评论
打印
"Of course I've always said that she looks at things quite differently," Mrs. Archer summed up.
“那是当然，我一直说她看问题跟别人两样，”阿切尔太太总结说。
A flush rose to May's forehead.
一片红润涌上梅的额头，
She looked across the table at her husband, and said precipitately: "I'm sure Ellen meant it kindly."
她看着桌子对面的丈夫，贸然地说：“我敢肯定，埃伦原本是出于好心。”
"Imprudent people are often kind," said Mrs. Archer, as if the fact were scarcely an extenuation; and Mrs. van der Luyden murmured: "If only she had consulted some one--" "Ah, that she never did!" Mrs. Archer rejoined.
“轻率的人经常是出于好心的，”阿切尔太太说，仿佛这也很难为其开脱。范德卢顿太太低声说：“她若是能找个人商量一下--”“咳，她从来不会找人商量的！”阿切尔太太应声说。
At this point Mr. van der Luyden glanced at his wife, who bent her head slightly in the direction of Mrs. Archer; and the glimmering trains of the three ladies swept out of the door while the gentlemen settled down to their cigars.
这时候，范德卢顿先生瞥了妻子一眼，后者朝阿切尔太太略一欠身，接着三位女士便拖着熠熠闪光的裙裾，一溜烟儿似的从门口出去了。
Mr. van der Luyden supplied short ones on Opera nights; but they were so good that they made his guests deplore his inexorable punctuality.
绅士们则安心地抽起雪茄。范德卢顿先生供应的是晚上听歌剧吸的短雪茄，不过品味极佳，以致客人们动身时都为主人的恪守时间而感到惋惜。
Archer, after the first act, had detached himself from the party and made his way to the back of the club box.
第一幕结束后，阿切尔摆脱开同伴，朝俱乐部包厢的后面走去。
From there he watched, over various Chivers, Mingott and Rushworth shoulders, the same scene that he had looked at, two years previously, on the night of his first meeting with Ellen Olenska.
从那儿，越过姓奇弗斯、明戈特、拉什沃斯的许多人的肩膀，他注视着两年前与埃伦·奥兰斯卡第一次见面那天晚上他看到的场景。
He had half- expected her to appear again in old Mrs. Mingott's box, but it remained empty; and he sat motionless, his eyes fastened on it, till suddenly Madame Nilsson's pure soprano broke out into "M'ama, non m'ama... "
他有意无意地盼望她会再出现在老明戈特太太的包厢里，但包厢里空无一人。他坐着一动不动，两眼紧盯着那个包厢，直到尼尔森夫人纯正的女高音突然进发出“啊--啊……”
Archer turned to the stage, where, in the familiar setting of giant roses and pen-wiper pansies, the same large blonde victim was succumbing to the same small brown seducer.
阿切尔转向舞台，上面硕大的玫瑰花与三色董的熟悉布景中，同一位无辜的高大金发女郎正屈服于同一位矮小的棕发引诱者。
From the stage his eyes wandered to the point of the horseshoe where May sat between two older ladies, just as, on that former evening, she had sat between Mrs. Lovell Mingott and her newly-arrived "foreign" cousin.
他的目光扫视了一个U字形，落到梅就坐的地方。她夹在两位老夫人中间，跟两年前那个晚上很相似。
As on that evening, she was all in white;
当时，她坐在洛弗尔·明戈特与她那位刚到的“外国”表姐中间。
and Archer, who had not noticed what she wore, recognised the blue-white satin and old lace of her wedding dress.
那天晚上她穿的是一身白衣服，阿切尔刚才没注意她穿的什么，这会儿才看出她穿的是那身带老式花边的蓝白缎子婚礼服。
It was the custom, in old New York, for brides to appear in this costly garment during the first year or two of marriage:
按纽约的老风俗，新娘在婚后头一两年内穿这身贵重的衣服。
his mother, he knew, kept hers in tissue paper in the hope that Janey might some day wear it, though poor Janey was reaching the age when pearl grey poplin and no bridesmaids would be thought more "appropriate."
据他所知，他母亲一直把自己那身婚服包在绵纸里保存着，指望有朝一日让詹尼穿。可是可怜的詹尼眼看已到了穿珠灰色府绸的年纪，且已不适合做伴娘了。
It struck Archer that May, since their return from Europe, had seldom worn her bridal satin, and the surprise of seeing her in it made him compare her appearance with that of the young girl he had watched with such blissful anticipations two years earlier.
阿切尔忽然想到，自从他们从欧洲回来后，梅一直很少穿她的新娘缎服。现在意外地见她穿在身上，他不由得将她的外貌与两年前他怀着幸福的憧憬观察的那位姑娘做了一番比较。
Though May's outline was slightly heavier, as her goddess like build had foretold, her athletic erectness of carriage, and the girlish transparency of her expression, remained unchanged:
虽然梅那女神般的体态早就预示她的轮廓会像现在这样略嫌粗大，但她昂首挺身的运动员风采及一脸小姑娘似的坦城却依然如故。
but for the slight languor that Archer had lately noticed in her she would have been the exact image of the girl playing with the bouquet of lilies-of-the-valley on her betrothal evening.
若不是阿切尔近来注意到的那一丝倦怠，她简直跟订婚那大晚上侍弄那束铃兰的那位姑娘一模一样。
The fact seemed an additional appeal to his pity: such innocence was as moving as the trustful clasp of a child.
这一事实似乎格外引起他的同情，她的单纯就像小孩子信赖的拥抱那样感人至深。
Then he remembered the passionate generosity latent under that incurious calm.
接着，他记起了隐伏于她的漠然与沉静中的激昂慷慨，
He recalled her glance of understanding when he had urged that their engagement should be announced at the Beaufort ball; he heard the voice in which she had said, in the Mission garden: "I couldn't have my happiness made out of a wrong--a wrong to some one else;" and an uncontrollable longing seized him to tell her the truth, to throw himself on her generosity, and ask for the freedom he had once refused.
回想起当他力劝她在博福特家舞会上宣布他们的订婚消息时她那理解的目光；他仿佛又听到了她在教区花园里说过的那番话：“我不能把自己的幸福建筑在对另一个人的不--不公平上。”他抑制不住地产生了一种渴望：想对她说出真相，以便仰仗她的宽宏大量，请求得到他一度拒绝过的自由。
Newland Archer was a quiet and self-controlled young man.
纽兰·阿切尔是个善于自我克制的沉稳青年，
Conformity to the discipline of a small society had become almost his second nature.
遵循一个狭小社会阶层的行为准则几乎已经成了他的第二天性。
It was deeply distasteful to him to do anything melodramatic and conspicuous, anything Mr. van der Luyden would have deprecated and the club box condemned as bad form.
对于任何哗众取宠的行为，对于任何范德卢顿先生与俱乐部包厢里的人们指责为粗鲁的行为，他都深恶痛绝。
But he had become suddenly unconscious of the club box, of Mr. van der Luyden, of all that had so long enclosed him in the warm shelter of habit.
但忽然间，他忘记了俱乐部包厢，忘记了范德卢顿先生，以及长期将他包围在习惯庇护中的一切。
He walked along the semi-circular passage at the back of the house, and opened the door of Mrs. van der Luyden's box as if it had been a gate into the unknown.
他穿过剧场后面半圆形的过道，打开范德卢顿太太包厢的门，仿佛那原是一道通往未知世界的门一样。
"M'ama!" thrilled out the triumphant Marguerite; and the occupants of the box looked up in surprise at Archer's entrance.
“啊--！”得意洋洋的玛格丽特正用颤音尖声唱着。阿切尔一进去，包厢里的人全都惊讶地抬起头来看他：
He had already broken one of the rules of his world, which forbade the entering of a box during a solo.
他已经违背了他那个圈子的一条规则--在独唱表演期间是不准进入包厢的。
Slipping between Mr. van der Luyden and Sillerton Jackson, he leaned over his wife.
他悄悄从范德卢顿先生与西勒顿先生中间走过去，探身俯于妻子上方。
"I've got a beastly headache; don't tell any one, but come home, won't you?" he whispered.
“我头痛得厉害。别对任何人讲，跟我回家好吗？”他悄声说。
May gave him a glance of comprehension, and he saw her whisper to his mother, who nodded sympathetically; then she murmured an excuse to Mrs. van der Luyden, and rose from her seat just as Marguerite fell into Faust's arms.
梅理解地看了他一眼，只见她悄声告诉了她母亲，后者同情地点了点头，接着她又嗫嚅着向范德卢顿太太表示了歉意，便从座位上站了起来。这时正值玛格丽特落进浮士德的怀抱。
Archer, while he helped her on with her Opera cloak, noticed the exchange of a significant smile between the older ladies.
当阿切尔帮她穿外衣时，他注意到两位老夫人相互交换了个意味深长的微笑。
