双语·灼人的秘密 伙伴

THE engine gave a hoarse shriek as the express drew up at Semmering station. A moment of silence followed, during which the carriages rested in the translucent mountain air. The train belched forth a traveller or two and swallowed down a couple of fresh arrivals. Peppery exclamations shuttlecocked to and fro. Again the locomotive uttered a raucous cry as it started off, dragging a dark serpent behind it, to disappear into the tunnel’s maw. A healing peace once more pervaded the landscape, and the windswept atmosphere was good to breathe.

One of the men who had stepped out of the train was young, and of agreeable aspect. He was stylishly dressed and debonair, with an elasticity of gait which brought him to the cabstand well in advance of the other passengers. He engaged the solitary vehicle, and was conveyed without haste to the hotel he had selected. Spring was in the air. A few white clouds, glinting and glowing in the sky, such clouds as are seen only in the months of May and June, seemed to be playing at catch-ascatch-can in the blue, only to hide themselves from the observer’s eye behind the scaling mountains, there to embrace and flee, to wave a lilywhite hand, as it were, then to melt away into nothingness, reappear, and finally to settle down as night-caps on the neighbouring hills.

A restless, insurgent wind rustled among the lean and raindrenched trees, so that their limbs groaned, and thousands of waterdrops were scattered on the ground. Chill currents of snow-laden air descended from the peaks, until one caught one’s breath in the keen, sharp atmosphere. The heavens and the earth were both in a yeasty ferment of impatience. The cab rattled along to the accompaniment of the leisurely trot of the horses and the silvery tinkle of the bells with which the harness was adorned.

On arriving at the hotel the young man’s first move was to consult the list of guests. Not a name that he knew was to be found!

“What the devil have I come here for?” he communed. “No office could be worse than this lonesome place with not a soul for company. Obviously I am too early in the season or too late. My vacations never seem to strike it lucky. Not a creature of my acquaintance among the whole bally lot of them. At least one or two women might have graced the list, so that I could have whiled away my one short week in a mild flirtation.”

The youth, a scion of the minor Austrian nobility and employeem the Treasury, had decided to give himself this week’s holiday, not because he was in need of a rest but because his colleagues were off on a jaunt and he did not see why he should not follow their example. Though by no means lacking in philosophical capacity, Baron Otto von Sternfeldt was essentially of a sociable disposition, and was popular in the circles he frequented. He found solitude irksome, soon tired of his own company, and avoided every occasion for being alone since he felt scant inclination to get to know himself better. If his talents were to flourish, the warmth of his heart to glow into a flame, and his natural high spirits to find vent, he needed constantly to rub shoulders with men and women. By himself he felt cold and lifeless like a match unlighted in a box.

He now wandered aimlessly about in the empty lounge, disconsolately fingering the papers and magazines; then he tried the music-room and strummed a waltz on the piano, but his fingers were stiff and clumsy, refusing to impart the necessary swing and rhythm to the tune. Utterly depressed, he threw himself into an easy-chair and stared out of the window. The evening was drawing in, and grey mistwreaths lurked among the pines. For a full hour, he remained drearily watching the gathering shadows. Then he decided to go into the diningroom.

Very few tables were laid; and he cast a hasty glance at the persons sitting over their meal. Not a friend or an acquaintance to be seen! Ah, yes, over there was a face he knew—but it was merely that of a professional trainer to whom he gave a nod. Women there were none; not a sign of anything worth the attention of a charming young gentleman on pleasure bent. His vexation swelled into impatience.

Sternfeldt belonged to the category of those whose face is a fortune; one took a liking to him at first sight. He was always eager for new experiences, fresh adventures; he was never taken off his guard, because he kept perpetually on the alert to seize the skirts of happy chance; Cupid stood ready at his elbow to give him a hint at the first approach of amorous possibilities; he looked at every woman, be she the wife of a friend or the chambermaid who opened his bedroom door for him, with a searching eye which seemed to unclothe her. It is customary to call such men “Women hunters,” and there is much penetrating wisdom in the appellation, for they actually do possess many of the instincts of the huntsman, passionately stalking their prey, enjoying the excitement of bringing the quarry to bay, and revelling in the spiritual cruelty of the kill. They are perpetually ambushed for the spring, and refuse to give up the chase until the game is theirs. Passion swamps their whole being; not the passion of a lover, but the passion of a gambler, which is cool, calculating, and dangerous. Some continue thus their whole life long, persistent adventurers in the field of“love,” persons whose days are divided into countless petty and lustful episodes—a significant glance in passing, a suggestive smile, a touch of the knee to a neighbour at table—and the year is made up of hundreds of such days wherein sensuality is the main ingredient.

That evening, the baron found no one to take a hand in his favourite sport; and there is nothing so exasperating to the temper of a gamester as to sit with the cards in his hand awaiting the arrival of a partner. Otto asked the waiter to bring him a newspaper. His eyes ran down the columns and over the headlines; but his mind was elsewhere, and he read as though his senses were benumbed by drink.

Then a skirt rustled behind him, and he heard a clear voice say somewhat irritably and with an affectation of culture:

“Mais tais-toi donc, Edgar!”

A tall, finely built woman in a silk dress passed followed by a boy with a pale face and eyes filled with vague curiosity which seemed to caress his companion’s form. The couple sat down at a table reserved for them. Edgar was obviously on his best behaviour, and yet the restlessness in his dark eyes betrayed his real feelings. The lady—and she it was who absorbed the whole of the baron’s interest—was well groomed and dressed with taste. She was a type that the young man admired being a not too buxom Jewess just past the prime but not as yet blowzy, a woman still capable of passion, though keeping her natural sensuousness veiled behind an outward decorum. At first he was denied a look into her eyes, for she kept the lids resolutely lowered; but he could contemplate at leisure the arch of her brows meeting delicately over her finely chiselled nose, which, though it betrayed her race, gave a noble grace to a clear-cut and interesting profile. Her hair was as abundant and feminine as the other charms of the flesh, and swept in opulent waves over her head. She possessed the assurance of a woman whose beauty has been the open delight of everyone with whom she has come in contact. Her voice was soft and low as she gave her orders to the waiter and told her son, who was fiddling with his spoon and fork, to remember his manners and to sit still. Seemingly indifferent to what was going on around her she appeared to ignore the baron’s cautious scrutiny—though in reality her masked interest in him had been awakened by the fact that he was frankly interested in her.

The cloud upon the young man’s spirit had dispersed, and his face was serene. Lines and wrinkles of annoyance were smoothed away, his muscles became taut, the blood flooded his skin and gave it renewed life, his eyes sparkled. Having many a feminine attribute in his nature, he responded to the presence of an attractive woman, as a woman responds to the presence of a man. Sensuous pleasure stretched his energies to the full. The hunter scented the game. His eyes challenged hers to the tourney. But she, though giving him a furtive glance, refused to look him in the face and thus to pick up the gauntlet. It seemed to him, however, that a hint of a smile might be detected flitting around the corners of her mouth. He could not be sure, and this excited him the more. What contented him was the fact that she deliberately avoided his eyes. A good sign, he thought, for it might be interpreted as defiance and at the same time as embarrassment. Besides, her preoccupation with the child was too meticulous, and must undoubtedly be aimed at the onlooker. Nor was her conversation with the lad quite natural; she seemed, rather, to be talking at her observant neighbour. The forced repose of her manner was, Otto felt, the mark of an initial uneasiness.

His feelings were roused. The hunt was on. He lingered over his meal, staring at the woman incessantly during a full hour until at length he could have drawn every curve of her face, while his eyes had secretly caressed each nook and fold of her splendid body. A heavy shroud of darkness had fallen over the countryside, blotting out the forest whose trees continued to sob as though they were frightened children, for the rainclouds were stretching eager fingers towards them grey and full of menace. Shadows had gathered in the corners of the room, and an oppressive silence hung like a pall upon the groups clustered round the dining-tables. Sternfeldt noticed that the lady’s chatter with her son became more and more forced under the burden of this silence, became more and more artificial and soon would have to cease. A test occurred to his mind. He got up, and, walking very slowly, with his eyes glued on the window, he passed close to her without giving her a glance, and disappeared through the doorway. Suddenly he reappeared as if he had forgotten something and had come back to fetch it. She was caught in the trap, for he found that she had been gazing with lively interest at his retreating figure.

Baron Otto von Sternfeldt was enchanted at the success of his ruse, and waited patiently in the entrance hall. She soon came out of the dining-room holding her boy by the hand, fluttering the pages of some magazines as she passed the big hall table, and showed a few of the illustrations to the little boy. As if by chance, the baron too, approached the table, pretending he wanted to read a paper but in reality that he might get another glimpse into those lustrous eyes, perhaps, even, say a word or two....However, the woman turned abruptly away not deigning to give him so much as a glance. She tapped her son lightly on the shoulder, saying with affectionate decision.

“Viens, Edgar. Au lit!”

A trifle crestfallen, Otto stared after her. He had fully expected to make acquaintance that very night. The postponement was a disappointment. And yet, it must be agreed, the situation was not lacking in charm. A zest had been added to the adventure. The incident goaded him to enhance desire. He had to admit that a partner had come his way, and he could now play his hand.