At last we came to a place from which the great spread of the earth was visible. For a time — I can not tell how long — we had wholly lost ourselves, going up and down, and turning corners, without getting further. But my father said that we must come right, if we made up our minds to go long enough. We had been in among all shapes, and want of shapes, of dreariness1, through and in and out of every thrup and thrum of weariness, scarcely hoping ever more to find our way out and discover memory of men for us, when all of a sudden we saw a grand sight. The day had been dreadfully hot and baffling, with sudden swirls2 of red dust arising, and driving the great drought into us. To walk had been worse than to drag one’s way through a stubbly bed of sting-nettles. But now the quick sting of the sun was gone, and his power descending3 in the balance toward the flat places of the land and sea. And suddenly we looked forth4 upon an immeasurable spread of these.
We stood at the gate of the sandy range, which here, like a vast brown patch, disfigures the beauty of the sierra. On either side, in purple distance, sprang sky-piercing obelisks5 and vapor-mantled glaciers6, spangled with bright snow, and shodden with eternal forest. Before us lay the broad, luxuriant plains of California, checkered8 with more tints9 than any other piece of earth can show, sleeping in alluvial10 ease, and veined with soft blue waters. And through a gap in the brown coast range, at twenty leagues of distance, a light (so faint as to seem a shadow) hovered11 above the Pacific.
But none of all this grandeur12 touched our hearts except the water gleam. Parched13 with thirst, I caught my father’s arm and tried to urge him on toward the blue enchantment14 of ecstatic living water. But, to my surprise, he staggered back, and his face grew as white as the distant snow. I managed to get him to a sandy ledge15, with the help of his own endeavors, and there let him rest and try to speak, while my frightened heart throbbed16 over his.
“My little child,” he said at last, as if we were fallen back ten years, “put your hand where I can feel it.”
My hand all the while had been in his, and to let him know where it was, it moved. But cold fear stopped my talking.
“My child, I have not been kind to you,” my father slowly spoke17 again, “but it has not been from want of love. Some day you will see all this, and some day you will pardon me.”
He laid one heavy arm around me, and forgetting thirst and pain, with the last intensity18 of eyesight watched the sun departing. To me, I know not how, great awe19 was every where, and sadness. The conical point of the furious sun, which like a barb20 had pierced us, was broadening into a hazy21 disk, inefficient22, but benevolent23. Underneath24 him depth of night was waiting to come upward (after letting him fall through) and stain his track with redness. Already the arms of darkness grew in readiness to receive him: his upper arc was pure and keen, but the lower was flaked25 with atmosphere; a glow of hazy light soon would follow, and one bright glimmer26 (addressed more to the sky than to the earth), and after that a broad, soft gleam; and after that how many a man should never see the sun again, and among them would be my father.
He, for the moment, resting there, with heavy light upon him, and the dark jaws27 of the mountain desert yawning wide behind him, and all the beautiful expanse of liberal earth before him — even so he seemed to me, of all the things in sight, the one that first would draw attention. His face was full of quiet grandeur and impressive calm, and the sad tranquillity28 which comes to those who know what human life is through continual human death. Although, in the matter of bodily strength, he was little past the prime of life, his long and abundant hair was white, and his broad and upright forehead marked with the meshes29 of the net of care. But drought and famine and long fatigue30 had failed even now to change or weaken the fine expression of his large, sad eyes. Those eyes alone would have made the face remarkable31 among ten thousand, so deep with settled gloom they were, and dark with fatal sorrow. Such eyes might fitly have told the grief of Adrastus, son of Gordias, who, having slain32 his own brother unwitting, unwitting slew33 the only son of his generous host and savior.
The pale globe of the sun hung trembling in the haze34 himself had made. My father rose to see the last, and reared his tall form upright against the deepening background. He gazed as if the course of life lay vanishing below him, while level land and waters drew the breadth of shadow over them. Then the last gleam flowed and fled upon the face of ocean, and my father put his dry lips to my forehead, saying nothing.
His lips might well be dry, for he had not swallowed water for three days; but it frightened me to feel how cold they were, and even tremulous. “Let us run, let us run, my dear father!” I cried. “Delicious water! The dark falls quickly; but we can get there before dark. It is all down hill. Oh, do let us run at once!”
“Erema,” he answered, with a quiet smile, “there is no cause now for hurrying, except that I must hurry to show you what you have to do, my child. For once, at the end of my life, I am lucky. We have escaped from that starving desert at a spot — at a spot where we can see —”
For a little while he could say no more, but sank upon the stony35 seat, and the hand with which he tried to point some distant landmark36 fell away. His face, which had been so pale before, became of a deadly whiteness, and he breathed with gasps37 of agony. I knelt before him and took his hands, and tried to rub the palms, and did whatever I could think of.
“Oh, father, father, you have starved yourself, and given every thing to me! What a brute38 I was to let you do it! But I did not know; I never knew! Please God to take me also!”
He could not manage to answer this, even if he understood it; but he firmly lifted his arm again, and tried to make me follow it.
“What does it matter? Oh, never mind, never mind such, a wretch39 as I am! Father, only try to tell me what I ought to do for you.”
“My child! my child!” were his only words; and he kept on saying, “My child! my child!” as if he liked the sound of it.
At what time of the night my father died I knew not then or afterward40. It may have been before the moon came over the snowy mountains, or it may not have been till the worn-out stars in vain repelled41 the daybreak. All I know is that I ever strove to keep more near to him through the night, to cherish his failing warmth, and quicken the slow, laborious42, harassed43 breath. From time to time he tried to pray to God for me and for himself; but every time his mind began to wander and to slip away, as if through want of practice. For the chills of many wretched years had deadened and benumbed his faith. He knew me, now and then, betwixt the conflict and the stupor44; for more than once he muttered feebly, and as if from out a dream,
“Time for Erema to go on her way. Go on your way, and save your life; save your life, Erema.”
There was no way for me to go, except on my knees before him. I took his hands, and made them lissome45 with a soft, light rubbing. I whispered into his ear my name, that he might speak once more to me; and when he could not speak, I tried to say what he would say to me.
At last, with a blow that stunned46 all words, it smote47 my stupid, wandering mind that all I had to speak and smile to, all I cared to please and serve, the only one left to admire and love, lay here in my weak arms quite dead. And in the anguish48 of my sobbing49, little things came home to me, a thousand little things that showed how quietly he had prepared for this, and provided for me only. Cold despair and self-reproach and strong rebellion dazed me, until I lay at my father’s side, and slept with his dead hand in mine. There in the desert of desolation pious51 awe embraced me, and small phantasms of individual fear could not come nigh me.
By-and-by long shadows of morning crept toward me dismally52, and the pallid53 light of the hills was stretched in weary streaks54 away from me. How I arose, or what I did, or what I thought, is nothing now. Such times are not for talking of. How many hearts of anguish lie forlorn, with none to comfort them, with all the joy of life died out, and all the fear of having yet to live, in front arising!
Young and weak, and wrong of sex for doing any valiance, long I lay by my father’s body, wringing55 out my wretchedness. Thirst and famine now had flown into the opposite extreme; I seemed to loathe56 the thought of water, and the smell of food would have made me sick. I opened my father’s knapsack, and a pang7 of new misery57 seized me. There lay nearly all his rations58, which he had made pretense59 to eat as he gave me mine from time to time. He had starved himself; since he failed of his mark, and learned our risk of famishing, all his own food he had kept for me, as well as his store of water. And I had done nothing but grumble60 and groan61, even while consuming every thing. Compared with me, the hovering62 vultures might be considered angels.
When I found all this, I was a great deal too worn out to cry or sob50. Simply to break down may be the purest mercy that can fall on truly hopeless misery. Screams of ravenous63 maws and flaps of fetid wings came close to me, and, fainting into the arms of death, I tried to save my father’s body by throwing my own over it.
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1
dreariness
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| 沉寂，可怕，凄凉 | |
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swirls
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| n.旋转( swirl的名词复数 )；卷状物；漩涡；尘旋v.旋转，打旋( swirl的第三人称单数 ) | |
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descending
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| n. 下行 adj. 下降的 | |
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forth
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| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
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obelisks
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| n.方尖石塔，短剑号，疑问记号( obelisk的名词复数 ) | |
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glaciers
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| 冰河，冰川( glacier的名词复数 ) | |
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pang
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| n.剧痛，悲痛，苦闷 | |
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checkered
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| adj.有方格图案的 | |
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tints
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| 色彩( tint的名词复数 )； 带白的颜色； （淡色）染发剂； 痕迹 | |
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alluvial
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| adj.冲积的；淤积的 | |
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hovered
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| 鸟( hover的过去式和过去分词 )； 靠近（某事物）； （人）徘徊； 犹豫 | |
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grandeur
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| n.伟大，崇高，宏伟，庄严，豪华 | |
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parched
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| adj.焦干的；极渴的；v.（使）焦干 | |
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enchantment
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| n.迷惑，妖术，魅力 | |
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ledge
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| n.壁架，架状突出物；岩架，岩礁 | |
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throbbed
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| 抽痛( throb的过去式和过去分词 )； （心脏、脉搏等）跳动 | |
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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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intensity
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| n.强烈，剧烈；强度；烈度 | |
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awe
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| n.敬畏，惊惧；vt.使敬畏，使惊惧 | |
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barb
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| n.（鱼钩等的）倒钩，倒刺 | |
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hazy
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| adj.有薄雾的，朦胧的；不肯定的，模糊的 | |
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inefficient
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| adj.效率低的，无效的 | |
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benevolent
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| adj.仁慈的，乐善好施的 | |
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underneath
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| adj.在...下面，在...底下；adv.在下面 | |
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flaked
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| 精疲力竭的，失去知觉的，睡去的 | |
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glimmer
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| v.发出闪烁的微光；n.微光，微弱的闪光 | |
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jaws
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| n.口部；嘴 | |
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tranquillity
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| n. 平静, 安静 | |
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meshes
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| 网孔( mesh的名词复数 )； 网状物； 陷阱； 困境 | |
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fatigue
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| n.疲劳，劳累 | |
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remarkable
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| adj.显著的，异常的，非凡的，值得注意的 | |
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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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slew
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| v.（使）旋转；n.大量，许多 | |
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haze
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| n.霾，烟雾；懵懂，迷糊；vi.(over)变模糊 | |
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stony
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| adj.石头的，多石头的，冷酷的，无情的 | |
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landmark
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| n.陆标，划时代的事，地界标 | |
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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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brute
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| n.野兽，兽性 | |
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wretch
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| n.可怜的人，不幸的人；卑鄙的人 | |
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afterward
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| adv.后来；以后 | |
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repelled
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| v.击退( repel的过去式和过去分词 )；使厌恶；排斥；推开 | |
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laborious
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| adj.吃力的，努力的，不流畅 | |
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43
harassed
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| adj. 疲倦的，厌烦的 动词harass的过去式和过去分词 | |
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stupor
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| v.昏迷；不省人事 | |
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45
lissome
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| adj.柔软的；敏捷的 | |
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46
stunned
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| adj. 震惊的，惊讶的 动词stun的过去式和过去分词 | |
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47
smote
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| v.猛打，重击，打击( smite的过去式 ) | |
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48
anguish
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| n.(尤指心灵上的)极度痛苦，烦恼 | |
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sobbing
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| <主方>Ⅰ adj.湿透的 | |
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sob
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| n.空间轨道的轰炸机；呜咽，哭泣 | |
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51
pious
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| adj.虔诚的；道貌岸然的 | |
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52
dismally
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| adv.阴暗地，沉闷地 | |
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53
pallid
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| adj.苍白的，呆板的 | |
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54
streaks
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| n.（与周围有所不同的）条纹( streak的名词复数 )；（通常指不好的）特征（倾向）；（不断经历成功或失败的）一段时期v.快速移动( streak的第三人称单数 )；使布满条纹 | |
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55
wringing
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| 淋湿的，湿透的 | |
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56
loathe
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| v.厌恶，嫌恶 | |
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misery
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| n.痛苦，苦恼，苦难；悲惨的境遇，贫苦 | |
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58
rations
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| 定量( ration的名词复数 )； 配给量； 正常量； 合理的量 | |
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pretense
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| n.矫饰，做作，借口 | |
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60
grumble
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| vi.抱怨；咕哝；n.抱怨，牢骚；咕哝，隆隆声 | |
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61
groan
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| vi./n.呻吟，抱怨；(发出)呻吟般的声音 | |
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62
hovering
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| 鸟( hover的现在分词 )； 靠近（某事物）； （人）徘徊； 犹豫 | |
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ravenous
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| adj.极饿的，贪婪的 | |
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