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The Turn of the Screw
by Henry James
I
I remember the whole beginning as a succession of flights and drops, a little seesaw1 of the right throbs2 and the wrong. After rising, in town, to meet his appeal, I had at all events a couple of very bad days — found myself doubtful again, felt indeed sure I had made a mistake. In this state of mind I spent the long hours of bumping, swinging coach that carried me to the stopping place at which I was to be met by a vehicle from the house. This convenience, I was told, had been ordered, and I found, toward the close of the June afternoon, a commodious3 fly in waiting for me. Driving at that hour, on a lovely day, through a country to which the summer sweetness seemed to offer me a friendly welcome, my fortitude4 mounted afresh and, as we turned into the avenue, encountered a reprieve5 that was probably but a proof of the point to which it had sunk. I suppose I had expected, or had dreaded6, something so melancholy7 that what greeted me was a good surprise. I remember as a most pleasant impression the broad, clear front, its open windows and fresh curtains and the pair of maids looking out; I remember the lawn and the bright flowers and the crunch8 of my wheels on the gravel9 and the clustered treetops over which the rooks circled and cawed in the golden sky. The scene had a greatness that made it a different affair from my own scant10 home, and there immediately appeared at the door, with a little girl in her hand, a civil person who dropped me as decent a curtsy as if I had been the mistress or a distinguished11 visitor. I had received in Harley Street a narrower notion of the place, and that, as I recalled it, made me think the proprietor12 still more of a gentleman, suggested that what I was to enjoy might be something beyond his promise.
I had no drop again till the next day, for I was carried triumphantly13 through the following hours by my introduction to the younger of my pupils. The little girl who accompanied Mrs. Grose appeared to me on the spot a creature so charming as to make it a great fortune to have to do with her. She was the most beautiful child I had ever seen, and I afterward14 wondered that my employer had not told me more of her. I slept little that night — I was too much excited; and this astonished me, too, I recollect15, remained with me, adding to my sense of the liberality with which I was treated. The large, impressive room, one of the best in the house, the great state bed, as I almost felt it, the full, figured draperies, the long glasses in which, for the first time, I could see myself from head to foot, all struck me — like the extraordinary charm of my small charge — as so many things thrown in. It was thrown in as well, from the first moment, that I should get on with Mrs. Grose in a relation over which, on my way, in the coach, I fear I had rather brooded. The only thing indeed that in this early outlook might have made me shrink again was the clear circumstance of her being so glad to see me. I perceived within half an hour that she was so glad — stout16, simple, plain, clean, wholesome17 woman — as to be positively18 on her guard against showing it too much. I wondered even then a little why she should wish not to show it, and that, with reflection, with suspicion, might of course have made me uneasy.
But it was a comfort that there could be no uneasiness in a connection with anything so beatific19 as the radiant image of my little girl, the vision of whose angelic beauty had probably more than anything else to do with the restlessness that, before morning, made me several times rise and wander about my room to take in the whole picture and prospect20; to watch, from my open window, the faint summer dawn, to look at such portions of the rest of the house as I could catch, and to listen, while, in the fading dusk, the first birds began to twitter, for the possible recurrence21 of a sound or two, less natural and not without, but within, that I had fancied I heard. There had been a moment when I believed I recognized, faint and far, the cry of a child; there had been another when I found myself just consciously starting as at the passage, before my door, of a light footstep. But these fancies were not marked enough not to be thrown off, and it is only in the light, or the gloom, I should rather say, of other and subsequent matters that they now come back to me. To watch, teach, “form” little Flora22 would too evidently be the making of a happy and useful life. It had been agreed between us downstairs that after this first occasion I should have her as a matter of course at night, her small white bed being already arranged, to that end, in my room. What I had undertaken was the whole care of her, and she had remained, just this last time, with Mrs. Grose only as an effect of our consideration for my inevitable23 strangeness and her natural timidity. In spite of this timidity — which the child herself, in the oddest way in the world, had been perfectly24 frank and brave about, allowing it, without a sign of uncomfortable consciousness, with the deep, sweet serenity25 indeed of one of Raphael’s holy infants, to be discussed, to be imputed26 to her, and to determine us — I feel quite sure she would presently like me. It was part of what I already liked Mrs. Grose herself for, the pleasure I could see her feel in my admiration27 and wonder as I sat at supper with four tall candles and with my pupil, in a high chair and a bib, brightly facing me, between them, over bread and milk. There were naturally things that in Flora’s presence could pass between us only as prodigious28 and gratified looks, obscure and roundabout allusions29.
“And the little boy — does he look like her? Is he too so very remarkable30?”
One wouldn’t flatter a child. “Oh, miss, MOST remarkable. If you think well of this one!” — and she stood there with a plate in her hand, beaming at our companion, who looked from one of us to the other with placid31 heavenly eyes that contained nothing to check us.
“Yes; if I do —?”
“You WILL be carried away by the little gentleman!”
“Well, that, I think, is what I came for — to be carried away. I’m afraid, however,” I remember feeling the impulse to add, “I’m rather easily carried away. I was carried away in London!”
I can still see Mrs. Grose’s broad face as she took this in. “In Harley Street?”
“In Harley Street.”
“Well, miss, you’re not the first — and you won’t be the last.”
“Oh, I’ve no pretension,” I could laugh, “to being the only one. My other pupil, at any rate, as I understand, comes back tomorrow?”
“Not tomorrow — Friday, miss. He arrives, as you did, by the coach, under care of the guard, and is to be met by the same carriage.”
I forthwith expressed that the proper as well as the pleasant and friendly thing would be therefore that on the arrival of the public conveyance32 I should be in waiting for him with his little sister; an idea in which Mrs. Grose concurred33 so heartily34 that I somehow took her manner as a kind of comforting pledge — never falsified, thank heaven! — that we should on every question be quite at one. Oh, she was glad I was there!
What I felt the next day was, I suppose, nothing that could be fairly called a reaction from the cheer of my arrival; it was probably at the most only a slight oppression produced by a fuller measure of the scale, as I walked round them, gazed up at them, took them in, of my new circumstances. They had, as it were, an extent and mass for which I had not been prepared and in the presence of which I found myself, freshly, a little scared as well as a little proud. Lessons, in this agitation35, certainly suffered some delay; I reflected that my first duty was, by the gentlest arts I could contrive36, to win the child into the sense of knowing me. I spent the day with her out-of-doors; I arranged with her, to her great satisfaction, that it should be she, she only, who might show me the place. She showed it step by step and room by room and secret by secret, with droll37, delightful38, childish talk about it and with the result, in half an hour, of our becoming immense friends. Young as she was, I was struck, throughout our little tour, with her confidence and courage with the way, in empty chambers39 and dull corridors, on crooked40 staircases that made me pause and even on the summit of an old machicolated square tower that made me dizzy, her morning music, her disposition41 to tell me so many more things than she asked, rang out and led me on. I have not seen Bly since the day I left it, and I daresay that to my older and more informed eyes it would now appear sufficiently42 contracted. But as my little conductress, with her hair of gold and her frock of blue, danced before me round corners and pattered down passages, I had the view of a castle of romance inhabited by a rosy43 sprite, such a place as would somehow, for diversion of the young idea, take all color out of storybooks and fairytales. Wasn’t it just a storybook over which I had fallen adoze and adream? No; it was a big, ugly, antique, but convenient house, embodying44 a few features of a building still older, half-replaced and half-utilized, in which I had the fancy of our being almost as lost as a handful of passengers in a great drifting ship. Well, I was, strangely, at the helm!
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1
seesaw
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| n.跷跷板 | |
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2
throbs
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| 体内的跳动( throb的名词复数 ) | |
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3
commodious
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| adj.宽敞的；使用方便的 | |
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4
fortitude
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| n.坚忍不拔；刚毅 | |
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5
reprieve
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| n.暂缓执行（死刑）；v.缓期执行；给…带来缓解 | |
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6
dreaded
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| adj.令人畏惧的；害怕的v.害怕，恐惧，担心( dread的过去式和过去分词) | |
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7
melancholy
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| n.忧郁，愁思；adj.令人感伤（沮丧）的，忧郁的 | |
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8
crunch
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| n.关键时刻；艰难局面；v.发出碎裂声 | |
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9
gravel
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| n.砂跞；砂砾层；结石 | |
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10
scant
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| adj.不充分的，不足的；v.减缩，限制，忽略 | |
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11
distinguished
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| adj.卓越的，杰出的，著名的 | |
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12
proprietor
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| n.所有人；业主；经营者 | |
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13
triumphantly
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| ad.得意洋洋地；得胜地；成功地 | |
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14
afterward
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| adv.后来；以后 | |
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15
recollect
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| v.回忆，想起，记起，忆起，记得 | |
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16
stout
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| adj.强壮的，粗大的，结实的，勇猛的，矮胖的 | |
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17
wholesome
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| adj.适合；卫生的；有益健康的；显示身心健康的 | |
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18
positively
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| adv.明确地，断然，坚决地；实在，确实 | |
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19
beatific
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| adj.快乐的，有福的 | |
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20
prospect
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| n.前景，前途；景色，视野 | |
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21
recurrence
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| n.复发，反复，重现 | |
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22
flora
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| n.(某一地区的)植物群 | |
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23
inevitable
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| adj.不可避免的，必然发生的 | |
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24
perfectly
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| adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地 | |
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25
serenity
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| n.宁静，沉着，晴朗 | |
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26
imputed
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| v.把（错误等）归咎于( impute的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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27
admiration
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| n.钦佩，赞美，羡慕 | |
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28
prodigious
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| adj.惊人的，奇妙的；异常的；巨大的；庞大的 | |
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29
allusions
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| 暗指，间接提到( allusion的名词复数 ) | |
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30
remarkable
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| adj.显著的，异常的，非凡的，值得注意的 | |
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31
placid
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| adj.安静的，平和的 | |
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32
conveyance
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| n.(不动产等的)转让，让与；转让证书；传送；运送；表达；（正）运输工具 | |
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33
concurred
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| 同意（concur的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
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34
heartily
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| adv.衷心地，诚恳地，十分，很 | |
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35
agitation
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| n.搅动；搅拌；鼓动，煽动 | |
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36
contrive
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| vt.谋划，策划；设法做到；设计，想出 | |
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37
droll
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| adj.古怪的，好笑的 | |
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38
delightful
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| adj.令人高兴的，使人快乐的 | |
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39
chambers
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| n.房间( chamber的名词复数 )；（议会的）议院；卧室；会议厅 | |
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40
crooked
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| adj.弯曲的；不诚实的，狡猾的，不正当的 | |
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41
disposition
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| n.性情，性格；意向，倾向；排列，部署 | |
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42
sufficiently
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| adv.足够地，充分地 | |
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43
rosy
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| adj.美好的，乐观的，玫瑰色的 | |
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44
embodying
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| v.表现( embody的现在分词 )；象征；包括；包含 | |
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