It is not difficult to understand Mr. Challoner’s feelings or even those of Doris at the moment of Mr. Brotherson’s departure. But why this change in Brotherson himself? Why this sense of something new and terrible rising between him and the suddenly beclouded future? Let us follow him to his lonely hotel-room and see if we can solve the puzzle.
But first, does he understand his own trouble? He does not seem to. For when, his hat thrown aside, he stops, erect2 and frowning under the flaring3 gas-jet he had no recollection of lighting4, his first act was to lift his hand to his head in a gesture of surprising helplessness for him, while snatches of broken sentences fell from his lips among which could be heard:
“What has come to me? Undone5 in an hour! Doubly undone! First by a face and then by this thought which surely the devils have whispered to me. Mr. Challoner and Oswald! What is the link between them? Great God! what is the link? Not myself? Who then or what?”
Flinging himself into a chair, he buried his face in his hands. There were two demons6 to fight — the first in the guise8 of an angel. Doris! Unknown yesterday, unknown an hour ago; but now! Had there ever been a day — an hour — when she had not been as the very throb9 of his heart, the light of his eyes, and the crown of all imaginable blisses?
He was startled at his own emotion as he contemplated11 her image in his fancy and listened for the lost echo of the few words she had spoken — words so full of music when they referred to his brother, so hard and cold when she simply addressed himself.
This was no passing admiration12 of youth for a captivating woman. This was not even the love he had given to Edith Challoner. This was something springing full-born out of nothing! a force which, for the first time in his life, made him complaisant13 to the natural weaknesses of man! a dream and yet a reality strong enough to blot14 out the past, remake the present, change the aspect of all his hopes, and outline a new fate. He did not know himself. There was nothing in his whole history to give him an understanding of such feelings as these.
Can a man be seized as it were by the hair, and swung up on the slopes of paradise or down the steeps of hell — without a forewarning, without the chance even to say whether he wished such a cataclysm16 in his life or no?
He, Orlando Brotherson, had never thought much of love. Science had been his mistress; ambition his lode-star. Such feeling as he had acknowledged to had been for men — struggling men, men who were down-trodden and gasping17 in the narrow bounds of poverty and helplessness. Miss Challoner had roused — well, his pride. He could see that now. The might of this new emotion made plain many things he had passed by as useless, puerile18, unworthy of a man of mental calibre and might. He had never loved Edith Challoner at any moment of their acquaintanceship, though he had been sincere in thinking that he did. Doris’ beauty, the hour he had just passed with her, had undeceived him.
Did he hail the experience? It was not likely to bring him joy. This young girl whose image floated in light before his eyes, would never love him. She loved his brother. He had heard their names mentioned together before he had been in town an hour. Oswald, the cleverest man, Doris, the most beautiful girl in Western Pennsylvania.
He had accepted the gossip then; he had not seen her and it all seemed very natural;— hardly worth a moment’s thought. But now!
And here, the other Demon7 sprang erect and grappled with him before the first one had let go his hold. Oswald and Challoner! The secret, unknown something which had softened19 that hard man’s eye when his brother’s name was mentioned! He had noted20 it and realised the mystery; a mystery before which sleep and rest must fly; a mystery to which he must now give his thought, whatever the cost, whatever the loss to those heavenly dreams the magic of which was so new it seemed to envelope him in the balm of Paradise. Away, then, image of light! Let the faculties21 thou hast dazed, act again. There is more than Fate’s caprice in Challoner’s interest in a man he never saw. Ghosts of old memories rise and demand a hearing. Facts, trivial and commonplace enough to have been lost in oblivion with the day which gave them birth, throng22 again from the past, proving that nought23 dies without a possibility of resurrection. Their power over this brooding man is shown by the force with which his fingers crush against his bowed forehead. Oswald and Challoner! Had he found the connecting link? Had it been — could it have been Edith? The preposterous24 is sometimes true; could it be true in this case?
He recalled the letters read to him as hers in that room of his in Brooklyn. He had hardly noted them then, he was so sure of their being forgeries25, gotten up by the police to mislead him. Could they have been real, the effusions of her mind, the breathings of her heart, directed to an actual O. B., and that O. B., his brother? They had not been meant for him. He had read enough of the mawkish26 lines to be sure of that. None of the allusions27 fitted in with the facts of their mutual28 intercourse29. But they might with those of another man; they might with the possible acts and affections of Oswald whose temperament30 was wholly different from his and who might have loved her, should it ever be shown that they had met and known each other. And this was not an impossibility. Oswald had been east, Oswald had even been in the Berkshires before himself. Oswald — Why it was Oswald who had suggested that he should go there — go where she still was. Why this second coincidence, if there were no tie — if the Challoners and Oswald were as far apart as they seemed and as conventionalities would naturally place them. Oswald was a sentimentalist, but very reserved about his sentimentalities. If these suppositions were true, he had had a sentimentalist’s motive31 for what he did. As Orlando realised this, he rose from his seat, aghast at the possibilities confronting him from this line of thought. Should he contemplate10 them? Risk his reason by dwelling32 on a supposition which might have no foundation in fact? No. His brain was too full — his purposes too important for any unnecessary strain to be put upon his faculties. No thinking! investigation33 first. Mr. Challoner should be able to settle this question. He would see him. Even at this late hour he ought to be able to find him in one of the rooms below; and, by the force of an irresistible34 demand, learn in a moment whether he had to do with a mere35 chimera36 of his own overwrought fancy, or with a fact which would call into play all the resources of an hitherto unconquered and undaunted nature.
There was a wood-fire burning in the sitting-room37 that night, and around it was grouped a number of men with their papers and pipes. Mr. Brotherson, entering, naturally looked that way for the man he was in search of, and was disappointed not to find him there; but on casting his glances elsewhere, he was relieved to see him standing15 in one of the windows overlooking the street. His back was to the room and he seemed to be lost in a fit of abstraction.
As Orlando crossed to him, he had time to observe how much whiter was this man’s head than in the last interview he had held with him in the coroner’s office in New York. But this evidence of grief in one with whom he had little, if anything, in common, neither touched his feelings nor deterred39 his step. The awakening40 of his heart to new and profound emotions had not softened him towards the sufferings of others if those others stood without the pale he had previously41 raised as the legitimate42 boundary of a just man’s sympathies.
He was, as I have said, an extraordinary specimen43 of manly44 vigour45 in body and in mind, and his presence in any company always attracted attention and roused, if it never satisfied, curiosity. Conversation accordingly ceased as he strode up to Mr. Challoner’s side, so that his words were quite audible as he addressed that gentleman with a somewhat curt46:
“You see me again, Mr. Challoner. May I beg of you a few minutes’ further conversation? I will not detain you long.”
The grey head turned, and the many eyes watching showed surprise at the expression of dislike and repulsion with which this New York gentleman met the request thus emphatically urged. But his answer was courteous47 enough. If Mr. Brotherson knew a place where they would be left undisturbed, he would listen to him if he would be very brief.
For reply, the other pointed38 to a small room quite unoccupied which opened out of the one in which they then stood. Mr. Challoner bowed and in an other moment the door dosed upon them, to the infinite disappointment of the men about the hearth48.
“What do you wish to ask?” was Mr. Challoner’s immediate49 inquiry50.
“This; I make no apologies and expect in answer nothing more than an unequivocal yes or no. You tell me that you have never met my brother. Can that be said of the other members of your family — of your deceased daughter, in fact?”
“No.”
“She was acquainted with Oswald Brotherson?”
“She was.”
“Without your knowledge?”
“Entirely so.”
“Corresponded with him?”
“Not exactly.”
“How, not exactly?”
“He wrote to her — occasionally. She wrote to him frequently — but she never sent her letters.”
“Ah!”
The exclamation51 was sharp, short and conveyed little. Yet with its escape, the whole scaffolding of this man’s hold upon life and his own fate went down in indistinguishable chaos. Mr. Challoner realised a sense of havoc52, though the eyes bent53 upon his countenance54 had not wavered, nor the stalwart figure moved.
“I have read some of those letters,” the inventor finally acknowledged. “The police took great pains to place them under my eye, supposing them to have been meant for me because of the initials written on the wrapper. But they were meant for Oswald. You believe that now?”
“I know it.”
“And that is why I found you in the same house with him.”
“It is. Providence55 has robbed me of my daughter; if this brother of yours should prove to be the man I am led to expect, I shall ask him to take that place in my heart and life which was once hers.”
A quick recoil56, a smothered57 exclamation on the part of the man he addressed. A barb58 had been hidden in this simple statement which had reached some deeply-hidden but vulnerable spot in Brotherson’s breast, which had never been pierced before. His eye which alone seemed alive, still rested piercingly upon that of Mr. Challoner, but its light was fast fading, and speedily became lost in a dimness in which the other seemed to see extinguished the last upflaring embers of those inner fires which feed the aspiring59 soul. It was a sight no man could see unmoved. Mr. Challoner turned sharply away, in dread60 of the abyss which the next word he uttered might open between them.
But Orlando Brotherson possessed61 resources of strength of which, possibly, he was not aware himself. When Mr. Challoner, still more affected62 by the silence than by the dread I have mentioned, turned to confront him again, it was to find his features composed and his glance clear. He had conquered all outward manifestation63 of the mysterious emotion which for an instant had laid his proud spirit low.
“You are considerate of my brother,” were the words with which he re-opened this painful conversation. “You will not find your confidence misplaced. Oswald is a straightforward64 fellow, of few faults.”
“I believe it. No man can be so universally beloved without some very substantial claims to regard. I am glad to see that your opinion, though given somewhat coldly, coincides with that of his friends.”
“I am not given to exaggeration,” was the even reply.
The flush which had come into Mr. Challoner’s cheek under the effort he had made to sustain with unflinching heroism65 this interview with the man he looked upon as his mortal enemy, slowly faded out till he looked the wraith66 of himself even to the unsympathetic eyes of Orlando Brotherson. A duty lay before him which would tax to its utmost extent his already greatly weakened self-control. Nothing which had yet passed showed that this man realised the fact that Oswald had been kept in ignorance of Miss Challoner’s death. If these brothers were to meet on the morrow, it must be with the full understanding that this especial topic was to be completely avoided. But in what words could he urge such a request upon this man? None suggested themselves, yet he had promised Miss Scott that he would ensure his silence in this regard, and it was with this difficulty and no other he had been struggling when Mr. Brotherson came upon him in the other room.
“You have still something to say,” suggested the latter, as an oppressive silence swallowed up that icy sentence I have already recorded.
“I have,” returned Mr. Challoner, regaining67 his courage under the exigencies68 of the moment. “Miss Scott is very anxious to have your promise that you will avoid all disagreeable topics with your brother till the doctor pronounces him strong enough to meet the trouble which awaits him.”
“You mean —”
“He is not as unhappy as we. He knows nothing of the affliction which has befallen him. He was taken ill —” The rest was almost inaudible.
But Orlando Brotherson had no difficulty in understanding him, and for the second time in this extraordinary interview, he gave evidences of agitation69 and of a mind shaken from its equipoise. But only for an instant. He did not shun70 the other’s gaze or even maintain more than a momentary71 silence. Indeed, he found strength to smile, in a curious, sardonic72 way, as he said:
“Do you think I should be apt to broach73 this subject with any one, let alone with him, whose connection with it I shall need days to realise? I’m not so given to gossip. Besides, he and I have other topics of interest. I have an invention ready with which I propose to experiment in a place he has already prepared for me. We can talk about that.”
The irony74, the hardy75 self-possession with which this was said struck Mr. Challoner to the heart. Without a word he wheeled about towards the door. Without a word, Brotherson stood, watching him go till he saw his hand fall on the knob when he quietly prevented his exit by saying:
“Unhappy truths cannot be long concealed76. How soon does the doctor think my brother can bear these inevitable77 revelations?”
“He said this morning that if his patient were as well to-morrow as his present condition gives promise of, he might be told in another week.”
Orlando bowed his appreciation78 of this fact, but added quickly:
“Who is to do the telling?”
“Doris. Nobody else could be trusted with so delicate a task.”
“I wish to be present.”
Mr. Challoner looked up, surprised at the feeling with which this request was charged.
“As his brother — his only remaining relative, I have that right. Do you think that Dor — that Miss Scott, can be trusted not to forestall79 that moment by any previous hint of what awaits him?”
“If she so promises. But will you exact this from her? It surely cannot be necessary for me to say that your presence will add infinitely80 to the difficulty of her task.”
“Yet it is a duty I cannot shirk. I will consult the doctor about it. I will make him see that I both understand and shall insist upon my rights in this matter. But you may tell Miss Doris that I will sit out of sight, and that I shall not obtrude81 myself unless my name is brought up in an undesirable82 way.”
The hand on the door-knob made a sudden movement.
“Mr. Brotherson, I can bear no more to-night. With your permission, I will leave this question to be settled by others.” And with a repetition of his former bow, the bereaved83 father withdrew.
Orlando watched him till the door closed, then he too dropped his mask.
But it was on again, when in a little while he passed through the sitting-room on his way upstairs.
No other day in his whole life had been like this to the hardy inventor; for in it both his heart and his conscience had been awakened84, and up to this hour he had not really known that he possessed either.
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chaos
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| n.混乱，无秩序 | |
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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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flaring
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| a.火焰摇曳的，过份艳丽的 | |
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lighting
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| n.照明，光线的明暗，舞台灯光 | |
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undone
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| a.未做完的，未完成的 | |
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demons
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| n.恶人( demon的名词复数 )；恶魔；精力过人的人；邪念 | |
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demon
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| n.魔鬼，恶魔 | |
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guise
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| n.外表，伪装的姿态 | |
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throb
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| v.震颤，颤动；(急速强烈地)跳动，搏动 | |
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contemplate
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| vt.盘算，计议；周密考虑；注视，凝视 | |
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contemplated
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| adj. 预期的 动词contemplate的过去分词形式 | |
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admiration
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| n.钦佩，赞美，羡慕 | |
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complaisant
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| adj.顺从的，讨好的 | |
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blot
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| vt.弄脏（用吸墨纸）吸干；n.污点，污渍 | |
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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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cataclysm
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| n.洪水，剧变，大灾难 | |
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gasping
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| adj. 气喘的, 痉挛的 动词gasp的现在分词 | |
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puerile
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| adj.幼稚的，儿童的 | |
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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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noted
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| adj.著名的，知名的 | |
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faculties
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| n.能力( faculty的名词复数 )；全体教职员；技巧；院 | |
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throng
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| n.人群，群众；v.拥挤，群集 | |
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nought
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| n.／adj.无，零 | |
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preposterous
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| adj.荒谬的，可笑的 | |
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forgeries
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| 伪造( forgery的名词复数 )； 伪造的文件、签名等 | |
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mawkish
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| adj.多愁善感的的；无味的 | |
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allusions
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| 暗指，间接提到( allusion的名词复数 ) | |
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mutual
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| adj.相互的，彼此的；共同的，共有的 | |
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intercourse
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| n.性交；交流，交往，交际 | |
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temperament
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| n.气质，性格，性情 | |
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motive
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| n.动机，目的；adv.发动的，运动的 | |
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dwelling
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| n.住宅，住所，寓所 | |
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investigation
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| n.调查，调查研究 | |
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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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mere
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| adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过 | |
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chimera
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| n.神话怪物；梦幻 | |
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sitting-room
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| n.（BrE）客厅，起居室 | |
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pointed
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| adj.尖的，直截了当的 | |
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deterred
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| v.阻止，制止( deter的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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awakening
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| n.觉醒，醒悟 adj.觉醒中的；唤醒的 | |
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previously
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| adv.以前，先前（地） | |
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legitimate
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| adj.合法的，合理的，合乎逻辑的；v.使合法 | |
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specimen
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| n.样本，标本 | |
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manly
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| adj.有男子气概的；adv.男子般地，果断地 | |
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vigour
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| （=vigor）n.智力，体力，精力 | |
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curt
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| adj.简短的，草率的 | |
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courteous
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| adj.彬彬有礼的，客气的 | |
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hearth
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| n.壁炉炉床，壁炉地面 | |
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immediate
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| adj.立即的；直接的，最接近的；紧靠的 | |
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inquiry
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| n.打听，询问，调查，查问 | |
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exclamation
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| n.感叹号，惊呼，惊叹词 | |
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havoc
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| n.大破坏，浩劫，大混乱，大杂乱 | |
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bent
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| n.爱好，癖好；adj.弯的；决心的，一心的 | |
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countenance
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| n.脸色，面容；面部表情；vt.支持，赞同 | |
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providence
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| n.深谋远虑，天道，天意；远见；节约；上帝 | |
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recoil
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| vi.退却，退缩，畏缩 | |
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smothered
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| （使）窒息， （使）透不过气( smother的过去式和过去分词 )； 覆盖； 忍住； 抑制 | |
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barb
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| n.（鱼钩等的）倒钩，倒刺 | |
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aspiring
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| adj.有志气的；有抱负的；高耸的v.渴望；追求 | |
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dread
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| vt.担忧，忧虑；惧怕，不敢；n.担忧，畏惧 | |
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possessed
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| adj.疯狂的；拥有的，占有的 | |
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affected
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| adj.不自然的，假装的 | |
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manifestation
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| n.表现形式；表明；现象 | |
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straightforward
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| adj.正直的，坦率的；易懂的，简单的 | |
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heroism
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| n.大无畏精神，英勇 | |
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wraith
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| n.幽灵；骨瘦如柴的人 | |
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regaining
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| 复得( regain的现在分词 )； 赢回； 重回； 复至某地 | |
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exigencies
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| n.急切需要 | |
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agitation
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| n.搅动；搅拌；鼓动，煽动 | |
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shun
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| vt.避开，回避，避免 | |
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momentary
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| adj.片刻的，瞬息的；短暂的 | |
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sardonic
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| adj.嘲笑的，冷笑的，讥讽的 | |
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broach
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| v.开瓶，提出(题目) | |
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74
irony
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| n.反语，冷嘲；具有讽刺意味的事，嘲弄 | |
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75
hardy
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| adj.勇敢的，果断的，吃苦的；耐寒的 | |
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76
concealed
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| a.隐藏的，隐蔽的 | |
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77
inevitable
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| adj.不可避免的，必然发生的 | |
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78
appreciation
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| n.评价；欣赏；感谢；领会，理解；价格上涨 | |
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79
forestall
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| vt.抢在…之前采取行动；预先阻止 | |
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80
infinitely
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| adv.无限地，无穷地 | |
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81
obtrude
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| v.闯入；侵入；打扰 | |
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82
undesirable
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| adj.不受欢迎的，不良的，不合意的，讨厌的；n.不受欢迎的人，不良分子 | |
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83
bereaved
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| adj.刚刚丧失亲人的v.使失去（希望、生命等）( bereave的过去式和过去分词)；（尤指死亡）使丧失（亲人、朋友等）；使孤寂；抢走（财物） | |
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84
awakened
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| v.（使）醒( awaken的过去式和过去分词 )；（使）觉醒；弄醒；（使）意识到 | |
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