WHAT a time of year it was—the freed earth suddenly breaking into life from every frozen seam! Manford wondered if he had ever before had time to feel the impetuous loveliness of the American spring.
In spite of his drive home in the small hours he had started out early the next morning for a long tramp. Sleep—how could a man sleep with that April moonlight in his veins1? The moon that was everywhere—caught in pearly puffs2 on the shadbush branches, scattered3 in ivory drifts of wild plum bloom, tipping the grasses of the wayside with pale pencillings, sheeting the recesses4 of the woodland with pools of icy silver. A freezing burning magic, into which a man plunged5, and came out cold and aglow6, to find everything about him as unreal and incredible as himself...
After the blatant7 club restaurant, noise, jazz, revolving8 couples, Japanese lanterns, screaming laughter, tumultuous good-byes, this white silence, the long road unwinding and twisting itself up again, blind faces of shuttered farmhouses9, black forests, misty10 lakes—a cut through a world in sleep, all dumb and moon-bemused...
The contrast was beautiful, intolerable...
Sleep? He hadn't even gone to bed. Just plunged into a bath, and stretched out on his lounge to see the dawn come. A mysterious sight that, too; the cold fingers of the light remaking a new world, while men slept, unheeding, and imagined they would wake to some familiar yesterday. Fools!
He breakfasted—ravenously—before his wife was down, and swung off with a couple of dogs on a long tramp, he didn't care where.
Even the daylight world seemed unimaginably strange: as if he had never really looked at it before. He walked on slowly for three or four miles, vaguely11 directing himself toward Greystock. His long tramps as a boy, in his farming days, had given him the habit of deliberate steady walking, and the unwonted movement refreshed rather than tired him—or at least, while it tired his muscles, it seemed to invigorate his brain. Excited? No—just pleasantly stimulated12...
He stretched himself out under a walnut13 tree on a sunny slope, lit his pipe and gazed abroad over fields and woods. All the land was hazy14 with incipient15 life. The dogs hunted and burrowed16, and then came back to doze17 at his feet with pleasant dreamings. The sun on his face felt warm and human, and gradually life began to settle back into its old ruts—a comfortable routine, diversified18 by pleasant episodes. Could it ever be more, to a man past fifty?
But after a while a chill sank on his spirit. He began to feel cold and hungry, and set out to walk again.
Presently he found it was half-past eleven—time to be heading for home. Home; and the lunch-table; Pauline; and Nona; and Lita. Oh, God, no—not yet... He trudged19 on, slowly and sullenly20, deciding to pick up a mouthful of lunch somewhere by the way.
At a turn of the road he caught sight of a woman's figure strolling across a green slope above him. Strong and erect21 in her trim golfing skirt, she came down in his direction swinging a club in her hand. Why, sure enough, he was actually on the edge of the Greystock course! The woman was alone, without companions or caddies—going around for a trial spin, or perhaps simply taking a stroll, as he was, drinking in the intoxicating22 air...
"Hullo!" she called, and he found himself advancing toward Gladys Toy.
Was this active erect woman in her nut-brown sweater and plaited skirt the same as the bejewelled and redundant23 beauty of so many wearisome dinners? Something of his old interest—the short-lived fancy of a week or two—revived in him as she swung along, treading firmly but lightly on her broad easy shoes.
"Hullo!" he responded. "Didn't know you were here."
"I wasn't. I only came last night. Isn't it glorious?" Even her slow-dripping voice moved faster and had a livelier ring. Decidedly, he admired a well-made woman, a woman with curves and volume—all the more after the stripped skeletons he had dined among the night before. Mrs. Toy had height enough to carry off her pounds, and didn't look ashamed of them, either.
"Glorious? Yes, you are!" he said.
"Oh, me?"
"What else did you mean, then?"
"Don't be silly! How did you get here?"
"On my feet."
"Gracious! From Cedarledge? You must be dead."
"Don't you believe it. I walked over to lunch with you."
"You've just said you didn't know I was here."
"You mustn't believe everything I say."
"All right. Then I won't believe you walked over to lunch with me."
"Yes!" she challenged him.
"And that I want to kiss you?"
She smiled with the eyes of a tired swimmer, and he saw that her slender stock of repartee25 was exhausted26. "Herman'll be here tonight," she said.
"Then let's make the most of today."
"But I've asked some people to lunch at the club."
"Then you'll chuck them, and come off and lunch with me somewhere else."
"Oh, will I—shall I?" She laughed, and he saw her breast rise on her shortened breath. He caught her to him and planted a kiss in the middle of her laughter.
"Now will you?"
She was a rich armful, and he remembered how splendid he had thought plump rosy27 women in his youth, before money and fashion imposed their artificial standards.
When he reëntered the doors of Cedarledge the cold spring sunset was slanting28 in through the library windows on the tea-table at which his wife and Nona sat. Of Lita there was no sign; Manford heard with indolent amusement that she was reported to be just getting up. His sentiment about Lita had settled into fatherly indulgence; he no longer thought the epithet29 inappropriate. But underneath30 the superficial kindliness31 he felt for her, as for all the world, he was aware of a fundamental indifference32 to most things but his own comfort and convenience. Such was the salutary result of fresh air and recovered leisure. How absurd to work one's self into a state of fluster33 about this or that—money or business or women! Especially women. As he looked back on the last weeks he saw what a fever of fatigue34 he must have been in to take such an exaggerated view of his own emotions. After three days at Cedarledge serenity35 had descended36 on him like a benediction37. Gladys Toy's cheeks were as smooth as nectarines; and the keen morning light had shown him that she wasn't in the least made up. He recalled the fact with a certain pleasure, and then dismissed her from his mind—or rather she dropped out of herself. He wasn't in the humour to think long about anybody or anything ... he revelled38 in his own laziness and indifference.
"Tea? Yes; and a buttered muffin by all means. Several of them. I'm as hungry as the devil. Went for a long tramp this morning before any of you were up. Mrs. Toy ran across me, and brought me back in her new two-seater. A regular beauty—the car, I mean—you'll have to have one like it, Nona... Jove, how good the fire feels ... and what is it that smells so sweet? Carnations—why, they're giants! We must go over the green-houses tomorrow, Pauline; and all the rest of it. I want to take stock of all your innovations."
At that moment he felt able to face even the tour of inspection39, and all the facts and calculations it would evoke40. Everything seemed easy now that he had found he could shake off his moonlight obsession41 by spending a few hours with a pretty woman who didn't mind being kissed. He was to meet Mrs. Toy again the day after tomorrow; and in the interval42 she would suffice to occupy his mind when he had nothing more interesting to think of.
As he was putting a match to his pipe Lita came into the room with her long glide43. Her boy was perched on her shoulder, and she looked like one of Crivelli's enigmatic Madonnas carrying a little red-haired Jesus.
"Gracious! Is this breakfast or tea? I seem to have overslept myself after our joy-ride," she said, addressing a lazy smile to Manford.
She dropped to her knees before the fire and held up the boy to Pauline. "Kiss his granny," she commanded in her faintly derisive44 voice.
It was very pretty, very cleverly staged; but Manford said to himself that she was too self-conscious, and that her lips were too much painted. Besides, he had always hated women with prominent cheekbones and hollows under them. He settled back comfortably into the afternoon's reminiscences.
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1
veins
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| n.纹理；矿脉( vein的名词复数 )；静脉；叶脉；纹理 | |
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2
puffs
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| n.吸( puff的名词复数 )；（烟斗或香烟的）一吸；一缕（烟、蒸汽等）；（呼吸或风的）呼v.使喷出( puff的第三人称单数 )；喷着汽（或烟）移动；吹嘘；吹捧 | |
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3
scattered
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| adj.分散的，稀疏的；散步的；疏疏落落的 | |
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4
recesses
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| n.壁凹( recess的名词复数 )；（工作或业务活动的）中止或暂停期间；学校的课间休息；某物内部的凹形空间v.把某物放在墙壁的凹处( recess的第三人称单数 )；将（墙）做成凹形，在（墙）上做壁龛；休息，休会，休庭 | |
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5
plunged
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| v.颠簸( plunge的过去式和过去分词 )；暴跌；骤降；突降 | |
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aglow
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| adj.发亮的；发红的；adv.发亮地 | |
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7
blatant
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| adj.厚颜无耻的；显眼的；炫耀的 | |
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8
revolving
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| adj.旋转的，轮转式的；循环的v.（使）旋转( revolve的现在分词 )；细想 | |
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9
farmhouses
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| n.农舍，农场的主要住房( farmhouse的名词复数 ) | |
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10
misty
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| adj.雾蒙蒙的，有雾的 | |
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11
vaguely
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| adv.含糊地，暖昧地 | |
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12
stimulated
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| a.刺激的 | |
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13
walnut
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| n.胡桃，胡桃木，胡桃色，茶色 | |
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14
hazy
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| adj.有薄雾的，朦胧的；不肯定的，模糊的 | |
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15
incipient
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| adj.起初的，发端的，初期的 | |
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16
burrowed
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| v.挖掘（洞穴），挖洞( burrow的过去式和过去分词 )；翻寻 | |
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17
doze
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| v.打瞌睡；n.打盹，假寐 | |
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18
diversified
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| adj.多样化的，多种经营的v.使多样化，多样化( diversify的过去式和过去分词 )；进入新的商业领域 | |
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19
trudged
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| vt.& vi.跋涉，吃力地走（trudge的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
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20
sullenly
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| 不高兴地，绷着脸，忧郁地 | |
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21
erect
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| n./v.树立，建立，使竖立；adj.直立的，垂直的 | |
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22
intoxicating
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| a. 醉人的,使人兴奋的 | |
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23
redundant
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| adj.多余的，过剩的；(食物)丰富的；被解雇的 | |
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24
awfully
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| adv.可怕地，非常地，极端地 | |
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25
repartee
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| n.机敏的应答 | |
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26
exhausted
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| adj.极其疲惫的，精疲力尽的 | |
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rosy
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| adj.美好的，乐观的，玫瑰色的 | |
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28
slanting
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| 倾斜的，歪斜的 | |
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29
epithet
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| n.（用于褒贬人物等的）表述形容词，修饰语 | |
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30
underneath
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| adj.在...下面，在...底下；adv.在下面 | |
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31
kindliness
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| n.厚道，亲切，友好的行为 | |
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32
indifference
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| n.不感兴趣，不关心，冷淡，不在乎 | |
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33
fluster
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| adj.慌乱，狼狈，混乱，激动 | |
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34
fatigue
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| n.疲劳，劳累 | |
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35
serenity
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| n.宁静，沉着，晴朗 | |
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36
descended
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| a.为...后裔的，出身于...的 | |
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37
benediction
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| n.祝福；恩赐 | |
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38
revelled
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| v.作乐( revel的过去式和过去分词 )；狂欢；着迷；陶醉 | |
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39
inspection
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| n.检查，审查，检阅 | |
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40
evoke
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| vt.唤起，引起，使人想起 | |
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41
obsession
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| n.困扰，无法摆脱的思想(或情感) | |
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42
interval
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| n.间隔，间距；幕间休息，中场休息 | |
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43
glide
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| n./v.溜，滑行；(时间)消逝 | |
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44
derisive
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| adj.嘲弄的 | |
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