Poor Mrs. Nutter1 continued in a state of distracted and flighty tribulation2, not knowing what to make of it, nor, indeed, knowing the worst; for the neighbours did not tell her half they might, nor drop a hint of the dreadful suspicion that dogged her absent helpmate.
She was sometimes up rummaging3 among the drawers, and fidgeting about the house, without any clear purpose, but oftener lying on her bed, with her clothes on, crying. When she got hold of a friend, she disburthened her soul, and called on him or her for endless consolations4 and assurances, which, for the most part, she herself prescribed. There were, of course, fits of despair as well as starts of hope; and bright ideas, accounting6 for everything, and then clouds of blackness, and tornadoes7 of lamentation8.
Father Roach, a good-natured apostle, whose digestion9 suffered when anyone he liked was in trouble, paid her a visit; and being somehow confounded with Dr. Toole, was shown up to her bed-room, where the poor little woman lay crying under the coverlet. On discovering where he was, the good father was disposed to flinch10, and get down stairs, in tenderness to his ‘character,’ and thinking what a story ‘them villians o’ the world’id make iv it down at the club there.’ But on second thoughts, poor little Sally being neither young nor comely11, he ventured, and sat down by the bed, veiled behind a strip of curtain, and poured his mellifluous12 consolations into her open ears.
And poor Sally became eloquent13 in return. And Father Roach dried his eyes, although she could not see him behind the curtain, and called her ‘my daughter,’ and ‘dear lady,’ and tendered such comforts as his housekeeping afforded. ‘Had she bacon in the house?’ or ‘maybe she’d like a fat fowl14?’ ‘She could not eat?’ ‘Why then she could make elegant broth15 of it, and dhrink it, an’ he’d keep another fattenin’ until Nutter himself come back.’
‘And then, my honey, you an’ himself’ll come down and dine wid ould Father Austin; an’ we’ll have a grand evenin’ of it entirely16, laughin’ over the remimbrance iv these blackguard troubles, acuishla! Or maybe you’d accept iv a couple o’ bottles of claret or canaries? I see — you don’t want for wine.’
So there was just one more offer the honest fellow had to make, and he opened with assurances ’twas only between himself an’ her — an’ not a sowl on airth ‘id ever hear a word about it — and he asked her pardon, but he thought she might chance to want a guinea or two, just till Nutter came back, and he brought a couple in his waistcoat pocket.
Poor Father Roach was hard-up just then. Indeed, the being hard-up was a chronic17 affection with him. Two horses were not to be kept for nothing. Nor for the same moderate figure was it possible to maintain an asylum18 for unfortunates and outlaws19 — pleasant fellows enough, but endowed with great appetites and an unquenchable taste for consolation5 in fluid forms.
A clerical provision in Father Roach’s day, and church, was not by any means what we have seen it since. At all events he was not often troubled with the possession of money, and when half-a-dozen good weddings brought him in fifty or a hundred pounds, the holy man was constrained20 forthwith to make distribution of his assets among a score of sour, and sometimes dangerous tradespeople. I mention this in no disparagement21 of Father Roach, quite the contrary. In making the tender of his two guineas — which, however, Sally declined — the worthy22 cleric was offering the widow’s mite23; not like some lucky dogs who might throw away a thousand or two and be nothing the worse; and you may be sure the poor fellow was very glad to find she did not want it.
‘Rather hard measure, it strikes me,’ said Dangerfield, in the club, ‘to put him in the Hue-and-Cry.’
But there he was, sure enough, ‘Charles Nutter, Esq., formerly24 of the Mills, near Knockmaroon, in the county of Dublin;’ and a full description of the dress he wore, as well as of his height, complexion25, features — and all this his poor little wife, still inhabiting the Mills, and quite unconscious that any man, woman, or child, who could prosecute26 him to conviction, for a murderous assault on Dr. Sturk, should have ￡50 reward.
‘News in today, by Jove,’ said Toole, bustling27 solemnly into the club; ‘by the packet that arrived at one o’clock, a man taken, answering Nutter’s description exactly, just going aboard of a Jamaica brig at Gravesend, and giving no account of himself. He’s to be sent over to Dublin for identification.’
And when that was thoroughly28 discussed two or three times over, they fell to talking of other subjects, and among the rest of Devereux, and wondered what his plans were; and, there being no brother officers by, whether he meant to keep his commission, and various speculations29 as to the exact cause of the coldness shown him by General Chattesworth. Dick Spaight thought it might be that he had not asked Miss Gertrude in marriage.
But this was pooh-poohed. ‘Besides, they knew at Belmont,’ said Toole, who was an authority upon the domestic politics of that family, and rather proud of being so, ‘just as well as I did that Gipsy Dick was in love with Miss Lilias; and I lay you fifty he’d marry her tomorrow if she’d have him.’
Toole was always a little bit more intimate with people behind their backs, so he called Devereux ‘Gipsy Dick.’
‘She’s ailing30, I hear,’ said old Slowe.
‘She is, indeed, Sir,’ answered the doctor, with a grave shake of the head.
‘Nothing of moment, I hope?’ he asked.
‘Why, you see it may be; she had a bad cough last winter, and this year she took it earlier, and it has fallen very much on her lungs; and you see, we can’t say, Sir, what turn it may take, and I’m very sorry she should be so sick and ailing — she’s the prettiest creature, and the best little soul; and I don’t know, on my conscience, what the poor old parson would do if anything happened her, you know. But I trust, Sir, with care, you know, ’twill turn out well.’
The season for trout-fishing was long past and gone, and there were no more pleasant rambles31 for Dangerfield and Irons along the flowery banks of the devious32 Liffey. Their rods and nets hung up, awaiting the return of genial33 spring; and the churlish stream, abandoned to its wintry mood, darkled and roared savagely34 under the windows of the Brass35 Castle.
One dismal36 morning, as Dangerfield’s energetic step carried him briskly through the town, the iron gate of the church-yard, and the door of the church itself standing37 open, he turned in, glancing upward as he passed at Sturk’s bed-room windows, as all the neighbours did, to see whether General Death’s white banners were floating there, and his tedious siege ended — as end it must — and the garrison38 borne silently away in his custody39 to the prison house.
Up the aisle40 marched Dangerfield, not abating41 his pace, but with a swift and bracing42 clatter43, like a man taking a frosty constitutional walk.
Irons was moping softly about in the neighbourhood of the reading-desk, and about to mark the places of psalms44 and chapters in the great church Bible and Prayer-book, and sidelong he beheld45 his crony of the angle marching, with a grim confidence and swiftness, up the aisle.
‘I say, where’s Martin?’ said Dangerfield, cheerfully.
‘He’s gone away, Sir.’
‘Hey! then you’ve no one with you?’
‘No, Sir.’
Dangerfield walked straight on, up the step of the communion-table, and shoving open the little balustraded door, he made a gay stride or two across the holy precinct, and with a quick right-about face, came to a halt, the white, scoffing46 face, for exercise never flushed it, and the cold, broad sheen of the spectacles, looked odd in the clerk’s eyes, facing the church-door, from beside the table of the sacrament, displayed, as it were, in the very frame — foreground, background, and all — in which he was wont47 to behold48 the thoughtful, simple, holy face of the rector.
‘Alone among the dead; and not afraid?’ croaked49 the white face pleasantly.
The clerk seemed always to writhe50 and sweat silently under the banter51 of his comrade of the landing-net, and he answered, without lifting his head, in a constrained and dogged sort of way, like a man who expects something unpleasant —
‘Alone? yes, Sir, there’s none here but ourselves.’
And his face flushed, and the veins52 on his forehead stood out, as will happen with a man who tugs53 at a weight that is too much for him.
‘I saw you steal a glance at Charles when he came into the church here, and it strikes me I was at the moment thinking of the same thing as you, to wit, will he require any special service at our hands? Well, he does! and you or I must do it. He’ll give a thousand pounds, mind ye; and that’s something in the way of fellows like you and me; and whatever else he may have done, Charles has never broke his word in a money matter. And, hark’ee, can’t you thumb over that Bible and Prayer-book on the table here as well as there? Do so. Well —’
And he went on in a lower key, still looking full front at the church-door, and a quick glance now and then upon Irons, across the communion-table.
‘’Tis nothing at all — don’t you see — what are you afraid of? It can’t change events —’tis only a question of today or tomorrow — a whim54 — a maggot — hey? You can manage it this way, mark ye.’
He had his pocket-handkerchief by the two corners before him, like an apron55, and he folded it neatly56 and quickly into four.
‘Don’t you see — and a little water. You’re a neat hand, you know; and if you’re interrupted, ’tis only to blow your nose in’t — ha, ha, ha!— and clap it in your pocket; and you may as well have the money — hey? Good-morning.’
And when he had got half-way down the aisle, he called back to Irons, in a loud, frank voice —
‘And Martin’s not here — could you say where he is?’
But he did not await the answer, and glided57 with quick steps from the porch, with a side leer over the wavy58 green mounds59 and tombstones. He had not been three minutes in the church, and across the street he went, to the shop over the way, and asked briskly where Martin, the sexton, was. Well, they did not know.
‘Ho! Martin,’ he cried across the street, seeing that functionary60 just about to turn the corner by Sturk’s hall-door steps; ‘a word with you. I’ve been looking for you. See, you must take a foot-rule, and make all the measurements of that pew, you know; don’t mistake a hair’s breadth, d’ye mind, for you must be ready to swear to it; and bring a note of it to me, at home, today, at one o’clock, and you shall have a crown-piece.’
From which the reader will perceive — as all the world might, if they had happened to see him enter the church just now — that his object in the visit was to see and speak with Martin; and that the little bit of banter with Irons, the clerk, was all by-play, and parenthesis61, and beside the main business, and, of course, of no sort of consequence.
Mr. Irons, like most men of his rank in life, was not much in the habit of exact thinking. His ruminations, therefore, were rather confused, but, perhaps, they might be translated in substance, into something like this —
‘Why the —— can’t he let them alone that’s willing to let him alone? I wish he was in his own fiery62 home, and better people at rest. I can’t mark them places — I don’t know whether I’m on my head or heels.’
And he smacked63 the quarto Prayer-book down upon the folio Bible with a sonorous64 bang, and glided out, furious, frightened, and taciturn, to the Salmon65 House.
He came upon Dangerfield again only half-a-dozen steps from the turn into the street. He had just dismissed Martin, and was looking into a note in his pocket-book, and either did not see, or pretended not to see, the clerk. But some one else saw and recognised Mr. Irons; and, as he passed, directed upon him a quick, searching glance. It was Mr. Mervyn, who happened to pass that way. Irons and Dangerfield, and the church-yard — there was a flash of association in the group and the background which accorded with an old suspicion. Dangerfield, indeed, was innocently reading a leaf in his red and gilt66 leather pocket-book, as I have said. But Irons’s eyes met the glance of Mervyn, and contracted oddly, and altogether there gleamed out something indefinable in his look. It was only for a second — a glance and an intuition; and from that moment it was one of Mervyn’s immovable convictions, that Mr. Dangerfield knew something of Irons’s secret. It was a sort of intermittent67 suspicion before — now it was a monstrous68, but fixed69 belief.
So Mr. Irons glided swiftly on to the Salmon House, where, in a dark corner, he drank something comfortable; and stalked back again to the holy pile, with his head aching, and the world round him like a wild and evil dream.
收听单词发音 |
1
nutter
|
|
| n.疯子 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
2
tribulation
|
|
| n.苦难，灾难 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
3
rummaging
|
|
| 翻找，搜寻( rummage的现在分词 )； 海关检查 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
4
consolations
|
|
| n.安慰，慰问( consolation的名词复数 )；起安慰作用的人（或事物） | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
5
consolation
|
|
| n.安慰，慰问 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
6
accounting
|
|
| n.会计，会计学，借贷对照表 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
7
tornadoes
|
|
| n.龙卷风，旋风( tornado的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
8
lamentation
|
|
| n.悲叹，哀悼 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
9
digestion
|
|
| n.消化，吸收 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
10
flinch
|
|
| v.畏缩，退缩 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
11
comely
|
|
| adj.漂亮的，合宜的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
12
mellifluous
|
|
| adj.（音乐等）柔美流畅的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
13
eloquent
|
|
| adj.雄辩的，口才流利的；明白显示出的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
14
fowl
|
|
| n.家禽，鸡，禽肉 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
15
broth
|
|
| n.原(汁)汤(鱼汤、肉汤、菜汤等) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
16
entirely
|
|
| ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
17
chronic
|
|
| adj.(疾病)长期未愈的，慢性的；极坏的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
18
asylum
|
|
| n.避难所，庇护所，避难 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
19
outlaws
|
|
| 歹徒，亡命之徒( outlaw的名词复数 )； 逃犯 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
20
constrained
|
|
| adj.束缚的,节制的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
21
disparagement
|
|
| n.轻视，轻蔑 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
22
worthy
|
|
| adj.(of)值得的，配得上的；有价值的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
23
mite
|
|
| n.极小的东西；小铜币 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
24
formerly
|
|
| adv.从前，以前 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
25
complexion
|
|
| n.肤色；情况，局面；气质，性格 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
26
prosecute
|
|
| vt.告发；进行；vi.告发，起诉，作检察官 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
27
bustling
|
|
| adj.喧闹的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
28
thoroughly
|
|
| adv.完全地，彻底地，十足地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
29
speculations
|
|
| n.投机买卖( speculation的名词复数 )；思考；投机活动；推断 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
30
ailing
|
|
| v.生病 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
31
rambles
|
|
| （无目的地）漫游( ramble的第三人称单数 )； （喻）漫谈； 扯淡； 长篇大论 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
32
devious
|
|
| adj.不坦率的，狡猾的；迂回的，曲折的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
33
genial
|
|
| adj.亲切的，和蔼的，愉快的，脾气好的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
34
savagely
|
|
| adv. 野蛮地，残酷地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
35
brass
|
|
| n.黄铜；黄铜器，铜管乐器 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
36
dismal
|
|
| adj.阴沉的，凄凉的，令人忧郁的，差劲的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
37
standing
|
|
| n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
38
garrison
|
|
| n.卫戍部队；驻地，卫戍区；vt.派(兵)驻防 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
39
custody
|
|
| n.监护，照看，羁押，拘留 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
40
aisle
|
|
| n.（教堂、教室、戏院等里的）过道，通道 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
41
abating
|
|
| 减少( abate的现在分词 )； 减去； 降价； 撤消（诉讼） | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
42
bracing
|
|
| adj.令人振奋的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
43
clatter
|
|
| v./n.(使)发出连续而清脆的撞击声 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
44
psalms
|
|
| n.赞美诗( psalm的名词复数 )；圣诗；圣歌；(中的) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
45
beheld
|
|
| v.看，注视( behold的过去式和过去分词 )；瞧；看呀；（叙述中用于引出某人意外的出现）哎哟 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
46
scoffing
|
|
| n. 嘲笑, 笑柄, 愚弄 v. 嘲笑, 嘲弄, 愚弄, 狼吞虎咽 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
47
wont
|
|
| adj.习惯于；v.习惯；n.习惯 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
48
behold
|
|
| v.看，注视，看到 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
49
croaked
|
|
| v.呱呱地叫( croak的过去式和过去分词 )；用粗的声音说 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
50
writhe
|
|
| vt.挣扎，痛苦地扭曲；vi.扭曲，翻腾，受苦；n.翻腾，苦恼 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
51
banter
|
|
| n.嘲弄，戏谑；v.取笑，逗弄，开玩笑 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
52
veins
|
|
| n.纹理；矿脉( vein的名词复数 )；静脉；叶脉；纹理 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
53
tugs
|
|
| n.猛拉( tug的名词复数 )；猛拖；拖船v.用力拉，使劲拉，猛扯( tug的第三人称单数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
54
whim
|
|
| n.一时的兴致，突然的念头；奇想，幻想 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
55
apron
|
|
| n.围裙；工作裙 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
56
neatly
|
|
| adv.整洁地，干净地，灵巧地，熟练地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
57
glided
|
|
| v.滑动( glide的过去式和过去分词 )；掠过；（鸟或飞机 ） 滑翔 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
58
wavy
|
|
| adj.有波浪的，多浪的，波浪状的，波动的，不稳定的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
59
mounds
|
|
| 土堆，土丘( mound的名词复数 )； 一大堆 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
60
functionary
|
|
| n.官员；公职人员 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
61
parenthesis
|
|
| n.圆括号，插入语，插曲，间歇，停歇 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
62
fiery
|
|
| adj.燃烧着的，火红的；暴躁的；激烈的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
63
smacked
|
|
| 拍，打，掴( smack的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
64
sonorous
|
|
| adj.响亮的，回响的；adv.圆润低沉地；感人地；n.感人，堂皇 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
65
salmon
|
|
| n.鲑，大马哈鱼，橙红色的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
66
gilt
|
|
| adj.镀金的；n.金边证券 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
67
intermittent
|
|
| adj.间歇的，断断续续的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
68
monstrous
|
|
| adj.巨大的；恐怖的；可耻的，丢脸的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
69
fixed
|
|
| adj.固定的，不变的，准备好的；(计算机)固定的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
| 欢迎访问英文小说网 |