In the meantime our worthy1 little Lieutenant2 Puddock — by this time quite reconciled to the new state of things, walked up to Belmont, with his head a great deal fuller — such and so great are human vagaries3 — of the interview pending4 between him and Aunt Becky than of the little romance which had exploded so unexpectedly about a fortnight ago.
He actually saw Miss Gertrude and my Lord Dunoran walking side by side, on the mulberry walk by the river; and though he looked and felt a little queer, perhaps, a little absurd, he did not sigh, or murmur5 a stanza6, or suffer a palpitation; but walked up to the hall-door, and asked for Miss Rebecca Chattesworth.
Aunt Becky received him in the drawing-room. She was looking very pale, and spoke7 very little, and very gently for her. In a reconciliation8 between two persons of the opposite sexes — though the ages be wide apart — there is almost always some little ingredient of sentiment.
The door was shut, and Puddock’s voice was heard in an indistinct murmur, upon the lobby. Then there was a silence, or possibly, some speaking in a still lower key. Then Aunt Becky was crying, and the lieutenant’s voice cooing through it. Then Aunt Becky, still crying, said —
‘A longer time than you think for, lieutenant; two years, and more — always! And the lieutenant’s voice rose again; and she said —‘What a fool I’ve been!’ which was again lost in Puddock’s accents; and the drawing-room door opened, and Aunt Rebecca ran up stairs, with her handkerchief to her red nose and eyes, and slammed her bed-room door after her like a boarding-school miss.
And the general’s voice was heard shouting ‘luncheon9’ in the hall; and Dominick repeated the announcement to Puddock, who stood, unusually pale and very much stunned10, with the handle of the open drawing-room door in his hand, looking up toward the bed-room in an undecided sort of way, as if he was not clear whether it was not his duty to follow Aunt Becky. On being told a second time, however, that the general awaited him at luncheon, he apprehended11 the meaning of the message, and went down to the parlour forthwith.
The general, and my lord Dunoran, and Miss Gertrude, and honest Father Roach, were there; and Aunt Becky being otherwise engaged, could not come.
Puddock, at luncheon, was abstracted — frightened — silent, for the most part; talking only two or three sentences during that sociable13 meal, by fits and starts; and he laughed once abruptly14 at a joke he did not hear. He also drank three glasses of port.
Aunt Rebecca met him with her hood15 on in the hall. She asked him, with a faltering16 sort of carelessness, looking very hard at the clock, and nearly with her back to him —
‘Lieutenant, will you take a turn in the garden with me?’
To which Puddock, with almost a start — for he had not seen her till she spoke — and, upon my word, ’tis a fact, with a blush, too — made a sudden smile, and a bow, and a suitable reply in low tones; and forth12 they sallied together, and into the garden, and up and down the same walk, for a good while — a long while — people sometimes don’t count the minutes — with none but Peter Brian, the gardener, whom they did not see, to observe them.
When they came to the white wicket-door of the garden, Aunt Rebecca hastily dropped his arm, on which she had leaned; and together they returned to the house very affably; and there Aunt Becky bid him good-bye in a whisper, a little hastily; and Puddock, so soon as he found Dominick, asked for the general.
He had gone down to the river; and Puddock followed. As he walked along the court, he looked up; there was a kind of face at the window. He smiled a great deal and raised his hat, and placed it to his heart, and felt quite bewildered, like a man in a dream; and in this state he marched down to the river’s bank.
They had not been together for a full minute when the stout17 general threw back his head, looking straight in his face; and then he stepped first one, then another, fat little pace backward, and poked18 his cane19 right at the ribs20 of the plump little lieutenant, then closing with him, he shook both Puddock’s hands in both his, with a hearty21 peal22 of laughter.
Then he took Puddock under his arm. Puddock had to stoop to pick up his hat which the general had dislodged. And so the general walks him slowly towards the house; sometimes jogging his elbow a little under his ribs; sometimes calling a halt and taking his collar in his finger and thumb, thrusting him out a little, and eyeing him over with a sort of swagger, and laughing and coughing, and whooping23, and laughing again, almost to strangulation; and altogether extraordinarily24 boisterous25, and hilarious26, and familiar, as Cluffe thought, who viewed this spectacle from the avenue.
Mr. Sterling27 would not have been quite so amused at a similar freak of Mrs. Hidleberg’s — but our honest general was no especial worshipper of money — he was rich, too, and his daughter, well dowered, was about to marry a peer, and beside all this, though he loved ‘Sister Becky,’ her yoke28 galled29 him; and I think he was not altogether sorry at the notion of a little more liberty.
At the same moment honest Peter Brien, having set his basket of winter greens down upon the kitchen-table, electrified30 his auditory by telling them, with a broad grin and an oath, that he had seen Lieutenant Puddock and Aunt Rebecca kiss in the garden, with a good smart smack31, ‘by the powers, within three yards of his elbow, when he was stooping down cutting them greens!’ At which profanity, old Mistress Dorothy, Aunt Rebecca’s maid, was so incensed32 that she rose and left the kitchen without a word. The sensation there, however, was immense; and Mistress Dorothy heard the gabble and laughter fast and furious behind her until she reached the hall.
Captain Cluffe was asking for Aunt Rebecca when Puddock and the general reached the hall-door, and was surprised to learn that she was not to be seen. ‘If she knew ’twas I,’ he thought, ‘but no matter.’
‘Oh, we could have told you that; eh, Puddock?’ cried the general; ‘‘tisn’t everybody can see my sister today, captain; a very peculiar33 engagement, eh, Puddock?’ and a sly wink34 and a chuckle35.
Cluffe smiled a little, and looked rather conscious and queer, but pleased with himself; and his eyes wandered over the front windows hastily, to see if Aunt Becky was looking out, for he fancied there was something in the general’s quizzing, and that the lady might have said more than she quite intended to poor little Puddock on the subject of the gallant36 mediator37; and that, in fact, he was somehow the theme of some little sentimental38 disclosure of the lady’s. What the plague else could they both mean by quizzing Cluffe about her?
Puddock and he had not gone half-way down the short avenue, when Cluffe said, with a sheepish smile:
‘Miss Rebecca Chattesworth dropped something in her talk with you, Puddock, I see that plain enough, my dear fellow, which the general has no objection I should hear, and, hang it, I don’t see any myself. I say, I may as well hear it, eh? I venture to say there’s no great harm in it.’
At first Puddock was reserved, but recollecting39 that he had been left quite free to tell whom he pleased, he made up his mind to unbosom; and suggested, for the sake of quiet and a longer conversation, that they should go round by the ferry.
‘No, I thank you, I’ve had enough of that; we can walk along as quietly as you like, and turn a little back again if need be.’
So slowly, side by side, the brother-officers paced toward the bridge; and little Puddock, with a serious countenance40 and blushing cheeks, and looking straight before him, made his astounding41 disclosure.
Puddock told things in a very simple and intelligible42 way, and Cluffe heard him in total silence; and just as he related the crowning fact, that he, the lieutenant, was about to marry Miss Rebecca Chattesworth, having reached the milestone43 by the footpath44, Captain Cluffe raised his foot thereupon, without a word to Puddock, and began tugging45 at the strap46 of his legging, with a dismal47 red grin, and a few spluttering curses at the artificer of the article.
‘And the lady has had the condescension48 to say that she has liked me for at least two years.’
‘And she hating you like poison, to my certain knowledge,’ laughed Captain Cluffe, very angrily, and swallowing down his feelings. So they walked on a little way in silence, and Cluffe, who, with his face very red, and his mouth a good deal expanded, and down in the corners, was looking steadfastly49 forward, exclaimed suddenly,—
‘Well?’
‘I see, Cluffe,’ said Puddock; ‘you don’t think it prudent50 — you think we mayn’t be happy?’
‘Prudent,’ laughed Cluffe, with a variety of unpleasant meanings; and after a while —‘And the general knows of it?’
‘And approves it most kindly,’ said Puddock.
‘What else can he do?’ sneered51 Cluffe; ‘’tis a precious fancy — they are such cheats! Why you might be almost her grand-son, my dear Puddock, ha, ha, ha. ’Tis preposterous52; you’re sixteen years younger than I.’
‘If you can’t congratulate me, ‘twould be kinder not to say anything, Captain Cluffe; and nobody must speak in my presence of that lady but with proper respect; and I— I thought, Cluffe, you’d have wished me well, and shaken hands and said something — something —’
‘Oh, as for that,’ said Cluffe, swallowing down his emotions again, and shaking hands with Puddock rather clumsily, and trying to smile, ‘I wish you well, Heaven knows — everything good; why shouldn’t I, by George? You know, Puddock, ’twas I who brought you together. And — and — am I at liberty to mention it?’
Puddock thought it better the news should be proclaimed from Belmont.
‘Well, so I think myself,’ said Cluffe, and relapsed into silence till they parted, at the corner of the broad street of Chapelizod and Cluffe walked at an astounding pace on to his lodgings53.
‘Here’s Captain Cluffe,’ said Mrs. Mason, to a plump youth, who had just made the journey from London, and was standing54 with the driver of a low-backed car, and saluted55 the captain, who was stalking in without taking any notice.
‘Little bill, if you please, captain.’
‘What is it?’ demanded the captain, grimly.
‘Obediar’s come, Sir.’
‘Obediar!’ said the captain. ‘What the plague do you mean, Sir?’
‘Obediar, Sir, is the name we give him. The pelican56, Sir, from Messrs. Hamburgh and Slighe.’
And the young man threw back a piece of green baize, and disclosed Obediar, who blinked with a tranquil57 countenance upon the captain through the wires of a strong wooden cage. I doubt if the captain ever looked so angry before or since. He glared at the pelican, and ground his teeth, and actually shook his cane in his fist; and if he had been one bit less prudent than he was, I think Obediar would then and there have slept with his fathers.
Cluffe whisked himself about, and plucked open the paper.
‘And what the devil is all this for, Sir? ten — twelve pounds ten shillings freightage and care on the way — and twenty-five, by George, Sir — not far from forty pounds, Sir,’ roared Cluffe.
‘Where’ll I bring him to, Sir?’ asked the driver.
The captain bellowed58 an address we sha’n’t print here.
‘Curse him — curse the brute59! forty pounds!’ and the captain swore hugely, ‘you scoundrel! Drive the whole concern out of that, Sir. Drive him away, Sir, or by Jove, I’ll break every bone in your body, Sir.’
And the captain scaled the stairs, and sat down panting, and outside the window he heard the driver advising something about putting the captain’s bird to livery, ‘till sich time as he’d come to his sinses;’ and himself undertaking60 to wait opposite the door of his lodgings until his fare from Dublin was paid.
Though Cluffe was occasionally swayed by the angry passions, he was, on the whole, in his own small way, a long-headed fellow. He hated law, especially when he had a bad case; and accordingly he went down again, rumpling61 the confounded bill in his hand, and told the man that he did not blame him for it — though the whole thing was an imposition; but that rather than have any words about it, he’d pay the account, and have done with it; and he stared again in the face of the pelican with an expression of rooted abhorrence62 and disgust, and the mild bird clapped its bill, perhaps expecting some refreshment63, and looking upon the captain with a serene64 complacency very provoking under the circumstances.
‘How the devil people can like such misshapen, idiotic-looking, selfish, useless brutes65; and, by George, it smells like a polecat — curse it! but some people have deuced queer fancies in more matters than one. The brute! on my soul, I’d like to shoot it.’
However, with plenty of disputation over the items, and many oaths and vows66, the gallant captain, with a heavy and wrathful heart, paid the bill; and although he had sworn in his drawing-room that he’d eat the pelican before Aunt Rebecca should have it, he thought better also upon this point too, and it arrived that evening at Belmont, with his respectful compliments.
Cluffe was soon of opinion that he was in absolute possession of his own secret, and resolved to keep it effectually. He hinted that very evening at mess, and afterwards at the club, that he had been managing a very nice and delicate bit of diplomacy67 which not a soul of them suspected, at Belmont; and that by George, he thought they’d stare when they heard it. He had worked like a lord chancellor68 to bring it about; and he thought all was pretty well settled, now. And the Chapelizod folk, in general, and Puddock, as implicitly69 as any, and Aunt Rebecca, for that matter, also believed to their dying day that Cluffe had managed that match, and been a true friend to little Puddock.
Cluffe never married, but grew confoundedly corpulent by degrees, and suffered plaguily from gout; but was always well dressed, and courageously70 buckled71 in, and, I dare say, two inches less in girth, thanks to the application of mechanics, than nature would have presented him.
收听单词发音 |
1
worthy
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| adj.(of)值得的，配得上的；有价值的 | |
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lieutenant
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| n.陆军中尉，海军上尉；代理官员，副职官员 | |
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vagaries
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| n.奇想( vagary的名词复数 )；异想天开；异常行为；难以预测的情况 | |
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pending
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| prep.直到，等待…期间；adj.待定的；迫近的 | |
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murmur
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| n.低语，低声的怨言；v.低语，低声而言 | |
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stanza
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| n.（诗）节，段 | |
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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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reconciliation
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| n.和解，和谐，一致 | |
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luncheon
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| n.午宴，午餐，便宴 | |
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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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apprehended
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| 逮捕，拘押( apprehend的过去式和过去分词 )； 理解 | |
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forth
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| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
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sociable
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| adj.好交际的，友好的，合群的 | |
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abruptly
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| adv.突然地，出其不意地 | |
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hood
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| n.头巾，兜帽，覆盖；v.罩上，以头巾覆盖 | |
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faltering
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| 犹豫的，支吾的，蹒跚的 | |
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poked
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| v.伸出( poke的过去式和过去分词 )；戳出；拨弄；与（某人）性交 | |
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cane
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| n.手杖，细长的茎，藤条；v.以杖击，以藤编制的 | |
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ribs
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| n.肋骨( rib的名词复数 )；（船或屋顶等的）肋拱；肋骨状的东西；（织物的）凸条花纹 | |
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21
hearty
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| adj.热情友好的；衷心的；尽情的，纵情的 | |
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peal
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| n.钟声；v.鸣响 | |
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whooping
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| 发嗬嗬声的，发咳声的 | |
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extraordinarily
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| adv.格外地；极端地 | |
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boisterous
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| adj.喧闹的，欢闹的 | |
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hilarious
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| adj.充满笑声的，欢闹的；[反]depressed | |
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sterling
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| adj.英币的(纯粹的，货真价实的)；n.英国货币(英镑) | |
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yoke
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| n.轭；支配；v.给...上轭，连接，使成配偶 | |
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29
galled
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| v.使…擦痛( gall的过去式和过去分词 )；擦伤；烦扰；侮辱 | |
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electrified
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| v.使电气化( electrify的过去式和过去分词 )；使兴奋 | |
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31
smack
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| vt.拍，打，掴；咂嘴；vi.含有…意味；n.拍 | |
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32
incensed
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| 盛怒的 | |
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peculiar
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| adj.古怪的，异常的；特殊的，特有的 | |
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wink
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| n.眨眼，使眼色，瞬间；v.眨眼，使眼色，闪烁 | |
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35
chuckle
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| vi.／n.轻声笑，咯咯笑 | |
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gallant
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| adj.英勇的，豪侠的；(向女人)献殷勤的 | |
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mediator
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| n.调解人，中介人 | |
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sentimental
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| adj.多愁善感的，感伤的 | |
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39
recollecting
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| v.记起，想起( recollect的现在分词 ) | |
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40
countenance
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| n.脸色，面容；面部表情；vt.支持，赞同 | |
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41
astounding
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| adj.使人震惊的vt.使震惊，使大吃一惊astound的现在分词) | |
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intelligible
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| adj.可理解的，明白易懂的，清楚的 | |
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43
milestone
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| n.里程碑；划时代的事件 | |
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44
footpath
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| n.小路，人行道 | |
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45
tugging
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| n.牵引感v.用力拉，使劲拉，猛扯( tug的现在分词 ) | |
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46
strap
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| n.皮带，带子；v.用带扣住，束牢；用绷带包扎 | |
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47
dismal
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| adj.阴沉的，凄凉的，令人忧郁的，差劲的 | |
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48
condescension
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| n.自以为高人一等，贬低(别人) | |
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49
steadfastly
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| adv.踏实地，不变地；岿然；坚定不渝 | |
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50
prudent
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| adj.谨慎的，有远见的，精打细算的 | |
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51
sneered
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| 讥笑，冷笑( sneer的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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52
preposterous
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| adj.荒谬的，可笑的 | |
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53
lodgings
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| n. 出租的房舍, 寄宿舍 | |
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54
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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55
saluted
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| v.欢迎，致敬( salute的过去式和过去分词 )；赞扬，赞颂 | |
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56
pelican
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| n.鹈鹕，伽蓝鸟 | |
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57
tranquil
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| adj. 安静的, 宁静的, 稳定的, 不变的 | |
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58
bellowed
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| v.发出吼叫声，咆哮（尤指因痛苦）( bellow的过去式和过去分词 )；（愤怒地）说出（某事），大叫 | |
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59
brute
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| n.野兽，兽性 | |
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60
undertaking
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| n.保证，许诺，事业 | |
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61
rumpling
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| v.弄皱，使凌乱( rumple的现在分词 ) | |
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abhorrence
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| n.憎恶；可憎恶的事 | |
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63
refreshment
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| n.恢复，精神爽快，提神之事物；（复数）refreshments:点心，茶点 | |
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64
serene
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| adj. 安详的，宁静的，平静的 | |
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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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vows
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| 誓言( vow的名词复数 )； 郑重宣布，许愿 | |
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67
diplomacy
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| n.外交；外交手腕，交际手腕 | |
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68
chancellor
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| n.(英)大臣；法官；(德、奥)总理；大学校长 | |
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69
implicitly
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| adv. 含蓄地, 暗中地, 毫不保留地 | |
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70
courageously
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| ad.勇敢地，无畏地 | |
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71
buckled
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| a. 有带扣的 | |
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