
|
|
| n.预订，预订费，亲笔签名，调配法，下标（处方） | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
7
delightful
|
|
| adj.令人高兴的，使人快乐的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
8
tragic
|
|
| adj.悲剧的，悲剧性的，悲惨的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
9
yearned
|
|
| 渴望，切盼，向往( yearn的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
10
extraordinarily
|
|
| adv.格外地；极端地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
11
fussy
|
|
| adj.为琐事担忧的，过分装饰的，爱挑剔的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
12
meditative
|
|
| adj.沉思的，冥想的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
13
plunge
|
|
| v.跳入，(使)投入，(使)陷入；猛冲 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
14
detested
|
|
| v.憎恶，嫌恶，痛恨( detest的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
15
rib
|
|
| n.肋骨，肋状物 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
16
recoiled
|
|
| v.畏缩( recoil的过去式和过去分词 )；退缩；报应；返回 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
17
instinctively
|
|
| adv.本能地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
18
essentially
|
|
| adv.本质上，实质上，基本上 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
19
contemplating
|
|
| 深思，细想，仔细考虑( contemplate的现在分词 )； 注视，凝视； 考虑接受（发生某事的可能性）； 深思熟虑，沉思，苦思冥想 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
20
petals
|
|
| n.花瓣( petal的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
21
repelled
|
|
| v.击退( repel的过去式和过去分词 )；使厌恶；排斥；推开 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
22
arbor
|
|
| n.凉亭；树木 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
23
flannels
|
|
| 法兰绒男裤； 法兰绒( flannel的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
24
attentively
|
|
| adv.聚精会神地；周到地；谛；凝神 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
25
momentary
|
|
| adj.片刻的，瞬息的；短暂的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
26
dread
|
|
| vt.担忧，忧虑；惧怕，不敢；n.担忧，畏惧 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
27
administrative
|
|
| adj.行政的，管理的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
28
chestnut
|
|
| n.栗树，栗子 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
29
hampers
|
|
| 妨碍，束缚，限制( hamper的第三人称单数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
30
lithe
|
|
| adj.(指人、身体)柔软的，易弯的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
31
quaint
|
|
| adj.古雅的，离奇有趣的，奇怪的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
32
diminutive
|
|
| adj.小巧可爱的，小的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
33
groves
|
|
| 树丛，小树林( grove的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
34
dense
|
|
| a.密集的，稠密的，浓密的；密度大的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
35
metallic
|
|
| adj.金属的；金属制的；含金属的；产金属的；像金属的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
36
blues
|
|
| n.抑郁，沮丧；布鲁斯音乐 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
37
maturity
|
|
| n.成熟；完成；(支票、债券等)到期 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
38
cedars
|
|
| 雪松，西洋杉( cedar的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
39
cypresses
|
|
| n.柏属植物，柏树( cypress的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
40
yew
|
|
| n.紫杉属树木 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
41
yews
|
|
| n.紫杉( yew的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
42
botanists
|
|
| n.植物学家，研究植物的人( botanist的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
43
maples
|
|
| 槭树，枫树( maple的名词复数 )； 槭木 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
44
shrubs
|
|
| 灌木( shrub的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
45
alleys
|
|
| 胡同，小巷( alley的名词复数 )； 小径 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
46
beeches
|
|
| n.山毛榉( beech的名词复数 )；山毛榉木材 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
47
chestnuts
|
|
| n.栗子( chestnut的名词复数 )；栗色；栗树；栗色马 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
48
evergreens
|
|
| n.常青树，常绿植物，万年青( evergreen的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
49
glisten
|
|
| vi.（光洁或湿润表面等）闪闪发光，闪闪发亮 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
50
futile
|
|
| adj.无效的，无用的，无希望的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
51
stump
|
|
| n.残株，烟蒂，讲演台；v.砍断，蹒跚而走 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
52
smothered
|
|
| （使）窒息， （使）透不过气( smother的过去式和过去分词 )； 覆盖； 忍住； 抑制 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
53
tapering
|
|
| adj.尖端细的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
54
gaudy
|
|
| adj.华而不实的；俗丽的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
55
iris
|
|
| n.虹膜，彩虹 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
56
merged
|
|
| （使）混合( merge的过去式和过去分词 )； 相融； 融入； 渐渐消失在某物中 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
57
mingled
|
|
| 混合，混入( mingle的过去式和过去分词 )； 混进，与…交往[联系] | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
58
ivy
|
|
| n.常青藤，常春藤 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
59
mellow
|
|
| adj.柔和的；熟透的；v.变柔和；(使)成熟 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
60
humility
|
|
| n.谦逊，谦恭 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
61
sketches
|
|
| n.草图( sketch的名词复数 )；素描；速写；梗概 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
62
spoke
|
|
| 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 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
63
crevices
|
|
| n.（尤指岩石的）裂缝，缺口( crevice的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
64
alluring
|
|
| adj.吸引人的，迷人的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
65
embodying
|
|
| v.表现( embody的现在分词 )；象征；包括；包含 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
66
friendliness
|
|
| n.友谊，亲切，亲密 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
67
wilderness
|
|
| n.杳无人烟的一片陆地、水等，荒漠 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
68
peculiar
|
|
| adj.古怪的，异常的；特殊的，特有的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
69
tarts
|
|
| n.果馅饼( tart的名词复数 )；轻佻的女人；妓女；小妞 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
70
larch
|
|
| n.落叶松 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
| 欢迎访问英文小说网 |