The dismal prison house, with its sentinel and lamp burning under the gateway, produced an even more dismal impression, with its long row of lighted windows, than it had done in the morning, in spite of the white covering that now lay over everything--the porch, the roof and the walls.
The imposing inspector came up to the gate and read the pass that had been given to Nekhludoff and the Englishman by the light of the lamp, shrugged his fine shoulders in surprise, but, in obedience to the order, asked the visitors to follow him in. He led them through the courtyard and then in at a door to the right and up a staircase into the office.
He offered them a seat and asked what he could do for them, and when he heard that Nekhludoff would like to see Maslova at once, he sent a jailer to fetch her. Then he prepared himself to answer the questions which the Englishman began to put to him, Nekhludoff acting as interpreter.
"How many persons is the prison built to hold?" the Englishman asked. "How many are confined in it? How many men? How many women? Children? How many sentenced to the mines? How many exiles? How many sick persons?"
Nekhludoff translated the Englishman’s and the inspector’s words without paying any attention to their meaning, and felt an awkwardness he had not in the least expected at the thought of the impending interview.
When, in the midst of a sentence he was translating for the Englishman, he heard the sound of approaching footsteps, and the office door opened, and, as had happened many times before, a jailer came in, followed by Katusha, and he saw her with a kerchief tied round her head, and in a prison jacket a heavy sensation came over him.
"I wish to live, I want a family, children, I want a human life." These thoughts flashed through his mind as she entered the room with rapid steps and blinking her eyes.
He rose and made a few steps to meet her, and her face appeared hard and unpleasant to him. It was again as it had been at the time when she reproached him. She flushed and turned pale, her fingers nervously twisting a corner of her jacket. She looked up at him, then cast down her eyes.
读书笔记
是否公开
9
-
“减刑批准了,您知道吗?”聂赫留朵夫说。
读书笔记
是否公开
9
-
"You know that a mitigation has come?"
读书笔记
是否公开
10
-
“知道了,看守告诉我了。”
读书笔记
是否公开
10
-
"Yes, the jailer told me."
读书笔记
是否公开
11
-
“这样,只要等公文一到,您高兴住哪里去就可以住哪里去了。让我们来考虑一下……”
读书笔记
是否公开
11
-
"So that as soon as the original document arrives you may come away and settle where you like. We shall consider--"
读书笔记
是否公开
12
-
她赶紧打断他的话:“我有什么可考虑的?西蒙松到哪里,我就跟他到哪里。”
读书笔记
是否公开
12
-
She interrupted him hurriedly. "What have I to consider? Where Valdemar Simonson goes, there I shall follow."
读书笔记
是否公开
13
-
她尽管十分激动,却抬起眼睛来瞧着聂赫留朵夫,这两句话说得又快又清楚,仿佛事先准备好似的。
读书笔记
是否公开
13
-
In spite of the excitement she was in she raised her eyes to Nekhludoff’s and pronounced these words quickly and distinctly, as if she had prepared what she had to say.
"Well, Dmitri Ivanovitch, you see he wishes me to live with him--" and she stopped, quite frightened, and corrected herself. "He wishes me to be near him. What more can I desire? I must look upon it as happiness. What else is there for me--"
"One of two things," thought he. "Either she loves Simonson and does not in the least require the sacrifice I imagined I was bringing her, or she still loves me and refuses me for my own sake, and is burning her ships by uniting her fate with Simonson." And Nekhludoff felt ashamed and knew that he was blushing.
读书笔记
是否公开
17
-
“要是您爱他……”他说。
读书笔记
是否公开
17
-
"And you yourself, do you love him?" he asked.
读书笔记
是否公开
18
-
“什么爱不爱的!那一套我早已丢掉了。不过,西蒙松这人确实和别人不同。”
读书笔记
是否公开
18
-
"Loving or not loving, what does it matter? I have given up all that. And then Valdemar Simonson is quite an exceptional man."
读书笔记
是否公开
19
-
“是啊,那当然,”聂赫留朵夫又说。“他是个非常出色的人,我想……”
读书笔记
是否公开
19
-
"Yes, of course," Nekhludoff began. "He is a splendid man, and I think--"
读书笔记
是否公开
20
-
她又打断他的话,仿佛生怕他说出什么不得体的话,或者生怕她来不及把要说的话都说出来。
读书笔记
是否公开
20
-
But she again interrupted him, as if afraid that he might say too much or that she should not say all.
"No, Dmitri Ivanovitch, you must forgive me if I am not doing what you wish," and she looked at him with those unfathomable, squinting eyes of hers. "Yes, it evidently must be so. You must live, too."
She said just what he had been telling himself a few moments before, but he no longer thought so now and felt very differently. He was not only ashamed, but felt sorry to lose all he was losing with her. "I did not expect this," he said.
读书笔记
是否公开
23
-
“您何必再待在这儿受罪呢?您受罪也受得够了。”
读书笔记
是否公开
23
-
"Why should you live here and suffer? You have suffered enough."
读书笔记
是否公开
24
-
“我并没有受罪,我过得挺好。要是可能的话,我还愿意为您出力呢。”
读书笔记
是否公开
24
-
"I have not suffered. It was good for me, and I should like to go on serving you if I could."
"We do not want anything," she said, and looked at him."You have done so much for me as it is. If it had not been for you--" She wished to say more, but her voice trembled.
读书笔记
是否公开
26
-
“您不用谢我,不用,”聂赫留朵夫说。
读书笔记
是否公开
26
-
"You certainly have no reason to thank me," Nekhludoff said.
读书笔记
是否公开
27
-
“何必算帐呢?我们的帐上帝会算的,”她说,那双乌黑的眼睛泪光闪闪。
读书笔记
是否公开
27
-
"Where is the use of our reckoning? God will make up our accounts," she said, and her black eyes began to glisten with the tears that filled them.
读书笔记
是否公开
28
-
“您是个多好的女人哪!”他说。
读书笔记
是否公开
28
-
"What a good woman you are," he said.
读书笔记
是否公开
29
-
“我好?”她含着眼泪说,凄苦的微笑使她容光焕发。
读书笔记
是否公开
29
-
"I good?" she said through her tears, and a pathetic smile lit up her face.
读书笔记
是否公开
30
-
“您好了吗?”这时英国人问。
读书笔记
是否公开
30
-
"Are you ready?" the Englishman asked.
读书笔记
是否公开
31
-
“马上就好,”聂赫留朵夫回答。接着他向卡秋莎打听克雷里卓夫的情况。
读书笔记
是否公开
31
-
"Directly," replied Nekhludoff and asked her about Kryltzoff.
She got over her emotion and quietly told him all she knew. Kryltzoff was very weak and had been sent into the infirmary. Mary Pavlovna was very anxious, and had asked to be allowed to go to the infirmary as a nurse, but could not get the permission.
读书笔记
是否公开
33
-
“那么我该走了吧?”她发现英国人在等聂赫留朵夫,就说。
读书笔记
是否公开
33
-
"Am I to go?" she asked, noticing that the Englishman was waiting.
读书笔记
是否公开
34
-
“我现在不同您告别,我还要跟您见面的,”聂赫留朵夫说。
读书笔记
是否公开
34
-
"I will not say good-bye; I shall see you again," said Nekhludoff, holding out his hand.
"Forgive me," she said so low that he could hardly hear her. Their eyes met, and Nekhludoff knew by the strange look of her squinting eyes and the pathetic smile with which she said not "Good-bye" but "Forgive me," that of the two reasons that might have led to her resolution, the second was the real one.
She loved him, and thought that by uniting herself to him she would be spoiling his life. By going with Simonson she thought she would be setting Nekhludoff free, and felt glad that she had done what she meant to do, and yet she suffered at parting from him.
读书笔记
是否公开
37
-
她握了握他的手,慌忙转身走出办公室。
读书笔记
是否公开
37
-
She pressed his hand, turned quickly and left the room.
Nekhludoff was ready to go, but saw that the Englishman was noting something down, and did not disturb him, but sat down on a wooden seat by the wall, and suddenly a feeling of terrible weariness came over him. It was not a sleepless night that had tired him, not the journey, not the excitement, but he felt terribly tired of living. He leaned against the back of the bench, shut his eyes and in a moment fell into a deep, heavy sleep.
读书笔记
是否公开
39
-
“怎么样,现在去看看牢房好吗?”典狱长问道。
读书笔记
是否公开
39
-
"Well, would you like to look round the cells now?" the inspector asked.
读书笔记
是否公开
40
-
聂赫留朵夫醒过来,看到自己竟在这里睡着了,不禁感到惊讶。英国人已写完笔记,很想参观牢房。
读书笔记
是否公开
40
-
Nekhludoff looked up and was surprised to find himself where he was. The Englishman had finished his notes and expressed a wish to see the cells.