II t was, I think, about a week later, that Partridge informed me that Mrs. Baker1 would like to speak to me for a minuteor two if I would be so kind.
The name Mrs. Baker conveyed nothing at all to me.
“Who is Mrs. Baker?” I said, bewildered—“Can’t she see Miss Joanna?”
But it appeared that I was the person with whom an interview was desired. It further transpired2 that Mrs. Baker wasthe mother of the girl Beatrice.
I had forgotten Beatrice. For a fortnight now, I had been conscious of a middle-aged3 woman with wisps of greyhair, usually on her knees retreating crablike4 from bathroom and stairs and passages when I appeared, and I knew, Isuppose, that she was our new Daily Woman. Otherwise the Beatrice complication had faded from my mind.
I could not very well refuse to see Beatrice’s mother, especially as I learned that Joanna was out, but I was, I mustconfess, a little nervous at the prospect5. I sincerely hoped that I was not going to be accused of having trifled withBeatrice’s affections. I cursed the mischievous6 activities of anonymous7 letter writers to myself at the same time as,aloud, I commanded that Beatrice’s mother should be brought to my presence.
Mrs. Baker was a big broad weather-beaten woman with a rapid flow of speech. I was relieved to notice no signs ofanger or accusation8.
“I hope, sir,” she said, beginning at once when the door had closed behind Partridge, “that you’ll excuse the libertyI’ve taken in coming to see you. But I thought, sir, as you was the proper person to come to, and I should be thankfulif you could see your way to telling me what I ought to do in the circumstances, because in my opinion, sir, somethingought to be done, and I’ve never been one to let the grass grow under my feet, and what I say is, no use moaning andgroaning, but ‘Up and doing’ as vicar said in his sermon only the week before last.”
I felt slightly bewildered and as though I had missed something essential in the conversation.
“Certainly,” I said. “Won’t you—er—sit down, Mrs. Baker? I’m sure I shall be glad to—er help you in anyway Ican—”
I paused expectantly.
“Thank you, sir.” Mrs. Baker sat down on the edge of a chair. “It’s very good of you, I’m sure. And glad I am that Icame to you, I said to Beatrice, I said, and her howling and crying on her bed, Mr. Burton will know what to do, I said,being a London gentleman. And something must be done, what with young men being so hotheaded and not listeningto reason the way they are, and not listening to a word a girl says, and anyway, if it was me, I says to Beatrice I’d givehim as good as I got, and what about that girl down at the mill?”
I felt more than ever bewildered.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “But I don’t quite understand. What has happened?”
“It’s the letters, sir. Wicked letters—indecent, too, using such words and all. Worse than I’ve ever seen in theBible, even.”
Passing over an interesting sideline here, I said desperately9:
“Has your daughter been having more letters?”
“Not her, sir. She had just the one. That one as was the occasion of her leaving here.”
“There was absolutely no reason—” I began, but Mrs. Baker firmly and respectfully interrupted me:
“There is no need to tell me, sir, that what was wrote was all wicked lies. I had Miss Partridge’s word for that—andindeed I would have known it for myself. You aren’t that type of gentleman, sir, that I well know, and you an invalidand all. Wicked untruthful lies it was, but all the same I says to Beatrice as she’d better leave because you know whattalk is, sir. No smoke without fire, that’s what people say. And a girl can’t be too careful. And besides the girl herselffelt bashful like after what had been written, so I says, ‘Quite right,’ to Beatrice when she said she wasn’t coming uphere again, though I’m sure we both regretted the inconvenience being such—”
Unable to find her way out of this sentence, Mrs. Baker took a deep breath and began again.
“And that, I hoped, would be the end of any nasty talk. But now George, down at the garage, him what Beatrice isgoing with, he’s got one of them. Saying awful things about our Beatrice, and how she’s going on with FredLedbetter’s Tom—and I can assure you, sir, the girl has been no more than civil to him and passing the time of day soto speak.”
My head was now reeling under this new complication of Mr. Ledbetter’s Tom.
“Let me get this straight,” I said. “Beatrice’s—er—young man has had an anonymous letter making accusationsabout her and another young man?”
“That’s right, sir, and not nicely put at all—horrible words used, and it drove young George mad with rage, it did,and he came round and told Beatrice he wasn’t going to put up with that sort of thing from her, and he wasn’t going tohave her go behind his back with other chaps—and she says it’s all a lie—and he says no smoke without fire, he says,and rushes off being hot-like in his temper, and Beatrice she took on ever so, poor girl, and I said I’ll put my hat onand come straight up to you, sir.”
Mrs. Baker paused and looked at me expectantly, like a dog waiting for reward after doing a particularly clevertrick.
“But why come to me?” I demanded.
“I understood, sir, that you’d had one of these nasty letters yourself, and I thought, sir, that being a Londongentleman, you’d know what to do about them.”
“If I were you,” I said, “I should go to the police. This sort of thing ought to be stopped.”
Mrs. Baker looked deeply shocked.
“Oh, no, sir. I couldn’t go to the police.”
“Why not?”
“I’ve never been mixed up with the police, sir. None of us ever have.”
“Probably not. But the police are the only people who can deal with this sort of thing. It’s their business.”
“Go to Bert Rundle?”
Bert Rundle was the constable10, I knew.
“There’s a sergeant11, or an inspector12, surely, at the police station.”
“Me, go into the police station?”
Mrs. Baker’s voice expressed reproach and incredulity. I began to feel annoyed.
“That’s the only advice I can give you.”
Mrs. Baker was silent, obviously quite unconvinced. She said wistfully and earnestly:
“These letters ought to be stopped, sir, they did ought to be stopped. There’ll be mischief13 done sooner or later.”
“It seems to me there is mischief done now,” I said.
“I meant violence, sir. These young fellows, they get violent in their feelings—and so do the older ones.”
I asked:
“Are a good many of these letters going about?”
Mrs. Baker nodded.
“It’s getting worse and worse, sir. Mr. and Mrs. Beadle at the Blue Boar—very happy they’ve always been—andnow these letters comes and it sets him thinking things—things that aren’t so, sir.”
I leaned forward:
“Mrs. Baker,” I said, “have you any idea, any idea at all, who is writing these abominable14 letters?”
To my great surprise she nodded her head.
“We’ve got our idea, sir. Yes, we’ve all got a very fair idea.”
“Who is it?”
I had fancied she might be reluctant to mention a name, but she replied promptly15:
“’Tis Mrs. Cleat—that’s what we all think, sir. ’Tis Mrs. Cleat for sure.”
I had heard so many names this morning that I was quite bewildered. I asked:
“Who is Mrs. Cleat?”
Mrs. Cleat, I discovered, was the wife of an elderly jobbing gardener. She lived in a cottage on the road leadingdown to the Mill. My further questions only brought unsatisfactory answers. Questioned as to why Mrs. Cleat shouldwrite these letters, Mrs. Baker would only say vaguely16 that “’T would be like her.”
In the end I let her go, reiterating17 once more my advice to go to the police, advice which I could see Mrs. Bakerwas not going to act upon. I was left with the impression that I had disappointed her.
I thought over what she had said. Vague as the evidence was, I decided18 that if the village was all agreed that Mrs.
Cleat was the culprit, then it was probably true. I decided to go and consult Griffith about the whole thing. Presumablyhe would know this Cleat woman. If he thought advisable, he or I might suggest to the police that she was at thebottom of this growing annoyance19.
I timed my arrival for about the moment I fancied Griffith would have finished his “Surgery.” When the last patienthad left, I went into the surgery.
“Hallo, it’s you, Burton.”
I outlined my conversation with Mrs. Baker, and passed on to him the conviction that this Mrs. Cleat wasresponsible. Rather to my disappointment, Griffith shook his head.
“It’s not so simple as that,” he said.
“You don’t think this Cleat woman is at the bottom of it?”
“She may be. But I should think it most unlikely.”
“Then why do they all think it is her?”
He smiled.
“Oh,” he said, “you don’t understand. Mrs. Cleat is the local witch.”
“Good gracious!” I exclaimed.
“Yes, sounds rather strange nowadays, nevertheless that’s what it amounts to. The feeling lingers, you know, thatthere are certain people, certain families, for instance, whom it isn’t wise to offend. Mrs. Cleat came from a family of‘wise women.’ And I’m afraid she’s taken pains to cultivate the legend. She’s a queer woman with a bitter andsardonic sense of humour. It’s been easy enough for her, if a child cut its finger, or had a bad fall, or sickened withmumps, to nod her head and say, ‘Yes, he stole my apples last week’ or ‘He pulled my cat’s tail.’ Soon enoughmothers pulled their children away, and other women brought honey or a cake they’d baked to give to Mrs. Cleat so asto keep on the right side of her so that she shouldn’t ‘ill wish’ them. It’s superstitious20 and silly, but it happens. Sonaturally, now, they think she’s at the bottom of this.”
“But she isn’t?”
“Oh, no. She isn’t the type. It’s—it’s not so simple as that.”
“Have you any idea?” I looked at him curiously21.
He shook his head, but his eyes were absent.
“No,” he said. “I don’t know at all. But I don’t like it, Burton—some harm is going to come of this.”
II
When I got back to the house I found Megan sitting on the veranda22 steps, her chin resting on her knees.
She greeted me with her usual lack of ceremony.
“Hallo,” she said. “Do you think I could come to lunch?”
“Certainly,” I said.
“If it’s chops, or anything difficult like that and they won’t go round, just tell me,” shouted Megan as I went roundto apprize Partridge of the fact that there would be three to lunch.
I fancy that Partridge sniffed23. She certainly managed to convey without saying a word of any kind, that she didn’tthink much of that Miss Megan.
I went back to the veranda.
“Is it quite all right?” asked Megan anxiously.
“Quite all right,” I said. “Irish stew24.”
“Oh well, that’s rather like dogs’ dinner anyway, isn’t it? I mean it’s mostly potato and flavour.”
“Quite,” I said.
I took out my cigarette case and offered it to Megan. She flushed.
“How nice of you.”
“Won’t you have one?”
“No, I don’t think I will, but it was very nice of you to offer it to me—just as though I was a real person.”
“Aren’t you a real person?” I said amused.
Megan shook her head, then, changing the subject, she stretched out a long dusty leg for my inspection25.
“I’ve darned my stockings,” she announced proudly.
I am not an authority on darning, but it did occur to me that the strange puckered26 blot27 of violently contrasting woolwas perhaps not quite a success.
“It’s much more uncomfortable than the hole,” said Megan.
“It looks as though it might be,” I agreed.
“Does your sister darn well?”
I tried to think if I had ever observed any of Joanna’s handiwork in this direction.
“I don’t know,” I had to confess.
“Well, what does she do when she gets a hole in her stocking?”
“I rather think,” I said reluctantly, “that she throws them away and buys another pair.”
“Very sensible,” said Megan. “But I can’t do that. I get an allowance now—forty pounds a year. You can’t domuch on that.”
I agreed.
“If only I wore black stockings, I could ink my legs,” said Megan sadly. “That’s what I always did at school. MissBatworthy, the mistress who looked after our mending was like her name—blind as a bat. It was awfully28 useful.”
“It must have been,” I said.
We were silent while I smoked my pipe. It was quite a companionable silence.
Megan broke it by saying suddenly and violently:
“I suppose you think I’m awful, like everyone else?”
I was so startled that my pipe fell out of my mouth. It was a meerschaum, just colouring nicely, and it broke. I saidangrily to Megan:
“Now, see what you’ve done.”
That most unaccountable of children, instead of being upset, merely grinned broadly.
“I do like you,” she said.
It was a most warming remark. It is the remark that one fancies perhaps erroneously that one’s dog would say if hecould talk. It occurred to me that Megan, for all she looked like a horse, had the disposition29 of a dog. She was certainlynot quite human.
“What did you say before the catastrophe30?” I asked, carefully picking up the fragments of my cherished pipe.
“I said I supposed you thought me awful,” said Megan, but not at all in the same tone she had said it before.
“Why should I?”
Megan said gravely:
“Because I am.”
I said sharply:
“Don’t be stupid.”
Megan shook her head.
“That’s just it. I’m not really stupid. People think I am. They don’t know that inside I know just what they’re like,and that all the time I’m hating them.”
“Hating them?”
“Yes,” said Megan.
Her eyes, those melancholy32, unchildlike eyes, stared straight into mine, without blinking. It was a long mournfulgaze.
“You would hate people if you were like me,” she said. “If you weren’t wanted.”
“Don’t you think you’re being rather morbid33?” I asked.
“Yes,” said Megan. “That’s what people always say when you’re saying the truth. And it is true. I’m not wantedand I can quite see why. Mummie doesn’t like me a bit. I remind her, I think, of my father, who was cruel to her andpretty dreadful from all I can hear. Only mothers can’t say they don’t want their children and just go away. Or eatthem. Cats eat the kittens they don’t like. Awfully sensible, I think. No waste or mess. But human mothers have tokeep their children, and look after them. It hasn’t been so bad while I could be sent away to school—but you see, whatMummie would really like is to be just herself and my stepfather and the boys.”
I said slowly:
“I still think you’re morbid, Megan, but accepting some of what you say as true, why don’t you go away and have alife of your own?”
She gave me an unchildlike smile.
“You mean take up a career. Earn my living?”
“Yes.”
“What at?”
“You could train for something, I suppose. Shorthand typing—bookkeeping.”
“I don’t believe I could. I am stupid about doing things. And besides—”
“Well?”
She had turned her face away, now she turned it slowly back again. It was crimson34 and there were tears in her eyes.
She spoke35 now with all the childishness back in her voice.
“Why should I go away? And be made to go away? They don’t want me, but I’ll stay. I’ll stay and make everyonesorry. I’ll make them all sorry. Hateful pigs! I hate everyone here in Lymstock. They all think I’m stupid and ugly. I’llshow them. I’ll show them. I’ll—”
It was a childish, oddly pathetic rage.
I heard a step on the gravel31 round the corner of the house.
“Get up,” I said savagely36. “Go into the house through the drawing room. Go up to the first floor to the bathroom.
End of the passage. Wash your face. Quick.”
She sprang awkwardly to her feet and darted37 through the window as Joanna came round the corner of the house.
“Gosh, I’m hot,” she called out. She sat down beside me and fanned her face with the Tyrolean scarf that had beenround her head. “Still I think I’m educating these damned brogues now. I’ve walked miles. I’ve learnt one thing, youshouldn’t have these fancy holes in your brogues. The gorse prickles go through. Do you know, Jerry, I think we oughtto have a dog?”
“So do I,” I said. “By the way, Megan is coming to lunch.”
“Is she? Good.”
“You like her?” I asked.
“I think she’s a changeling,” said Joanna. “Something left on a doorstep, you know, while the fairies take the rightone away. It’s very interesting to meet a changeling. Oof, I must go up and wash.”
“You can’t yet,” I said, “Megan is washing.”
“Oh, she’s been footslogging too, has she?”
Joanna took out her mirror and looked at her face long and earnestly. “I don’t think I like this lipstick,” sheannounced presently.
Megan came out through the window. She was composed, moderately clean, and showed no signs of the recentstorm. She looked doubtfully at Joanna.
“Hallo,” said Joanna, still preoccupied38 by her face. “I’m so glad you’ve come to lunch. Good gracious, I’ve got afreckle on my nose. I must do something about it. Freckles39 are so earnest and Scottish.”
Partridge came out and said coldly that luncheon40 was served.
“Come on,” said Joanna, getting up. “I’m starving.”
She put her arm through Megan’s and they went into the house together.
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收听单词发音
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1
baker
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| n.面包师 | |
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transpired
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| （事实，秘密等）被人知道( transpire的过去式和过去分词 )； 泄露； 显露； 发生 | |
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middle-aged
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| adj.中年的 | |
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crablike
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| adj.似蟹的，似蟹行般的 | |
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prospect
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| n.前景，前途；景色，视野 | |
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mischievous
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| adj.调皮的，恶作剧的，有害的，伤人的 | |
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anonymous
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accusation
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desperately
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constable
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| n.(英国)警察，警官 | |
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sergeant
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| n.警官，中士 | |
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inspector
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| n.检查员，监察员，视察员 | |
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mischief
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| n.损害，伤害，危害；恶作剧，捣蛋，胡闹 | |
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abominable
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| adj.可厌的，令人憎恶的 | |
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promptly
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| adv.及时地，敏捷地 | |
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vaguely
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| adv.含糊地，暖昧地 | |
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reiterating
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| 反复地说，重申( reiterate的现在分词 ) | |
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decided
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| adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的 | |
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annoyance
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superstitious
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curiously
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| adv.有求知欲地；好问地；奇特地 | |
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veranda
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| n.走廊；阳台 | |
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sniffed
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| v.以鼻吸气，嗅，闻( sniff的过去式和过去分词 )；抽鼻子（尤指哭泣、患感冒等时出声地用鼻子吸气）；抱怨，不以为然地说 | |
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stew
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| n.炖汤，焖，烦恼；v.炖汤，焖，忧虑 | |
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inspection
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| n.检查，审查，检阅 | |
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puckered
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| v.（使某物）起褶子或皱纹( pucker的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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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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awfully
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| adv.可怕地，非常地，极端地 | |
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disposition
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| n.性情，性格；意向，倾向；排列，部署 | |
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catastrophe
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| n.大灾难，大祸 | |
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gravel
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| n.砂跞；砂砾层；结石 | |
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melancholy
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| n.忧郁，愁思；adj.令人感伤（沮丧）的，忧郁的 | |
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morbid
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| adj.病的；致病的；病态的；可怕的 | |
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crimson
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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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savagely
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| adv. 野蛮地，残酷地 | |
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darted
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| v.投掷，投射( dart的过去式和过去分词 )；向前冲，飞奔 | |
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preoccupied
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| adj.全神贯注的，入神的；被抢先占有的；心事重重的v.占据（某人）思想，使对…全神贯注，使专心于( preoccupy的过去式) | |
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freckles
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| n.雀斑，斑点( freckle的名词复数 ) | |
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luncheon
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| n.午宴，午餐，便宴 | |
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