Dan’s fury cooled out of him as he looked at the white face half hidden by a grass tussock, and caught a glint of the polished barrels of Bess’s pistols. Jeffray’s beaver1 had fallen off, and he lay with the blood soaking from a scalp-wound into his hair. Dan drew back, swinging his stick, and staring sheepishly at the blood trickling2 across Jeffray’s forehead.
Bess, seeing that Dan had come to his senses, put back one of the pistols into the holster, but kept the other in her hand. She ordered Dan back, and kneeling down on the wet grass turned Jeffray’s head gently into her lap. A look of wonder flashed into her eyes as she considered his face, for this was the man St. Agnes had showed her in her dream. He even wore black, with white ruffles3 at his wrists, and his blood had been spilled for her in saving her from Dan’s savagery4.
She looked wonderingly at Jeffray, remembering him at last as the gentleman who had ridden by when Dan and David were fighting in the mist by the Queen’s Circle. The sight of the blood trickling across his forehead roused her from such reveries to womanly pity. She flashed a glance at Dan, and bade him give her the scarf he wore about his neck. With this she bound up Jeffray’s head, smoothing back his hair with her strong brown hands.
“Take him up,” she said to Dan; “we must carry him home to Mother Ursula.”
Dan was swinging his stick and watching Bess holding Jeffray’s head in her lap with a sullen5 jealousy6 that he could not dissemble. He obeyed the girl, however, and lifted Jeffray as though he had been a child. Bess picked up the fallen sword, and taking Jeffray’s mare7 by the bridle8, pointed9 to the path that led towards the hamlet.
Old Ursula held up her hands when Dan appeared at her cottage door with Jeffray still unconscious in his arms. Bess told her foster-mother all that had happened, not deigning10 to spare Dan shame in the telling of it. They laid Jeffray on the settle before the fire, and sent in haste for Isaac, who knew all the gentry11 by sight who lived within ten miles of the Beacon12 Rock.
“Dan ’ll swing for it,” quoth Ursula, with an unloving glance at her nephew.
“Bah, there’s no great harm done. Get him to bed, dame16, and when he wakes see that you put the youngster in a good temper.”
Isaac beckoned17 his son away, Ursula hobbling off to drag clean sheets from the linen18-press. Calling Bess, who was watching Jeffray, she bade her fetch a new blanket and the best quilt from the oak chest on the stairs. Isaac had taken Jeffray’s mare, and, still rating Dan, stabled her in the byre where Ursula kept her cows.
The old woman pattered into her bedroom on the ground floor, dragged the clothes from the four-poster, while Bess came in bearing a new blanket and a patch-work quilt of many colors. Between them they spread the clean sheets, stripped off Jeffray’s clothes, and put him to bed there in his shirt. Ursula made a stew19 of friar’s-balsam, and after tearing soft linen into strips, washed Jeffray’s wound and bound up his head. Then she went out to speak with Isaac in the kitchen, leaving Bess alone to watch by the bed.
It was growing dark when Jeffray recovered consciousness, and awoke to find great beams above his head, and the sunset reddening the narrow casement20 of a room. He fingered his bandaged head, looked round him curiously21, and would have struggled up in the bed but for the swooping22 of Bess’s strong brown hand upon his shoulder. She had been sitting there silently in the twilight23, thinking of the dream she had dreamed on St. Agnes’s Eve, and studying Jeffray’s pale and inanimate face.
At his wakening she had set her hand upon his shoulder, as though to hint that he was under fair protection. Old Ursula had whispered to the girl that she was to be polite, nay24, servile, to the gentleman, since the Squire of Rodenham might prove a troublesome neighbor should he care to charge Dan with violence. Servility, however, was not part of Bess’s nature. She did not even call Mr. Richard “sir,” and though she abated25 her masterfulness, she spoke26 to him as to an equal.
“Bide still,” she said, leaning over him and looking in his eyes, “you are safe with us.”
Richard could see the girl’s face in the dusk, white beneath the dead black hair. There was the deliciousness of youth in the rare roundness of her cheek, the smooth low forehead, the strong chin and pouting27 mouth.
“Where am I?” he asked her, quietly, with his hands lying on the many-colored quilt.
“In our cottage—Ursula’s cottage. I made Dan carry you home from the woods.”
“Ah, I had the worst of it. What happened? Tell me.”
Bess was pleased with his voice.
“Dan hit you over the head,” she said.
“I can believe that,” quoth Richard, with a smile.
“I picked your pistols out of the holsters, and swore I would shoot him if he struck you again.”
Jeffray’s thoughts were not of himself for the moment. He lay silent, looking up at Bess, still feeling the pressure of her hand upon his shoulder. The room was growing very dark. He could see only her hair as a deep shadow above the white oval of her face.
“You are one of the forest-folk?” he asked.
“I am Bess—Bess Grimshaw.”
“And Ursula?”
“Is my mother. I live with her.”
“And Dan—?”
“Is my cousin.”
The tawny28 light had melted out of the sky. From the kitchen came the murmur29 of Isaac’s voice as he argued with old Ursula. They were speaking of Richard and of Dan. The same subjects were in Bess’s thought, and perhaps the man in the bed divined the same.
“What happened to David?”
She seemed puzzled for the moment, and then flushed up redly in the dusk.
“David ran away,” she said.
“Yes.”
“He was terrified of Dan. They pressed him at Portsmouth for the king’s navy. We heard it from a peddler who had seen the lad marched off.”
They were both silent for a while, Richard’s eyes turned towards the window, Bess’s hand still on Jeffray’s shoulder. The same thoughts were in either heart. By some strange flash of sympathy Jeffray and the girl seemed to understand each other.
“Are you afraid of your cousin?” he asked, suddenly.
“Of Dan?”
“Yes.”
She looked down into the man’s face.
“I will leave you my pistols.”
Then came the pattering of Dame Ursula’s slippers33 across the flagged floor of the kitchen. The door opened and Bess of the Woods was called away.
Isaac Grimshaw was something of a sylvan34 diplomat35, a suave36, sweet-voiced old sinner, who could bleat37 texts or snarl38 out fantastic oaths as the emergency required. He had sworn at Dan for laying his hands on one of the gentry and risking his bull neck for a wench’s lips, and had driven his giant of a son cowering39 from old Ursula’s cottage. Then he had entered in and preached to the dame in the ingle-nook, wagging a long forefinger40 and brushing his white hair back from his forehead. Squire Jeffray must be appeased41, tickled42 into a good temper. That was the mark towards which Isaac winged his words.
In due course he took the two candles in the brass43 sticks from the mantle-shelf, and lighting44 them with a fagot from the fire, bade Ursula open the bedroom door and call Bess out. The patriarch went in mincingly45, set one candle on a table by the bed, and the other on an oaken press. He stood very humbly46 before Richard Jeffray, his white hair waving over his forehead, his clean-shaven mouth sweet and benignant as the mouth of some tender-souled old priest.
“I trust your honor is feeling comfortable.”
“Not much the worse, Grimshaw, for your son’s stick.”
Isaac rubbed his palms together and beamed.
“I have come to ask your honor’s pardon, sir.”
The patriarch sniffed47 pathetically, and fidgeted as he stood with limp humbleness48 beside the bed. How could Jeffray appear angry with such an old fellow whose soul was overwhelmed in contrition50 for his son’s misdeeds.
“Do not vex51 yourself, Grimshaw, on my account,” said the master of Rodenham, frankly52, “your son’s blood was up, and I drew my sword on him. He is a dangerous fellow, Grimshaw, and beyond your handling, I imagine.”
Isaac bowed his head into his hands.
“This may be a lesson to him, Grimshaw.”
“Please God, sir, it will. Bess, sir, Bess is a good wench, but she has a tongue that would drive a young man crazy.”
“I don’t blame her, Grimshaw, so far as your son is concerned.”
“Dear Heaven, no, your honor. I will see to it, sir; I will speak to Dan like a father. He shall not pester54 the wench, and she shall be taught to bridle her tongue.”
“If she has a temper, Grimshaw, you can best mend it by teaching your son to mind his business.”
Jeffray lay quiet a moment, while Isaac still sniffed and fidgeted beside the bed, watching the master of Rodenham with his shrewd, gray eyes. Old Ursula was clattering56 her pans in the kitchen, humming some old ditty, while Bess, her brown hands white with flour, was making pastry57 for Squire Jeffray’s supper.
“Grimshaw,” said the younger man, at last.
“Sir?”
“I shall not set the law against your son.”
“God bless your honor’s noble heart.”
“If there is more trouble betwixt him and the girl—”
“You may like to find a good home for her—”
“Ah—your honor—”
“Well?”
“We should sorely miss her pretty face.”
“Better lose her than have her ruined, Grimshaw.”
“The words of a prophet, sir.”
“We could take her at Rodenham. Old Mrs. Barbara, my butler’s wife, could give her a good home.”
Had Richard Jeffray seemed less innocent a youth, Isaac might have winked59 at him, and grown gay over so disinterested60 a proposal. Old Grimshaw was a fair connoisseur61 of rogues62, and his instincts told him that Jeffray was not of the intriguing63 order. Therefore he made Richard a very humble49 and grateful speech, and declared he would keep such a benefactor’s advice in mind. “Deuce take me,” he thought, “here is an honest simpleton. Why, the lad needs no more bribing64 to be generous than a drunken Paddy. He’ll grow fat on sentiment, without a morsel65 of real kissing to put him into a good temper.”
Jeffray discovered himself served royally in Ursula Grimshaw’s cottage that night. Isaac had sent a chicken, his best cutlery, and silver forks and a flask66 of wine, bidding his sister serve up a supper fit for a city alderman. There was red wine, white meat, nutty bread, savory67 herbs, custard and sugared fruits. Bess tricked out in her best green gown, with a white lawn apron68, red stockings and shoes, and a silver chain set with amethysts69 about her throat, waited on the master of Rodenham as though to serve him were her whole heart’s desire. She drank wine with Richard, showed her white teeth, courtesied and blushed when he thanked her and old Ursula for their courtesies. She smoothed his pillow, talked to him in her quaint70, bold way, and altogether reconciled Richard to his lodging71 for the night. Solomon Grimshaw, Isaac’s brother, had ridden over on his pony72 to Rodenham to ease the Lady Letitia of any anxiety on her nephew’s account. Bess had brought Jeffray a quill73, inkhorn, and paper, and stood by the bed watching the man’s clever hand at work. He was a being full of strangeness and mystery to this forest elf, who had learned to look on men of coarser fibre. There was a frank yet courtly simplicity74 about Jeffray that charmed all women and made them trust him. The world-wise among them might think him a fool, and such folly75 women easily forgive.
Thus it befell that Bess of the Woods and Richard Jeffray stepped for the first time into that subtle maze76 of circumstance whose weavings spell out the passionate77 strangeness of tragedy. Had not Isaac counselled Dame Ursula to bewitch Squire Jeffray into as noble a temper as statecraft would permit? And what more pleasant to the eyes of youth than the unfolding beauty of a buxom78 girl?
About bedtime old Ursula clattered79 in the kitchen, coughed, and stamped up the wooden stairs. She would sleep with Bess that night, since the young squire had her bed. Bess, unaffected as could be, bent over Richard to smooth his pillow. She looked at him a moment with a queer light in her eyes, and then—stooping, kissed his lips.
“That’s for my sake,” she said, with a half-frightened laugh. “Dan would have had it but for you.”
She fled away, red as fire, and closed the door very gently after her. Richard heard her climb the stairs. He lay awake for many hours, listening to the wind in the trees without, as the candles burned down towards their sockets80.
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收听单词发音
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1
beaver
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| n.海狸，河狸 | |
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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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ruffles
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| 褶裥花边( ruffle的名词复数 ) | |
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savagery
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| n.野性 | |
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sullen
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| adj.愠怒的，闷闷不乐的，(天气等)阴沉的 | |
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jealousy
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| n.妒忌，嫉妒，猜忌 | |
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mare
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| n.母马，母驴 | |
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bridle
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| n.笼头，束缚；vt.抑制，约束；动怒 | |
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pointed
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| adj.尖的，直截了当的 | |
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deigning
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| v.屈尊，俯就( deign的现在分词 ) | |
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gentry
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| n.绅士阶级，上层阶级 | |
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beacon
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| n.烽火，（警告用的）闪火灯，灯塔 | |
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sleek
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| adj.光滑的，井然有序的；v.使光滑，梳拢 | |
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authoritative
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| adj.有权威的，可相信的；命令式的；官方的 | |
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squire
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| n.护卫, 侍从, 乡绅 | |
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dame
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| n.女士 | |
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beckoned
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| v.（用头或手的动作）示意，召唤( beckon的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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18
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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19
stew
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| n.炖汤，焖，烦恼；v.炖汤，焖，忧虑 | |
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20
casement
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| n.竖铰链窗；窗扉 | |
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curiously
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| adv.有求知欲地；好问地；奇特地 | |
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22
swooping
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| 俯冲，猛冲( swoop的现在分词 ) | |
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23
twilight
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| n.暮光，黄昏；暮年，晚期，衰落时期 | |
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24
nay
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| adv.不；n.反对票，投反对票者 | |
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abated
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| 减少( abate的过去式和过去分词 )； 减去； 降价； 撤消（诉讼） | |
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26
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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27
pouting
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| v.撅（嘴）( pout的现在分词 ) | |
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28
tawny
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| adj.茶色的，黄褐色的；n.黄褐色 | |
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29
murmur
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| n.低语，低声的怨言；v.低语，低声而言 | |
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30
Christian
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| adj.基督教徒的；n.基督教徒 | |
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31
bent
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| n.爱好，癖好；adj.弯的；决心的，一心的 | |
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32
peculiar
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| adj.古怪的，异常的；特殊的，特有的 | |
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33
slippers
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| n. 拖鞋 | |
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sylvan
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| adj.森林的 | |
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35
diplomat
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| n.外交官，外交家；能交际的人，圆滑的人 | |
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36
suave
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| adj.温和的；柔和的；文雅的 | |
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bleat
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| v.咩咩叫，(讲)废话，哭诉；n.咩咩叫，废话，哭诉 | |
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38
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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39
cowering
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| v.畏缩，抖缩( cower的现在分词 ) | |
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40
forefinger
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| n.食指 | |
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41
appeased
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| 安抚，抚慰( appease的过去式和过去分词 )； 绥靖（满足另一国的要求以避免战争） | |
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42
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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43
brass
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| n.黄铜；黄铜器，铜管乐器 | |
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44
lighting
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| n.照明，光线的明暗，舞台灯光 | |
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45
mincingly
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humbly
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| adv. 恭顺地，谦卑地 | |
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47
sniffed
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| v.以鼻吸气，嗅，闻( sniff的过去式和过去分词 )；抽鼻子（尤指哭泣、患感冒等时出声地用鼻子吸气）；抱怨，不以为然地说 | |
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48
humbleness
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| n.谦卑，谦逊；恭顺 | |
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humble
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| adj.谦卑的，恭顺的；地位低下的；v.降低，贬低 | |
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50
contrition
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| n.悔罪，痛悔 | |
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51
vex
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| vt.使烦恼，使苦恼 | |
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52
frankly
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| adv.坦白地，直率地；坦率地说 | |
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53
sobbing
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| <主方>Ⅰ adj.湿透的 | |
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54
pester
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| v.纠缠，强求 | |
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55
kindly
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| adj.和蔼的，温和的，爽快的；adv.温和地，亲切地 | |
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56
clattering
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| 发出咔哒声（clatter的现在分词形式） | |
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57
pastry
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| n.油酥面团，酥皮糕点 | |
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58
reverent
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| adj.恭敬的，虔诚的 | |
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59
winked
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| v.使眼色( wink的过去式和过去分词 )；递眼色（表示友好或高兴等）；（指光）闪烁；闪亮 | |
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60
disinterested
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| adj.不关心的，不感兴趣的 | |
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61
connoisseur
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| n.鉴赏家，行家，内行 | |
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62
rogues
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| n.流氓( rogue的名词复数 )；无赖；调皮捣蛋的人；离群的野兽 | |
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63
intriguing
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| adj.有趣的；迷人的v.搞阴谋诡计(intrigue的现在分词)；激起…的好奇心 | |
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64
bribing
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| 贿赂 | |
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65
morsel
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| n.一口，一点点 | |
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66
flask
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| n.瓶，火药筒，砂箱 | |
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67
savory
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| adj.风味极佳的，可口的，味香的 | |
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68
apron
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| n.围裙；工作裙 | |
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69
amethysts
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| n.紫蓝色宝石( amethyst的名词复数 )；紫晶；紫水晶；紫色 | |
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70
quaint
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| adj.古雅的，离奇有趣的，奇怪的 | |
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71
lodging
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| n.寄宿，住所；(大学生的)校外宿舍 | |
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72
pony
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| adj.小型的；n.小马 | |
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73
quill
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| n.羽毛管；v.给（织物或衣服）作皱褶 | |
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74
simplicity
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| n.简单，简易；朴素；直率，单纯 | |
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75
folly
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| n.愚笨，愚蠢，蠢事，蠢行，傻话 | |
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76
maze
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| n.迷宫，八阵图，混乱，迷惑 | |
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77
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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buxom
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| adj.（妇女）丰满的，有健康美的 | |
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79
clattered
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| 发出咔哒声（clatter的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
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80
sockets
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| n.套接字，使应用程序能够读写与收发通讯协定(protocol)与资料的程序( Socket的名词复数 )；孔( socket的名词复数 )；（电器上的）插口；托座；凹穴 | |
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