【荆棘鸟】第一章 02

搜索关注在线英语听力室公众号：tingroom，领取免费英语资料大礼包。

The doll's golden hair tumbled down, the pearls flew winking¹ into the long grass and disappeared. A dusty boot came down thoughtlessly on the abandoned dress, smearing² grease from the smithy across its satin. Meggie dropped to her knees, scrabbling frantically³ to collect the miniature clothes before more damage was done them, then she began picking among the grass blades where she thought the pearls might have fallen. Her tears were blinding her, the grief in her heart new, for until now she had never owned anything worth grieving for.

         Frank threw the shoe hissing⁴ into cold water and straightened his back; it didn't ache these days, so perhaps he was used to smithying. Not before time, his father would have said, after six months at it. 

         But Frank knew very well how long it was since his introduction to the forge and anvil⁵; he had measured the time in hatred⁶ and resentment⁷. Throwing the hammer into its box, he pushed the lank⁸ black hair off his brow with a trembling hand and dragged the old leather apron⁹ from around his neck. His shirt lay on aheap of straw in the corner; he plodded¹⁰ across to it and stood for a moment staring at the splintering barn wall as if it did not exist, his black eyes wide and fixed¹¹. 

         He was very small, not above five feet three inches, and thin still as striplings are, but the bare shoulders and arms had muscles already knotted from working with the hammer, and the pale, flawless skin gleamed with sweat. The darkness of his hair and eyes had a foreign tang, his full-lipped mouth and wide-bridged nose not the usual family shape, but there was Maori blood on his mother's side and in him it showed. He was nearly sixteen years old, where Bob was barely eleven, Jack¹² ten, Hughie nine, Stuart five and little Meggie three. 

         Then he remembered that today Meggie was four; it was December 8th. He put on his shirt and left the barn.

分享到：