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“Marry!” said Miss Matty once again.
“结婚！”马蒂小姐又说了一遍。”
“Well! I never thought of it. Two people that we know going to be married. It’s coming very near!”
“啊！我从未想过。我们认识的两个人要结婚了。这件事离我们太近了！”
“So near that my heart stopped beating when I heard of it, while you might have counted twelve,” said Miss Pole.
“是太近了，我听到这事时，心都停止跳动了几秒，够你从一数到十二了。”波尔小姐说。
“One does not know whose turn may come next.
“不知道接下来轮到谁。
Here, in Cranford, poor Lady Glenmire might have thought herself safe,” said Miss Matty, with a gentle pity in her tones.
在这里，在克兰福德，可怜的格兰米尔夫人可能觉得自己是安全的。”马蒂小姐说，语气中带着温和的怜悯。
“Bah!” said Miss Pole, with a toss of her head.
“呸！”波尔小姐把头一甩说，
“Don’t you remember poor dear Captain Brown’s song ‘Tibbie Fowler,’ and the line — ‘Set her on the Tintock tap, The wind will blaw a man till her.’”
“你记不记得亲爱的布朗上尉的歌《蒂比·福勒》，还有那句歌词——‘把她放在廷托克塔楼上，风会吹一个男人到她身边。”
“That was because ‘Tibbie Fowler’ was rich, I think.”
“那是因为‘蒂比·福勒’很有钱吧，我觉得。”
“Well! There was a kind of attraction about Lady Glenmire that I, for one, should be ashamed to have.”
“哼！格兰米尔夫人有一种吸引力，不过我个人觉得应该为拥有这种吸引力而感到羞愧。”
I put in my wonder. “But how can she have fancied Mr Hoggins? I am not surprised that Mr Hoggins has liked her.”
我好奇地问：“可是她怎么会喜欢霍金斯先生呢？我并不惊讶霍金斯先生喜欢她。”
“Oh! I don’t know. Mr Hoggins is rich, and very pleasant-looking,” said Miss Matty, “and very good-tempered and kind-hearted.”
“哦！我不知道。霍金斯先生很富有，而且长得非常讨人喜欢，”马蒂小姐说，“脾气也非常好，心地也善良。”
“She has married for an establishment, that’s it. I suppose she takes the surgery with it,” said Miss Pole, with a little dry laugh at her own joke.
“她就是为了财产才结婚，就是这样。我猜她想顺带把手术也做了，”波尔小姐说，对自己的笑话干笑了一下。
But, like many people who think they have made a severe and sarcastic speech, which yet is clever of its kind, she began to relax in her grimness from the moment when she made this allusion to the surgery; and we turned to speculate on the way in which Mrs Jamieson would receive the news.
但是就像许多人以为自己说了一句严厉而挖苦、可能有点小聪明的话之后一样，波尔小姐提到手术后就开始放松了她的严肃态度；于是我们开始推测贾米森夫人听到这个消息会有何反应。
The person whom she had left in charge of her house to keep off followers from her maids to set up a follower of her own!
她留下负责看家并防止女仆有追求者的人，却为自己找了一个追求者！
And that follower a man whom Mrs Jamieson had tabooed as vulgar, and inadmissible to Cranford society, not merely on account of his name, but because of his voice, his complexion, his boots, smelling of the stable, and himself, smelling of drugs.
而且这个追随者是个贾米森夫人认为很粗俗的男人，被克兰福德社交界所不容，不仅因为他的名字，还因为他的嗓音、肤色、靴子（有马厩的味道）和他本人，他身上也有股药味。
Had he ever been to see Lady Glenmire at Mrs Jamieson’s?
他去过贾米森夫人家去见格兰米尔夫人吗？
Chloride of lime would not purify the house in its owner’s estimation if he had.
如果他去过，贾米森夫人会认为就是用漂白粉也无法净化房子。
Or had their interviews been confined to the occasional meetings in the chamber of the poor sick conjuror, to whom, with all our sense of the mesalliance, we could not help allowing that they had both been exceedingly kind?
或者他们只是在那个可怜的生病的魔术师的房间里偶尔见面吗？尽管我们觉得这桩婚姻不是很合适，但我们还是忍不住承认他们俩对魔术师都非常善良。
And now it turned out that a servant of Mrs Jamieson’s had been ill, and Mr Hoggins had been attending her for some weeks.
现在我们才知道，贾米森夫人的一个仆人病了，霍金斯先生已经照顾她好几个星期了。
So the wolf had got into the fold, and now he was carrying off the shepherdess.
所以是狼钻进了羊圈，现在正叼走牧羊女。
What would Mrs Jamieson say?
贾米森夫人会怎么说呢？
We looked into the darkness of futurity as a child gazes after a rocket up in the cloudy sky, full of wondering expectation of the rattle, the discharge, and the brilliant shower of sparks and light.
我们展望黑暗的未来，就像一个孩子凝视着冲上云天的火箭弹，对火箭弹发出的噼啪声、爆炸的烟雾、灿烂的火花和光亮充满好奇和期待。
Then we brought ourselves down to earth and the present time by questioning each other (being all equally ignorant, and all equally without the slightest data to build any conclusions upon) as to when IT would take place? Where?
然后我们回到地面和当下的现实，互相询问（我们都同样没有头绪，也都同样没有任何数据来建立任何结论）“那件事”什么时候会发生？在哪里发生？
How much a year Mr Hoggins had?
霍金斯先生一年有多少收入？
Whether she would drop her title?
她是否会放弃贵族头衔？
And how Martha and the other correct servants in Cranford would ever be brought to announce a married couple as Lady Glenmire and Mr Hoggins?
还有如何向玛莎和克兰福德的其他正统仆人宣布有一对新婚夫妇是格兰米尔夫人和霍金斯先生呢？
But would they be visited? Would Mrs Jamieson let us?
但是人们会去拜访他们吗？贾米森夫人会让我们这么做吗？
Or must we choose between the Honourable Mrs Jamieson and the degraded Lady Glenmire?
还是我们必须在尊贵的贾米森夫人和落魄的格兰米尔夫人之间做出选择？
We all liked Lady Glenmire the best.
我们都最喜欢格兰米尔夫人。
She was bright, and kind, and sociable, and agreeable; and Mrs Jamieson was dull, and inert, and pompous, and tiresome.
她聪明、善良、合群、讨人喜欢；而贾米森夫人则沉闷、没有活力、自负、令人厌烦。
But we had acknowledged the sway of the latter so long, that it seemed like a kind of disloyalty now even to meditate disobedience to the prohibition we anticipated.
但是我们已经承认后者有影响力如此之久，以至于现在即使是想想不服从我们预想的禁令，也似乎是一种不忠。
Mrs Forrester surprised us in our darned caps and patched collars; and we forgot all about them in our eagerness to see how she would bear the information, which we honourably left to Miss Pole, to impart, although, if we had been inclined to take unfair advantage, we might have rushed in ourselves, for she had a most out-of-place fit of coughing for five minutes after Mrs Forrester entered the room.
我们还戴着破旧的帽子、穿着打着补丁的衣领，这时福里斯特夫人突然来访，让我们感到很惊讶；但我们急切地想知道她对这个消息有什么看法，以至于完全忘记了我们的穿着，我们很谦让地把这个消息留给了波尔小姐去传达，尽管如果我们想不公平地利用优势，我们本可以自己说出这个消息，因为福里斯特夫人进屋后，她咳嗽了五分钟，这咳嗽非常不凑巧。
I shall never forget the imploring expression of her eyes, as she looked at us over her pocket-handkerchief.
我永远不会忘记她的眼神，她越过手帕看着我们，眼神中充满了恳求。
They said, as plain as words could speak, “Don’t let Nature deprive me of the treasure which is mine, although for a time I can make no use of it.”
她的眼睛像语言一样清楚地说：“不要让我这不巧的咳嗽剥夺我的珍贵机会，这机会属于我，尽管我暂时无法利用它。”
And we did not.
我们没有剥夺她的机会。
Mrs Forrester’s surprise was equal to ours; and her sense of injury rather greater, because she had to feel for her Order, and saw more fully than we could do how such conduct brought stains on the aristocracy.
福里斯特夫人的惊讶不亚于我们；她甚至感觉更受伤，因为她对像她一样有勋位的人感到痛心，而且比我们更清楚地看到这样的行为给贵族阶层带来了怎样的污点。
