Wunsch and old Fritz and Spanish Johnny celebrated1 Christmas together, so riotously2 that Wunsch was unable to give Thea her lesson the next day. In the middle of the vacation week Thea went to the Kohlers’ through a soft, beautiful snowstorm. The air was a tender blue-gray, like the color on the doves that flew in and out of the white dove-house on the post in the Kohlers’ garden. The sand hills looked dim and sleepy. The tamarisk hedge was full of snow, like a foam3 of blossoms drifted over it. When Thea opened the gate, old Mrs. Kohler was just coming in from the chicken yard, with five fresh eggs in her apron4 and a pair of old top-boots on her feet. She called Thea to come and look at a bantam egg, which she held up proudly. Her bantam hens were remiss5 in zeal6, and she was always delighted when they accomplished7 anything. She took Thea into the sitting-room8, very warm and smelling of food, and brought her a plateful of little Christmas cakes, made according to old and hallowed formulae, and put them before her while she warmed her feet. Then she went to the door of the kitchen stairs and called: “Herr Wunsch, Herr Wunsch!”
Wunsch came down wearing an old wadded jacket, with a velvet9 collar. The brown silk was so worn that the wadding stuck out almost everywhere. He avoided Thea’s eyes when he came in, nodded without speaking, and pointed10 directly to the piano stool. He was not so insistent11 upon the scales as usual, and throughout the little sonata12 of Mozart’s she was studying, he remained languid and absent-minded. His eyes looked very heavy, and he kept wiping them with one of the new silk handkerchiefs Mrs. Kohler had given him for Christmas. When the lesson was over he did not seem inclined to talk. Thea, loitering on the stool, reached for a tattered13 book she had taken off the music-rest when she sat down. It was a very old Leipsic edition of the piano score of Gluck’s “Orpheus.” She turned over the pages curiously14.
“Is it nice?” she asked.
“It is the most beautiful opera ever made,” Wunsch declared solemnly. “You know the story, eh? How, when she die, Orpheus went down below for his wife?”
“Oh, yes, I know. I didn’t know there was an opera about it, though. Do people sing this now?”
“Aber ja! What else? You like to try? See.” He drew her from the stool and sat down at the piano. Turning over the leaves to the third act, he handed the score to Thea. “Listen, I play it through and you get the rhythmus. Eins, zwei, drei, vier.” He played through Orpheus’ lament15, then pushed back his cuffs16 with awakening17 interest and nodded at Thea. “Now, vom blatt, mit mir.”
“Ach, ich habe sie verloren,
“Noch einmal, alone, yourself.” He played the introductory measures, then nodded at her vehemently20, and she began:—
“Ach, ich habe sie verloren.”
When she finished, Wunsch nodded again. “Schön,” he muttered as he finished the accompaniment softly. He dropped his hands on his knees and looked up at Thea. “That is very fine, eh? There is no such beautiful melody in the world. You can take the book for one week and learn something, to pass the time. It is good to know—always. Euridice, Eu—ri—di—ce, weh dass ich auf Erden bin21!” he sang softly, playing the melody with his right hand.
Thea, who was turning over the pages of the third act, stopped and scowled22 at a passage. The old German’s blurred23 eyes watched her curiously.
“For what do you look so, immer?” puckering24 up his own face. “You see something a little difficult, may-be, and you make such a face like it was an enemy.”
Thea laughed, disconcerted. “Well, difficult things are enemies, aren’t they? When you have to get them?”
Wunsch lowered his head and threw it up as if he were butting25 something. “Not at all! By no means.” He took the book from her and looked at it. “Yes, that is not so easy, there. This is an old book. They do not print it so now any more, I think. They leave it out, may-be. Only one woman could sing that good.”
Thea looked at him in perplexity.
Wunsch went on. “It is written for alto, you see. A woman sings the part, and there was only one to sing that good in there. You understand? Only one!” He glanced at her quickly and lifted his red forefinger26 upright before her eyes.
Thea looked at the finger as if she were hypnotized. “Only one?” she asked breathlessly; her hands, hanging at her sides, were opening and shutting rapidly.
Wunsch nodded and still held up that compelling finger. When he dropped his hands, there was a look of satisfaction in his face.
“Was she very great?”
Wunsch nodded.
“Was she beautiful?”
“Aber gar nicht! Not at all. She was ugly; big mouth, big teeth, no figure, nothing at all,” indicating a luxuriant bosom27 by sweeping28 his hands over his chest. “A pole, a post! But for the voice—ach! She have something in there, behind the eyes,” tapping his temples.
Thea followed all his gesticulations intently. “Was she German?”
“No, Spanisch.” He looked down and frowned for a moment. “Ach, I tell you, she look like the Frau Tellamantez, some-thing. Long face, long chin, and ugly al-so.”
“Did she die a long while ago?”
“Die? I think not. I never hear, anyhow. I guess she is alive somewhere in the world; Paris, may-be. But old, of course. I hear her when I was a youth. She is too old to sing now any more.”
“Was she the greatest singer you ever heard?”
Wunsch nodded gravely. “Quite so. She was the most—” he hunted for an English word, lifted his hand over his head and snapped his fingers noiselessly in the air, enunciating fiercely, “künst-ler-isch!” The word seemed to glitter in his uplifted hand, his voice was so full of emotion.
Wunsch rose from the stool and began to button his wadded jacket, preparing to return to his half-heated room in the loft29. Thea regretfully put on her cloak and hood30 and set out for home.
When Wunsch looked for his score late that afternoon, he found that Thea had not forgotten to take it with her. He smiled his loose, sarcastic31 smile, and thoughtfully rubbed his stubbly chin with his red fingers. When Fritz came home in the early blue twilight32 the snow was flying faster, Mrs. Kohler was cooking Hasenpfeffer in the kitchen, and the professor was seated at the piano, playing the Gluck, which he knew by heart. Old Fritz took off his shoes quietly behind the stove and lay down on the lounge before his masterpiece, where the firelight was playing over the walls of Moscow. He listened, while the room grew darker and the windows duller. Wunsch always came back to the same thing:—
“Ach, ich habe sie verloren,
...
Euridice, Euridice!”
From time to time Fritz sighed softly. He, too, had lost a Euridice.
点击
收听单词发音
收听单词发音 |
1
celebrated
|
|
| adj.有名的，声誉卓著的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
2
riotously
|
|
| adv.骚动地，暴乱地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
3
foam
|
|
| v./n.泡沫，起泡沫 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
4
apron
|
|
| n.围裙；工作裙 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
5
remiss
|
|
| adj.不小心的，马虎 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
6
zeal
|
|
| n.热心，热情，热忱 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
7
accomplished
|
|
| adj.有才艺的；有造诣的；达到了的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
8
sitting-room
|
|
| n.（BrE）客厅，起居室 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
9
velvet
|
|
| n.丝绒，天鹅绒；adj.丝绒制的，柔软的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
10
pointed
|
|
| adj.尖的，直截了当的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
11
insistent
|
|
| adj.迫切的，坚持的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
12
sonata
|
|
| n.奏鸣曲 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
13
tattered
|
|
| adj.破旧的，衣衫破的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
14
curiously
|
|
| adv.有求知欲地；好问地；奇特地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
15
lament
|
|
| n.悲叹，悔恨，恸哭；v.哀悼，悔恨，悲叹 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
16
cuffs
|
|
| n.袖口( cuff的名词复数 )v.掌打，拳打( cuff的第三人称单数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
17
awakening
|
|
| n.觉醒，醒悟 adj.觉醒中的；唤醒的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
18
nun
|
|
| n.修女，尼姑 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
19
aria
|
|
| n.独唱曲，咏叹调 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
20
vehemently
|
|
| adv. 热烈地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
21
bin
|
|
| n.箱柜；vt.放入箱内；[计算机] DOS文件名:二进制目标文件 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
22
scowled
|
|
| 怒视，生气地皱眉( scowl的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
23
blurred
|
|
| v.（使）变模糊( blur的过去式和过去分词 )；（使）难以区分；模模糊糊；迷离 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
24
puckering
|
|
| v.（使某物）起褶子或皱纹( pucker的现在分词 )；小褶纹；小褶皱 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
25
butting
|
|
| 用头撞人（犯规动作） | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
26
forefinger
|
|
| n.食指 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
27
bosom
|
|
| n.胸，胸部；胸怀；内心；adj.亲密的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
28
sweeping
|
|
| adj.范围广大的，一扫无遗的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
29
loft
|
|
| n.阁楼，顶楼 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
30
hood
|
|
| n.头巾，兜帽，覆盖；v.罩上，以头巾覆盖 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
31
sarcastic
|
|
| adj.讥讽的，讽刺的，嘲弄的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
32
twilight
|
|
| n.暮光，黄昏；暮年，晚期，衰落时期 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
| 欢迎访问英文小说网 |