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The Turn of the Screw
by Henry James
V
Oh, she let me know as soon as, round the corner of the house, she loomed1 again into view. “What in the name of goodness is the matter —?” She was now flushed and out of breath.
I said nothing till she came quite near. “With me?” I must have made a wonderful face. “Do I show it?”
“You’re as white as a sheet. You look awful.”
I considered; I could meet on this, without scruple2, any innocence3. My need to respect the bloom of Mrs. Grose’s had dropped, without a rustle4, from my shoulders, and if I wavered for the instant it was not with what I kept back. I put out my hand to her and she took it; I held her hard a little, liking5 to feel her close to me. There was a kind of support in the shy heave of her surprise. “You came for me for church, of course, but I can’t go.”
“Has anything happened?”
“Yes. You must know now. Did I look very queer?”
“Through this window? Dreadful!”
“Well,” I said, “I’ve been frightened.” Mrs. Grose’s eyes expressed plainly that SHE had no wish to be, yet also that she knew too well her place not to be ready to share with me any marked inconvenience. Oh, it was quite settled that she MUST share! “Just what you saw from the dining room a minute ago was the effect of that. What I saw — just before — was much worse.”
“An extraordinary man. Looking in.”
“What extraordinary man?”
“I haven’t the least idea.”
Mrs. Grose gazed round us in vain. “Then where is he gone?”
“I know still less.”
“Have you seen him before?”
“Yes — once. On the old tower.”
She could only look at me harder. “Do you mean he’s a stranger?”
“Oh, very much!”
“Yet you didn’t tell me?”
“No — for reasons. But now that you’ve guessed — ”
Mrs. Grose’s round eyes encountered this charge. “Ah, I haven’t guessed!” she said very simply. “How can I if YOU don’t imagine?”
“I don’t in the very least.”
“You’ve seen him nowhere but on the tower?”
“And on this spot just now.”
Mrs. Grose looked round again. “What was he doing on the tower?”
She thought a minute. “Was he a gentleman?”
I found I had no need to think. “No.” She gazed in deeper wonder. “No.”
“Then nobody about the place? Nobody from the village?”
“Nobody — nobody. I didn’t tell you, but I made sure.”
She breathed a vague relief: this was, oddly, so much to the good. It only went indeed a little way. “But if he isn’t a gentleman — ”
“What IS he? He’s a horror.”
“A horror?”
“He’s — God help me if I know WHAT he is!”
Mrs. Grose looked round once more; she fixed8 her eyes on the duskier distance, then, pulling herself together, turned to me with abrupt9 inconsequence. “It’s time we should be at church.”
“Oh, I’m not fit for church!”
“Won’t it do you good?”
“It won’t do THEM—! I nodded at the house.
“The children?”
“I can’t leave them now.”
“You’re afraid —?”
Mrs. Grose’s large face showed me, at this, for the first time, the faraway faint glimmer11 of a consciousness more acute: I somehow made out in it the delayed dawn of an idea I myself had not given her and that was as yet quite obscure to me. It comes back to me that I thought instantly of this as something I could get from her; and I felt it to be connected with the desire she presently showed to know more. “When was it — on the tower?”
“About the middle of the month. At this same hour.”
“Almost at dark,” said Mrs. Grose.
“Oh, no, not nearly. I saw him as I see you.”
“Then how did he get in?”
“And how did he get out?” I laughed. “I had no opportunity to ask him! This evening, you see,” I pursued, “he has not been able to get in.”
“He only peeps?”
“I hope it will be confined to that!” She had now let go my hand; she turned away a little. I waited an instant; then I brought out: “Go to church. Goodbye. I must watch.”
Slowly she faced me again. “Do you fear for them?”
We met in another long look. “Don’t YOU?” Instead of answering she came nearer to the window and, for a minute, applied12 her face to the glass. “You see how he could see,” I meanwhile went on.
She didn’t move. “How long was he here?”
“Till I came out. I came to meet him.”
Mrs. Grose at last turned round, and there was still more in her face. “I couldn’t have come out.”
“Neither could I!” I laughed again. “But I did come. I have my duty.”
“So have I mine,” she replied; after which she added: “What is he like?”
“I’ve been dying to tell you. But he’s like nobody.”
“Nobody?” she echoed.
“He has no hat.” Then seeing in her face that she already, in this, with a deeper dismay, found a touch of picture, I quickly added stroke to stroke. “He has red hair, very red, close-curling, and a pale face, long in shape, with straight, good features and little, rather queer whiskers that are as red as his hair. His eyebrows13 are, somehow, darker; they look particularly arched and as if they might move a good deal. His eyes are sharp, strange — awfully14; but I only know clearly that they’re rather small and very fixed. His mouth’s wide, and his lips are thin, and except for his little whiskers he’s quite clean-shaven. He gives me a sort of sense of looking like an actor.”
“An actor!” It was impossible to resemble one less, at least, than Mrs. Grose at that moment.
“I’ve never seen one, but so I suppose them. He’s tall, active, erect,” I continued, “but never — no, never! — a gentleman.”
My companion’s face had blanched15 as I went on; her round eyes started and her mild mouth gaped16. “A gentleman?” she gasped17, confounded, stupefied: “a gentleman HE?”
“You know him then?”
She visibly tried to hold herself. “But he IS handsome?”
I saw the way to help her. “Remarkably!”
“And dressed —?”
“In somebody’s clothes. “They’re smart, but they’re not his own.”
I caught it up. “You DO know him?”
“Quint?”
“Peter Quint — his own man, his valet, when he was here!”
“When the master was?”
Gaping20 still, but meeting me, she pieced it all together. “He never wore his hat, but he did wear — well, there were waistcoats missed. They were both here — last year. Then the master went, and Quint was alone.”
I followed, but halting a little. “Alone?”
“Alone with US.” Then, as from a deeper depth, “In charge,” she added.
“And what became of him?”
She hung fire so long that I was still more mystified. “He went, too,” she brought out at last.
“Went where?”
Her expression, at this, became extraordinary. “God knows where! He died.”
She seemed fairly to square herself, plant herself more firmly to utter the wonder of it. “Yes. Mr. Quint is dead.”
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1
loomed
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| v.隐约出现，阴森地逼近( loom的过去式和过去分词 )；隐约出现，阴森地逼近 | |
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2
scruple
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| n./v.顾忌，迟疑 | |
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3
innocence
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| n.无罪；天真；无害 | |
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4
rustle
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| v.沙沙作响；偷盗(牛、马等)；n.沙沙声声 | |
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5
liking
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| n.爱好；嗜好；喜欢 | |
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6
tightened
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| 收紧( tighten的过去式和过去分词 )； （使）变紧； （使）绷紧； 加紧 | |
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7
standing
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| n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的 | |
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8
fixed
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| adj.固定的，不变的，准备好的；(计算机)固定的 | |
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9
abrupt
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| adj.突然的，意外的；唐突的，鲁莽的 | |
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10
spoke
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| n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说 | |
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11
glimmer
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| v.发出闪烁的微光；n.微光，微弱的闪光 | |
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12
applied
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| adj.应用的；v.应用，适用 | |
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13
eyebrows
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| 眉毛( eyebrow的名词复数 ) | |
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14
awfully
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| adv.可怕地，非常地，极端地 | |
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15
blanched
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| v.使变白( blanch的过去式 )；使（植物）不见阳光而变白；酸洗（金属）使有光泽；用沸水烫（杏仁等）以便去皮 | |
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16
gaped
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| v.目瞪口呆地凝视( gape的过去式和过去分词 )；张开，张大 | |
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17
gasped
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| v.喘气( gasp的过去式和过去分词 )；喘息；倒抽气；很想要 | |
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18
groan
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| vi./n.呻吟，抱怨；(发出)呻吟般的声音 | |
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19
faltered
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| （嗓音）颤抖( falter的过去式和过去分词 )； 支吾其词； 蹒跚； 摇晃 | |
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20
gaping
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| adj.口的；张口的；敞口的；多洞穴的v.目瞪口呆地凝视( gape的现在分词 )；张开，张大 | |
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21
shrieked
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| v.尖叫( shriek的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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