In spite of the drawn1 blinds and the darkness, you have just seen Mr. Hoopdriver's face peaceful in its beauty sleep in the little, plain bedroom at the very top of the Yellow Hammer Coffee Tavern2 at Guildford. That was before midnight. As the night progressed he was disturbed by dreams.
After your first day of cycling one dream is inevitable3. A memory of motion lingers in the muscles of your legs, and round and round they seem to go. You ride through Dreamland on wonderful dream bicycles that change and grow; you ride down steeples and staircases and over precipices4; you hover5 in horrible suspense6 over inhabited towns, vainly seeking for a brake your hand cannot find, to save you from a headlong fall; you plunge7 into weltering rivers, and rush helplessly at monstrous8 obstacles. Anon Mr. Hoopdriver found himself riding out of the darkness of non-existence, pedalling Ezekiel's Wheels across the Weald of Surrey, jolting9 over the hills and smashing villages in his course, while the other man in brown cursed and swore at him and shouted to stop his career. There was the Putney heath-keeper, too, and the man in drab raging at him. He felt an awful fool, a- -what was it?--a juggins, ah!--a Juggernaut. The villages went off one after another with a soft, squashing noise. He did not see the Young Lady in Grey, but he knew she was looking at his back. He dared not look round. Where the devil was the brake? It must have fallen off. And the bell? Right in front of him was Guildford. He tried to shout and warn the town to get out of the way, but his voice was gone as well. Nearer, nearer! it was fearful! and in another moment the houses were cracking like nuts and the blood of the inhabitants squirting this way and that. The streets were black with people running. Right under his wheels he saw the Young Lady in Grey. A feeling of horror came upon Mr. Hoopdriver; he flung himself sideways to descend10, forgetting how high he was, and forthwith he began falling; falling, falling.
He woke up, turned over, saw the new moon on the window, wondered a little, and went to sleep again.
This second dream went back into the first somehow, and the other man in brown came threatening and shouting towards him. He grew uglier and uglier as he approached, and his expression was intolerably evil. He came and looked close into Mr. Hoopdriver's eyes and then receded11 to an incredible distance. His face seemed to be luminous12. "MISS BEAUMONT," he said, and splashed up a spray of suspicion. Some one began letting off fireworks, chiefly Catherine wheels, down the shop, though Mr. Hoopdriver knew it was against the rules. For it seemed that the place they were in was a vast shop, and then Mr. Hoopdriver perceived that the other man in brown was the shop-walker, differing from most shop-walkers in the fact that he was lit from within as a Chinese lantern might be. And the customer Mr. Hoopdriver was going to serve was the Young Lady in Grey. Curious he hadn't noticed it before. She was in grey as usual,--rationals,--and she had her bicycle leaning against the counter. She smiled quite frankly13 at him, just as she had done when she had apologised for stopping him. And her form, as she leant towards him, was full of a sinuous14 grace he had never noticed before. "What can I have the pleasure?" said Mr. Hoopdriver at once, and she said, "The Ripley road." So he got out the Ripley road and unrolled it and showed it to her, and she said that would do very nicely, and kept on looking at him and smiling, and he began measuring off eight miles by means of the yard measure on the counter, eight miles being a dress length, a rational dress length, that is; and then the other man in brown came up and wanted to interfere15, and said Mr. Hoopdriver was a cad, besides measuring it off too slowly. And as Mr. Hoopdriver began to measure faster, the other man in brown said the Young Lady in Grey had been there long enough, and that he WAS her brother, or else she would not be travelling with him, and he suddenly whipped his arm about her waist and made off with her. It occurred to Mr. Hoopdriver even at the moment that this was scarcely brotherly behaviour. Of course it wasn't! The sight of the other man gripping her so familiarly enraged16 him frightfully; he leapt over the counter forthwith and gave chase. They ran round the shop and up an iron staircase into the Keep, and so out upon the Ripley road. For some time they kept dodging17 in and out of a wayside hotel with two front doors and an inn yard. The other man could not run very fast because he had hold of the Young Lady in Grey, but Mr. Hoopdriver was hampered18 by the absurd behaviour of his legs. They would not stretch out; they would keep going round and round as if they were on the treadles of a wheel, so that he made the smallest steps conceivable. This dream came to no crisis. The chase seemed to last an interminable time, and all kinds of people, heathkeepers, shopmen, policemen, the old man in the Keep, the angry man in drab, the barmaid at the Unicorn19, men with flying-machines, people playing billiards20 in the doorways21, silly, headless figures, stupid cocks and hens encumbered22 with parcels and umbrellas and waterproofs23, people carrying bedroom candles, and such-like riffraff, kept getting in his way and annoying him, although he sounded his electric bell, and said, "Wonderful, wonderful!" at every corner....
1 drawn | |
v.拖,拉,拔出;adj.憔悴的,紧张的 | |
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2 tavern | |
n.小旅馆,客栈;小酒店 | |
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3 inevitable | |
adj.不可避免的,必然发生的 | |
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4 precipices | |
n.悬崖,峭壁( precipice的名词复数 ) | |
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5 hover | |
vi.翱翔,盘旋;徘徊;彷徨,犹豫 | |
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6 suspense | |
n.(对可能发生的事)紧张感,担心,挂虑 | |
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7 plunge | |
v.跳入,(使)投入,(使)陷入;猛冲 | |
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8 monstrous | |
adj.巨大的;恐怖的;可耻的,丢脸的 | |
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9 jolting | |
adj.令人震惊的 | |
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10 descend | |
vt./vi.传下来,下来,下降 | |
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11 receded | |
v.逐渐远离( recede的过去式和过去分词 );向后倾斜;自原处后退或避开别人的注视;尤指问题 | |
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12 luminous | |
adj.发光的,发亮的;光明的;明白易懂的;有启发的 | |
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13 frankly | |
adv.坦白地,直率地;坦率地说 | |
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14 sinuous | |
adj.蜿蜒的,迂回的 | |
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15 interfere | |
v.(in)干涉,干预;(with)妨碍,打扰 | |
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16 enraged | |
使暴怒( enrage的过去式和过去分词 ); 歜; 激愤 | |
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17 dodging | |
n.避开,闪过,音调改变v.闪躲( dodge的现在分词 );回避 | |
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18 hampered | |
妨碍,束缚,限制( hamper的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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19 unicorn | |
n.(传说中的)独角兽 | |
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20 billiards | |
n.台球 | |
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21 doorways | |
n.门口,门道( doorway的名词复数 ) | |
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22 encumbered | |
v.妨碍,阻碍,拖累( encumber的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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23 waterproofs | |
n.防水衣物,雨衣 usually plural( waterproof的名词复数 )v.使防水,使不透水( waterproof的第三人称单数 ) | |
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