One stepping back under the dark shelter of the bulwark1, and one standing2 out boldly in the yellow light of the moon, the two friends turned face to face on the deck of the timber-ship, and looked at each other in silence. The next moment Allan’s inveterate3 recklessness seized on the grotesque4 side of the situation by main force. He seated himself astride on the bulwark, and burst out boisterously5 into his loudest and heartiest6 laugh.
“All my fault,” he said; “but there’s no help for it now. Here we are, hard and fast in a trap of our own setting; and there goes the last of the doctor’s boat! Come out of the dark, Midwinter; I can’t half see you there, and I want to know what’s to be done next.”
Midwinter neither answered nor moved. Allan left the bulwark, and, mounting the forecastle, looked down attentively7 at the waters of the Sound.
“One thing is pretty certain,” he said. “With the current on that side, and the sunken rocks on this, we can’t find our way out of the scrape by swimming, at any rate. So much for the prospect8 at this end of the wreck9. Let’s try how things look at the other. Rouse up, messmate!” he called out, cheerfully, as he passed Midwinter. “Come and see what the old tub of a timber-ship has got to show us astern.” He sauntered on, with his hands in his pockets, humming the chorus of a comic song.
His voice had produced no apparent effect on his friend; but, at the light touch of his hand in passing, Midwinter started, and moved out slowly from the shadow of the bulwark. “Come along!” cried Allan, suspending his singing for a moment, and glancing back. Still, without a word of answer, the other followed. Thrice he stopped before he reached the stern end of the wreck: the first time, to throw aside his hat, and push back his hair from his forehead and temples; the second time, reeling, giddy, to hold for a moment by a ring-bolt close at hand; the last time (though Allan was plainly visible a few yards ahead), to look stealthily behind him, with the furtive10 scrutiny11 of a man who believes that other footsteps are following him in the dark. “Not yet!” he whispered to himself, with eyes that searched the empty air. “I shall see him astern, with his hand on the lock of the cabin door.”
The stern end of the wreck was clear of the ship-breakers’ lumber12, accumulated in the other parts of the vessel13. Here, the one object that rose visible on the smooth surface of the deck was the low wooden structure which held the cabin door and roofed in the cabin stairs. The wheel-house had been removed, the binnacle had been removed, but the cabin entrance, and all that had belonged to it, had been left untouched. The scuttle14 was on, and the door was closed.
On gaining the after-part of the vessel, Allan walked straight to the stern, and looked out to sea over the taffrail. No such thing as a boat was in view anywhere on the quiet, moon-brightened waters. Knowing Midwinter’s sight to be better than his own, he called out, “Come up here, and see if there’s a fisherman within hail of us.” Hearing no reply, he looked back. Midwinter had followed him as far as the cabin, and had stopped there. He called again in a louder voice, and beckoned15 impatiently. Midwinter had heard the call, for he looked up, but still he never stirred from his place. There he stood, as if he had reached the utmost limits of the ship and could go no further.
Allan went back and joined him. It was not easy to discover what he was looking at, for he kept his face turned away from the moonlight; but it seemed as if his eyes were fixed16, with a strange expression of inquiry17, on the cabin door. “What is there to look at there?” Allan asked. “Let’s see if it’s locked.” As he took a step forward to open the door, Midwinter’s hand seized him suddenly by the coat collar and forced him back. The moment after, the hand relaxed without losing its grasp, and trembled violently, like the hand of a man completely unnerved.
“Am I to consider myself in custody18?” asked Allan, half astonished and half amused. “Why in the name of wonder do you keep staring at the cabin door? Any suspicious noises below? It’s no use disturbing the rats — if that’s what you mean — we haven’t got a dog with us. Men? Living men they can’t be; for they would have heard us and come on deck. Dead men? Quite impossible! No ship’s crew could be drowned in a land-locked place like this, unless the vessel broke up under them — and here’s the vessel as steady as a church to speak for herself. Man alive, how your hand trembles! What is there to scare you in that rotten old cabin? What are you shaking and shivering about? Any company of the supernatural sort on board? Mercy preserve us! (as the old women say) do you see a ghost?”
“I see two !” answered the other, driven headlong into speech and action by a maddening temptation to reveal the truth. “Two!” he repeated, his breath bursting from him in deep, heavy gasps19, as he tried vainly to force back the horrible words. “The ghost of a man like you, drowning in the cabin! And the ghost of a man like me, turning the lock of the door on him!”
Once more young Armadale’s hearty20 laughter rang out loud and long through the stillness of the night.
“Turning the lock of the door, is he?” said Allan, as soon as his merriment left him breath enough to speak. “That’s a devilish unhandsome action, Master Midwinter, on the part of your ghost. The least I can do, after that, is to let mine out of the cabin, and give him the run of the ship.”
With no more than a momentary21 exertion22 of his superior strength, he freed himself easily from Midwinter’s hold. “Below there!” he called out, gayly, as he laid his strong hand on the crazy lock, and tore open the cabin door. “Ghost of Allan Armadale, come on deck!” In his terrible ignorance of the truth, he put his head into the doorway23 and looked down, laughing, at the place where his murdered father had died. “Pah!” he exclaimed, stepping back suddenly, with a shudder24 of disgust. “The air is foul25 already; and the cabin is full of water.”
It was true. The sunken rocks on which the vessel lay wrecked27 had burst their way through her lower timbers astern, and the water had welled up through the rifted wood. Here, where the deed had been done, the fatal parallel between past and present was complete. What the cabin had been in the time of the fathers, that the cabin was now in the time of the sons.
Allan pushed the door to again with his foot, a little surprised at the sudden silence which appeared to have fallen on his friend from the moment when he had laid his hand on the cabin lock. When he turned to look, the reason of the silence was instantly revealed. Midwinter had dropped on the deck. He lay senseless before the cabin door; his face turned up, white and still, to the moonlight, like the face of a dead man.
In a moment Allan was at his side. He looked uselessly round the lonely limits of the wreck, as he lifted Midwinter’s head on his knee, for a chance of help, where all chance was ruthlessly cut off. “What am I to do?” he said to himself, in the first impulse of alarm. “Not a drop of water near, but the foul water in the cabin.” A sudden recollection crossed his memory, the florid color rushed back over his face, and he drew from his pocket a wicker-covered flask28. “God bless the doctor for giving me this before we sailed!” he broke out, fervently29, as he poured down Midwinter’s throat some drops of the raw whisky which the flask contained. The stimulant30 acted instantly on the sensitive system of the swooning man. He sighed faintly, and slowly opened his eyes. “Have I been dreaming?” he asked, looking up vacantly in Allan’s face. His eyes wandered higher, and encountered the dismantled31 masts of the wreck rising weird33 and black against the night sky. He shuddered34 at the sight of them, and hid his face on Allan’s knee. “No dream!” he murmured to himself, mournfully. “Oh me, no dream!”
“You have been overtired all day,” said Allan, “and this infernal adventure of ours has upset you. Take some more whisky, it’s sure to do you good. Can you sit by yourself, if I put you against the bulwark, so?”
“Why by myself? Why do you leave me?” asked Midwinter.
Allan pointed36 to the mizzen shrouds37 of the wreck, which were still left standing. “You are not well enough to rough it here till the workmen come off in the morning,” he said. “We must find our way on shore at once, if we can. I am going up to get a good view all round, and see if there’s a house within hail of us.”
Even in the moment that passed while those few words were spoken, Midwinter’s eyes wandered back distrustfully to the fatal cabin door. “Don’t go near it!” he whispered. “Don’t try to open it, for God’s sake!”
“No, no,” returned Allan, humoring him. “When I come down from the rigging, I’ll come back here.” He said the words a little constrainedly39, noticing, for the first time while he now spoke38, an underlying40 distress41 in Midwinter’s face, which grieved and perplexed42 him. “You’re not angry with me?” he said, in his simple, sweet-tempered way. “All this is my fault, I know; and I was a brute43 and a fool to laugh at you, when I ought to have seen you were ill. I am so sorry, Midwinter. Don’t be angry with me!”
Midwinter slowly raised his head. His eyes rested with a mournful interest, long and tender, on Allan’s anxious face.
“Angry?” he repeated, in his lowest, gentlest tones. “Angry with you?— Oh, my poor boy, were you to blame for being kind to me when I was ill in the old west-country inn? And was I to blame for feeling your kindness thankfully? Was it our fault that we never doubted each other, and never knew that we were traveling together blindfold44 on the way that was to lead us here? The cruel time is coming, Allan, when we shall rue26 the day we ever met. Shake hands, brother, on the edge of the precipice45 — shake hands while we are brothers still!”
Allan turned away quickly, convinced that his mind had not yet recovered the shock of the fainting fit. “Don’t forget the whisky!” he said, cheerfully, as he sprang into the rigging, and mounted to the mizzen-top.
It was past two, the moon was waning46, and the darkness that comes before dawn was beginning to gather round the wreck. Behind Allan, as he now stood looking out from the elevation47 of the mizzen-top, spread the broad and lonely sea. Before him were the low, black, lurking48 rocks, and the broken waters of the channel, pouring white and angry into the vast calm of the westward49 ocean beyond. On the right hand, heaved back grandly from the water-side, were the rocks and precipices50, with their little table-lands of grass between; the sloping downs, and upward-rolling heath solitudes51 of the Isle52 of Man. On the left hand rose the craggy sides of the Islet of the Calf53, here rent wildly into deep black chasms54, there lying low under long sweeping55 acclivities of grass and heath. No sound rose, no light was visible, on either shore. The black lines of the topmost masts of the wreck looked shadowy and faint in the darkening mystery of the sky; the land breeze had dropped; the small shoreward waves fell noiseless: far or near, no sound was audible but the cheerless bubbling of the broken water ahead, pouring through the awful hush56 of silence in which earth and ocean waited for the coming day.
Even Allan’s careless nature felt the solemn influence of the time. The sound of his own voice startled him when he looked down and hailed his friend on deck
“I think I see one house,” he said. “Here-away, on the mainland to the right.” He looked again, to make sure, at a dim little patch of white, with faint white lines behind it, nestling low in a grassy57 hollow, on the main island. “It looks like a stone house and inclosure,” he resumed. “I’ll hail it, on the chance.” He passed his arm round a rope to steady himself, made a speaking-trumpet58 of his hands, and suddenly dropped them again without uttering a sound. “It’s so awfully59 quiet,” he whispered to himself. “I’m half afraid to call out.” He looked down again on deck. “I shan’t startle you, Midwinter, shall I?” he said, with an uneasy laugh. He looked once more at the faint white object, in the grassy hollow. “It won’t do to have come up here for nothing,” he thought, and made a speaking-trumpet of his hands again. This time he gave the hail with the whole power of his lungs. “On shore there!” he shouted, turning his face to the main island. “Ahoy-hoy-hoy!”
The last echoes of his voice died away and were lost. No sound answered him but the cheerless bubbling of the broken water ahead.
He looked down again at his friend, and saw the dark figure of Midwinter rise erect60, and pace the deck backward and forward, never disappearing out of sight of the cabin when it retired61 toward the bows of the wreck, and never passing beyond the cabin when it returned toward the stern. “He is impatient to get away,” thought Allan; “I’ll try again.” He hailed the land once more, and, taught by previous experience, pitched his voice in its highest key.
This time another sound than the sound of the bubbling water answered him. The lowing of frightened cattle rose from the building in the grassy hollow, and traveled far and drearily62 through the stillness of the morning air. Allan waited and listened. If the building was a farmhouse63 the disturbance64 among the beasts would rouse the men. If it was only a cattle-stable, nothing more would happen. The lowing of the frightened brutes65 rose and fell drearily, the minutes passed, and nothing happened.
“Once more!” said Allan, looking down at the restless figure pacing beneath him. For the third time he hailed the land. For the third time he waited and listened.
In a pause of silence among the cattle, he heard behind him, on the opposite shore of the channel, faint and far among the solitudes of the Islet of the Calf, a sharp, sudden sound, like the distant clash of a heavy door-bolt drawn66 back. Turning at once in the new direction, he strained his eyes to look for a house. The last faint rays of the waning moonlight trembled here and there on the higher rocks, and on the steeper pinnacles67 of ground, but great strips of darkness lay dense69 and black over all the land between; and in that darkness the house, if house there were, was lost to view.
“I have roused somebody at last,” Allan called out, encouragingly, to Midwinter, still walking to and fro on the deck, strangely indifferent to all that was passing above and beyond him. “Look out for the answering, hail!” And with his face set toward the islet, Allan shouted for help.
The shout was not answered, but mimicked70 with a shrill71, shrieking72 derision, with wilder and wilder cries, rising out of the deep distant darkness, and mingling73 horribly the expression of a human voice with the sound of a brute’s. A sudden suspicion crossed Allan’s mind, which made his head swim and turned his hand cold as it held the rigging. In breathless silence he looked toward the quarter from which the first mimicry74 of his cry for help had come. After a moment’s pause the shrieks75 were renewed, and the sound of them came nearer. Suddenly a figure, which seemed the figure of a man, leaped up black on a pinnacle68 of rock, and capered76 and shrieked77 in the waning gleam of the moonlight. The screams of a terrified woman mingled78 with the cries of the capering79 creature on the rock. A red spark flashed out in the darkness from a light kindled80 in an invisible window. The hoarse81 shouting of a man’s voice in anger was heard through the noise. A second black figure leaped up on the rock, struggled with the first figure, and disappeared with it in the darkness. The cries grew fainter and fainter, the screams of the woman were stilled, the hoarse voice of the man was heard again for a moment, hailing the wreck in words made unintelligible82 by the distance, but in tones plainly expressive83 of rage and fear combined. Another moment, and the clang of the door-bolt was heard again, the red spark of light was quenched84 in darkness, and all the islet lay quiet in the shadows once more. The lowing of the cattle on the main-land ceased, rose again, stopped. Then, cold and cheerless as ever, the eternal bubbling of the broken water welled up through the great gap of silence — the one sound left, as the mysterious stillness of the hour fell like a mantle32 from the heavens, and closed over the wreck.
Allan descended85 from his place in the mizzen-top, and joined his friend again on deck.
“We must wait till the ship-breakers come off to their work,” he said, meeting Midwinter halfway86 in the course of his restless walk. “After what has happened, I don’t mind confessing that I’ve had enough of hailing the land. Only think of there being a madman in that house ashore87, and of my waking him! Horrible, wasn’t it?”
Midwinter stood still for a moment, and looked at Allan, with the perplexed air of a man who hears circumstances familiarly mentioned to which he is himself a total stranger. He appeared, if such a thing had been possible, to have passed over entirely88 without notice all that had just happened on the Islet of the Calf.
“Nothing is horrible out of this ship,” he said. “Everything is horrible in it.”
Answering in those strange words, he turned away again, and went on with his walk.
Allan picked up the flask of whisky lying on the deck near him, and revived his spirits with a dram. “Here’s one thing on board that isn’t horrible,” he retorted briskly, as he screwed on the stopper of the flask; “and here’s another,” he added, as he took a cigar from his case and lit it. “Three o’clock!” he went on, looking at his watch, and settling himself comfortably on deck with his back against the bulwark. “Daybreak isn’t far off; we shall have the piping of the birds to cheer us up before long. I say, Midwinter, you seem to have quite got over that unlucky fainting fit. How you do keep walking! Come here and have a cigar, and make yourself comfortable. What’s the good of tramping backward and forward in that restless way?”
“I am waiting,” said Midwinter.
“Waiting! What for?”
“For what is to happen to you or to me — or to both of us — before we are out of this ship.”
“With submission89 to your superior judgment90, my dear fellow, I think quite enough has happened already. The adventure will do very well as it stands now; more of it is more than I want.” He took another dram of whisky, and rambled91 on, between the puffs92 of his cigar, in his usual easy way. “I’ve not got your fine imagination, old boy; and I hope the next thing that happens will be the appearance of the workmen’s boat. I suspect that queer fancy of yours has been running away with you while you were down here all by yourself. Come, now, what were you thinking of while I was up in the mizzen-top frightening the cows?”
Midwinter suddenly stopped. “Suppose I tell you?” he said.
“Suppose you do?”
The torturing temptation to reveal the truth, roused once already by his companion’s merciless gayety of spirit, possessed93 itself of Midwinter for the second time. He leaned back in the dark against the high side of the ship, and looked down in silence at Allan’s figure, stretched comfortably on the deck. “Rouse him,” the fiend whispered, subtly, “from that ignorant self-possession and that pitiless repose94. Show him the place where the deed was done; let him know it with your knowledge, and fear it with your dread95. Tell him of the letter you burned, and of the words no fire can destroy which are living in your memory now. Let him see your mind as it was yesterday, when it roused your sinking faith in your own convictions, to look back on your life at sea, and to cherish the comforting remembrance that, in all your voyages, you had never fallen in with this ship. Let him see your mind as it is now, when the ship has got you at the turning-point of your new life, at the outset of your friendship with the one man of all men whom your father warned you to avoid. Think of those death-bed words, and whisper them in his ear, that he may think of them, too: ‘Hide yourself from him under an assumed name. Put the mountains and the seas between you; be ungrateful, be unforgiving; be all that is most repellent to your own gentler nature, rather than live under the same roof and breathe the same air with that man.’” So the tempter counseled. So, like a noisome96 exhalation from the father’s grave, the father’s influence rose and poisoned the mind of the son.
The sudden silence surprised Allan; he looked back drowsily97 over his shoulder. “Thinking again!” he exclaimed, with a weary yawn.
Midwinter stepped out from the shadow, and came nearer to Allan than he had come yet. “Yes,” he said, “thinking of the past and the future.”
“The past and the future?” repeated Allan, shifting himself comfortably into a new position. “For my part, I’m dumb about the past. It’s a sore subject with me: the past means the loss of the doctor’s boat. Let’s talk about the future. Have you been taking a practical view? as dear old Brock calls it. Have you been considering the next serious question that concerns us both when we get back to the hotel — the question of breakfast?”
After an instant’s hesitation98, Midwinter took a step nearer. “I have been thinking of your future and mine,” he said; “I have been thinking of the time when your way in life and my way in life will be two ways instead of one.”
“Here’s the daybreak!” cried Allan. “Look up at the masts; they’re beginning to get clear again already. I beg your pardon. What were you saying?”
Midwinter made no reply. The struggle between the hereditary99 superstition100 that was driving him on, and the unconquerable affection for Allan that was holding him back, suspended the next words on his lips. He turned aside his face in speechless suffering. “Oh, my father!” he thought, “better have killed me on that day when I lay on your bosom101, than have let me live for this.”
“What’s that about the future?” persisted Allan. “I was looking for the daylight; I didn’t hear.”
Midwinter controlled himself, and answered: “You have treated me with your usual kindness,” he said, “in planning to take me with you to Thorpe Ambrose. I think, on reflection, I had better not intrude102 myself where I am not known and not expected.” His voice faltered103, and he stopped again. The more he shrank from it, the clearer the picture of the happy life that he was resigning rose on his mind.
Allan’s thoughts instantly reverted104 to the mystification about the new steward105 which he had practiced on his friend when they were consulting together in the cabin of the yacht. “Has he been turning it over in his mind?” wondered Allan; “and is he beginning at last to suspect the truth? I’ll try him.— Talk as much nonsense, my dear fellow, as you like,” he rejoined, “but don’t forget that you are engaged to see me established at Thorpe Ambrose, and to give me your opinion of the new steward.”
Midwinter suddenly stepped forward again, close to Allan.
“I am not talking about your steward or your estate,” he burst out passionately106; “I am talking about myself. Do you hear? Myself! I am not a fit companion for you. You don’t know who I am.” He drew back into the shadowy shelter of the bulwark as suddenly as he had come out from it. “O God! I can’t tell him,” he said to himself, in a whisper.
For a moment, and for a moment only, Allan was surprised. “Not know who you are?” Even as he repeated the words, his easy goodhumor got the upper-hand again. He took up the whisky flask, and shook it significantly. “I say,” he resumed, “how much of the doctor’s medicine did you take while I was up in the mizzen-top?”
The light tone which he persisted in adopting stung Midwinter to the last pitch of exasperation107. He came out again into the light, and stamped his foot angrily on the deck. “Listen to me!” he said. “You don’t know half the low things I have done in my lifetime. I have been a tradesman’s drudge108; I have swept out the shop and put up the shutters109; I have carried parcels through the street, and waited for my master’s money at his customers’ doors.”
“I have never done anything half as useful,” returned Allan, composedly. “Dear old boy, what an industrious110 fellow you have been in your time!”
“I’ve been a vagabond and a blackguard in my time,” returned the other, fiercely; “I’ve been a street tumbler, a tramp, a gypsy’s boy! I’ve sung for half-pence with dancing dogs on the high-road! I’ve worn a foot-boy’s livery, and waited at table! I’ve been a common sailors’ cook, and a starving fisherman’s Jack-of-all-trades! What has a gentleman in your position in common with a man in mine? Can you take me into the society at Thorpe Ambrose? Why, my very name would be a reproach to you. Fancy the faces of your new neighbors when their footmen announce Ozias Midwinter and Allan Armadale in the same breath!” He burst into a harsh laugh, and repeated the two names again, with a scornful bitterness of emphasis which insisted pitilessly on the marked contrast between them.
Something in the sound of his laughter jarred painfully even on Allan’s easy nature. He raised himself on the deck and spoke seriously for the first time. “A joke’s a joke, Midwinter,” he said, “as long as you don’t carry it too far. I remember your saying something of the same sort to me once before when I was nursing you in Somersetshire. You forced me to ask you if I deserved to be kept at arms-length by you of all the people in the world. Don’t force me to say so again. Make as much fun of me as you please, old fellow, in any other way. That way hurts me.”
Simple as the words were, and simply as they had been spoken, they appeared to work an instant revolution in Midwinter’s mind. His impressible nature recoiled111 as from some sudden shock. Without a word of reply, he walked away by himself to the forward part of the ship. He sat down on some piled planks112 between the masts, and passed his hand over his head in a vacant, bewildered way. Though his father’s belief in fatality113 was his own belief once more — though there was no longer the shadow of a doubt in his mind that the woman whom Mr. Brock had met in Somersetshire, and the woman who had tried to destroy herself in London, were one and the same — though all the horror that mastered him when he first read the letter from Wildbad had now mastered him again, Allan’s appeal to their past experience of each other had come home to his heart, with a force more irresistible114 than the force of his superstition itself. In the strength of that very superstition, he now sought the pretext115 which might encourage him to sacrifice every less generous feeling to the one predominant dread of wounding the sympathies of his friend. “Why distress him?” he whispered to himself. “We are not the end here: there is the Woman behind us in the dark. Why resist him when the mischief’s done, and the caution comes too late? What is to be will be. What have I to do with the future? and what has he?”
He went back to Allan, sat down by his side, and took his hand. “Forgive me,” he said, gently; “I have hurt you for the last time.” Before it was possible to reply, he snatched up the whisky flask from the deck. “Come!” he exclaimed, with a sudden effort to match his friend’s cheerfulness, “you have been trying the doctor’s medicine, why shouldn’t I?”
Allan was delighted. “This is something like a change for the better,” he said; “Midwinter is himself again. Hark! there are the birds. Hail, smiling morn! smiling morn!” He sang the words of the glee in his old, cheerful voice, and clapped Midwinter on the shoulder in his old, hearty way. “How did you manage to clear your head of those confounded megrims? Do you know you were quite alarming about something happening to one or other of us before we were out of this ship?”
“Sheer nonsense!” returned Midwinter, contemptuously. “I don’t think my head has ever been quite right since that fever; I’ve got a bee in my bonnet116, as they say in the North. Let’s talk of something else. About those people you have let the cottage to? I wonder whether the agent’s account of Major Milroy’s family is to be depended on? There might be another lady in the household besides his wife and his daughter.”
“Oho!” cried Allan, “you’re beginning to think of nymphs among the trees, and flirtations in the fruit-garden, are you? Another lady, eh? Suppose the major’s family circle won’t supply another? We shall have to spin that half-crown again, and toss up for which is to have the first chance with Miss Milroy.”
For once Midwinter spoke as lightly and carelessly as Allan himself. “No, no,” he said, “the major’s landlord has the first claim to the notice of the major’s daughter. I’ll retire into the background, and wait for the next lady who makes her appearance at Thorpe Ambrose.”
“Very good. I’ll have an address to the women of Norfolk posted in the park to that effect,” said Allan. “Are you particular to a shade about size or complexion117? What’s your favorite age?”
Midwinter trifled with his own superstition, as a man trifles with the loaded gun that may kill him, or with the savage118 animal that may maim119 him for life. He mentioned the age (as he had reckoned it himself) of the woman in the black gown and the red Paisley shawl.
“Five-and-thirty,” he said.
As the words passed his lips, his factitious spirits deserted120 him. He left his seat, impenetrably deaf to all Allan’s efforts at rallying him on his extraordinary answer, and resumed his restless pacing of the deck in dead silence. Once more the haunting thought which had gone to and fro with him in the hour of darkness went to and fro with him now in the hour of daylight.
Once more the conviction possessed itself of his mind that something was to happen to Allan or to himself before they left the wreck.
Minute by minute the light strengthened in the eastern sky; and the shadowy places on the deck of the timber-ship revealed their barren emptiness under the eye of day. As the breeze rose again, the sea began to murmur35 wakefully in the morning light. Even the cold bubbling of the broken water changed its cheerless note, and softened121 on the ear as the mellowing122 flood of daylight poured warm over it from the rising sun. Midwinter paused near the forward part of the ship, and recalled his wandering attention to the passing time. The cheering influences of the hour were round him, look where he might. The happy morning smile of the summer sky, so brightly merciful to the old and weary earth, lavished123 its all-embracing beauty even on the wreck. The dew that lay glittering on the inland fields lay glittering on the deck, and the worn and rusted124 rigging was gemmed125 as brightly as the fresh green leaves on shore. Insensibly, as he looked round, Midwinter’s thoughts reverted to the comrade who had shared with him the adventure of the night. He returned to the after-part of the ship, spoke to Allan as he advanced. Receiving no answer, he approached the recumbent figure and looked closer at it. Left to his own resources, Allan had let the fatigues127 of the night take their own way with him. His head had sunk back; his hat had fallen off; he lay stretched at full length on the deck of the timber-ship, deeply and peacefully asleep.
Midwinter resumed his walk; his mind lost in doubt; his own past thoughts seeming suddenly to have grown strange to him. How darkly his forebodings had distrusted the coming time, and how harmlessly that time had come! The sun was mounting in the heavens, the hour of release was drawing nearer and nearer, and of the two Armadales imprisoned128 in the fatal ship, one was sleeping away the weary time, and the other was quietly watching the growth of the new day.
The sun climbed higher; the hour wore on. With the latent distrust of the wreck which still clung to him, Midwinter looked inquiringly on either shore for signs of awakening129 human life. The land was still lonely. The smoke wreaths that were soon to rise from cottage chimneys had not risen yet.
After a moment’s thought he went back again to the after-part of the vessel, to see if there might be a fisherman’s boat within hail astern of them. Absorbed for the moment by the new idea, he passed Allan hastily, after barely noticing that he still lay asleep. One step more would have brought him to the taffrail, when that step was suspended by a sound behind him, a sound like a faint groan130. He turned, and looked at the sleeper131 on the deck. He knelt softly, and looked closer.
“It has come!” he whispered to himself. “Not to me — but to him .”
It had come, in the bright freshness of the morning; it had come, in the mystery and terror of a Dream. The face which Midwinter had last seen in perfect repose was now the distorted face of a suffering man. The perspiration132 stood thick on Allan’s forehead, and matted his curling hair. His partially133 opened eyes showed nothing but the white of the eyeball gleaming blindly. His outstretched hands scratched and struggled on the deck. From moment to moment he moaned and muttered helplessly; but the words that escaped him were lost in the grinding and gnashing of his teeth. There he lay — so near in the body to the friend who bent126 over him; so far away in the spirit, that the two might have been in different worlds — there he lay, with the morning sunshine on his face, in the torture of his dream.
One question, and one only, rose in the mind of the man who was looking at him. What had the fatality which had imprisoned him in the wreck decreed that he should see?
Had the treachery of Sleep opened the gates of the grave to that one of the two Armadales whom the other had kept in ignorance of the truth? Was the murder of the father revealing itself to the son — there, on the very spot where the crime had been committed — in the vision of a dream?
With that question overshadowing all else in his mind, the son of the homicide knelt on the deck, and looked at the son of the man whom his father’s hand had slain134.
The conflict between the sleeping body and the waking mind was strengthening every moment. The dreamer’s helpless groaning135 for deliverance grew louder; his hands raised themselves, and clutched at the empty air. Struggling with the all-mastering dread that still held him, Midwinter laid his hand gently on Allan’s forehead. Light as the touch was, there were mysterious sympathies in the dreaming man that answered it. His groaning ceased, and his hands dropped slowly. There was an instant of suspense136 and Midwinter looked closer. His breath just fluttered over the sleeper’s face. Before the next breath had risen to his lips, Allan suddenly sprang up on his knees — sprang up, as if the call of a trumpet had rung on his ear, awake in an instant.
“You have been dreaming,” said Midwinter, as the other looked at him wildly, in the first bewilderment of waking.
Allan’s eyes began to wander about the wreck, at first vacantly, then with a look of angry surprise. “Are we here still?” he said, as Midwinter helped him to his feet. “Whatever else I do on board this infernal ship,” he added, after a moment, “I won’t go to sleep again!”
As he said those words, his friend’s eyes searched his face in silent inquiry. They took a turn together on the deck.
“Tell me your dream,” said Midwinter, with a strange tone of suspicion in his voice, and a strange appearance of abruptness137 in his manner.
“I can’t tell it yet,” returned Allan. “Wait a little till I’m my own man again.”
They took another turn on the deck. Midwinter stopped, and spoke once more.
“Look at me for a moment, Allan,” he said.
There was something of the trouble left by the dream, and something of natural surprise at the strange request just addressed to him, in Allan’s face, as he turned it full on the speaker; but no shadow of ill-will, no lurking lines of distrust anywhere. Midwinter turned aside quickly, and hid, as he best might, an irrepressible outburst of relief.
“Do I look a little upset?” asked Allan, taking his arm, and leading him on again. “Don’t make yourself nervous about me if I do. My head feels wild and giddy, but I shall soon get over it.”
For the next few minutes they walked backward and forward in silence, the one bent on dismissing the terror of the dream from his thoughts, the other bent on discovering what the terror of the dream might be. Relieved of the dread that had oppressed it, the superstitious138 nature of Midwinter had leaped to its next conclusion at a bound. What if the sleeper had been visited by another revelation than the revelation of the Past? What if the dream had opened those unturned pages in the book of the Future which told the story of his life to come? The bare doubt that it might be so strengthened tenfold Midwinter’s longing139 to penetrate140 the mystery which Allan’s silence still kept a secret from him.
“Is your head more composed?” he asked. “Can you tell me your dream now?”
While he put the question, a last memorable141 moment in the Adventure of the Wreck was at hand.
They had reached the stern, and were just turning again when Midwinter spoke. As Allan opened his lips to answer, he looked out mechanically to sea. Instead of replying, he suddenly ran to the taffrail, and waved his hat over his head, with a shout of exultation142.
Midwinter joined him, and saw a large six-oared boat pulling straight for the channel of the Sound. A figure, which they both thought they recognized, rose eagerly in the stern-sheets and returned the waving of Allan’s hat. The boat came nearer, the steersman called to them cheerfully, and they recognized the doctor’s voice.
“Thank God you’re both above water!” said Mr. Hawbury, as they met him on the deck of the timber-ship. “Of all the winds of heaven, which wind blew you here?”
He looked at Midwinter as he made the inquiry, but it was Allan who told him the story of the night, and Allan who asked the doctor for information in return. The one absorbing interest in Midwinter’s mind — the interest of penetrating143 the mystery of the dream — kept him silent throughout. Heedless of all that was said or done about him, he watched Allan, and followed Allan, like a dog, until the time came for getting down into the boat. Mr. Hawbury’s professional eye rested on him curiously144, noting his varying color, and the incessant145 restlessness of his hands. “I wouldn’t change nervous systems with that man for the largest fortune that could be offered me,” thought the doctor as he took the boat’s tiller, and gave the oarsmen their order to push off from the wreck.
Having reserved all explanations on his side until they were on their way back to Port St. Mary, Mr. Hawbury next addressed himself to the gratification of Allan’s curiosity. The circumstances which had brought him to the rescue of his two guests of the previous evening were simple enough. The lost boat had been met with at sea by some fishermen of Port Erin, on the western side of the island, who at once recognized it as the doctor’s property, and at once sent a messenger to make inquiry, at the doctor’s house. The man’s statement of what had happened had naturally alarmed Mr. Hawbury for the safety of Allan and his friend. He had immediately secured assistance, and, guided by the boatman’s advice, had made first for the most dangerous place on the coast — the only place, in that calm weather, in which an accident could have happened to a boat sailed by experienced men — the channel of the Sound. After thus accounting146 for his welcome appearance on the scene, the doctor hospitably147 insisted that his guests of the evening should be his guests of the morning as well. It would still be too early when they got back for the people at the hotel to receive them, and they would find bed and breakfast at Mr. Hawbury’s house.
At the first pause in the conversation between Allan and the doctor, Midwinter, who had neither joined in the talk nor listened to the talk, touched his friend on the arm. “Are you better?” he asked, in a whisper. “Shall you soon be composed enough to tell me what I want to know?”
Allan’s eyebrows148 contracted impatiently; the subject of the dream, and Midwinter’s obstinacy149 in returning to it, seemed to be alike distasteful to him. He hardly answered with his usual good humor. “I suppose I shall have no peace till I tell you,” he said, “so I may as well get it over at once.”
“No!” returned Midwinter, with a look at the doctor and his oarsmen. “Not where other people can hear it — not till you and I are alone.”
“If you wish to see the last, gentlemen, of your quarters for the night,” interposed the doctor, “now is your time! The coast will shut the vessel out in a minute more.”
In silence on the one side and on the other, the two Armadales looked their last at the fatal ship. Lonely and lost they had found the wreck in the mystery of the summer night; lonely and lost they left the wreck in the radiant beauty of the summer morning.
An hour later the doctor had seen his guests established in their bedrooms, and had left them to take their rest until the breakfast hour arrived.
Almost as soon as his back was turned, the doors of both rooms opened softly, and Allan and Midwinter met in the passage.
“Can you sleep after what has happened?” asked Allan.
Midwinter shook his head. “You were coming to my room, were you not?” he said. “What for?”
“To ask you to keep me company. What were you coming to my room for?”
“To ask you to tell me your dream.”
“Damn the dream! I want to forget all about it.”
“And I want to know all about it.”
Both paused; both refrained instinctively150 from saying more. For the first time since the beginning of their friendship they were on the verge151 of a disagreement, and that on the subject of the dream. Allan’s good temper just stopped them on the brink152.
“You are the most obstinate153 fellow alive,” he said; “but if you will know all about it, you must know all about it, I suppose. Come into my room, and I’ll tell you.”
He led the way, and Midwinter followed. The door closed and shut them in together.
收听单词发音 |
1
bulwark
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| n.堡垒，保障，防御 | |
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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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inveterate
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| adj.积习已深的，根深蒂固的 | |
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grotesque
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| adj.怪诞的，丑陋的；n.怪诞的图案，怪人（物） | |
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boisterously
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| adv.喧闹地，吵闹地 | |
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6
heartiest
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| 亲切的( hearty的最高级 )； 热诚的； 健壮的； 精神饱满的 | |
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attentively
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| adv.聚精会神地；周到地；谛；凝神 | |
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prospect
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| n.前景，前途；景色，视野 | |
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wreck
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| n.失事，遇难；沉船；vt.(船等)失事，遇难 | |
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furtive
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| adj.鬼鬼崇崇的，偷偷摸摸的 | |
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scrutiny
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| n.详细检查，仔细观察 | |
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12
lumber
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| n.木材，木料；v.以破旧东西堆满；伐木；笨重移动 | |
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13
vessel
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| n.船舶；容器，器皿；管，导管，血管 | |
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14
scuttle
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| v.急赶，疾走，逃避；n.天窗；舷窗 | |
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15
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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16
fixed
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| adj.固定的，不变的，准备好的；(计算机)固定的 | |
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17
inquiry
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| n.打听，询问，调查，查问 | |
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18
custody
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| n.监护，照看，羁押，拘留 | |
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19
gasps
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| v.喘气( gasp的第三人称单数 )；喘息；倒抽气；很想要 | |
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hearty
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| adj.热情友好的；衷心的；尽情的，纵情的 | |
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momentary
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| adj.片刻的，瞬息的；短暂的 | |
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22
exertion
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| n.尽力，努力 | |
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23
doorway
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| n.门口，(喻)入门；门路，途径 | |
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24
shudder
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| v.战粟，震动，剧烈地摇晃；n.战粟，抖动 | |
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25
foul
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| adj.污秽的；邪恶的；v.弄脏；妨害；犯规；n.犯规 | |
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26
rue
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| n.懊悔，芸香，后悔；v.后悔，悲伤，懊悔 | |
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wrecked
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| adj.失事的，遇难的 | |
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28
flask
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| n.瓶，火药筒，砂箱 | |
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29
fervently
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| adv.热烈地，热情地，强烈地 | |
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30
stimulant
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| n.刺激物，兴奋剂 | |
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31
dismantled
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| 拆开( dismantle的过去式和过去分词 )； 拆卸； 废除； 取消 | |
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32
mantle
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| n.斗篷，覆罩之物，罩子；v.罩住，覆盖，脸红 | |
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33
weird
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| adj.古怪的，离奇的；怪诞的，神秘而可怕的 | |
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34
shuddered
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| v.战栗( shudder的过去式和过去分词 )；发抖；（机器、车辆等）突然震动；颤动 | |
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35
murmur
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| n.低语，低声的怨言；v.低语，低声而言 | |
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pointed
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| adj.尖的，直截了当的 | |
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shrouds
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| n.裹尸布( shroud的名词复数 )；寿衣；遮蔽物；覆盖物v.隐瞒( shroud的第三人称单数 )；保密 | |
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38
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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constrainedly
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| 不自然地，勉强地，强制地 | |
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40
underlying
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| adj.在下面的，含蓄的，潜在的 | |
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41
distress
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| n.苦恼，痛苦，不舒适；不幸；vt.使悲痛 | |
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42
perplexed
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| adj.不知所措的 | |
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43
brute
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| n.野兽，兽性 | |
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44
blindfold
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| vt.蒙住…的眼睛；adj.盲目的；adv.盲目地；n.蒙眼的绷带[布等]； 障眼物，蒙蔽人的事物 | |
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45
precipice
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| n.悬崖，危急的处境 | |
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46
waning
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| adj.（月亮）渐亏的，逐渐减弱或变小的n.月亏v.衰落( wane的现在分词 )；（月）亏；变小；变暗淡 | |
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47
elevation
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| n.高度；海拔；高地；上升；提高 | |
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48
lurking
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| 潜在 | |
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49
westward
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| n.西方，西部；adj.西方的，向西的；adv.向西 | |
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50
precipices
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| n.悬崖，峭壁( precipice的名词复数 ) | |
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51
solitudes
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| n.独居( solitude的名词复数 )；孤独；荒僻的地方；人迹罕至的地方 | |
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52
isle
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| n.小岛，岛 | |
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53
calf
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| n.小牛，犊，幼仔，小牛皮 | |
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54
chasms
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| 裂缝( chasm的名词复数 )； 裂口； 分歧； 差别 | |
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55
sweeping
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| adj.范围广大的，一扫无遗的 | |
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56
hush
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| int.嘘，别出声；n.沉默，静寂；v.使安静 | |
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57
grassy
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| adj.盖满草的；长满草的 | |
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58
trumpet
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| n.喇叭，喇叭声；v.吹喇叭，吹嘘 | |
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59
awfully
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| adv.可怕地，非常地，极端地 | |
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60
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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61
retired
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| adj.隐退的，退休的，退役的 | |
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62
drearily
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| 沉寂地，厌倦地，可怕地 | |
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63
farmhouse
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| n.农场住宅（尤指主要住房） | |
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64
disturbance
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| n.动乱，骚动；打扰，干扰；(身心)失调 | |
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65
brutes
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| 兽( brute的名词复数 )； 畜生； 残酷无情的人； 兽性 | |
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66
drawn
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| v.拖，拉，拔出；adj.憔悴的，紧张的 | |
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67
pinnacles
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| 顶峰( pinnacle的名词复数 )； 顶点； 尖顶； 小尖塔 | |
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68
pinnacle
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| n.尖塔，尖顶，山峰；(喻)顶峰 | |
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69
dense
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| a.密集的，稠密的，浓密的；密度大的 | |
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70
mimicked
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| v.（尤指为了逗乐而）模仿( mimic的过去式和过去分词 )；酷似 | |
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71
shrill
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| adj.尖声的；刺耳的；v尖叫 | |
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72
shrieking
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| v.尖叫( shriek的现在分词 ) | |
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73
mingling
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| adj.混合的 | |
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74
mimicry
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| n.（生物）拟态，模仿 | |
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75
shrieks
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| n.尖叫声( shriek的名词复数 )v.尖叫( shriek的第三人称单数 ) | |
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76
capered
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| v.跳跃，雀跃( caper的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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77
shrieked
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| v.尖叫( shriek的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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78
mingled
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| 混合，混入( mingle的过去式和过去分词 )； 混进，与…交往[联系] | |
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79
capering
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| v.跳跃，雀跃( caper的现在分词 )；蹦蹦跳跳 | |
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80
kindled
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| （使某物）燃烧，着火( kindle的过去式和过去分词 )； 激起（感情等）； 发亮，放光 | |
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81
hoarse
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| adj.嘶哑的，沙哑的 | |
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82
unintelligible
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| adj.无法了解的，难解的，莫明其妙的 | |
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83
expressive
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| adj.表现的，表达…的，富于表情的 | |
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84
quenched
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| 解（渴）( quench的过去式和过去分词 )； 终止（某事物）； （用水）扑灭（火焰等）； 将（热物体）放入水中急速冷却 | |
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85
descended
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| a.为...后裔的，出身于...的 | |
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86
halfway
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| adj.中途的，不彻底的，部分的；adv.半路地，在中途，在半途 | |
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87
ashore
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| adv.在(向)岸上，上岸 | |
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88
entirely
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| ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地 | |
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89
submission
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| n.服从，投降；温顺，谦虚；提出 | |
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90
judgment
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| n.审判；判断力，识别力，看法，意见 | |
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91
rambled
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| （无目的地）漫游( ramble的过去式和过去分词 )； （喻）漫谈； 扯淡； 长篇大论 | |
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92
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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93
possessed
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| adj.疯狂的；拥有的，占有的 | |
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94
repose
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| v.(使)休息；n.安息 | |
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95
dread
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| vt.担忧，忧虑；惧怕，不敢；n.担忧，畏惧 | |
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96
noisome
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| adj.有害的，可厌的 | |
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97
drowsily
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| adv.睡地，懒洋洋地，昏昏欲睡地 | |
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98
hesitation
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| n.犹豫，踌躇 | |
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99
hereditary
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| adj.遗传的，遗传性的，可继承的，世袭的 | |
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100
superstition
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| n.迷信，迷信行为 | |
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101
bosom
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| n.胸，胸部；胸怀；内心；adj.亲密的 | |
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102
intrude
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| vi.闯入；侵入；打扰，侵扰 | |
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103
faltered
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| （嗓音）颤抖( falter的过去式和过去分词 )； 支吾其词； 蹒跚； 摇晃 | |
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104
reverted
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| 恢复( revert的过去式和过去分词 )； 重提； 回到…上； 归还 | |
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105
steward
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| n.乘务员，服务员；看管人；膳食管理员 | |
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106
passionately
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| ad.热烈地，激烈地 | |
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107
exasperation
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| n.愤慨 | |
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108
drudge
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| n.劳碌的人；v.做苦工，操劳 | |
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109
shutters
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| 百叶窗( shutter的名词复数 )； （照相机的）快门 | |
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110
industrious
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| adj.勤劳的，刻苦的，奋发的 | |
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111
recoiled
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| v.畏缩( recoil的过去式和过去分词 )；退缩；报应；返回 | |
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112
planks
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| （厚）木板( plank的名词复数 )； 政纲条目，政策要点 | |
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113
fatality
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| n.不幸，灾祸，天命 | |
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114
irresistible
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| adj.非常诱人的，无法拒绝的，无法抗拒的 | |
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115
pretext
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| n.借口，托词 | |
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116
bonnet
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| n.无边女帽；童帽 | |
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117
complexion
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| n.肤色；情况，局面；气质，性格 | |
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118
savage
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| adj.野蛮的；凶恶的，残暴的；n.未开化的人 | |
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119
maim
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| v.使残废，使不能工作，使伤残 | |
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120
deserted
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| adj.荒芜的，荒废的，无人的，被遗弃的 | |
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121
softened
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| （使）变软( soften的过去式和过去分词 )； 缓解打击； 缓和； 安慰 | |
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122
mellowing
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| 软化，醇化 | |
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123
lavished
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| v.过分给予，滥施( lavish的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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124
rusted
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| v.（使）生锈( rust的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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125
gemmed
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| 点缀（gem的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
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126
bent
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| n.爱好，癖好；adj.弯的；决心的，一心的 | |
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127
fatigues
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| n.疲劳( fatigue的名词复数 )；杂役；厌倦；（士兵穿的）工作服 | |
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128
imprisoned
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| 下狱，监禁( imprison的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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129
awakening
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| n.觉醒，醒悟 adj.觉醒中的；唤醒的 | |
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130
groan
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| vi./n.呻吟，抱怨；(发出)呻吟般的声音 | |
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131
sleeper
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| n.睡眠者，卧车，卧铺 | |
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132
perspiration
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| n.汗水；出汗 | |
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133
partially
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| adv.部分地，从某些方面讲 | |
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134
slain
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| 杀死，宰杀，杀戮( slay的过去分词 )； (slay的过去分词) | |
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135
groaning
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| adj. 呜咽的, 呻吟的 动词groan的现在分词形式 | |
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136
suspense
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| n.（对可能发生的事）紧张感，担心，挂虑 | |
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137
abruptness
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| n. 突然，唐突 | |
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138
superstitious
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| adj.迷信的 | |
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139
longing
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| n.（for）渴望 | |
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140
penetrate
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| v.透(渗)入；刺入，刺穿；洞察，了解 | |
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141
memorable
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| adj.值得回忆的，难忘的，特别的，显著的 | |
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142
exultation
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| n.狂喜，得意 | |
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143
penetrating
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| adj.（声音）响亮的，尖锐的adj.（气味）刺激的adj.（思想）敏锐的，有洞察力的 | |
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144
curiously
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| adv.有求知欲地；好问地；奇特地 | |
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145
incessant
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| adj.不停的，连续的 | |
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146
accounting
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| n.会计，会计学，借贷对照表 | |
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147
hospitably
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| 亲切地，招待周到地，善于款待地 | |
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148
eyebrows
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| 眉毛( eyebrow的名词复数 ) | |
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149
obstinacy
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| n.顽固；（病痛等）难治 | |
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150
instinctively
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| adv.本能地 | |
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151
verge
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| n.边，边缘；v.接近，濒临 | |
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152
brink
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| n.(悬崖、河流等的)边缘，边沿 | |
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153
obstinate
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| adj.顽固的，倔强的，不易屈服的，较难治愈的 | |
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