Philip spent the few weeks that remained before the beginning of the winter session in the out-patients’ department, and in October settled down to regular work. He had been away from the hospital for so long that he found himself very largely among new people; the men of different years had little to do with one another, and his contemporaries were now mostly qualified : some had left to take up assistantships or posts in country hospitals and infirmaries, and some held appointments at St. Luke’s. The two years during which his mind had lain fallow had refreshed him, he fancied, and he was able now to work with energy.
The Athelnys were delighted with his change of fortune. He had kept aside a few things from the sale of his uncle’s effects and gave them all presents. He gave Sally a gold chain that had belonged to his aunt. She was now grown up. She was apprenticed to a dressmaker and set out every morning at eight to work all day in a shop in Regent Street.
Sally had frank blue eyes, a broad brow, and plentiful shining hair; she was buxom , with broad hips and full breasts; and her father, who was fond of discussing her appearance, warned her constantly that she must not grow fat. She attracted because she was healthy, animal, and feminine. She had many admirers, but they left her unmoved; she gave one the impression that she looked upon love-making as nonsense; and it was easy to imagine that young men found her unapproachable.
Sally was old for her years: she had been used to help her mother in the household work and in the care of the children, so that she had acquired a managing air, which made her mother say that Sally was a bit too fond of having things her own way.
She did not speak very much, but as she grew older she seemed to be acquiring a quiet sense of humour, and sometimes uttered a remark which suggested that beneath her impassive exterior she was quietly bubbling with amusement at her fellow-creatures.
Philip found that with her he never got on the terms of affectionateintimacy upon which he was with the rest of Athelny’s huge family. Now and then her indifference slightly irritated him. There was something enigmatic in her.
Philip saw her embarrassment , and, amused, turned Athelny’s attention to something else. That was never a very difficult thing to do. But evidently her mother spoke of the matter later, for next time Philip came she took the opportunity when they were alone for a couple of minutes to refer to it.
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12
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"上星期我不愿吻你,你不会恨我吧?"
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12
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‘You didn’t think it disagreeable of me last week when I wouldn’t kiss you?’
‘It’s not because I wasn’t grateful.’ She blushed a little as she uttered the formal phrase which she had prepared. ‘I shall always value the necklace, and it was very kind of you to give it me.’
Philip found it always a little difficult to talk to her. She did all that she had to do very competently, but seemed to feel no need of conversation; yet there was nothing unsociable in her. One Sunday afternoon when Athelny and his wife had gone out together, and Philip, treated as one of the family, sat reading in the parlour, Sally came in and sat by the window to sew. The girls’ clothes were made at home and Sally could not afford to spend Sundays in idleness. Philip thought she wished to talk and put down his book.
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16
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"继续念你的书,"莎莉说,"我只是想,你一个人在这里寂寞,所以我来陪陪你。"
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16
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‘Go on reading,’ she said. ‘I only thought as you were alone I’d come and sit with you.’
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17
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"你是我平生遇见的最不爱说话的人,"菲利普说。
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17
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‘You’re the most silent person I’ve ever struck,’ said Philip.
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18
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"我们可不希望家里再来一个话匣子,"她说。
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18
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‘We don’t want another one who’s talkative in this house,’ she said.
There was no irony in her tone: she was merely stating a fact. But it suggested to Philip that she measured her father, alas , no longer the hero he was to her childhood, and in her mind joined together his entertaining conversation and the thriftlessness which often brought difficulties into their life; she compared his rhetoric with her mother’s practical common sense; and though the liveliness of her father amused her she was perhaps sometimes a little impatient with it. Philip looked at her as she bent over her work; she was healthy, strong, and normal; it must be odd to see her among the other girls in the shop with their flat chests and anaemic faces. Mildred suffered from anaemia.
After a time it appeared that Sally had a suitor. She went out occasionally with friends she had made in the work-room, and had met a young man, an electrical engineer in a very good way of business, who was a most eligible person. One day she told her mother that he had asked her to marry him.
‘Oh, I told him I wasn’t over-anxious to marry anyone just yet awhile.’ She paused a little as was her habit between observations. ‘He took on so that I said he might come to tea on Sunday.’
It was an occasion that thoroughly appealed to Athelny. He rehearsed all the afternoon how he should play the heavy father for the young man’s edification till he reduced his children to helpless giggling . Just before he was due Athelny routed out an Egyptian tarboosh and insisted on putting it on.
‘Go on with you, Athelny,’ said his wife, who was in her best, which was of black velvet , and, since she was growing stouter every year, very tight for her. ‘You’ll spoil the girl’s chances.’
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25
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她拚命想把那顶帽子摘下来,可她那小个子男人像条泥鳅似的溜了。
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She tried to pull it off, but the little man skipped nimbly out of her way.
‘Unhand me, woman. Nothing will induce me to take it off. This young man must be shown at once that it is no ordinary family he is preparing to enter.’
‘Let him keep it on, mother,’ said Sally, in her even, indifferent fashion. ‘If Mr. Donaldson doesn’t take it the way it’s meant he can take himself off, and good riddance.’
Philip thought it was a severe ordeal that the young man was being exposed to, since Athelny, in his brown velvet jacket, flowing black tie, and red tarboosh, was a startling spectacle for an innocent electrical engineer. When he came he was greeted by his host with the proud courtesy of a Spanish grandee and by Mrs. Athelny in an altogether homely and natural fashion.
They sat down at the old ironing-table in the high-backed monkish chairs, and Mrs. Athelny poured tea out of a lustre teapot which gave a note of England and the country-side to the festivity. She had made little cakes with her own hand, and on the table was home-made jam. It was a farm-house tea, and to Philip very quaint and charming in that Jacobean house.
Athelny for some fantastic reason took it into his head to discourse upon Byzantine history; he had been reading the later volumes of the Decline and Fall; and, his forefinger dramatically extended, he poured into the astonished ears of the suitor scandalous stories about Theodora and Irene.
He addressed himself directly to his guest with a torrent of rhodomontade; and the young man, reduced to helpless silence and shy, nodded his head at intervals to show that he took an intelligent interest. Mrs. Athelny paid no attention to Thorpe’s conversation, but interrupted now and then to offer the young man more tea or to press upon him cake and jam.
Philip watched Sally; she sat with downcast eyes, calm, silent, and observant; and her long eye-lashes cast a pretty shadow on her cheek. You could not tell whether she was amused at the scene or if she cared for the young man. She was inscrutable.
But one thing was certain: the electrical engineer was good-looking, fair and clean-shaven, with pleasant, regular features, and an honest face; he was tall and well-made. Philip could not help thinking he would make an excellent mate for her, and he felt a pang of envy for the happiness which he fancied was in store for them.
Presently the suitor said he thought it was about time he was getting along. Sally rose to her feet without a word and accompanied him to the door. When she came back her father burst out:
‘Well, Sally, we think your young man very nice. We are prepared to welcome him into our family. Let the banns be called and I will compose a nuptial song.’
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36
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莎莉没有接她父亲的话茬,默默地动手收拾茶具。突然间,她敏捷地瞟了菲利普一眼。
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Sally set about clearing away the tea-things. She did not answer. Suddenly she shot a swift glance at Philip.
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37
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"菲利普先生,你对他的看法如何?"
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37
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‘What did you think of him, Mr. Philip?’
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38
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她一直拒绝跟弟妹们一样称他为菲尔叔叔,但又不愿意直呼其名。
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38
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She had always refused to call him Uncle Phil as the other children did, and would not call him Philip.
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39
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"我认为你们俩真是天生一对,地造一双。"
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39
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‘I think you’d make an awfully handsome pair.’
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40
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莎莉又一次匆匆地瞥了他一眼,接着她脸上浮起一阵淡淡的红晕,连忙埋头干她的事。
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She looked at him quickly once more, and then with a slight blush went on with her business.