Twenty-one（1）

Twenty-one
Mark Easterbrook’s Narrative¹
II doubt if I shall ever forget the next few days. It appears to me now as akind of bewildered kaleidoscope without sequence or form. Ginger² was re-moved from the flat to a private nursing home. I was allowed to see heronly at visiting hours.
Her own doctor, I gather, was inclined to stand on his high horse aboutthe whole business. He could not understand what the fuss was all about.
His own diagnosis³ was quite clear—bronchopneumonia following on in-fluenza, though complicated by certain slightly unusual symptoms, butthat, as he pointed⁴ out, “happens all the time. No case is ever ‘typical.’ Andsome people don’t respond to antibiotics⁵.”
And, of course, all that he said was true. Ginger had bronchopneumo-nia. There was nothing mysterious about the disease from which she wassuffering. She just had it—and had it badly.
I had one interview with the Home Office psychologist. He was a quaintlittle cock robin⁶ of a man, rising up and down on his toes, with eyes twink-ling through very thick lenses.
He asked me innumerable questions, half of which I could see no pointin whatever, but there must have been a point, for he nodded sapiently⁷ atmy answers. He entirely⁸ refused to commit himself, wherein he was prob-ably wise. He made occasional pronouncements in what I took to be thejargon of his trade. He tried, I think, various forms of hypnotism onGinger, but by what seemed to be universal consent, no one would tell mevery much. Possibly because there was nothing to tell.
I avoided my own friends and acquaintances, yet the loneliness of myexistence was insupportable.
Finally, in an excess of desperation, I rang up Poppy at her flower shop.
Would she come out and dine with me. Poppy would love to do so.
I took her to the Fantasie. Poppy prattled⁹ happily and I found her com-pany very soothing¹⁰. But I had not asked her out only for her soothingqualities. Having lulled¹¹ her into a happy stupor¹² with delicious food anddrink, I began a little cautious probing. It seemed to be possible that Poppymight know something without being wholly conscious of what it was sheknew. I asked her if she remembered my friend Ginger. Poppy said, “Ofcourse,” opening her big blue eyes, and asked what Ginger was doingnowadays.
“She’s very ill,” I said.
“Poor pet.” Poppy looked as concerned as it was possible for her to look,which was not very much.
“She got herself mixed up with something,” I said. “I believe she askedyour advice about it. Pale Horse stuff. Cost her a terrible lot of money.”
“Oh,” exclaimed Poppy, eyes wider still. “So it was you!”
For a moment or two I didn’t understand. Then it dawned upon me thatPoppy was identifying me with the “man” whose invalid¹³ wife was the barto Ginger’s happiness. So excited was she by this revelation of our love lifethat she quite failed to be alarmed by the mention of the Pale Horse.
She breathed excitedly:
“Did it work?”
“It went a bit wrong somehow,” I added, “The dog it was that died.”
“What dog?” asked Poppy, at sea.
I saw that words of one syllable¹⁴ would always be needed where Poppywas concerned.
“The—er—business seems to have recoiled¹⁵ upon Ginger. Did you everhear of that happening before?”
Poppy never had.
“Of course,” I said, “this stuff they do at the Pale Horse down in MuchDeeping—you know about that, don’t you?”
“I didn’t know where it was. Down in the country somewhere.”
“I couldn’t quite make out from Ginger what it is they do….”
I waited carefully.
“Rays, isn’t it?” said Poppy vaguely¹⁶. “Something like that. From outerspace,” she added helpfully. “Like the Russians!”
I decided¹⁷ that Poppy was now relying on her limited imagination.
“Something of that kind,” I agreed. “But it must be quite dangerous. Imean, for Ginger to get ill like this.”
“But it was your wife who was to be ill and die, wasn’t it?”
“Yes,” I said, accepting the role Ginger and Poppy had planted on me.
“But it seems to have gone wrong—backfired.”
“You mean —?” Poppy made a terrific mental effort. “Like when youplug an electric iron in wrong and you get a shock?”
“Exactly,” I said. “Just like that. Did you ever know that sort of thinghappen before?”
“Well, not that way—”
“What way, then?”
“Well, I mean if one didn’t pay up — afterwards. A man I knewwouldn’t.” Her voice dropped in an awestricken fashion. “He was killed inthe tube—fell off the platform in front of a train.”
“It might have been an accident.”
“Oh no,” said Poppy, shocked at the thought. “It was THEM.”
I poured some more champagne¹⁸ into Poppy’s glass. Here, I felt, in frontof me was someone who might be helpful if only you could tear out of herthe disassociated facts that were flitting about in what she called herbrain. She had heard things said, and assimilated about half of them, andgot them jumbled¹⁹ up and nobody had been very careful what they said be-cause it was “only Poppy.”
The maddening thing was that I didn’t know what to ask her. If I saidthe wrong thing she would shut up in alarm like a clam²⁰ and go dumb onme.
“My wife,” I said, “is still an invalid, but she doesn’t seem any worse.”
“That’s too bad,” said Poppy sympathetically, sipping²¹ champagne.
“So what do I do next?”
Poppy didn’t seem to know.
“You see it was Ginger who—I didn’t make any of the arrangements. Isthere anyone I could get at?”
“There’s a place in Birmingham,” said Poppy doubtfully.
“That’s closed down,” I said. “Don’t you know anyone else who’d knowanything about it?”
“Eileen Brandon might know something—but I don’t think so.”
The introduction of a totally unexpected Eileen Brandon startled me. Iasked who Eileen Brandon was.
“She’s terrible really,” said Poppy. “Very dim. Has her hair very tightlypermed, and never wears stiletto heels. She’s the end.” She added by wayof explanation, “I was at school with her—but she was pretty dim then.
She was frightfully good at geography.”
“What’s she got to do with the Pale Horse?”
“Nothing really. It was only an idea she got. And so she chucked it up.”
“Chucked what up?” I asked, bewildered.
“Her job with C.R.C.”
“What’s C.R.C.?”
“Well, I don’t really know exactly. They just say C.R.C. Something aboutCustomers’ Reactions or Research. It’s quite a small show.”
“And Eileen Brandon worked for them? What did she have to do?”
“Just go round and ask questions—about toothpaste or gas stoves, andwhat kind of sponges you used. Too too depressing and dull. I mean, whocares?”
“Presumably C.R.C.” I felt a slight prickling of excitement.
It was a woman employed by an association of this kind who had beenvisited by Father Gorman on the fatal night. And — yes — of course,someone of that kind had called on Ginger at the flat….
Here was a link of some kind.
“Why did she chuck up her job? Because she got bored?”
“I don’t think so. They paid quite well. But she got a sort of idea about it—that it wasn’t what it seemed.”
“She thought that it might be connected, in some way, with the PaleHorse? Is that it?”
“Well, I don’t know. Something of that kind… Anyway, she’s working inan Espresso coffee bar off Tottenham Court Road now.”
“Give me her address.”
“She’s not a bit your type.”
“I don’t want to make sexual advances to her,” I said brutally²². “I wantsome hints on Customers Research. I’m thinking of buying some shares inone of those things.”
“Oh, I see,” said Poppy, quite satisfied with this explanation.
There was nothing more to be got out of her, so we finished up thechampagne, and I took her home and thanked her for a lovely evening.

1 narrative   

n.叙述，故事；adj.叙事的，故事体的

参考例句：

• He was a writer of great narrative power.他是一位颇有记述能力的作家。
• Neither author was very strong on narrative.两个作者都不是很善于讲故事。

2 ginger   

n.姜，精力，淡赤黄色；adj.淡赤黄色的；vt.使活泼，使有生气

参考例句：

• There is no ginger in the young man.这个年轻人没有精神。
• Ginger shall be hot in the mouth.生姜吃到嘴里总是辣的。

3 diagnosis   

n.诊断，诊断结果，调查分析，判断

参考例句：

• His symptoms gave no obvious pointer to a possible diagnosis.他的症状无法作出明确的诊断。
• The engineer made a complete diagnosis of the bridge's collapse.工程师对桥的倒塌做一次彻底的调查分析。

4 pointed   

adj.尖的，直截了当的

参考例句：

• He gave me a very sharp pointed pencil.他给我一支削得非常尖的铅笔。
• She wished to show Mrs.John Dashwood by this pointed invitation to her brother.她想通过对达茨伍德夫人提出直截了当的邀请向她的哥哥表示出来。

5 antibiotics   

n.（用作复数）抗生素；（用作单数）抗生物质的研究；抗生素，抗菌素( antibiotic的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• the discovery of antibiotics in the 20th century 20世纪抗生素的发现
• The doctor gave me a prescription for antibiotics. 医生给我开了抗生素。

6 robin   

n.知更鸟，红襟鸟

参考例句：

• The robin is the messenger of spring.知更鸟是报春的使者。
• We knew spring was coming as we had seen a robin.我们看见了一只知更鸟，知道春天要到了。

7 sapiently   

参考例句：

8 entirely   

ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地

参考例句：

• The fire was entirely caused by their neglect of duty. 那场火灾完全是由于他们失职而引起的。
• His life was entirely given up to the educational work. 他的一生统统献给了教育工作。

9 prattled   

v.（小孩般）天真无邪地说话( prattle的过去式和过去分词 )；发出连续而无意义的声音；闲扯；东拉西扯

参考例句：

• She prattled on about her children all evening. 她整个晚上没完没了地唠叨她的孩子们的事。
• The water prattled over the rocks. 水在石上淙淙地流过。 来自《现代英汉综合大词典》

10 soothing   

adj.慰藉的；使人宽心的；镇静的

参考例句：

• Put on some nice soothing music.播放一些柔和舒缓的音乐。
• His casual, relaxed manner was very soothing.他随意而放松的举动让人很快便平静下来。

11 lulled   

vt.使镇静，使安静（lull的过去式与过去分词形式）

参考例句：

• They lulled her into a false sense of security. 他们哄骗她，使她产生一种虚假的安全感。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• The movement of the train lulled me to sleep. 火车轻微的震动催我进入梦乡。 来自《简明英汉词典》

12 stupor   

v.昏迷；不省人事

参考例句：

• As the whisky took effect, he gradually fell into a drunken stupor.随着威士忌酒力发作，他逐渐醉得不省人事。
• The noise of someone banging at the door roused her from her stupor.梆梆的敲门声把她从昏迷中唤醒了。

13 invalid   

n.病人，伤残人；adj.有病的，伤残的；无效的

参考例句：

• He will visit an invalid.他将要去看望一个病人。
• A passport that is out of date is invalid.护照过期是无效的。

14 syllable   

n.音节；vt.分音节

参考例句：

• You put too much emphasis on the last syllable.你把最后一个音节读得太重。
• The stress on the last syllable is light.最后一个音节是轻音节。

15 recoiled   

v.畏缩( recoil的过去式和过去分词 )；退缩；报应；返回

参考例句：

• She recoiled from his touch. 她躲开他的触摸。
• Howard recoiled a little at the sharpness in my voice. 听到我的尖声，霍华德往后缩了一下。 来自《简明英汉词典》

16 vaguely   

adv.含糊地，暖昧地

参考例句：

• He had talked vaguely of going to work abroad.他含糊其词地说了到国外工作的事。
• He looked vaguely before him with unseeing eyes.他迷迷糊糊的望着前面，对一切都视而不见。

17 decided   

adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的

参考例句：

• This gave them a decided advantage over their opponents.这使他们比对手具有明显的优势。
• There is a decided difference between British and Chinese way of greeting.英国人和中国人打招呼的方式有很明显的区别。

18 champagne   

n.香槟酒；微黄色

参考例句：

• There were two glasses of champagne on the tray.托盘里有两杯香槟酒。
• They sat there swilling champagne.他们坐在那里大喝香槟酒。

19 jumbled   

adj.混乱的；杂乱的

参考例句：

• Books, shoes and clothes were jumbled together on the floor. 书、鞋子和衣服胡乱堆放在地板上。
• The details of the accident were all jumbled together in his mind. 他把事故细节记得颠三倒四。

20 clam   

n.蛤，蛤肉

参考例句：

• Yup!I also like clam soup and sea cucumbers.对呀！我还喜欢蛤仔汤和海参。
• The barnacle and the clam are two examples of filter feeders.藤壶和蛤类是滤过觅食者的两种例子。

21 sipping   

v.小口喝，呷，抿( sip的现在分词 )

参考例句：

• She sat in the sun, idly sipping a cool drink. 她坐在阳光下懒洋洋地抿着冷饮。
• She sat there, sipping at her tea. 她坐在那儿抿着茶。

22 brutally   

adv.残忍地，野蛮地，冷酷无情地

参考例句：

• The uprising was brutally put down.起义被残酷地镇压下去了。
• A pro-democracy uprising was brutally suppressed.一场争取民主的起义被残酷镇压了。