Chapter 37

    124 WAS LOUD. Stamp Paid could hear it even from the road. He walked toward the householding his head as high as possible so nobody looking could call him a sneak¹, although hisworried mind made him feel like one. Ever since he showed that newspaper clipping to Paul D andlearned that he'd moved out of 124 that very day, Stamp felt uneasy. Having wrestled² with thequestion of whether or not to tell a man about his woman, and having convinced himself that heshould, he then began to worry about Sethe. Had he stopped the one shot she had of the happinessa good man could bring her? Was she vexed³ by the loss, the free and unasked-for revival⁴ of gossipby the man who had helped her cross the river and who was her friend as well as Baby Suggs'?

　　"I'm too old," he thought, "for clear thinking. I'm too old and I seen too much." He had insisted onprivacy during the revelation at the slaughter⁵ yard — now he wondered whom he was protecting.

　　Paul D was the only one in town who didn't know. How did information that had been in thenewspaper become a secret that needed to be whispered in a pig yard? A secret from whom? Sethe,that's who. He'd gone behind her back, like a sneak. But sneaking⁶ was his job — his life; thoughalways for a clear and holy purpose. Before the War all he did was sneak: runaways⁷ into hiddenplaces, secret information to public places. Underneath⁸ his legal vegetables were the contrabandhumans that he ferried across the river. Even the pigs he worked in the spring served his purposes.

　　Whole families lived on the bones and guts⁹ he distributed to them. He wrote their letters and readto them the ones they received. He knew who had dropsy and who needed stovewood; whichchildren had a gift and which needed correction. He knew the secrets of the Ohio River and itsbanks; empty houses and full; the best dancers, the worst speakers, those with beautiful voices andthose who could not carry a tune¹⁰. There was nothing interesting between his legs, but heremembered when there had been — when that drive drove the driven — and that was why heconsidered long and hard before opening his wooden box and searching for the eighteen-year-oldclipping to show Paul D as proof.

　　Afterward — not before — he considered Sethe's feelings in the matter. And it was the lateness ofthis consideration that made him feel so bad. Maybe he should have left it alone; maybe Sethe would have gotten around to telling him herself; maybe he was not the high minded Soldier ofChrist he thought he was, but an ordinary, plain meddler¹¹ who had interrupted something goingalong just fine for the sake of truth and forewarning, things he set much store by. Now 124 wasback like it was before Paul D came to town — worrying Sethe and Denver with a pack of hauntshe could hear from the road. Even if Sethe could deal with the return of the spirit, Stamp didn'tbelieve her daughter could. Denver needed somebody normal in her life. By luck he had been thereat her very birth almost — before she knew she was alive — and it made him partial to her. It wasseeing her, alive, don't you know, and looking healthy four weeks later that pleased him so muchhe gathered all he could carry of the best blackberries in the county and stuck two in her mouthfirst, before he presented the difficult harvest to Baby Suggs. To this day he believed his berries(which sparked the feast and the wood chopping that followed) were the reason Denver was stillalive. Had he not been there, chopping firewood, Sethe would have spread her baby brains on theplanking. Maybe he should have thought of Denver, if not Sethe, before he gave Paul D the newsthat ran him off, the one normal somebody in the girl's life since Baby Suggs died. And right therewas the thorn.

1 sneak   

vt.潜行(隐藏,填石缝)；偷偷摸摸做；n.潜行；adj.暗中进行

参考例句：

• He raised his spear and sneak forward.他提起长矛悄悄地前进。
• I saw him sneak away from us.我看见他悄悄地从我们身边走开。

2 wrestled   

v.（与某人）搏斗( wrestle的过去式和过去分词 )；扭成一团；扭打；（与…）摔跤

参考例句：

• As a boy he had boxed and wrestled. 他小的时候又是打拳又是摔跤。
• Armed guards wrestled with the intruder. 武装警卫和闯入者扭打起来。 来自《简明英汉词典》

3 vexed   

adj.争论不休的；（指问题等）棘手的；争论不休的问题；烦恼的v.使烦恼( vex的过去式和过去分词 )；使苦恼；使生气；详细讨论

参考例句：

• The conference spent days discussing the vexed question of border controls. 会议花了几天的时间讨论边境关卡这个难题。
• He was vexed at his failure. 他因失败而懊恼。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》

4 revival   

n.复兴，复苏，（精力、活力等的）重振

参考例句：

• The period saw a great revival in the wine trade.这一时期葡萄酒业出现了很大的复苏。
• He claimed the housing market was showing signs of a revival.他指出房地产市场正出现复苏的迹象。

5 slaughter   

n.屠杀，屠宰；vt.屠杀，宰杀

参考例句：

• I couldn't stand to watch them slaughter the cattle.我不忍看他们宰牛。
• Wholesale slaughter was carried out in the name of progress.大规模的屠杀在维护进步的名义下进行。

6 sneaking   

a.秘密的，不公开的

参考例句：

• She had always had a sneaking affection for him. 以前她一直暗暗倾心于他。
• She ducked the interviewers by sneaking out the back door. 她从后门偷偷溜走，躲开采访者。

7 runaways   

（轻而易举的）胜利( runaway的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• They failed to find any trace of the runaways. 他们未能找到逃跑者的任何踪迹。
• Unmanageable complexity can result in massive foul-ups or spectacular budget "runaways. " 这种失控的复杂性会造成大量的故障或惊人的预算“失控”。

8 underneath   

adj.在...下面，在...底下；adv.在下面

参考例句：

• Working underneath the car is always a messy job.在汽车底下工作是件脏活。
• She wore a coat with a dress underneath.她穿着一件大衣，里面套着一条连衣裙。

9 guts   

v.狼吞虎咽，贪婪地吃，飞碟游戏（比赛双方每组5人，相距15码，互相掷接飞碟）；毁坏（建筑物等）的内部( gut的第三人称单数 )；取出…的内脏n.勇气( gut的名词复数 )；内脏；消化道的下段；肠

参考例句：

• I'll only cook fish if the guts have been removed. 鱼若已收拾干净，我只需烧一下即可。
• Barbara hasn't got the guts to leave her mother. 巴巴拉没有勇气离开她妈妈。 来自《简明英汉词典》

10 tune   

n.调子；和谐，协调；v.调音，调节，调整

参考例句：

• He'd written a tune,and played it to us on the piano.他写了一段曲子，并在钢琴上弹给我们听。
• The boy beat out a tune on a tin can.那男孩在易拉罐上敲出一首曲子。

11 meddler   

n.爱管闲事的人，干涉者

参考例句：

• "I know you, you scoundrel! I have heard of you before. You are Holmes, the meddler." “我知道你，这个恶棍。我以前听过你。你是福尔摩斯，爱管闲事的人。” 来自互联网