-
“My aunt will be down presently, Mr.
Nuttel,” said a very self
-possessed
young
lady of fifteen; “in the meantime
you must try and put up with me.”
Privately Framton Nuttel doubted more
than ever whether these formal
visits
on a succession of total strangers would do much
towards helping the
nerve cure which he
was supposed to be undergoing.
“I
know how it will be,” his sister had said when he
was preparing to
migrate to this rural
retreat; “you will bury
yourself down there and not speak to a
living soul, and your nerves will be
worse than ever from moping. I shall
just give
you
letters of introduction to all the people I know
there. Some of them, as far
as I can
remember, were quite nice.”
Framton wondered whether Mrs.
Sappleton, the lady to whom he was
presenting one of the letters of
introduction came into the nice division.
“Do you know many of the people round
here?” asked the niece, when
she judged
that they had had sufficient silent
communion.
“Hardly a soul,” said Framton.
“M
y sister was staying here, at the
rectory,
you know, some four years ago,
and she gave me letters of introduction to
some of the people here.”
He made the last statement in a tone of
distinct regret.
“Then you know
practically nothing about my aunt?” pursued the
self-possessed young lady.
“Only her name and address,” admitted
the caller. He was wondering
whether
Mrs. Sappleton was in the married or widowed
state. An undefinable
something about
the room seemed to suggest masculine habitation.
“Her great tragedy happened just three
years ago,” said the child; “that
would
be since your sister's time.”
“Her tragedy?” asked Framton; somehow
in this restful country spot
tragedies
seemed out of place.
“You may wonder
why we keep that window
wide open on an
October
afternoon,” said the niece,
indicating a large French
window that opened on to a lawn.
“It is quite warm for the time of the
year,” said Framton; “but has that
window got anything to do with the
tragedy?”
“Out through
that
window, three years ago to a day,
her husband and her
two young brothers
went off for their day's
shooting. They never came back. In
crossing the moor to their favourite
snipe-shooting ground they were all
three engulfed
in a treacherous piece of bog. Poor
aunt always thinks that they will come back
someday, they and the little brown
spaniel
that
was lost with them, and walk in at that window
just as they used to do.
Poor dear
aunt, she has often told me how they
went out, her husband with
his white waterproof coat over his arm, and
Ronnie,
her youngest brother, singing
‘Bertie, why
do
you bound?' as he always did to tease her, because
she said it got on her
nerves. Do you
know, sometimes on still, quiet
evenings like this, I
almost get a creepy feeling that they will all
walk in through
that window”
She broke off with a little shudder. It
was a relief to Framton when the aunt
bustled into the room with a whirl of
apologies for
being late in making her appearance.
“I
hope Vera has been amusing you?” she
said.
“She has been
very interesting,” said Framton.
“I hope you don't mind the open
window,” said Mrs. Sappleton briskly; “my
husband and brothers will be home
directly from shooting, and they always
come in this way. They've been out for
snipe in the marshes today, so they'll
make a fine mess over my poor carpets.
So like you menfolk, isn't it?”
She rattled on cheerfully about the
shooting and the scarcity of birds, and
the prospects for duck in the winter.
Framton was conscious that his hostess
was giving him only a fragment of her
attention, and her eyes were constantly
straying past him to the open window
and the lawn beyond. It was certainly an
unfortunate coincidence that he should
have paid his visit on this tragic
anniversary.
“The doctors
agree in ordering me complete rest, an absence of
mental
excitement, and avoidance of
anything in the nature of violent physical
exercise,” announced
Framton.
“No?” said Mrs.
Sappleton, in a voice which only replaced a yawn
at
the
last moment. Then she
suddenly brightened into
alert attention- but not to what
Framton was saying.
“Here they are
at last!” she cried. “Just in time for tea, and
don't they look
as if they were muddy
up to the eyes!”
Framton shivered slightly and turned
towards the niece with a look
intended
to convey sympathetic comprehension. The child was
staring out
through the open window
with a dazed horror in her eyes. In a chill shock
of
nameless fear Framton swung round in
his seat and looked in the same
direction.
In the
deepening twilight three figures were walking
across the lawn
towards the window,
they all carried guns under their arms, and one of
them
was additionally burdened with a
white coat hung over his shoulders. A tired
brown spaniel kept close at their
heels. Noiselessly they neared the house,
and then a hoarse young voice chanted
out of the dusk: “I said, Bertie, why do
you bound?”
Framton grabbed wildly at his stick and
hat; the hall door, the gravel drive,
and the front gate were dimly noted
stages in his headlong retreat. A cyclist
coming along the road had to run into
the hedge to avoid imminent collision.
“Here we are, my dear,” said the bearer
of the white mackintosh, coming
in
through the window, “fairly muddy, but
most
of it's dry. Who was that who
bolted out as we came up?”
“A most extraordinary man, a Mr.
Nuttel,” said Mrs. Sappleton; “could only
talk about his illnesses, and dashed
off
without a
word of goodbye or apology when you arrived. One
would think he
ha
d seen a
ghost.”
“I expect it
was the spaniel,” said the niece calmly; “he told
me he had a
horror of dogs. He was once
hunted into a
cemetery somewhere on the banks of the
Ganges by a pack of pariah dogs,
and
had to spend the night in a newly dug grave with
the creatures
snarling and grinning and foaming just above him.
Enough to
make anyone lose their
nerve.”
Romance at short
notice was her speciality.
“
纳托先生，我姑妈很快就会下来
”<
/p>
，说话人是一位十五岁的年轻小姐，看上去沉
着自信，
“
现在我来陪您，请多包涵。
”
< br>
弗雷顿
·
纳
托目前需要接受神经衰弱的治疗，可是一个接着一个的拜访这样
完全陌生的人真的会对他
的神经有什么帮助吗？他现在比以往任何时候都更加
怀疑这一点。
当时他正收拾行装准备来乡下静居，姐姐对他说：
“
我知道最后会是什么样
子！
到了那里你会把自己封
闭起来，
不跟任何人说一句话，
而你的神经会因为抑
郁不乐而变得更加糟糕。
我还是要写一些引见信，
把你介绍给那里所有我认识的
人，在我的印象中，有些人还是很和善的。
”
弗雷顿现在就要把这样一封引见信
交给赛普顿夫人，
不知道这位夫人是不是
属于和善之流。
“
您在这里认识很多人吗？
”
那位小姐开口问道，因为她发现他们这样沉默的
交流时间过长了。
“
几乎一
个人都不认识，
”
弗雷顿答道，
“
四年前我的姐姐在这里住过一段时间，
你也许知道，在教区长的家里
，是她写的引见信让我认识这里的人。
”
他说最后一句话时，语气中透露出说不出的后悔。
“
那么您实际上对我姑妈是一无所知了？
”
年轻的小姐继续问道。
“
只知道她的名字和地址，
”
来客承认，同时
他又在暗自考虑，这位赛普顿夫
人的丈夫是否还健在，因为房间里有些说不清的迹象表明
这里是有男人居住的。
“
三年前
她的家里发生了一场悲剧，
”
那孩子接着说，
< br>“
当时您的姐姐应该已经
离开这里了。
< br>”
“
悲剧？
”
弗雷顿觉得有些不可思议，不知为什么他觉得在这样的乡村静
地是
不会发生什么悲剧的。
“
也许您会奇怪，为什么十月份的下午我们会将窗户大敞着，
”
那位小姐用手
指着那扇宽敞的法式落地窗说。窗外是一片草坪。
“
今年的十月天气不是很凉，
”
弗雷顿回答，
“
不
过你的意思是说，
这扇窗户跟
那场悲剧有什么关系吗？
”
“
三年前
的今天，她的丈夫和两个弟弟，就是穿过那扇窗户去打猎，但是一
去无返。他们当时要去
那块最适合猎射沙锥鸟的地方，但是在穿过野地的时候，
三个人意想不到的全部陷进沼泽
里。
可怜的姑妈总是相信他们有一天会回来，
他
们三个，
还有那条跟他们一块儿失踪的西班牙猎狗，
会
像从前一样从那扇窗户走
进来。可怜的，亲爱的姑妈，她总是跟我提起当时他们出门的情
景，她的丈夫胳
膊上搭着一件白色雨衣，她最小的弟弟，罗尼，唱着
“
伯蒂，你为什么又蹦又
跳？
”“
因为这首歌会让她心烦意乱，
所以他就经常唱这个调子打趣她。
你知道吗，
在这样安静的夜晚，
我有时
也会觉得他们会从那扇窗子走进来，
这种感觉让我浑
身发怵。<
/p>
”
讲到这里，她停了下来，打了个寒
颤。这时，那位姑妈匆匆走进房间，让弗
雷顿松了一口气，她一进屋就不停的道歉说自己
这么迟才下楼来。
“
维拉没
有让您觉得无聊吧？
”
她问道。
“
她是位很有趣的小姐。
”
弗雷顿回答。
“
希望您
不会介意我把窗户开着，
”
赛普顿夫人轻快的说，
“
我丈夫和弟弟打猎
以后回家，
总是从这边进来。
他们今天去沼泽地打沙锥鸟，
回来的时候
肯定会把
我的地毯弄得脏兮兮的。男人都是这样子，对吧？
”<
/p>
接着她又饶有兴趣喋喋不休地谈起打猎，
最近树林里面鸟不多，
以及冬天会
有鸭子等等。
在弗雷顿看来，
没什么比这更可怕的了。
弗雷顿意
识到这位女主人
大部分的注意力并不在他的身上，
她的眼光不断
的绕过他，
朝那扇开着的窗和窗
外的草坪望去。
他竟然会在这个悲剧发生三周年的日子拜访这位夫人，
真是个不
幸的巧合！
“
医生们
一致认为我应该彻底休息，避免任何心理刺激，和任何形式的剧烈
体力运动，
”
弗雷顿大声说道。
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