Suppose a being who should be neither man nor woman, a creature wholly removed from the temptations that beset1 either sex, a person who could look on with absolute indifference2 at all our various ways of wasting life, untouched by the ambitions of man, and unstirred by the longings3 of woman, what would such a being think of the popular notion against which other uneasy women besides Charlotte raise their voices, that the man should never be bothered by the cares of the house and the babies, but rather go his daily round of business or pleasure precisely4 as he did before he had his house and his babies? I love to have the details of life arranged with fastidious justice, all its little burdens distributed with an exact fairness among those who have to carry them; and I imagine that this being, who should be rather more than man and less than god, who should understand everything and care nothing, would call it wrong to allot5 a double weight to the strong merely because he is strong, and would call it right that he should have his exact share, and use the strength he has left over not in carrying the burden of some weak friend who, burdenless, is still of no account in life, but in praising God, going first, and showing the others the way.
Thus did I meditate6, walking in silence by Charlotte's side in the beech7 forest of Sellin. Not for anything would I have put my meditations8 into words, well aware that though they might be nourishing to me they would poison Charlotte. The maiden9 aunt and the dinner together had given Charlotte a headache, which I respected by keeping silent; and for two hours we wandered and sat about among the beeches10, sometimes on the grassy11 edge of the cliffs, our backs against tree trunks, looking out over the brilliant blue water with its brilliant green shallows, or lying in the grass watching the fine weather clouds floating past between the shining beech-leaves.
Those were glorious hours, for Charlotte dozed12 most of the time, and it was almost as quiet as though she had not been there at all. No bath-guests parted the branches to stare at us; they were sleeping till the cool of the day. No pedestrians13 with field-glasses came to look at the view and ask each other, with one attentive14 eye on us, if it were not colossal15. No warm students walked along wiping their foreheads as they sang of love and beer. Nothing that had dined at a table d'hôte could possibly move in such heat.
And so it came about that Charlotte and I shared the forest only with birds and squirrels.
This forest is extremely beautiful. It stretches for miles along the coast, and is full of paths and roads that lead you to unexpected lovelinesses—sudden glimpses of the sea between huge beech trunks on grassy plateaus; deep ravines, their sides clothed with moss16, with water trickling17 down over green stones to the sea out in the sun at the bottom; silent glades18 of bracken, silvery in the afternoon light, where fallow deer examine you for one brief moment of curiosity before they spring away, panic-stricken, into the deeper shadows of the beeches. In that sun-flecked place, so exquisite19 whichever way I looked, so spacious20, and so quiet, how could I be seriously interested in stuffy21 indoor questions such as the equality of the sexes, in anything but the beauty of the world and the joy of living in it? I was not seriously interested; I doubt if I have ever been. Destiny having decided22 that I shall walk through life petticoated, weighed down by the entire range of disabilities connected with German petticoats, I will waste no time arguing. There it is, the inexorable fact, and there it will remain; and one gets used to the disabilities, and finds, on looking at them closer, that they exclude nothing that is really worth having.
I glanced at the dozing23 Charlotte, half inclined to wake her up to tell her this, and exhort24 her to do as the dragons in the glorious verse of Doctor Watts25, who
But I was afraid to stir her up lest her tongue should be too forked and split my arguments to pieces. So she dozed on undisturbed, and I enjoyed myself in silence, repeating gems28 from the pages of the immortal29 doctor, echoes of the days when I lisped in numbers that were not only infant but English at the knee of a pious30 nurse from the land of fogs.
At five o'clock, when I felt that a gentle shaking of Charlotte was no longer avoidable if we were to reach Binz that evening, and was preparing to apply it with cousinly gingerliness, an obliging bumble-bee who had been swinging deliciously for some minutes past in the purple flower of a foxglove on the very edge of the cliff, backed out of it and blundered so near Charlotte's face that he brushed it with his wings. Charlotte instantly sat up, opened her eyes, and stared hard at me. Such is the suspiciousness of cousins that though I was lying half a dozen yards away she was manifestly of opinion that I had tickled31 her. This annoyed me, for Charlotte was the last person in the world I would think of tickling33. There was something about her that would make it impossible, however sportively disposed I might be; and besides, you must be very great friends before you begin to tickle32. Charlotte and I were cousins, but we were as yet nowhere near being very great friends. I got up, put on my hat, and said rather stiffly, for she still sat staring, that it was time to go. We walked back in silence, each feeling resentful, and keeping along the cliff passed, just before we came to Sellin, a little restaurant of coloured glass, a round building of an atrocious ugliness, which we discovered was one of the prides of Sellin; for afterwards, driving through the forest to Binz, all the sign-posts had fingers pointing in its direction, and bore the inscription34 Glas Pavilion, schönste Aussicht Sellins. The schöne Aussicht was indisputable, but to choose the loveliest spot and blot35 its beauty with a coloured glass restaurant so close to a place full of restaurants is surely unusually profane36. There it is, however, and all day long it industriously37 scents38 the forest round it with the smell of soup. People were beginning to gather about its tables, the people we had seen dining and who had slept since, and some of them were already drinking coffee and eating slabs40 of cherry cake with a pile of whipped cream on each slab39, for all the world as though they had had nothing since breakfast. Conspicuous41 at one table sat the maiden aunt, still rosy42 from her sleep. She too had ordered cherry cake, and the waiter put it down before her as we came by, and she sat for a moment fondly regarding it, turning the plate round and round so as to take in all its beauties, and if ever a woman looked happy it was that one. 'Poor dumb, half-conscious remnant'—I murmured under my breath. Charlotte seemed to read my thoughts, for she turned her head impatiently away from the cake and the lady, and said once again and defiantly43, 'The principle is the same, of course.'
'Of course,' said I.
The drive from Sellin to Binz was by far the most beautiful I had had. Up to that point no drive had been uninterruptedly beautiful, but this one was lovely from end to end. It took about an hour and a half, and we were the whole time in the glorious mixed forest belonging to Prince Putbus and called the Granitz. As we neared Binz the road runs down close to the sea, and through the overhanging branches we could see that we had rounded another headland and were in another bay. Also, after having met nothing but shy troops of deer, we began to pass increasing numbers of bath-guests, walking slowly, taking the gentlest of exercise before their evening meal. Charlotte had been fairly quiet. Her head, apparently44, still ached; but suddenly she started and exclaimed 'There are the Harvey-Brownes.'
'And who, pray, are the Harvey-Brownes?' I inquired, following the direction of her eyes.
It was easy enough to see which of the groups of tourists were the Harvey-Brownes. They were going in the same direction as ourselves, a tall couple in clothes of surpassing simplicity45 and excellence46. Immediately afterwards we drove past them; Charlotte bowed coldly; the Harvey-Brownes bowed cordially, and I saw that the young man was my philosophic47 friend of the afternoon at Vilm.
'And who, pray, are the Harvey-Brownes?' I asked again.
'The English people I told you about who had got on to my nerves. I thought they'd have left by now.'
'And why were they on your nerves?'
'Oh she's a bishop48's wife, and is about the narrowest person I have met, so we're not likely to be anywhere but on each other's nerves. But she adores that son of hers and would do anything in the world that pleases him, and he pursues me.'
'Pursues you?' I cried, with an incredulousness that I immediately perceived was rude. I hastened to correct it by shaking my head in gentle reproof49 and saying: 'Dear me, Charlotte—dear, dear me.' Simultaneously50 I was conscious of feeling disappointed in young Harvey-Browne.
'What do you suppose he pursues me for?' Charlotte asked, turning her head and looking at me.
'I can't think,' I was going to say, but stopped in time.
'The most absurd reason. He torments51 me with attentions because I am Bernhard's wife. He is a hero-worshipper, and he says Bernhard is the greatest man living.'
'Well, but isn't he?'
'He can't get hold of him, so he hovers52 round me, and talks Bernhard to me for hours together. That's why I went to Thiessow. He was sending me mad.'
'He hasn't an idea, poor innocent, that you don't—that you no longer——'
'I have as much courage as other people, but I don't think there's enough of it for explaining things to the mother. You see, she's the wife of a bishop.'
Not being so well acquainted as Charlotte with the characteristics of the wives of bishops53 I did not see; but she seemed to think it explained everything.
'Doesn't she know about your writings?' I inquired.
'Oh yes, and she came to a lecture I gave at Oxford—the boy is at Balliol—and she read some of the pamphlets. He made her.'
'Well?'
'Oh she made a few conventional remarks that showed me her limitations, and then she began about Bernhard. To these people I have no individuality, no separate existence, no brains of my own, no opinions worth listening to—I am solely54 of interest as the wife of Bernhard. Oh, it's maddening! The boy has put I don't know what ideas into his mother's head. She has actually tried to read one of Bernhard's works, and she pretends she thought it sublime55. She quotes it. I won't stay at Binz. Let us go on somewhere else to-morrow.'
'But I think Binz looks as if it were a lovely place, and the Harvey-Brownes look very nice. I am not at all sure that I want to go on somewhere else to-morrow.'
'Then I'll go on alone, and wait for you at Sassnitz.'
'Oh, don't wait. I mightn't come to Sassnitz.'
'Oh well, I'll be sure to pick you up again somewhere. It isn't a very big island, and you are a conspicuous object, driving round it.'
This was true. So long as I was on that island I could not hope to escape Charlotte. I entered Binz in a state of moody56 acquiescence57.
Every hotel was full, and every room in the villas58 was taken. It was the Göhren experience over again. At last we found shelter by the merest chance in the prettiest house in the place—we had not dared inquire there, certain that its rooms would be taken first of all—a little house on the sands, overhung at the back by beechwoods, its windows garnished59 with bright yellow damask curtains, its roof very red, and its walls very white. A most cheerful, trim little house, with a nice tiled path up to the door, and pots of geraniums on its sills. A cleanly person of the usual decent widow type welcomed us with a cordiality contrasting pleasantly with the indifference of those widows whose rooms had been all engaged. The entire lower floor, she said, was at our disposal. We each had a bedroom opening on to a verandah that seemed to hang right over the sea; and there was a dining-room, and a beautiful blue-and-white kitchen if we wanted to cook, and a spacious chamber60 for Gertrud. The price was low. Even when I said that we should probably only stay one or two nights it did not go up. The widow explained that the rooms were engaged for the entire season, but that the Berlin gentleman who had taken them was unavoidably prevented coming, which was the reason why we might have them, for it was not her habit to take in the passing stranger.
I asked whether it were likely that the Berlin gentleman might yet appear and turn us out. She stared at me a moment as though struck by my question, and then shook her head. 'No, no,' she said decidedly; 'he will not appear.'
A very pretty little maidservant who was bringing in our luggage was so much perturbed61 by my innocent inquiry62 that she let the things drop.
'Hedwig, do not be a fool,' said the widow sternly. 'The gentleman,' she went on, turning to me, 'cannot come, because he is dead.'
'Oh,' I said, silenced by the excellence of the reason.
Charlotte, being readier of speech, said 'Indeed.'
The reason was a good one; but when I heard it it seemed as if the pleasant rooms with the beds all ready and everything set out for the expected one took on a look of awfulness. It is true it was now past eight o'clock, and the sun had gone, and across the bay the dusk was creeping. I went out through the long windows to the little verandah. It had white pillars of great apparent massiveness, which looked as though they were meant to support vast weights of masonry63; and through them I watched the water rippling64 in slow, steely ripples65 along the sand just beneath me, and the ripples had the peculiar66 lonely sound that slight waves have in the evening when they lick a deserted67 shore.
'To-day,' said the widow.
'To-day?' echoed Charlotte.
'That is why the beds are made. It is lucky for you ladies.'
'Very,' agreed Charlotte; and her voice was hollow.
'He died yesterday—an accident. I received the telegram only this morning. It is a great misfortune for me. Will the ladies sup? I have some provisions in the house sent on by the gentleman for his supper to-night. He, poor soul, will never sup again.'
The widow, more moved by this last reflection than she had yet been, sighed heavily. She then made the observation usual on such occasions that it is a strange world, and that one is here to-day and gone to-morrow—or rather, correcting herself, here yesterday and gone to-day—and that the one thing certain was the schönes Essen at that moment on the shelves of the larder69. Would the ladies not seize the splendid opportunity and sup?
'No, no, we will not sup,' Charlotte cried with great decision. 'You won't eat here to-night, will you?' she asked through the yellow window-curtains, which made her look very pale. 'It is always horrid70 in lodgings71. Shall we go to that nice red-brick hotel we passed, where the people were sitting under the big tree looking so happy?'
We went in silence to the red-brick hotel; and threading our way among the crowded tables set out under a huge beech tree a few yards from the water to the only empty one, we found ourselves sitting next to the Harvey-Brownes.
'Dear Frau Nieberlein, how delightful72 to have you here again!' cried the bishop's wife in tones of utmost cordiality, leaning across the little space between the tables to press Charlotte's hand. 'Brosy has been scouring73 the country on his bicycle trying to discover your retreat, and was quite disconsolate74 at not finding you.'
Scouring the country in search of Charlotte! Heavens. And I who had dropped straight on top of her in the waters of Thiessow without any effort at all! Thus does Fortune withhold75 blessings76 from those who clamour, and piles them unasked on the shrinking heads of the meek77.
Brosy Harvey-Browne meanwhile, like a polite young man acquainted with German customs, had got out of his chair and was waiting for Charlotte to present him to me. 'Oh yes, my young philosopher,' I thought, not without a faint regret, 'you are now to find out that your promising78 and intellectual Fräulein isn't anything of the sort.'
'Pray present me,' said Brosy.
Charlotte did.
'Pray present me,' I said in my turn, bowing in the direction of the bishop's wife.
Charlotte did.
At this ceremony the bishop's wife's face took on the look of one who thinks there is really no need to make fresh acquaintances in breathless hurries. It also wore the look of one who, while admitting a Nieberlein within the range of her cordiality on account of the prestige of that Nieberlein's famous husband, does not see why the Nieberlein's obscure female relatives should be admitted too. So I was not admitted; and I sat outside and studied the menu.
'How very strange,' observed Brosy in his beautifully correct German as he dropped into a vacant chair at our table, 'that you should be related to the Nieberleins.'
'And how odd that we should meet again here.'
'One is always meeting again on an island if it is small enough.'
This is a sample of my conversation with Brosy, weighty on my part with solid truths, while our supper was being prepared and while Charlotte answered his mother's questions as to where she had been, where she had met me, how we were related, and who my husband was.
'Oh, really. How interesting,' said Mrs. Harvey-Browne; and immediately ceased to be interested.
The lights of Sassnitz twinkled on the other side of the bay. A steamer came across the calm grey water, gaily82 decked out in coloured lights, the throbbing83 of her paddle-wheels heard almost from the time she left Sassnitz in the still evening air. Up and down the road between our tables and the sea groups of bath-guests strolled—artless family groups, papa and mamma arm in arm, and in front the daughter and the admirer; knots of girls in the backfisch stage, tittering and pushing each other about; quiet maiden-ladies, placid84 after their supper, gently praising, as they passed, the delights of a few weeks spent in the very bosom85 of Nature, expatiating86 on her peace, her restfulness, and the freshness of her vegetables. And with us, while the stars flashed through the stirring beech leaves, Mrs. Harvey-Browne rhapsodised about the great Nieberlein to the blank Charlotte, and Brosy tried to carry on a reasonable conversation about things like souls with a woman who was eating an omelette.
I was in an entirely87 different mood from the one of the afternoon at Vilm, and it was a mood in which I like to be left alone. When it is on me not all the beautiful young men in the world, looking like archangels and wearing the loveliest linen88, would be able to shake me out of it. Brosy was apparently in exactly the same mood as he had been then. Was it his perennially89? Did he always want to talk about the Unknowable, and the Unthinkable, and the Unspeakable? I am positive I did not look intelligent this time, not only because I did not try to, but because I was feeling profoundly stupid. And still he went on. There was only one thing I really wanted to know, and that was why he was called Brosy. While I ate my supper, and he talked, and his mother listened during the pauses of her fitful conversation with Charlotte, I turned this over in my mind. Why Brosy? His mother kept on saying it. To Charlotte her talk, having done with Nieberlein, was all of Brosy. Was it in itself a perfect name, or was it the short of something long, or did it come under the heading Pet? Was he perhaps a twin, and his twin sister was Rosy? In which case, if his parents were lovers of the neat, his own name would be almost inevitable90.
It was when our supper had been cleared away and he was remarking for the second time—the first time he remarked it I had said 'What?',—that ultimate religious ideas are merely symbols of the actual, not cognitions of it, and his mother not well knowing what he meant but afraid it must be something a bishop's son ought not to mean said with gentle reproach, 'My dear Brosy,' that I took courage to inquire of him 'Why Brosy?'
'It is short for Ambrose,' he answered.
'He was christened after Ambrose,' said his mother,—' one of the Early Fathers, as no doubt you know.'
But I did not know, because she spoke91 in German, for the sake, I suppose, of making things easier for me, and she called the Early Fathers frühzeitige Väter, so how could I know?
'Frühzeitige Väter?' I repeated dully; 'Who are they?'
The bishop's wife took the kindest view of it. 'Perhaps you do not have them in the Lutheran Church,' she said; but she did not speak to me again at all, turning her back on me quite this time, and wholly concentrating her attention on the monosyllabic Charlotte.
'I am sorry,' said I politely, 'that I was so dull.'
And then he went on with the paragraph—for to me it seemed as though he spoke always in entire paragraphs instead of sentences—he had been engaged upon when I interrupted him; and, for my refreshment93, I caught fragments of Mrs. Harvey-Browne's conversation in between.
'I have a message for you, dear Frau Nieberlein,' I heard her say,—'a message from the bishop.'
'Yes?' said Charlotte, without warmth.
'We had letters from home to-day, and in his he mentions you.'
'Yes?' said Charlotte, ungratefully cold.
'"Tell her," he writes,—"tell her I have been reading her pamphlets."'
'Indeed?' said Charlotte, beginning to warm.
'It is not often that the bishop has time for reading, and it is quite unusual for him to look at anything written by a woman, so that it is really an honour he has paid you.'
'Of course it is,' said Charlotte, quite warmly.
'And he is an old man, dear Frau Nieberlein, of ripe experience, and admirable wisdom, as no doubt you have heard, and I am sure you will take what he says in good part.'
'"Tell her," he writes,—"tell her that I grieve for her."'
There was a pause. Then Charlotte said loftily, 'It is very good of him.'
'And I can assure you the bishop never grieves without reason, or else in such a large diocese he would always be doing it.'
Charlotte was silent.
'He begged me to tell you that he will pray for you.'
There was another pause. Then Charlotte said, 'Thank you.'
What else was she to say? What does one say in such a case? Our governesses teach us how pleasant and amiable95 an adornment96 is politeness, but not one of mine ever told me what I was to say when confronted by an announcement that I was to be included in somebody's prayers. If Charlotte, anxious to be polite, had said, 'Oh, please don't let him trouble,' the bishop's wife would have been shocked. If she had said what she felt, and wholly declined to be prayed for at all by strange bishops, Mrs. Harvey-Browne would have been horrified97. It is a nice question; and it preoccupied98 me for the rest of the time we sat there, and we sat there a very long time; for although Charlotte was manifestly sorely tried by Mrs. Harvey-Browne I had great difficulty in getting her away. Each time I suggested going back to our lodgings to bed she made some excuse for staying where she was. Everybody else seemed to have gone to bed, and even Ambrose, who had been bicycling all day, had begun visibly to droop99 before I could persuade her to come home. Slowly she walked along the silent sands, slowly she went into the house, still more slowly into her bedroom; and then, just as Gertrud had blessed me and blown out my candle in one breath, in she came with a light, and remarking that she did not feel sleepy sat down on the foot of my bed and began to talk.
She had on a white dressing-gown, and her hair fell loose about her face, and she was very pale.
'I can't talk; I am much too sleepy,' I said, 'and you look dreadfully tired.'
'My soul is tired—tired out utterly101 by that woman. I wanted to ask you if you won't come away with me to-morrow.'
'I can't go away till I have explored these heavenly forests.'
'I can't stay here if I am to spend my time with that woman.'
'That woman? Oh Charlotte, don't call her such awful names. Try and imagine her sensations if she heard you.'
'Why, I shouldn't care.'
'Oh hush,' I whispered, 'the windows are open—she might be just outside on the beach. It gives me shivers only to think of it. Don't say it again. Don't be such an audacious German. Think of Oxford—think of venerable things like cathedral closes and bishops' palaces. Think of the dignity and deference102 that surround Mrs. Harvey-Browne at home. And won't you go to bed? You can't think how sleepy I am.'
'Will you come away with me to-morrow?'
'We'll talk it over in the morning. I'm not nearly awake enough now.'
Charlotte got up reluctantly and went to the door leading into her bedroom. Then she came back and crossed over to the windows and peeped out between the yellow curtains. 'It's bright moonlight,' she said, 'and so quiet. The sea is like a pond. How clear the Sassnitz lights are.'
'Are you really going to leave your windows open? Any one can get in. We are almost on a level with the beach.'
To this I made no answer; and my little travelling-clock on the table gave point to my silence by chiming twelve.
Charlotte went away slowly, candle in hand. At her door she stopped and looked back. 'It seems,' she said, 'that I have got that unfortunate man's bed.'
So it was the Berlin gentleman who was making her restless.
'And you,' she went on, 'have got the one his daughter was to have had.'
'Is she alive?' I asked sleepily.
'Oh yes, she's alive.'
'Well, that was nice, anyway.'
'I believe you are frightened,' I murmured, as she still lingered.
'Frightened? What of?'
'The Berlin gentleman.'
'Absurd,' said Charlotte, and went away.
I was having a most cheerful dream in which I tried hard to remember the exact words Herbert Spencer uses about effete104 beliefs that, in the stole, still cling about the necks of priests, and, in gaiters, linger round the legs of bishops, and was repeating the words about the bishops in a rapture105 of enjoyment—and indeed it is a lovely sentence—when a sudden pause of fear came into my dream, and I felt that some one beside myself was in the room.
The dark to me has always been full of terrors. I can look back through my memories and find past years studded with horrible black nights on which I woke up and was afraid. Till I have lit a candle, how can I remember that I do not believe in ghosts, and in nameless hideousnesses infinitely106 more frightful107 than ghosts? But what courage is needed to sit up in all the solid, pressing blackness, and stretch out one defenceless hand into it to feel about for the matches, appalled108 by the echoing noises the search produces, cold with fear that the hand may touch something unknown and terrible. And so at Binz, dragged out of my pleasant dream to night and loneliness, I could not move for a moment for sheer extremity109 of fright. When I did, when I did put out a shaking hand to feel for the matches, the dread100 of years became a reality—I touched another hand. Now I think it was very wonderful of me not to scream. I suppose I did not dare. I don't know how I managed it, petrified110 as I was with terror, but the next thing that happened was that I found myself under the bedclothes thinking things over. Whose hand had I touched? And what was it doing on my table? It was a nasty, cold hand, and it had clutched at mine as I tore it away. Oh—there it was, coming after me—it was feeling its way along the bedclothes—surely it was not real—it must be a nightmare—and that was why no sound came when I tried to shriek111 for Charlotte—but what a horrible nightmare—so very, very real—I could hear the hand sliding along the sheet to the corner where I was huddling—oh, why had I come to this frightful island? A gasp112 of helpless horror did get out, and instantly Charlotte's voice whispered, 'Be quiet. Don't make a sound. There's a man outside your window.'
At this my senses came back to me with a rush. 'You've nearly killed me,' I whispered, filling the whisper with as much hot indignation as it would hold. 'If my heart had had anything the matter with it I would have died. Let me go—I want to light the candle. What does a man, a real living man, matter?'
Charlotte held me tighter. 'Be quiet,' she whispered, in an agony, it seemed, of fear. 'Be quiet—he isn't—he doesn't look—I don't think he is alive.'
'What?' I whispered.
'Sh—sh—your window's open—he only need put his leg over the sill to get in.'
'But if he isn't alive he can't put his leg over sills,' I whispered back incredulously. 'He's some poor drowned sailor washed ashore113.'
'Oh be quiet!' implored114 Charlotte, burying her face on my shoulder; and having got over my own fright I marvelled at the abjectness115 of hers.
'Let me go. I want to look at him,' I said, trying to get away.
'Sh—sh—don't move—he'd hear—he is just outside——' And she clung to me in terror.
'But how can he hear if he isn't alive? Let me go——'
'No—no—he's sitting there—just outside—he's been sitting there for hours—and never moves—oh, it's that man!—I know it is—I knew he'd come——'
'What man?'
'Oh the dreadful, dreadful Berlin man who died——'
'My dear Charlotte,' I expostulated, feeling now perfectly116 calm in the presence of such a collapse117. 'Let me go. I'll look through the curtains so that he shall not see me, and I'll soon tell you if he's alive or not. Do you suppose I don't know a live man when I see one?'
I wriggled118 out of her arms and crept with bare, silent feet to the window, and cautiously moving the curtains a slit119 apart peeped through. There certainly was a man outside, sitting on a rock exactly in front of my window, with his face to the sea. Clouds were passing slowly across the moon, and I waited for them to pass to see him more clearly. He never moved. And when the light did fall on him it fell on a well-clothed back with two shining buttons on it,—not the back of a burglar, and surely not the back of a ghost. In all my varied120 imaginings I had never yet imagined a ghost in buttons, and I refused to believe that I saw one then.
Back I crept to the cowering121 Charlotte. 'It isn't anybody who's dead,' I whispered cheerfully, 'and I think he wants to paddle.'
'Paddle?' echoed Charlotte sitting up, the word seeming to restore her to her senses. 'Why should he want to paddle in the middle of the night?'
'Well, why not? It's the only thing I can think of that makes you sit on rocks.'
Charlotte was so much recovered and so much relieved at finding herself recovered, that she gave a hysterical122 giggle123. Instantly there was a slight noise outside, and the shadow of a man appeared on the curtains. We clung to each other in consternation124.
'Hedwig,' whispered the man, pushing the curtains a little aside, and peering into the darkness of the room; 'kleiner Schatz—endlich da? Lässt mich so lange warten——'
He waited, uncertain, trying to see in. Charlotte grasped the situation quickest. 'Hedwig is not here,' she said with immense dignity, 'and you should be ashamed of yourself, disturbing ladies in this manner. I must request you to go away at once, and to give me your name and address so that I may report you to the proper authorities. I shall not fail in my duty, which will be to make an example of you.'
'That was admirably put,' I remarked, going across to the window and shutting it, 'only he didn't stay to listen. Now we'll light the candle.'
And looking out as I drew the curtains I saw the moonlight flash on flying buttons.
'Who would have thought,' I observed to Charlotte, who was standing125 in the middle of the room shaking with indignation,—'who would have thought that that very demure126 little Hedwig would be the cause of a night of terror for us?'
'Who could have imagined her so depraved?' said Charlotte wrathfully.
'Well, we don't know that she is.'
'Doesn't it look like it?'
'Poor little thing.'
'Poor little thing! What drivel is this?'
'Oh I don't know—we all want forgiving very badly, it seems to me—Hedwig not more than you and I. And we want it so much more badly than we want punishing, yet we are always getting punished and hardly ever getting forgiven.'
'I don't know what you mean,' said Charlotte.
'It isn't very clear,' I admitted.
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beset
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| v.镶嵌；困扰，包围 | |
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indifference
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| n.不感兴趣，不关心，冷淡，不在乎 | |
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longings
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| 渴望，盼望( longing的名词复数 ) | |
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4
precisely
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| adv.恰好，正好，精确地，细致地 | |
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5
allot
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| v.分配；拨给；n.部分；小块菜地 | |
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6
meditate
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| v.想，考虑，（尤指宗教上的）沉思，冥想 | |
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7
beech
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| n.山毛榉；adj.山毛榉的 | |
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8
meditations
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| 默想( meditation的名词复数 )； 默念； 沉思； 冥想 | |
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9
maiden
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| n.少女，处女；adj.未婚的，纯洁的，无经验的 | |
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10
beeches
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| n.山毛榉( beech的名词复数 )；山毛榉木材 | |
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11
grassy
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| adj.盖满草的；长满草的 | |
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12
dozed
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| v.打盹儿，打瞌睡( doze的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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13
pedestrians
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| n.步行者( pedestrian的名词复数 ) | |
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14
attentive
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| adj.注意的，专心的；关心(别人)的，殷勤的 | |
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15
colossal
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| adj.异常的，庞大的 | |
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16
moss
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| n.苔，藓，地衣 | |
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17
trickling
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| n.油画底色含油太多而成泡沫状突起v.滴( trickle的现在分词 )；淌；使)慢慢走；缓慢移动 | |
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18
glades
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| n.林中空地( glade的名词复数 ) | |
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19
exquisite
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| adj.精美的；敏锐的；剧烈的，感觉强烈的 | |
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20
spacious
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| adj.广阔的，宽敞的 | |
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21
stuffy
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| adj.不透气的，闷热的 | |
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22
decided
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| adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的 | |
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23
dozing
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| v.打瞌睡,假寐 n.瞌睡 | |
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24
exhort
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| v.规劝，告诫 | |
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25
watts
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| （电力计量单位）瓦，瓦特( watt的名词复数 ) | |
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26
joyful
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| adj.欢乐的，令人欢欣的 | |
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27
maker
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| n.制造者，制造商 | |
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28
gems
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| growth； economy； management； and customer satisfaction 增长 | |
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29
immortal
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| adj.不朽的；永生的，不死的；神的 | |
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30
pious
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| adj.虔诚的；道貌岸然的 | |
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31
tickled
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| （使）发痒( tickle的过去式和过去分词 )； （使）愉快，逗乐 | |
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32
tickle
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| v.搔痒，胳肢；使高兴；发痒；n.搔痒，发痒 | |
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33
tickling
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| 反馈，回授，自旋挠痒法 | |
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34
inscription
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| n.（尤指石块上的）刻印文字，铭文，碑文 | |
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35
blot
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| vt.弄脏（用吸墨纸）吸干；n.污点，污渍 | |
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36
profane
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| adj.亵神的，亵渎的；vt.亵渎，玷污 | |
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37
industriously
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38
scents
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| n.香水( scent的名词复数 )；气味；（动物的）臭迹；（尤指狗的）嗅觉 | |
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39
slab
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| n.平板，厚的切片；v.切成厚板，以平板盖上 | |
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40
slabs
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| n.厚板，平板，厚片( slab的名词复数 )；厚胶片 | |
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41
conspicuous
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| adj.明眼的，惹人注目的；炫耀的，摆阔气的 | |
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42
rosy
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| adj.美好的，乐观的，玫瑰色的 | |
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43
defiantly
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| adv.挑战地，大胆对抗地 | |
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44
apparently
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| adv.显然地；表面上，似乎 | |
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45
simplicity
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| n.简单，简易；朴素；直率，单纯 | |
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46
excellence
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| n.优秀，杰出，(pl.)优点，美德 | |
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47
philosophic
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| adj.哲学的，贤明的 | |
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48
bishop
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| n.主教，（国际象棋）象 | |
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49
reproof
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| n.斥责，责备 | |
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50
simultaneously
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| adv.同时发生地，同时进行地 | |
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51
torments
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| （肉体或精神上的）折磨，痛苦( torment的名词复数 )； 造成痛苦的事物[人] | |
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52
hovers
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| 鸟( hover的第三人称单数 )； 靠近（某事物）； （人）徘徊； 犹豫 | |
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53
bishops
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| （基督教某些教派管辖大教区的）主教( bishop的名词复数 )； （国际象棋的）象 | |
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54
solely
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| adv.仅仅，唯一地 | |
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55
sublime
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| adj.崇高的，伟大的；极度的，不顾后果的 | |
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56
moody
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| adj.心情不稳的，易怒的，喜怒无常的 | |
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57
acquiescence
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| n.默许；顺从 | |
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58
villas
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| 别墅，公馆( villa的名词复数 )； （城郊）住宅 | |
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59
garnished
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| v.给（上餐桌的食物）加装饰( garnish的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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60
chamber
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| n.房间，寝室；会议厅；议院；会所 | |
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61
perturbed
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| adj.烦燥不安的v.使（某人）烦恼，不安( perturb的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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62
inquiry
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| n.打听，询问，调查，查问 | |
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63
masonry
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| n.砖土建筑；砖石 | |
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64
rippling
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| 起涟漪的，潺潺流水般声音的 | |
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65
ripples
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| 逐渐扩散的感觉( ripple的名词复数 ) | |
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66
peculiar
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| adj.古怪的，异常的；特殊的，特有的 | |
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67
deserted
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| adj.荒芜的，荒废的，无人的，被遗弃的 | |
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68
depressed
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| adj.沮丧的，抑郁的，不景气的，萧条的 | |
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69
larder
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| n.食物贮藏室，食品橱 | |
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70
horrid
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| adj.可怕的；令人惊恐的；恐怖的；极讨厌的 | |
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71
lodgings
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| n. 出租的房舍, 寄宿舍 | |
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72
delightful
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| adj.令人高兴的，使人快乐的 | |
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73
scouring
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| 擦[洗]净，冲刷，洗涤 | |
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74
disconsolate
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| adj.忧郁的，不快的 | |
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75
withhold
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| v.拒绝，不给；使停止，阻挡 | |
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76
blessings
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| n.（上帝的）祝福( blessing的名词复数 )；好事；福分；因祸得福 | |
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77
meek
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| adj.温顺的，逆来顺受的 | |
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78
promising
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| adj.有希望的，有前途的 | |
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79
marvelled
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| v.惊奇，对…感到惊奇( marvel的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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80
dreary
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| adj.令人沮丧的，沉闷的，单调乏味的 | |
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81
boredom
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| n.厌烦，厌倦，乏味，无聊 | |
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82
gaily
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| adv.欢乐地，高兴地 | |
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83
throbbing
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| a. 跳动的,悸动的 | |
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84
placid
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| adj.安静的，平和的 | |
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85
bosom
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| n.胸，胸部；胸怀；内心；adj.亲密的 | |
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86
expatiating
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| v.详述，细说( expatiate的现在分词 ) | |
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87
entirely
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| ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地 | |
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88
linen
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| n.亚麻布，亚麻线，亚麻制品；adj.亚麻布制的，亚麻的 | |
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89
perennially
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| adv.经常出现地；长期地；持久地；永久地 | |
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90
inevitable
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| adj.不可避免的，必然发生的 | |
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91
spoke
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| 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 | |
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92
subdued
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| adj. 屈服的，柔和的，减弱的 动词subdue的过去式和过去分词 | |
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93
refreshment
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| n.恢复，精神爽快，提神之事物；（复数）refreshments:点心，茶点 | |
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94
ominous
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| adj.不祥的，不吉的，预兆的，预示的 | |
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95
amiable
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| adj.和蔼可亲的，友善的，亲切的 | |
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96
adornment
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| n.装饰；装饰品 | |
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97
horrified
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| a.(表现出)恐惧的 | |
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98
preoccupied
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| adj.全神贯注的，入神的；被抢先占有的；心事重重的v.占据（某人）思想，使对…全神贯注，使专心于( preoccupy的过去式) | |
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99
droop
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| v.低垂，下垂；凋萎，萎靡 | |
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100
dread
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| vt.担忧，忧虑；惧怕，不敢；n.担忧，畏惧 | |
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101
utterly
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| adv.完全地，绝对地 | |
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102
deference
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| n.尊重，顺从；敬意 | |
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103
drowsily
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| adv.睡地，懒洋洋地，昏昏欲睡地 | |
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104
effete
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| adj.无生产力的，虚弱的 | |
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105
rapture
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| n.狂喜；全神贯注；着迷；v.使狂喜 | |
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106
infinitely
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| adv.无限地，无穷地 | |
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107
frightful
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| adj.可怕的；讨厌的 | |
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108
appalled
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| v.使惊骇，使充满恐惧( appall的过去式和过去分词)adj.惊骇的；丧胆的 | |
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109
extremity
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| n.末端，尽头；尽力；终极；极度 | |
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110
petrified
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| adj.惊呆的；目瞪口呆的v.使吓呆，使惊呆；变僵硬；使石化(petrify的过去式和过去分词) | |
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111
shriek
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| v./n.尖叫，叫喊 | |
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112
gasp
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| n.喘息，气喘；v.喘息；气吁吁他说 | |
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113
ashore
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| adv.在(向)岸上，上岸 | |
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114
implored
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| 恳求或乞求（某人）( implore的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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115
abjectness
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| 凄惨； 绝望； 卑鄙； 卑劣 | |
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116
perfectly
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| adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地 | |
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117
collapse
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| vi.累倒；昏倒；倒塌；塌陷 | |
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118
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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119
slit
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| n.狭长的切口；裂缝；vt.切开，撕裂 | |
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120
varied
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| adj.多样的，多变化的 | |
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121
cowering
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| v.畏缩，抖缩( cower的现在分词 ) | |
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122
hysterical
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| adj.情绪异常激动的，歇斯底里般的 | |
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123
giggle
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| n.痴笑，咯咯地笑；v.咯咯地笑着说 | |
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124
consternation
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| n.大为吃惊，惊骇 | |
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125
standing
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| n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的 | |
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126
demure
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| adj.严肃的；端庄的 | |
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