Somewhere behind a screen a clock began wheezing¹, as though oppressed by something, as though someone were strangling it. After an unnaturally² prolonged wheezing there followed a shrill⁴, nasty, and as it were unexpectedly rapid, chime — as though someone were suddenly jumping forward. It struck two. I woke up, though I had indeed not been asleep but lying half-conscious.

It was almost completely dark in the narrow, cramped⁵, low-pitched room, cumbered up with an enormous wardrobe and piles of cardboard boxes and all sorts of frippery and litter. The candle end that had been burning on the table was going out and gave a faint flicker⁶ from time to time. In a few minutes there would be complete darkness.

I was not long in coming to myself; everything came back to my mind at once, without an effort, as though it had been in ambush⁷ to pounce⁸ upon me again. And, indeed, even while I was unconscious a point seemed continually to remain in my memory unforgotten, and round it my dreams moved drearily⁹. But strange to say, everything that had happened to me in that day seemed to me now, on waking, to be in the far, far away past, as though I had long, long ago lived all that down.

My head was full of fumes¹⁰. Something seemed to be hovering¹¹ over me, rousing me, exciting me, and making me restless. Misery¹² and spite seemed surging up in me again and seeking an

分享到：