CHAPTER XXII PLANTING THYME

 The morning she came was the morning Eric said good-bye "just for a few days," he dreaming, as little as we, of what those few days were to bring.

 

And so, ignorant of what I was facing, I was almost happy in spite of the parting, because of what Eric said to me that last Monday morning.

 

The cart had been ordered to go for Madame Aurore at 9:42. Directly after breakfast my mother and Bettina set about trimming hats—a business in which they scorned my help. I had something particular to finish in the garden. I went on digging up the bare patches on the south bank, sharing the delight of all things growing and blowing and flying under the glorious cloud-piled sky of May. I listened intently, as I worked, to that orchestra of tiny sound underneath² the loud birds' singing. The spring, unlike last year's, had been cold and late; many days like this—with crisp air and fitful sunshine. Only here, in the sheltered south-west corner, were[Pg 210] the bees in any number tuning³ up their fiddles⁴.

 

I looked up from my work and saw—at that most unusual hour—Eric Annan at the gate! I saw, too, that he looked odd—excited. I dropped the garden-fork. "What is the matter?" I said.

 

"Matter? What should be the matter?"

 

I only smiled. It was so like Eric not to be pleased at hearing he had betrayed himself.

 

"I thought you looked as if—as if something had happened," I said. What I meant was, as if something were about to happen. Only one thing, I thought, could make Eric look like that; make him interrupt his precious morning; one thing, alone, could have grown so great overnight that the heart of man could not conceal⁵ it, or contain it, for another hour.

 

But, even if my hopes were not misleading me, I felt that Eric would not like my having guessed so much. To hide my eyes from him I bent⁶ down over my basket. I lifted out tufts of aromatic⁷ green, and set them firmly in the loosened soil. I pressed the earth down tight about their roots.

 

"What are you planting there?" he asked.

 

"Re-planting the wild thyme," I said. Something had killed it last year.[Pg 211]

 

"Where do you find wild thyme?" he asked.

 

I told him how far I had to go for it. And when? Before breakfast! He looked astonished.

 

I did not like to explain that I had got into the habit of waking early to study. And, now that studying was no use, I spent the time in taking delicious walks in the early morning, before other people were awake. I confessed the walks.

 

"You ought not to have told me," he said.

 

"Why?"

 

"Because, for these next days, I can't come too."

 

I went on planting thyme.

 

"Promise me, for these next days you won't go either."

 

"Why?" I asked again.

 

"Because my thoughts might go wandering."

 

I nudged the wild thyme, and we both smiled secretly.

 

"I can't afford, just at this moment, to have anything distracting me." He said this in an anxious, almost appealing, way.

 

"Very well," I answered. "I won't go early walks for the next—how many days am I to be[Pg 212] cooped up when the morning is at its best?"

 

"Oh, not long." Then with that impatience⁸ of his, if you were doing other things while he was there: "How much more of that stuff are you going to put in?"

 

"All there is," I said provokingly. And I did not hurry.

 

"Why must you have wild thyme there?" he grumbled⁹.

 

"So as not to disappoint the blue butterflies," I said gravely. "They 'know a bank' and this is it. They've had an understanding with my mother about it for years. If they don't find thyme here they're annoyed. They go on dying out. My mother says a world without blue butterflies would be a poor sort of place."

 

We talked irrelevancies for a moment more—the passion of the convolvulus moth¹ for petunias¹⁰, and the other flowers the different sorts of moths¹¹ and butterflies preferred.

 

He was surprised to hear that for years my mother had taken all that trouble to please even the ordinary red admirals and spotted¹² footmen and painted ladies. I explained that I was re-planting this thyme only to please my mother.[Pg 213] "Personally," I had never bothered much about the butterfly-garden, I said, in what he promptly¹³ called a superior tone.

 

I maintained that the pampered¹⁴ creatures were dreadful "slackers" and sybarites—all for colour and sweet scents¹⁵.

 

He stood listening a moment to the bees' band playing in the rhododendron concert, and then he defended the butterflies. Butterflies were much misunderstood. "In their way—and a very good way, too—they answer to the call."

 

"What call?"

 

"The call to serve the ends of life."

 

I looked up, surprised, from my fresh thyme patch, for general moralisings were not much in Eric's way. "What are the ends of life?"

 

"More life." There was a moment's pause. Then he said butterflies were no more "idle" than bees and birds. Besides attending to their more immediate¹⁶ affairs they were pollen-bringers.

 

It was such solemn talk for butterflies. I told him the two sulphur yellows reeling in the sunshine were laughing at him. "'Ends of life' indeed! They simply love bright colour and things that smell sweet...."[Pg 214]

 

"Of course they love them!" Then he said something that sank deeper than any single sentence I ever heard: "Hating never created anything; all life comes from lovers."

 

At the moment that great saying only frightened me. And the strange thing was it seemed to frighten him.

 

We were very still for a moment. I thought even the little music of the honey bees had slackened. I and all the world waited—holding breath.

 

Then a gust¹⁷ of wind veered¹⁸ round the corner, and Eric turned up his collar. He asked if I wasn't cold. I was anything but cold. But I had noticed that after his long hours of motionless concentration indoors, Eric was very sensitive to chill. So I put off planting the rest of the thyme, and I took Eric up to the morning-room.

 

"What is he going to tell me?" I asked myself on the way. And though I asked, I thought I knew.

1 moth   

n.蛾，蛀虫

参考例句：

• A moth was fluttering round the lamp.有一只蛾子扑打着翅膀绕着灯飞。
• The sweater is moth-eaten.毛衣让蛀虫咬坏了。

2 underneath   

adj.在...下面，在...底下；adv.在下面

参考例句：

• Working underneath the car is always a messy job.在汽车底下工作是件脏活。
• She wore a coat with a dress underneath.她穿着一件大衣，里面套着一条连衣裙。

3 tuning   

n.调谐，调整，调音v.调音( tune的现在分词 )；调整；（给收音机、电视等）调谐；使协调

参考例句：

• They are tuning up a plane on the flight line. 他们正在机场的飞机跑道上调试一架飞机。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• The orchestra are tuning up. 管弦乐队在定弦。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》

4 fiddles   

n.小提琴( fiddle的名词复数 )；欺诈；（需要运用手指功夫的）细巧活动；当第二把手v.伪造( fiddle的第三人称单数 )；篡改；骗取；修理或稍作改动

参考例句：

• He fiddles with his papers on the table. 他抚弄着桌子上那些报纸。 来自辞典例句
• The annual Smithsonian Festival of American Folk Life celebrates hands-hands plucking guitars and playing fiddles. 一年一度的美国民间的“史密斯索尼安节”是赞美人的双手的节日--弹拔吉他的手，演奏小提琴的手。 来自辞典例句

5 conceal   

v.隐藏，隐瞒，隐蔽

参考例句：

• He had to conceal his identity to escape the police.为了躲避警方，他只好隐瞒身份。
• He could hardly conceal his joy at his departure.他几乎掩饰不住临行时的喜悦。

6 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。

7 aromatic   

adj.芳香的，有香味的

参考例句：

• It has an agreeable aromatic smell.它有一种好闻的香味。
• It is light,fruity aromatic and a perfect choice for ending a meal.它是口感轻淡，圆润，芳香的，用于结束一顿饭完美的选择。

8 impatience   

n.不耐烦，急躁

参考例句：

• He expressed impatience at the slow rate of progress.进展缓慢，他显得不耐烦。
• He gave a stamp of impatience.他不耐烦地跺脚。

9 grumbled   

抱怨( grumble的过去式和过去分词 )； 发牢骚； 咕哝； 发哼声

参考例句：

• He grumbled at the low pay offered to him. 他抱怨给他的工资低。
• The heat was sweltering, and the men grumbled fiercely over their work. 天热得让人发昏，水手们边干活边发着牢骚。

10 petunias   

n.矮牵牛（花）( petunia的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• The petunias were already wilting in the hot sun. 在烈日下矮牵牛花已经开始枯萎了。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• With my porch and my pillow, my pretty purple petunias. 那里有我的前廊我的枕头，我漂亮的紫色矮牵牛。 来自互联网

11 moths   

n.蛾( moth的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• The moths have eaten holes in my wool coat. 蛀虫将我的羊毛衫蛀蚀了几个小洞。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• The moths tapped and blurred at the window screen. 飞蛾在窗帘上跳来跳去，弄上了许多污点。 来自《现代英汉综合大词典》

12 spotted   

adj.有斑点的，斑纹的，弄污了的

参考例句：

• The milkman selected the spotted cows,from among a herd of two hundred.牛奶商从一群200头牛中选出有斑点的牛。
• Sam's shop stocks short spotted socks.山姆的商店屯积了有斑点的短袜。

13 promptly   

adv.及时地，敏捷地

参考例句：

• He paid the money back promptly.他立即还了钱。
• She promptly seized the opportunity his absence gave her.她立即抓住了因他不在场给她创造的机会。

14 pampered   

adj.饮食过量的，饮食奢侈的v.纵容，宠，娇养( pamper的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• The lazy scum deserve worse. What if they ain't fed up and pampered? 他们吃不饱，他们的要求满足不了，这又有什么关系？ 来自飘（部分）
• She petted and pampered him and would let no one discipline him but she, herself. 她爱他，娇养他，而且除了她自己以外，她不允许任何人管教他。 来自辞典例句

15 scents   

n.香水( scent的名词复数 )；气味；（动物的）臭迹；（尤指狗的）嗅觉

参考例句：

• The air was fragrant with scents from the sea and the hills. 空气中荡漾着山和海的芬芳气息。
• The winds came down with scents of the grass and wild flowers. 微风送来阵阵青草和野花的香气。 来自《简明英汉词典》

16 immediate   

adj.立即的；直接的，最接近的；紧靠的

参考例句：

• His immediate neighbours felt it their duty to call.他的近邻认为他们有责任去拜访。
• We declared ourselves for the immediate convocation of the meeting.我们主张立即召开这个会议。

17 gust   

n.阵风，突然一阵（雨、烟等），（感情的）迸发

参考例句：

• A gust of wind blew the front door shut.一阵大风吹来，把前门关上了。
• A gust of happiness swept through her.一股幸福的暖流流遍她的全身。

18 veered   

v.（尤指交通工具）改变方向或路线( veer的过去式和过去分词 )；（指谈话内容、人的行为或观点）突然改变；（指风） （在北半球按顺时针方向、在南半球按逆时针方向）逐渐转向；风向顺时针转

参考例句：

• The bus veered onto the wrong side of the road. 公共汽车突然驶入了逆行道。
• The truck veered off the road and crashed into a tree. 卡车突然驶离公路撞上了一棵树。 来自《简明英汉词典》