登陆注册
19497600000202

第202章

Waking WHEN Maggie was gone to sleep, Stephen, weary too with his unaccustomed amount of rowing and with the intense inward life of the last twelve hours, but too restless to sleep, walked and lounged about the deck, with his cigar, far on into midnight, not seeing the dark water - hardly conscious there were stars - living only in the near and distant future.At last fatigue conquered restlessness, and he rolled himself up in a piece of tarpauling on the deck near Maggie's feet.She had fallen asleep before nine, and had been sleeping for six hours before the faintest hint of a midsummer daybreak was discernible.She awoke from that vivid dreaming which makes the margin of our deeper rest.She was in a boat on the wide water with Stephen, and in the gathering darkness something like a star appeared, that grew and grew till they saw it was the Virgin seated in St Ogg's boat, and it came nearer and nearer till they saw the Virgin was Lucy and the boatman was Philip - no, not Philip, but her brother, who rowed past without looking at her; and she rose to stretch out her arms and call to him, and their own boat turned over with the movement and they began to sink, till with one spasm of dread she seemed to awake and find she was a child again in the parlour at evening twilight, and Tom was not really angry.From the soothed sense of that false waking she passed to the real waking, to the plash of water against the vessel, and the sound of a footstep on the deck, and the awful starlit sky.There was a moment of utter bewilderment before her mind could get disentangled from the confused web of dreams; but soon the whole terrible truth urged itself upon her.

Stephen was not by her now: she was alone with her own memory and her own dread.The irrevocable wrong that must blot her life had been committed - she had brought sorrow into the lives of others - into the lives that were knit up with hers by trust and love.The feeling of a few short weeks had hurried her into the sins her nature had most recoiled from - breach of faith and cruel selfishness; she had rent the ties that had given meaning to duty, and had made herself an outlawed soul with no guide but the wayward choice of her own passion.And where would that lead her? - where had it led her now? She had said she would rather die than fall into that temptation.

She felt it now - now that the consequences of such a fall had come before the outward act was completed.There was at least this fruit from all her years of striving after the highest and best - that her soul, though betrayed, beguiled, ensnared, could never deliberately consent to a choice of the lower.And a choice of what? O God - not a choice of joy - but of conscious cruelty and hardness; for could she ever cease to see before her Lucy and Philip with their murdered trust and hopes? Her life with Stephen could have no sacredness: she must for ever sink and wander vaguely, driven by uncertain impulse; for she had let go the clue of life - that clue which once in the far off years her young need had clutched so strongly.She had renounced all delights then, before she knew them, before they had come within her reach: Philip had been right when he told her that she knew nothing of renunciation: she had thought it was quiet ecstasy; she saw it face to face now - that sad patient living strength which holds the clue of life, and saw that the thorns were for ever pressing on its brow.That yesterday which could never be revoked - if she could exchange it now for any length of inward silent endurance she would have bowed beneath that cross with a sense of rest.

Daybreak came and the reddening eastern light while her past life was grasping her in this way, with that tightening clutch which comes in the last moments of possible rescue.She could see Stephen now lying on the deck still fast asleep, and with the sight of him there came a wave of anguish that found its way in a long-suppressed sob.The worst bitterness of parting - the thought that urged the sharpest inward cry for help was the pain it must give to him.But surmounting everything was the horror at her own possible failure, the dread lest her conscience should be benumbed again and not rise to energy till it was too late.- Too late!

It was too late now, not to have caused misery - too late for everything, perhaps, but to rush away from the last act of baseness - the tasting of joys that were wrung from crushed hearts.

The sun was rising now, and Maggie started up with the sense that a day of resistance was beginning for her.Her eyelashes were still wet with tears, as, with her shawl over her head, she sat looking at the slowly-rounding sun.Something roused Stephen too, and, getting up from his hard bed, he came to sit beside her.The sharp instinct of anxious love saw something to give him alarm in the very first glance.He had a hovering dread of some resistance in Maggie's nature that he would be unable to overcome.

He had the uneasy consciousness that he had robbed her of perfect freedom yesterday: there was too much native honour in him, for him not to feel that if her will should recoil, his conduct would have been odious, and she would have a right to reproach him.

But Maggie did not feel that right: she was too conscious of fatal weakness in herself - too full of the tenderness that comes with the foreseen need for inflicting a wound.She let him take her hand when he came to sit down beside her, and smiled at him - only with rather a sad glance: she could say nothing to pain him till the moment of possible parting was nearer.

And so they drank their cup of coffee together, and walked about the deck, and heard the captain's assurance that they should be in at Mudport by five o'clock, each with an inward burthen - but in him it was an undefined fear, which he trusted to the coming hours to dissipate - in her it was a definite resolve on which she was trying silently to tighten her hold.

同类推荐
  • 洗髓经

    洗髓经

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。
  • 梼杌萃编

    梼杌萃编

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 诸方门人参问语录

    诸方门人参问语录

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。
  • 摄大乘论章

    摄大乘论章

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。
  • 步里客谈

    步里客谈

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。
热门推荐
  • 赌王皇贵妃

    赌王皇贵妃

    一个是人人喊打的舒家丑女,一个是人人传颂的玉面赌王。却哪知,丑女就是赌王,赌王就是丑女。一赌,赌来声名鹊起;二赌,赌来公主之名;三赌,赌来远嫁他国;四赌,赌来皇贵妃之位……穿越重生十岁赌王,以一手赌术叱咤朝堂,引得乱世英雄竞相折腰。
  • 养血美少年

    养血美少年

    我们都拥有红色的血液,我们是一类人。当红色血液的我们,遇到拥有蓝、绿、黑等颜色血液的人,将会发生什么样的故事。他们来自哪里,为何凭空闯入我们的世界?故事没结束之前,我都不得而知。你愿意和我边走边看吗?
  • 天心苦海录

    天心苦海录

    墨家有名的废物大少在族中受尽欺凌,成人礼前,发现了母亲遗物之中的秘密,从此一飞冲天,天才鬼才尽为垫脚之石,豪门大势成其修道之阶,苦海争渡我必鱼跃九天。书友群247403914
  • 灵异杂记

    灵异杂记

    灵异是主题。只是自己平时想法天马行空的,想随便写写,因为没有主线,没有背后的阴谋,也没有大反派势力(可能有,没想到,所以不知道),所以我把这个当作随笔,就没有主角了吧,一个小故事换一个主角,你们看不到主角升级打怪,越级打怪,最后消灭BOSS的情节,很好,就这么决定了。
  • 不奴隶,毋宁死?

    不奴隶,毋宁死?

    《红楼梦》原名《石头记》,书里第一回就说了,实际版本也是如此,脂评本、戚本、列(宁格勒)藏本都叫《石头记》。本书第一回里还提到另外的书名:《情僧录》和《金陵十二钗》。虽有此名,却未见这样的版本。用得最广泛的还是《红楼梦》的书名,所有外文译本都是用这个名称,最多翻译时加个介词,使之类似梦在红楼或红楼之梦。还有一个名字被坊间采用过:《金玉缘》。
  • 大小姐的贴身机器人

    大小姐的贴身机器人

    为保护地球,疯狂博士同机器助手重返过去,寻找那神秘力量,在这期限一年的时间里,他们能否找到那股力量?然而穿越会过去后,为了不被敌人发现和维持生计,只好做兼职了,结果一个意外,毁了人家一栋楼!欠了一屁股债,后背人帮忙还清了,却成了他女儿的管家……这是个坑啊!没辙了,只能做保镖,在家救世主了……
  • 网游之一代传奇

    网游之一代传奇

    新书《暴枪》,豆豆流浪三年,无颜面对各位兄弟,再给豆豆一次机会吧!
  • 雨露曦临

    雨露曦临

    轮回,因果,曾经,又有几度,又该从何谈起。我沐浴这血,愿去无尽的深渊,寻找彼方。
  • 挂名皇后要革命

    挂名皇后要革命

    一缕魂穿成堂堂将军曼罗家二小姐,被迫替姐出嫁却独守空房。洞房花烛夜形单影只,夫君却留恋妾室闺房。她,淡雅随意闲散人间。她,无情无爱明哲保身。王妃至皇后的上升之路,本以为只是保全家族,最后丢失的却是一颗心。他,南昭国最受宠的三王爷。穷尽一身也只爱过两个女人。一个陪了他整整十年的女孩。直至那个女孩香消玉殒。但是她的陪伴,她的付出,她的真心只换回一句“帝王无情”,她是选择守候还是放手,原本错开的命运是否还有机会?是期盼一生一世一双人,还是错过、错过、再错过的纠葛之路。
  • 重阳全真集

    重阳全真集

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。