When Edna entered the dining-room one evening a little late, as was her habit, an unusually animated1 conversation seemed to be going on. Several persons were talking at once, and Victor’s voice was predominating, even over that of his mother. Edna had returned late from her bath, had dressed in some haste, and her face was flushed. Her head, set off by her dainty white gown, suggested a rich, rare blossom. She took her seat at table between old Monsieur Farival and Madame Ratignolle.
As she seated herself and was about to begin to eat her soup, which had been served when she entered the room, several persons informed her simultaneously2 that Robert was going to Mexico. She laid her spoon down and looked about her bewildered. He had been with her, reading to her all the morning, and had never even mentioned such a place as Mexico. She had not seen him during the afternoon; she had heard some one say he was at the house, upstairs with his mother. This she had thought nothing of, though she was surprised when he did not join her later in the afternoon, when she went down to the beach.
She looked across at him, where he sat beside Madame Lebrun, who presided. Edna’s face was a blank picture of bewilderment, which she never thought of disguising. He lifted his eyebrows3 with the pretext4 of a smile as he returned her glance. He looked embarrassed and uneasy. “When is he going?” she asked of everybody in general, as if Robert were not there to answer for himself.
“To-night!” “This very evening!” “Did you ever!” “What possesses him!” were some of the replies she gathered, uttered simultaneously in French and English.
“Impossible!” she exclaimed. “How can a person start off from Grand Isle5 to Mexico at a moment’s notice, as if he were going over to Klein’s or to the wharf6 or down to the beach?”
“I said all along I was going to Mexico; I’ve been saying so for years!” cried Robert, in an excited and irritable7 tone, with the air of a man defending himself against a swarm8 of stinging insects.
Madame Lebrun knocked on the table with her knife handle.
“Please let Robert explain why he is going, and why he is going to-night,” she called out. “Really, this table is getting to be more and more like Bedlam9 every day, with everybody talking at once. Sometimes-I hope God will forgive me-but positively10, sometimes I wish Victor would lose the power of speech.”
Victor laughed sardonically11 as he thanked his mother for her holy wish, of which he failed to see the benefit to anybody, except that it might afford her a more ample opportunity and license12 to talk herself.
Monsieur Farival thought that Victor should have been taken out in mid-ocean in his earliest youth and drowned. Victor thought there would be more logic13 in thus disposing of old people with an established claim for making themselves universally obnoxious14. Madame Lebrun grew a trifle hysterical15; Robert called his brother some sharp, hard names.
“There’s nothing much to explain, mother,” he said; though he explained, nevertheless-looking chiefly at Edna-that he could only meet the gentleman whom he intended to join at Vera Cruz by taking such and such a steamer, which left New Orleans on such a day; that Beaudelet was going out with his lugger-load of vegetables that night, which gave him an opportunity of reaching the city and making his vessel16 in time.
“But when did you make up your mind to all this?” demanded Monsieur Farival.
“This afternoon,” returned Robert, with a shade of annoyance17.
“At what time this afternoon?” persisted the old gentleman, with nagging18 determination, as if he were cross-questioning a criminal in a court of justice.
“At four o’clock this afternoon, Monsieur Farival,” Robert replied, in a high voice and with a lofty air, which reminded Edna of some gentleman on the stage.
She had forced herself to eat most of her soup, and now she was picking the flaky bits of a court bouillon with her fork.
The lovers were profiting by the general conversation on Mexico to speak in whispers of matters which they rightly considered were interesting to no one but themselves. The lady in black had once received a pair of prayer-beads of curious workmanship from Mexico, with very special indulgence attached to them, but she had never been able to ascertain19 whether the indulgence extended outside the Mexican border. Father Fochel of the Cathedral had attempted to explain it; but he had not done so to her satisfaction. And she begged that Robert would interest himself, and discover, if possible, whether she was entitled to the indulgence accompanying the remarkably20 curious Mexican prayer-beads.
Madame Ratignolle hoped that Robert would exercise extreme caution in dealing21 with the Mexicans, who, she considered, were a treacherous22 people, unscrupulous and revengeful. She trusted she did them no injustice23 in thus condemning24 them as a race. She had known personally but one Mexican, who made and sold excellent tamales, and whom she would have trusted implicitly25, so soft-spoken was he. One day he was arrested for stabbing his wife. She never knew whether he had been hanged or not.
Victor had grown hilarious26, and was attempting to tell an anecdote27 about a Mexican girl who served chocolate one winter in a restaurant in Dauphine Street. No one would listen to him but old Monsieur Farival, who went into convulsions over the droll28 story.
Edna wondered if they had all gone mad, to be talking and clamoring at that rate. She herself could think of nothing to say about Mexico or the Mexicans.
“At what time do you leave?” she asked Robert.
“At ten,” he told her. “Beaudelet wants to wait for the moon.”
“Are you all ready to go?”
“Quite ready. I shall only take a hand-bag, and shall pack my trunk in the city.”
He turned to answer some question put to him by his mother, and Edna, having finished her black coffee, left the table.
She went directly to her room. The little cottage was close and stuffy29 after leaving the outer air. But she did not mind; there appeared to be a hundred different things demanding her attention indoors. She began to set the toilet-stand to rights, grumbling30 at the negligence31 of the quadroon, who was in the adjoining room putting the children to bed. She gathered together stray garments that were hanging on the backs of chairs, and put each where it belonged in closet or bureau drawer. She changed her gown for a more comfortable and commodious32 wrapper. She rearranged her hair, combing and brushing it with unusual energy. Then she went in and assisted the quadroon in getting the boys to bed.
They were very playful and inclined to talk-to do anything but lie quiet and go to sleep. Edna sent the quadroon away to her supper and told her she need not return. Then she sat and told the children a story. Instead of soothing33 it excited them, and added to their wakefulness. She left them in heated argument, speculating about the conclusion of the tale which their mother promised to finish the following night.
The little black girl came in to say that Madame Lebrun would like to have Mrs. Pontellier go and sit with them over at the house till Mr. Robert went away. Edna returned answer that she had already undressed, that she did not feel quite well, but perhaps she would go over to the house later. She started to dress again, and got as far advanced as to remove her peignoir. But changing her mind once more she resumed the peignoir, and went outside and sat down before her door. She was overheated and irritable, and fanned herself energetically for a while. Madame Ratignolle came down to discover what was the matter.
“All that noise and confusion at the table must have upset me,” replied Edna, “and moreover, I hate shocks and surprises. The idea of Robert starting off in such a ridiculously sudden and dramatic way! As if it were a matter of life and death! Never saying a word about it all morning when he was with me.”
“Yes,” agreed Madame Ratignolle. “I think it was showing us all-you especially-very little consideration. It wouldn’t have surprised me in any of the others; those Lebruns are all given to heroics. But I must say I should never have expected such a thing from Robert. Are you not coming down? Come on, dear; it doesn’t look friendly.”
“No,” said Edna, a little sullenly34. “I can’t go to the trouble of dressing35 again; I don’t feel like it.”
“You needn’t dress; you look all right; fasten a belt around your waist. Just look at me!”
“No,” persisted Edna; “but you go on. Madame Lebrun might be offended if we both stayed away.”
Madame Ratignolle kissed Edna good-night, and went away, being in truth rather desirous of joining in the general and animated conversation which was still in progress concerning Mexico and the Mexicans.
Somewhat later Robert came up, carrying his hand-bag.
“Aren’t you feeling well?” he asked.
“Oh, well enough. Are you going right away?”
He lit a match and looked at his watch. “In twenty minutes,” he said. The sudden and brief flare36 of the match emphasized the darkness for a while. He sat down upon a stool which the children had left out on the porch.
“Get a chair,” said Edna.
“This will do,” he replied. He put on his soft hat and nervously37 took it off again, and wiping his face with his handkerchief, complained of the heat.
“Take the fan,” said Edna, offering it to him.
“Oh, no! Thank you. It does no good; you have to stop fanning some time, and feel all the more uncomfortable afterward38.”
“That’s one of the ridiculous things which men always say. I have never known one to speak otherwise of fanning. How long will you be gone?”
“Forever, perhaps. I don’t know. It depends upon a good many things.”
“Well, in case it shouldn’t be forever, how long will it be?”
“I don’t know.”
“This seems to me perfectly39 preposterous40 and uncalled for. I don’t like it. I don’t understand your motive41 for silence and mystery, never saying a word to me about it this morning.” He remained silent, not offering to defend himself. He only said, after a moment:
“Don’t part from me in any ill humor. I never knew you to be out of patience with me before.”
“I don’t want to part in any ill humor,” she said. “But can’t you understand? I’ve grown used to seeing you, to having you with me all the time, and your action seems unfriendly, even unkind. You don’t even offer an excuse for it. Why, I was planning to be together, thinking of how pleasant it would be to see you in the city next winter.”
“So was I,” he blurted42. “Perhaps that’s the-” He stood up suddenly and held out his hand. “Good-by, my dear Mrs. Pontellier; good-by. You won’t-I hope you won’t completely forget me.” She clung to his hand, striving to detain him.
“Write to me when you get there, won’t you, Robert?” she entreated43.
“I will, thank you. Good-by.”
How unlike Robert! The merest acquaintance would have said something more emphatic44 than “I will, thank you; good-by,” to such a request.
He had evidently already taken leave of the people over at the house, for he descended45 the steps and went to join Beaudelet, who was out there with an oar46 across his shoulder waiting for Robert. They walked away in the darkness. She could only hear Beaudelet’s voice; Robert had apparently47 not even spoken a word of greeting to his companion.
Edna bit her handkerchief convulsively, striving to hold back and to hide, even from herself as she would have hidden from another, the emotion which was troubling-tearing-her. Her eyes were brimming with tears.
For the first time she recognized the symptoms of infatuation which she had felt incipiently48 as a child, as a girl in her earliest teens, and later as a young woman. The recognition did not lessen49 the reality, the poignancy50 of the revelation by any suggestion or promise of instability. The past was nothing to her; offered no lesson which she was willing to heed51. The future was a mystery which she never attempted to penetrate52. The present alone was significant; was hers, to torture her as it was doing then with the biting conviction that she had lost that which she had held, that she had been denied that which her impassioned, newly awakened53 being demanded.
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animated
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| adj.生气勃勃的，活跃的，愉快的 | |
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simultaneously
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| adv.同时发生地，同时进行地 | |
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eyebrows
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| 眉毛( eyebrow的名词复数 ) | |
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pretext
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| n.借口，托词 | |
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isle
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| n.小岛，岛 | |
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wharf
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| n.码头，停泊处 | |
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irritable
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| adj.急躁的；过敏的；易怒的 | |
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swarm
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| n.(昆虫)等一大群；vi.成群飞舞；蜂拥而入 | |
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bedlam
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| n.混乱，骚乱；疯人院 | |
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positively
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| adv.明确地，断然，坚决地；实在，确实 | |
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sardonically
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| adv.讽刺地，冷嘲地 | |
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license
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| n.执照，许可证，特许；v.许可，特许 | |
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logic
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| n.逻辑(学)；逻辑性 | |
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obnoxious
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| adj.极恼人的，讨人厌的，可憎的 | |
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hysterical
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| adj.情绪异常激动的，歇斯底里般的 | |
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vessel
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| n.船舶；容器，器皿；管，导管，血管 | |
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annoyance
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| n.恼怒，生气，烦恼 | |
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nagging
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| adj.唠叨的，挑剔的；使人不得安宁的v.不断地挑剔或批评（某人）( nag的现在分词 )；不断地烦扰或伤害（某人）；无休止地抱怨；不断指责 | |
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ascertain
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| vt.发现，确定，查明，弄清 | |
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remarkably
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| ad.不同寻常地，相当地 | |
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dealing
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| n.经商方法，待人态度 | |
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treacherous
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| adj.不可靠的，有暗藏的危险的；adj.背叛的，背信弃义的 | |
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injustice
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| n.非正义，不公正，不公平，侵犯（别人的）权利 | |
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condemning
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| v.（通常因道义上的原因而）谴责( condemn的现在分词 )；宣判；宣布…不能使用；迫使…陷于不幸的境地 | |
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implicitly
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| adv. 含蓄地, 暗中地, 毫不保留地 | |
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hilarious
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| adj.充满笑声的，欢闹的；[反]depressed | |
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anecdote
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| n.轶事，趣闻，短故事 | |
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droll
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| adj.古怪的，好笑的 | |
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stuffy
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| adj.不透气的，闷热的 | |
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grumbling
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| adj. 喃喃鸣不平的, 出怨言的 | |
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31
negligence
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| n.疏忽，玩忽，粗心大意 | |
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32
commodious
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| adj.宽敞的；使用方便的 | |
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soothing
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| adj.慰藉的；使人宽心的；镇静的 | |
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sullenly
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| 不高兴地，绷着脸，忧郁地 | |
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35
dressing
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| n.(食物)调料；包扎伤口的用品，敷料 | |
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flare
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| v.闪耀，闪烁；n.潮红；突发 | |
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nervously
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| adv.神情激动地，不安地 | |
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afterward
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| adv.后来；以后 | |
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perfectly
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| adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地 | |
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40
preposterous
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| adj.荒谬的，可笑的 | |
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41
motive
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| n.动机，目的；adv.发动的，运动的 | |
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42
blurted
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| v.突然说出，脱口而出( blurt的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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43
entreated
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| 恳求，乞求( entreat的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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emphatic
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| adj.强调的，着重的；无可置疑的，明显的 | |
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descended
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| a.为...后裔的，出身于...的 | |
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oar
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| n.桨，橹，划手；v.划行 | |
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apparently
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| adv.显然地；表面上，似乎 | |
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incipiently
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| adv.起初地，早期地 | |
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49
lessen
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| vt.减少，减轻；缩小 | |
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poignancy
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| n.辛酸事，尖锐 | |
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51
heed
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| v.注意，留意；n.注意，留心 | |
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52
penetrate
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| v.透(渗)入；刺入，刺穿；洞察，了解 | |
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awakened
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| v.（使）醒( awaken的过去式和过去分词 )；（使）觉醒；弄醒；（使）意识到 | |
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