There was once a priest with cold, watery1 eyes, who, in the still of the night, wept cold tears. He wept because the afternoons were warm and long, and he was unable to attain2 a complete mystical union with our Lord. Sometimes, near four o'clock, there was a rustle3 of Swede girls along the path by his window, and in their shrill4 laughter he found a terrible dissonance that made him pray aloud for the twilight5 to come. At twilight the laughter and the voices were quieter, but several times he had walked past Romberg's Drug Store when it was dusk and the yellow lights shone inside and the nickel taps of the soda-fountain were gleaming, and he had found the scent6 of cheap toilet soap desperately7 sweet upon the air. He passed that way when he returned from hearing confessions9 on Saturday nights, and he grew careful to walk on the other side of the street so that the smell of the soap would float upward before it reached his nostrils10 as it drifted, rather like incense11, toward the summer moon.
But there was no escape from the hot madness of four o'clock. From his window, as far as he could see, the Dakota wheat thronged12 the valley of the Red River. The wheat was terrible to look upon and the carpet pattern to which in agony he bent13 his eyes sent his thought brooding through grotesque14 labyrinths15, open always to the unavoidable sun.
One afternoon when he had reached the point where the mind runs down like an old clock, his housekeeper16 brought into his study a beautiful, intense little boy of eleven named Rudolph Miller17. The little boy sat down in a patch of sunshine, and the priest, at his walnut18 desk, pretended to be very busy. This was to conceal19 his relief that some one had come into his haunted room.
Presently he turned around and found himself staring into two enormous, staccato eyes, lit with gleaming points of cobalt light. For a moment their expression startled him—then he saw that his visitor was in a state of abject20 fear.
"Your mouth is trembling," said Father Schwartz, in a haggard voice.
The little boy covered his quivering mouth with his hand.
"Are you in trouble?" asked Father Schwartz, sharply. "Take your hand away from your mouth and tell me what's the matter."
The boy—Father Schwartz recognized him now as the son of a parishioner, Mr. Miller, the freight-agent—moved his hand reluctantly off his mouth and became articulate in a despairing whisper.
"Father Schwartz—I've committed a terrible sin."
"A sin against purity?"
"No, Father ... worse."
Father Schwartz's body jerked sharply.
"Have you killed somebody?"
"No—but I'm afraid—" the voice rose to a shrill whimper.
"Do you want to go to confession8?"
The little boy shook his head miserably21. Father Schwartz cleared his throat so that he could make his voice soft and say some quiet, kind thing. In this moment he should forget his own agony, and try to act like God. He repeated to himself a devotional phrase, hoping that in return God would help him to act correctly.
"Tell me what you've done," said his new soft voice.
The little boy looked at him through his tears, and was reassured22 by the impression of moral resiliency which the distraught priest had created. Abandoning as much of himself as he was able to this man, Rudolph Miller began to tell his story.
"On Saturday, three days ago, my father he said I had to go to confession, because I hadn't been for a month, and the family they go every week, and I hadn't been. So I just as leave go, I didn't care. So I put it off till after supper because I was playing with a bunch of kids and father asked me if I went, and I said 'no,' and he took me by the neck and he said 'You go now,' so I said 'All right,' so I went over to church. And he yelled after me: 'Don't come back till you go.'..."
点击收听单词发音
1 watery | |
adj.有水的,水汪汪的;湿的,湿润的 | |
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2 attain | |
vt.达到,获得,完成 | |
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3 rustle | |
v.沙沙作响;偷盗(牛、马等);n.沙沙声声 | |
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4 shrill | |
adj.尖声的;刺耳的;v尖叫 | |
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5 twilight | |
n.暮光,黄昏;暮年,晚期,衰落时期 | |
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6 scent | |
n.气味,香味,香水,线索,嗅觉;v.嗅,发觉 | |
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7 desperately | |
adv.极度渴望地,绝望地,孤注一掷地 | |
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8 confession | |
n.自白,供认,承认 | |
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9 confessions | |
n.承认( confession的名词复数 );自首;声明;(向神父的)忏悔 | |
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10 nostrils | |
鼻孔( nostril的名词复数 ) | |
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11 incense | |
v.激怒;n.香,焚香时的烟,香气 | |
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12 thronged | |
v.成群,挤满( throng的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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13 bent | |
n.爱好,癖好;adj.弯的;决心的,一心的 | |
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14 grotesque | |
adj.怪诞的,丑陋的;n.怪诞的图案,怪人(物) | |
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15 labyrinths | |
迷宫( labyrinth的名词复数 ); (文字,建筑)错综复杂的 | |
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16 housekeeper | |
n.管理家务的主妇,女管家 | |
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17 miller | |
n.磨坊主 | |
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18 walnut | |
n.胡桃,胡桃木,胡桃色,茶色 | |
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19 conceal | |
v.隐藏,隐瞒,隐蔽 | |
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20 abject | |
adj.极可怜的,卑屈的 | |
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21 miserably | |
adv.痛苦地;悲惨地;糟糕地;极度地 | |
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22 reassured | |
adj.使消除疑虑的;使放心的v.再保证,恢复信心( reassure的过去式和过去分词) | |
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