有声名著之双城记Book2 Chapter09

（单词翻译）

　　CHAPTER IXThe Gorgon's Head

       IT was a heavy mass of building, that chaateau of Monsieur theMarquis, with a large stone court-yard before it, and twostone sweeps of staircase meeting in a stone terrace beforethe principal door. A stony business altogether, with heavystone balustrades, and stone urns, and stone flowers, andstone faces of men, and stone heads of lions, in alldirections. As if the Gorgon's head had surveyed it, when itwas finished, two centuries ago.
　　Up the broad flight of shallow steps, Monsieur the Marquis,flambeau preceded, went from his carriage, sufficientlydisturbing the darkness to elicit loud remonstrance from anowl in the roof of the great pile of stable building awayamong the trees. All else was so quiet, that the flambeaucarried up the steps, and the other flambeau held at the greatdoor, burnt as if they were in a close room of state, insteadof being in the open night-air. Other sound than the owl'svoice there was none, save the falling of a fountain into itsstone basin; for, it was one of those dark nights that holdtheir breath by the hour together, and then heave a long lowsigh, and hold their breath again.
　　The great door clanged behind him, and Monsieur the Marquiscrossed a hall grim with certain old boar-spears, swords, andknives of the chase; grimmer with certain heavy riding-rodsand riding-whips, of which many a peasant, gone to hisbenefactor Death, had felt the weight when his lord was angry.
　　Avoiding the larger rooms, which were dark and made fast forthe night, Monsieur the Marquis, with his flambeau-bearergoing on before, went up the staircase to a door in acorridor. This thrown open, admitted him to his own privateapartment of three rooms: his bed-chamber and two others. Highvaulted rooms with cool uncarpeted floors, great dogs upon thehearths for the burning of wood in winter time, and allluxuries befitting the state of a marquis in a luxurious ageand country. The fashion of the last Louis but one, of tileline that was never to break--the fourteenth Louis--wasconspicuous in their rich furniture; but, it was diversifiedby many objects that were illustrations of old pages in thehistory of France.
　　A supper-table was laid for two, in the third of the rooms; around room, in one of the chaateau's four extinguisher-toppedtowers. A small lofty room, with its window wide open, and thewooden jalousie-blinds closed, so that the dark night onlyshowed in slight horizontal lines of black, alternating withtheir broad lines of stone colour.
　　`My nephew,' said the Marquis, glancing at the supperpreparation; `they said he was not arrived.'
　　Nor was he; but, he had been expected with Monseigneur.
　　`Ah! It is not probable he will arrive to-night; nevertheless,leave the table as it is. I shall be ready in a quarter of anhour.' In a quarter of an hour Monseigneur was ready, and satdown alone to his sumptuous and choice supper. His chair wasopposite to the window, and he had taken his soup, and wasraising his glass of Bordeaux to his lips, when he put itdown.
　　`What is that?' he calmly asked, looking with attention atthe horizontal lines of black and stone colour'.
　　`Monseigneur? That?'
　　`Outside the blinds. Open the blinds.'
　　It was done.
　　`well?'
　　`Monseigneur, it is nothing. The trees and the night are allthat are here.'
　　The servant who spoke, had thrown the blinds wide, had lookedout into the vacant darkness, and stood, with that blankbehind him, looking round for instructions.
　　`Good,' said the imperturbable master. `Close them again.'
　　That was done too, and the Marquis went on with his supper. Hewas halfway through it, when he again stopped with his glassin his hand, hearing the sound of wheels. It came on briskly,and came up to the front of the chaateau.
　　`Ask who is arrived.'
　　It was the nephew of Monseigneur. He had been some fewleagues behind Monseigneur, early in the afternoon. He haddiminished the distance rapidly, but not so rapidly as to comeup with Monseigneur on the road. He had heard of Monseigneur,at the posting-houses, as being before him.
　　He was to be told (said Monseigneur) that supper awaited himthen and there, and that he was prayed to come to it. In alittle while he came. He had been known in England as CharlesDarnay.
　　Monseigneur received him in a courtly manner, but they didnot shake hands.
　　`You left Paris yesterday, sir?' he said to Monseigneur, ashe took his seat at table.
　　`Yesterday. And you?'
　　`I come direct.
　　`From London?'
　　`Yes.'
　　`You have been a long time coming,' said the Marquis, with asmile.
　　`On the contrary; I come direct.'
　　`Pardon me! I mean, not a long time on the journey; a longtime intending the Journey.
　　`I have been detained by'--the nephew stopped a moment in hisanswer--various business.'
　　`Without doubt,' said the polished uncle.
　　So long as a servant was present, no other words passedbetween them. When coffee had been served and they were alonetogether, the nephew, looking at the uncle and meeting theeyes of the face that was like a fine mask, opened aconversation.
　　`I have come back, sir, as you anticipate, pursuing theobject that took me away. It carried me into great andunexpected peril; but it is a sacred object, and if it hadcarried me to death I hope it would have sustained me.'
　　`Not to death,' said the uncle; `it is not necessary to say,to death.'
　　`I doubt, sir,' returned the nephew, `whether, if it hadcarried me to the utmost brink of death, you would have caredto stop me there.'
　　The deepened marks in the nose, and the lengthening of thefine straight lines in the cruel face, looked ominous as tothat; the uncle made a graceful gesture of protest, which wasso clearly a slight form of good breeding that it was notreassuring.
　　`Indeed, sir,' pursued the nephew, `for anything I know, youmay have expressly worked to give a more suspicious appearanceto the suspicious circumstances that surrounded me.
　　`No, no, no,' said the uncle, pleasantly.
　　`But, however that may be,' resumed the nephew, glancing athim with deep distrust, `I know that your diplomacy would stopme by any means, and would know no scruple as to means.
　　`My friend, I told you so,' said the uncle, with a finepulsation in the two marks. `Do me the favour to recall that Itold you so, long ago.'
　　`I recall it.'
　　`Thank you,' said the Marquis--very sweetly indeed.
　　His tone lingered in the air, almost like the tone of amusical instrument.
　　`In effect, sir,' pursued the nephew, `I believe it to be atonce your bad fortune, and my good fortune, that has kept meout of a prison in France here.'
　　`I do not quite understand,' returned the uncle, sipping hiscoffee. `Dare I ask you to explain?' #p#副标题#e#`I believe that if you were not in disgrace with the Court,and had not been overshadowed by that cloud for years past, aletter de cachet would have sent me to some fortressindefinitely.'
　　`It is possible,' said the uncle, with great calmness. `Forthe honour of the family, I could even resolve to incommodeyou to that extent. Pray excuse me!'
　　`I perceive that, happily for me, the Reception of the daybefore yesterday was, as usual, a cold one,' observed thenephew.
　　`I would not say happily, my friend,' returned the uncle,with refined politeness; `I would not be sure of that. A goodopportunity for consideration, surrounded by the advantages ofsolitude, might influence your destiny to far greateradvantage than you influence it for yourself. But it isuseless to discuss the question. I am, as you say, at adisadvantage. These little instruments of correction, thesegentle aids to the power and honour of families, these slightfavours that might so incommode you, are only to be obtainednow by interest and importunity. They are sought by so many,and they are granted (comparatively) to so few! It used not tobe so, but France in all such things is changed for the worse.
　　Our not remote ancestors held the right of life and death overthe surrounding vulgar. From this room, many such dogs havebeen taken out to be hanged; in the next room (my bedroom),one fellow, to our knowledge, was poniarded on the spot forprofessing some insolent delicacy respecting his daughter--hisdaughter? We have lost many privileges; a new philosophy hasbecome the mode; and the assertion of our station, in thesedays, might (I do not go so far as to say would, but might)cause us real inconvenience. All very bad, very bad!'
　　The Marquis took a gentle little pinch of snuff, and shookhis head; as elegantly despondent as he could becomingly be ofa country still containing himself, that great means ofregeneration.
　　`We have so asserted our station, both in the old time and inthe modern time also,' said the nephew, gloomily, `that Ibelieve our name to be more detested than any name in France.'
　　`Let us hope so,' said the uncle. `Detestation of the high isthe involuntary homage of the low.'
　　`There is not,' pursued the nephew, in his former tone, `aface I can look at, in all this country round about us, whichlooks at me with any deference on it but the dark deference offear and slavery.'
　　`A compliment,' said the Marquis, `to the grandeur of thefamily, merited by the manner in which the family hassustained its grandeur. Hah!' And he took another gentlelittle pinch of snuff, and lightly crossed his legs.
　　But, when his nephew, leaning an elbow on the table, coveredhis eyes thoughtfully and dejectedly with his hand, the finemask looked at him sideways with a stronger concentration ofkeenness, closeness, and dislike, than was comportable withits wearer's assumption of indifference.
　　`Repression is the only lasting philosophy. The darkdeference of fear and slavery, my friend,' observed theMarquis, `will keep tee dogs obedient to the whip, as long asthis roof,' looking up to it, `shuts out the sky.'
　　That might not be so long as the Marquis supposed. If apicture of the chaateau as it was to be a very few yearshence, and of fifty like it as they too were to be a very fewyears hence, could have been shown to him that night, he mighthave been at a loss to claim his own from the ghastly, fire-charred, plunder-wrecked ruins. As for the roof he vaunted, hemight have found that shutting out the sky in a new way--towit, for ever, from the eyes of the bodies into which its leadwas fired, out of the barrels of a hundred thousand muskets.
　　`Meanwhile,' said the Marquis, `I will preserve the honour andrepose of the family, if you will not. But you must befatigued. Shall we terminate our Conference for the night?'
　　`A moment more.'
　　`An hour, if you please.'
　　`Sir,' said the nephew, `we have done wrong, and are reapingthe fruits of wrong.'
　　`We have done wrong?' repeated the Marquis, with an inquiringsmile, and delicately pointing, first to his nephew, then tohimself.
　　`Our family; our honourable family, whose honour is of somuch account to both of us, in such different ways. Even in myfather's time, we did a world of wrong, injuring every humancreature who came between us and our pleasure, whatever itwas. Why need I speak of my father's time, when it is equallyyours? Can I separate my father's twin-brother, jointinheritor, and next successor, from himself?'
　　`Death has done that!' said the Marquis.
　　`And has left me,' answered the nephew, `bound to a systemthat is frightful to me, responsible for it, but powerless init; seeking to execute the last request of my dear mother'slips, and obey the last look of my dear mother's eyes, whichimplored file to have mercy and to redress; and tortured byseeking assistance and power in vain?
　　`Seeking them from me, my nephew,' said the Marquis, touchinghim on the breast with his forefinger--they were now standingby the hearth--you will for ever seek them in vain, beassured.
　　Every fine straight line in the clear whiteness of his face,was cruelly, craftily, and closely compressed, while he stoodlooking quietly at his nephew, with his snuff-box in his hand.
　　Once again he touched him on the breast, as though his fingerwere the fine point of a small sword, with which, in delicatefinesse, he ran him through the body, and said,`My friend, I will die, perpetuating the system under which Ihave lived.'
　　When he had said it, he took a culminating pinch of Snuff,and put his box in his pocket.
　　`Better to be a rational creature,' he added then, afterringing a small bell on the table, `and accept your naturaldestiny. But you are lost, Monsieur Charles, I see.'
　　`This property and France are lost to me,' said the nephew,sadly; `I renounce them.'
　　`Are they both yours to renounce? France may be, but is theproperty? It is scarcely worth mentioning; but, is it yet?'
　　`I had no intention, in the words I used, to claim it yet. Ifit passed to me from you, to-morrow---`Which I have the vanity to hope is not probable.'
　　`--or twenty years hence---'
　　`You do me too much honour,' said the Marquis; `still, Iprefer that supposition.'
　　`--I would abandon it, and live otherwise and elsewhere. Itis little to relinquish. What is it but a wilderness of miseryand ruin?'
　　`Hah!' said the Marquis, glancing round the luxurious room.
　　`To the eye it is fair enough, here; but seen in itsintegrity, under the sky, and by the daylight, it is acrumbling tower of waste, mismanagement, extortion, debt,mortgage, oppression, hunger, nakedness, and suffering.'
　　`Hah!' said the Marquis again, in a well-satisfied manner.
　　`If it ever becomes mine, it shall be put into some handsbetter qualified to free it slowly (if such a thing ispossible) from the weight that drags it down, so that themiserable people Who cannot leave it and who have been longwrung to the last point of endurance, may, in anothergeneration, suffer less; bat it is not for me. There is acurse on it, and on all this land.'
　　`And you?' said the uncle. `Forgive my curiosity; do you,under your new philosophy, graciously intend to live?'
　　`I must do, to live, what others of my countrymen, even withnobility at their backs, may have to do some day--work.'
　　`In England, for example?'
　　`Yes. The family honour, sir, is safe from me in thiscountry. The family name can suffer from me in no other, for Ibear it in no other.'
　　The ringing of the bell had caused the adjoining bedchamberto be lighted. It now shone brightly, through the door ofcommunication. The Marquis looked that way, and listened forthe retreating step of his valet. #p#副标题#e#`England is very attractive to you, seeing how indifferently you have prospered there,' he observed then, turning his calm face to his nephew with a smile.
　　`I have already said, that for my prospering there, I am sensible I may be indebted to you, sir. For the rest, it is my Refuge.'
　　`They say, those boastful English, that it is the Refuge of many. You know a compatriot who has found a Refuge there? A Doctor?'
　　`Yes.'
　　`With, a daughter?'
　　`Yes,' said the Marquis. `You are fatigued. Good-night!'
　　As he bent his head in his most courtly manner, there was a secrecy in his smiling face, and he conveyed an air of mystery to those words, which struck the eyes and ears of his nephew forcibly. At the same time, the thin straight lines of the setting of the eyes, and the thin straight lips, and the markings in the nose, curved with a sarcasm that looked handsomely diabolic.
　　`Yes,' repeated the Marquis. `A Doctor with a daughter. Yes. So commences the new philosophy! You are fatigued. Good-night!'
　　It would have been of as much avail to interrogate any stone face outside the chaateau as to interrogate that face of his. The nephew looked at him in vain, in passing on to the door.
　　`Good-night!' said the uncle. `I look to the pleasure of seeing you again in the morning. Good repose! Light Monsieur my nephew to his chamber there!--And burn Monsieur my nephew in his bed, if you will,' he added to himself, before he rang his little bell again, and summoned his valet to his own bedroom.
　　The valet come and gone, Monsieur the Marquis walked to and fro in his loose chamber-robe, to prepare himself gently for sleep, that hot still night. Rustling about the room, his softly-slippered feet making no noise on the floor, he moved like a refined tiger--looked like some enchanted marquis of the impenitently wicked sort, in story, whose periodical change into tiger form was either just going off, or just coming on.
　　He moved from end to end of his voluptuous bedroom, looking again at the scraps of the day's journey that came unbidden into his mind; the slow toil up the hill at sunset, the setting sun, the descent, the mill, the prison on the crag, the little village in the hollow, the peasants at the fountain, and the mender of roads with his blue cap pointing out the chain under the carriage. That fountain suggested the Paris fountain, the little bundle lying on the step, the women bending over it, and the tall man with his arms up, crying, `Dead!'
　　`I am cool now,' said Monsieur the Marquis, `and may go to bed.'
　　So, leaving only one light burning on the large hearth, he let his thin gauze curtains fall around him, and heard the night break its silence with a long sigh as he composed himself to sleep.
　　The stone faces on the outer walls stared blindly at the black night for three heavy hours; for three heavy hours tile horses in the stables rattled at their racks, the dogs barked, and the owl made a noise with very little resemblance in it to the noise conventionally assigned to the owl by men-poets. But it is the obstinate custom of such creatures hardly ever to say what is set down for them.
　　For three heavy hours, the stone faces of the chaateau, lion and human, stared blindly at the night. Dead darkness lay on all the landscape, dead darkness added its own hush to the hushing dust on all the roads. The burial-place had got to the pass that its little heaps of poor grass were undistinguishable from one another; the figure on the Cross might have come down, for anything that could be seen of it. In the village, taxers and taxed were fast asleep. Dreaming, perhaps, of banquets, as the starved usually do, and of ease and rest, as the driven slave and the yoked ox may, its lean inhabitants slept soundly, and were fed and freed.
　　The fountain in the village flowed unseen and unheard, and the fountain at the chaateau dropped unseen and unheard--both melting away, like the minutes that were falling from the spring of Time--through three dark hours. Then, the grey water of both began to be ghostly in the light, and the eyes of the stone faces of the chaateau were opened.
　　Lighter and lighter, until at last the sun touched the tops of the still trees, and poured its radiance over the hill. In the glow, the water of the chaateau fountain seemed to turn to blood, and the stone faces crimsoned. The carol of the birds was loud and high, and, on the weather-beaten sill of the great window of the bedchamber of Monsieur the Marquis, one little bird sang its sweetest song with all its might. At this, the nearest stone face seemed to stare amazed, and, with opened mouth and dropped under-jaw, looked awe-stricken.
　　Now, the sun was full up, and movement began in the village. Casement windows opened, crazy doors were unbarred, and people came forth shivering--chilled, as yet, by the new sweet air. Then began the rarely lightened toil of the day among the village population. Some, to the fountain; some, to the fields; men and women here, to dig and delve; men and women there, to see to the poor live stock, and lead the bony cows out, to such pasture as could be found by the roadside. In the church and at the Cross, a kneeling figure or two; attendant on the latter prayers, the led cow, trying for a breakfast among the weeds at its foot.
　　The chaateau awoke later, as became its quality, but awoke gradually and surely. First, the lonely boar-spears and knives of the chase had been reddened as of old; then, had gleamed trenchant in the morning sunshine; now, doors and windows were thrown open, horses in their stables looked round over their shoulders at the light and freshness pouring in at door+ways, leaves sparkled and rustled at iron-grated windows, dogs pulled hard at their chains, and reared impatient to be loosed.
　　All these trivial incidents belonged to the routine of life, and the return of morning. Surely, not so the ringing of the great hell of the chaateau, nor the running up and down the stairs; nor the hurried figures on the terrace; nor the booting and tramping here and there and everywhere, nor the quick saddling of horses and riding away?
　　What winds conveyed this hurry to the grizzled mender of roads, already at work on the hill-top beyond the village, with his day's dinner (not much to carry) lying in a bundle that it was worth no crow's while to peck at, on a heap of stones? Had the birds, carrying some grains of it to a distance, dropped one over him as they sow chance seeds? Whether or no, the mender of roads ran, on the sultry morning, as if for his life, down the hill, knee-high in dust, and never stopped till he got to the fountain.
　　All the people of the village were at the fountain, standing about in their depressed manner, and whispering low, but showing no other emotions than grim curiosity and surprise. The led cows, hastily brought in and tethered to anything that would hold them, were looking stupidly on, or lying down chewing the cud of nothing particularly repaying their trouble, which they had picked up in their interrupted saunter. Some of the people of the chaateau, and some of those of the posting-house, and all the taxing authorities, were armed more or less, and were crowded on the other side of the little street in a purposeless way, that was highly fraught with nothing. Already, the mender of roads had penetrated into the midst of a group of fifty particular friends, and was smiting himself in the breast with his blue cap. What did all this portend, and what portended the swift hoisting-up of Monsieur Gabelle behind a servant on horseback, and the conveying away of the said Gabelle (double-laden though the horse was), at a gallop, like a new version of the German ballad of Leonora?
　　It portended that there was one stone face too many, up at the chaateau.
　　The Gorgon had surveyed the building again in the night, and had added the one stone face wanting; the stone face for which it had waited through about two hundred years.
　　It lay back on the pillow of Monsieur the Marquis. It was like a fine mask, suddenly startled, made angry, and petrified. Driven home into the heart of the stone figure attached to it, was a knife. Round its hilt was a frill of paper, on which was scrawled:
　　`Drive him fast to his tomb. This, from JACQUES.'