皮漏斗之谜（6）

 

“Exactly! That’s the beauty of it. He owned this curious object, and yet he had someone else’s initials upon it. Why did he do this?”

“I can’t imagine; can you?”

“Well, I might, perhaps, guess. Do you observe something drawn¹ a little farther along the rim²?”

“I should say it was a crown.”

“It is undoubtedly³ a crown; but if you examine it in a good light, you will convince yourself that it is not an ordinary crown. It is a heraldic crown—a badge of rank, and it consists of an alternation of four pearls and strawberry leaves, the proper badge of a marquis. We may infer, therefore, that the person whose initials end in B was entitled to wear that coronet.”

“Then this common leather filler belonged to a marquis?”

Dacre gave a peculiar⁴ smile.

“Or to some member of the family of a marquis,” said he. “So much we have clearly gathered from this engraved⁵ rim.”

“But what has all this to do with dreams?” I do not know whether it was from a look upon Dacre’s face, or from some subtle suggestion in his manner, but a feeling of repulsion, of unreasoning horror, came upon me as I looked at the gnarled old lump of leather.

“正是！妙就妙在这儿。这个奇怪的东西是属于他的，可他却把另一个人的名字刻在上面。他为什么要这样做？”

“我想不出来，你呢？"

“嗯，我可以猜猜，你是否注意到旁边稍远一点的地方刻着什么？”

“好像是冠印。”

“的确是冠印。但如果你借助更亮的光线，就会相信那不是普通的冠印，而是纹章专用的冠印，是等级的标志，由四颗珍珠和草莓叶组成，这是候爵的标志。因此，我们可以推测，以B’作为姓名缩写最后一个字母的那个人就是戴这种冠冕的”

“那么，这个普通的皮漏斗属于一位侯爵吗？”

达克笑了，笑得有点特别。

“或者属于侯爵家族的一名成员，"他说。“从镶的铜边上我们只能得到这些了。”

“可是这一切跟梦究竟有什么关系？"我望着眼前这个古老的凹凸不平的皮家伙，忽然产生厌恶的感觉，还有种莫名其妙的恐惧，不知这种感觉是来自达克的表情还是来自他的神态中隐藏的某种暗示。

 

1 drawn   

v.拖，拉，拔出；adj.憔悴的，紧张的

参考例句：

• All the characters in the story are drawn from life.故事中的所有人物都取材于生活。
• Her gaze was drawn irresistibly to the scene outside.她的目光禁不住被外面的风景所吸引。

2 rim   

n.(圆物的)边，轮缘；边界

参考例句：

• The water was even with the rim of the basin.盆里的水与盆边平齐了。
• She looked at him over the rim of her glass.她的目光越过玻璃杯的边沿看着他。

3 undoubtedly   

adv.确实地，无疑地

参考例句：

• It is undoubtedly she who has said that.这话明明是她说的。
• He is undoubtedly the pride of China.毫无疑问他是中国的骄傲。

4 peculiar   

adj.古怪的，异常的；特殊的，特有的

参考例句：

• He walks in a peculiar fashion.他走路的样子很奇特。
• He looked at me with a very peculiar expression.他用一种很奇怪的表情看着我。

5 engraved   

v.在（硬物）上雕刻（字，画等）( engrave的过去式和过去分词 )；将某事物深深印在（记忆或头脑中）

参考例句：

• The silver cup was engraved with his name. 银杯上刻有他的名字。
• It was prettily engraved with flowers on the back. 此件雕刻精美，背面有花饰图案。 来自《简明英汉词典》