But this second time I jumped up with a genuine start of terror. It was neither the wind nor the river that woke me, but the slow approach of something that caused the sleeping portion of me to grow smaller and smaller till at last it vanished altogether, and I found myself sitting bolt upright—listening.
Outside there was a sound of multitudinous little patterings. They had been coming, I was aware, for a long time, and in my sleep they had first become audible. I sat there nervously2 wide awake as though I had not slept at all. It seemed to me that my breathing came with difficulty, and that there was a great weight upon the surface of my body. In spite of the hot night, I felt clammy with cold and shivered. Something surely was pressing steadily3 against the sides of the tent and weighing down upon it from above. Was it the body of the wind? Was this the pattering rain, the dripping of the leaves? The spray blown from the river by the wind and gathering4 in big drops? I thought quickly of a dozen things.
Then suddenly the explanation leaped into my mind: a bough5 from the poplar, the only large tree on the island, had fallen with the wind. Still half caught by the other branches, it would fall with the next gust6 and crush us, and meanwhile its leaves brushed and tapped upon the tight canvas surface of the tent. I raised the loose flap and rushed out, calling to the Swede to follow.
But when I got out and stood upright I saw that the tent was free. There was no hanging bough; there was no rain or spray; nothing approached.
A cold, gray light filtered down through the bushes and lay on the faintly gleaming sand. Stars still crowded the sky directly overhead, and the wind howled magnificently, but the fire no longer gave out any glow, and I saw the east reddening in streaks7 through the trees. Several hours must have passed since I stood there before, watching the ascending8 figures, and the memory of it now came back to me horribly, like an evil dream. Oh, how tired it made me feel, that ceaseless raging wind! Yet, though the deep lassitude of a sleepless9 night was on me, my nerves were tingling10 with the activity of an equally tireless apprehension11, and all idea of repose12 was out of the question. The river I saw had risen further. Its thunder filled the air, and a fine spray made itself felt through my thin sleeping shirt.
Yet nowhere did I discover the slightest evidences of anything to cause alarm. This deep, prolonged disturbance13 in my heart remained wholly unaccounted for.
My companion had not stirred when I called him, and there was no need to waken him now. I looked about me carefully, noting everything: the turned-over canoe; the yellow paddles—two of them, I'm certain; the provision sack and the extra lantern hanging together from the tree; and, crowding everywhere about me, enveloping14 all, the willows15, those endless, shaking willows. A bird uttered its morning cry, and a string of duck passed with whirring flight overhead in the twilight16. The sand whirled, dry and stinging, about my bare feet in the wind.
I walked round the tent and then went out a little way into the bush, so that I could see across the river to the farther landscape, and the same profound yet indefinable emotion of distress17 seized upon me again as I saw the interminable sea of bushes stretching to the horizon, looking ghostly and unreal in the wan18 light of dawn. I walked softly here and there, still puzzling over that odd sound of infinite pattering, and of that pressure upon the tent that had wakened me. It must have been the wind, I reflected—the wind beating upon the loose, hot sand, driving the dry particles smartly against the taut19 canvas—the wind dropping heavily upon our fragile roof.
Yet all the time my nervousness and malaise increased appreciably20.
I crossed over to the farther shore and noted21 how the coast line had altered in the night, and what masses of sand the river had torn away. I dipped my hands and feet into the cool current, and bathed my forehead. Already there was a glow of sunrise in the sky and the exquisite22 freshness of coming day. On my way back I passed purposely beneath the very bushes where I had seen the column of figures rising into the air, and midway among the clumps23 I suddenly found myself overtaken by a sense of vast terror. From the shadows a large figure went swiftly by. Some one passed me, as sure as ever man did....
It was a great staggering blow from the wind that helped me forward again, and once out in the more open space, the sense of terror diminished strangely. The winds were about and walking, I remember saying to myself; for the winds often move like great presences under the trees. And altogether the fear that hovered24 about me was such an unknown and immense kind of fear, so unlike anything I had ever felt before, that it woke a sense of awe25 and wonder in me that did much to counteract26 its worst effects; and when I reached a high point in the middle of the island from which I could see the wide stretch of river, crimson27 in the sunrise, the whole magical beauty of it all was so overpowering that a sort of wild yearning28 woke in me and almost brought a cry up into the throat.
But this cry found no expression, for as my eyes wandered from the plain beyond to the island round me and noted our little tent half hidden among the willows, a dreadful discovery leaped out at me, compared to which my terror of the walking winds seemed as nothing at all.
For a change, I thought, had somehow come about in the arrangement of the landscape. It was not that my point of vantage gave me a different view, but that an alteration30 had apparently31 been effected in the relation of the tent to the willows, and of the willows to the tent. Surely the bushes now crowded much closer—unnecessarily, unpleasantly close. They had moved nearer.
Creeping with silent feet over the shifting sands, drawing imperceptibly nearer by soft, unhurried movements, the willows had come closer during the night. But had the wind moved them, or had they moved of themselves? I recalled the sound of infinite small patterings and the pressure upon the tent and upon my own heart that caused me to wake in terror. I swayed for a moment in the wind like a tree, finding it hard to keep my upright position on the sandy hillock. There was a suggestion here of personal agency, of deliberate intention, of aggressive hostility32, and it terrified me into a sort of rigidity33.
Then the reaction followed quickly. The idea was so bizarre, so absurd, that I felt inclined to laugh. But the laughter came no more readily than the cry, for the knowledge that my mind was so receptive to such dangerous imaginings brought the additional terror that it was through our minds and not through our physical bodies that the attack would come, and was coming.
The wind buffeted34 me about, and, very quickly it seemed, the sun came up over the horizon, for it was after four o'clock, and I must have stood on that little pinnacle35 of sand longer than I knew, afraid to come down at close quarters with the willows. I returned quietly, creepily, to the tent, first taking another exhaustive look round and—yes, I confess it—making a few measurements. I paced out on the warm sand the distances between the willows and the tent, making a note of the shortest distance particularly.
I crawled stealthily into my blankets. My companion, to all appearances, still slept soundly, and I was glad that this was so. Provided my experiences were not corroborated36, I could find strength somehow to deny them, perhaps. With the daylight I could persuade myself that it was all a subjective37 hallucination, a fantasy of the night, a projection38 of the excited imagination.
Nothing further came to disturb me, and I fell asleep almost at once, utterly39 exhausted40, yet still in dread29 of hearing again that weird41 sound of multitudinous pattering, or of feeling the pressure upon my heart that had made it difficult to breathe.
点击
收听单词发音
收听单词发音 |
1
underneath
|
|
| adj.在...下面，在...底下；adv.在下面 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
2
nervously
|
|
| adv.神情激动地，不安地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
3
steadily
|
|
| adv.稳定地；不变地；持续地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
4
gathering
|
|
| n.集会，聚会，聚集 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
5
bough
|
|
| n.大树枝，主枝 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
6
gust
|
|
| n.阵风，突然一阵（雨、烟等），（感情的）迸发 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
7
streaks
|
|
| 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 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
8
ascending
|
|
| adj.上升的，向上的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
9
sleepless
|
|
| adj.不睡眠的，睡不著的，不休息的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
10
tingling
|
|
| v.有刺痛感( tingle的现在分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
11
apprehension
|
|
| n.理解，领悟；逮捕，拘捕；忧虑 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
12
repose
|
|
| v.(使)休息；n.安息 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
13
disturbance
|
|
| n.动乱，骚动；打扰，干扰；(身心)失调 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
14
enveloping
|
|
| v.包围，笼罩，包住( envelop的现在分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
15
willows
|
|
| n.柳树( willow的名词复数 )；柳木 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
16
twilight
|
|
| n.暮光，黄昏；暮年，晚期，衰落时期 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
17
distress
|
|
| n.苦恼，痛苦，不舒适；不幸；vt.使悲痛 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
18
wan
|
|
| (wide area network)广域网 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
19
taut
|
|
| adj.拉紧的，绷紧的，紧张的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
20
appreciably
|
|
| adv.相当大地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
21
noted
|
|
| adj.著名的，知名的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
22
exquisite
|
|
| adj.精美的；敏锐的；剧烈的，感觉强烈的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
23
clumps
|
|
| n.（树、灌木、植物等的）丛、簇( clump的名词复数 )；（土、泥等）团；块；笨重的脚步声v.（树、灌木、植物等的）丛、簇( clump的第三人称单数 )；（土、泥等）团；块；笨重的脚步声 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
24
hovered
|
|
| 鸟( hover的过去式和过去分词 )； 靠近（某事物）； （人）徘徊； 犹豫 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
25
awe
|
|
| n.敬畏，惊惧；vt.使敬畏，使惊惧 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
26
counteract
|
|
| vt.对…起反作用，对抗，抵消 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
27
crimson
|
|
| n./adj.深(绯)红色(的)；vi.脸变绯红色 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
28
yearning
|
|
| a.渴望的；向往的；怀念的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
29
dread
|
|
| vt.担忧，忧虑；惧怕，不敢；n.担忧，畏惧 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
30
alteration
|
|
| n.变更，改变；蚀变 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
31
apparently
|
|
| adv.显然地；表面上，似乎 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
32
hostility
|
|
| n.敌对，敌意；抵制［pl.］交战，战争 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
33
rigidity
|
|
| adj.钢性，坚硬 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
34
buffeted
|
|
| 反复敲打( buffet的过去式和过去分词 )； 连续猛击； 打来打去； 推来搡去 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
35
pinnacle
|
|
| n.尖塔，尖顶，山峰；(喻)顶峰 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
36
corroborated
|
|
| v.证实，支持（某种说法、信仰、理论等）( corroborate的过去式 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
37
subjective
|
|
| a.主观(上)的，个人的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
38
projection
|
|
| n.发射，计划，突出部分 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
39
utterly
|
|
| adv.完全地，绝对地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
40
exhausted
|
|
| adj.极其疲惫的，精疲力尽的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
41
weird
|
|
| adj.古怪的，离奇的；怪诞的，神秘而可怕的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
| 欢迎访问英文小说网 |