雙語·灼人的秘密 沉默

Edgar henceforward felt easy. His heart was overflowing with one undivided emotion: hatred, open enmity. He was now absolutely single-minded. Since he knew that his presence was irksome, he took a voluptuous pleasure in sticking to them like a leech. His energies were concentrated upon making their lives a burden to them. The baron was the first to feel the boy’s fangs.

Next morning, when Sternfeldt passed through the lounge throwing a friendly “Good morning, Eddie” to the child, the latter did not look up but muttered a cold, hard “Good morning” in return.

“Mother down yet?”

Edgar remained buried in the newspaper. “Don’t know,” he said carelessly.

The baron was surprised. What could this mean?

“Slept badly, Eddie?” he asked, facetiously.

“No,” answered the boy curtly, and buried his head still deeper in the periodical.

“Silly young ass,” murmured Otto, shrugging, and passing on his way.

War had been declared.

Towards his mother Edgar behaved with exaggerated politeness. A suggestion that it would be good for his health to play a game of tennis was courteously thrust aside. A fixed and rather bitter smile showed that he was no longer to be duped by such ruses. With assumed friendliness he remarked: “I’d rather go for a walk with you and Baron von Sternfeldt, Mummy.”

He glanced up at her as he spoke, and noticed her embarrassment. At length she said:

“Wait for me here,” and passed into the dining-room where breakfast was served for her.

He waited; but as he waited mistrust grew stronger within him. At last he decided to go outside where he could keep the front door under observation and all the other exits likewise. His instinct told him his enemies were likely to betray him again, and he was determined not to be caught napping. Books on Red Indians had taught him how to take cover, and he crept behind a wood-pile. He chuckled contentedly when, half an hour later his mother came stealthily out of one of the side with a superb bunch of red roses in her hand, and, close at her heels, the baron, the traitor.

Both appeared to be in fine fettle, to be enjoying the fact that they had given Edgar the slip, and could now relish their secret together, without the boy’s watchful eye perpetually upon them.

The moment had come for the young spy to act. He sauntered along the path towards the hotel as if he had not observed them, pretending he was engrossed in the bushes and birds, giving them ample time to compose their features after their initial surprise. Very deliberately the child drew nearer, and, when a few yards away, lifted mocking eyes towards them. Frau Blumental was the first to recover.

“Ah, there you are at last, Edgar. We’ve been hunting for you all over the place.”

“What a whopper,” thought the boy, as the lie slid easily off her tongue. But he kept himself in hand, and drew a veil over the intensity of his hate. They stood in a bunch, not knowing what to do next, each watching the other.

“Well, we’d better be starting,” said the woman, nervously plucking the head off one of the beautiful roses. Her sensitive nostrils quivered, and Edgar knew this was a sign that she was angry. The boy did not move. He continued to gaze indifferently aloft, into the blue firmament. At length they passed onward down the path, and he followed. One more endeavour on the baron’s part.

“There’s a tennis tournament this afternoon, Eddie. Don’t you want to be there?”

The boy looked at his interlocutor with unconcealed disgust, and did not deign to answer. He pursed up his lips as if about to whistle.

His presence weighed upon the two elders. They walked like convicts under guard. The child said nothing and did nothing, and yet his presence became more and more irksome as the minutes went by. He repelled their advances, their essays at conciliation. His eyelids stung with suppressed tears, his lips were drawn and sullen. Suddenly, feeling she could bear this furtive observation no longer, the mother ordered Edgar to go on in front.

“I can’t stand your dogging my steps like this. It makes me nervous.”

Obediently, the boy took the lead, but every once in a while he looked back to see if they were following, and would wait for them to catch up with him if they dawdled on the way.

His obstinate silence poisoned any pleasure they had hoped to derive from this stroll, and his hostile eyes dried up the words on their lips. Baron Otto von Sternfeldt did not venture to woo, and it was with impotent fury that he sensed the woman slipping from his grasp as the passion he had been at such pains to evoke cooled under the observation of this nerve-racking and detestable child. Every time they started to converse they became tongue-tied. In the end, the trio wandered aimlessly through the forest, wrapped in a shroud of silence, while the trees rustled above their heads and the sound of their own footsteps beat upon the air. The boy had successfully wet-blanketed their conversation.

A malevolent spirit had taken up its abode in the heart of each one of them. But the child was armed and invulnerable; he took a wild delight in the fact that he, whom they despised, remained unscathed by their wrath. It was sheer delight to see how mortified the baron was, how he resented such treatment. Edgar could guess the tenor of the curses that lay unuttered upon the man’s lips; he knew that his mother’s temper rising; he realized that they would have given almost anything to fall upon him tooth and nail, to get rid of him by hook or by crook. But he gave them no occasion to treat him harshly, behaving civilly, walking sedately before them. His hatred had reckoned upon hours of this martyrdom, and he was determined not to yield an iota of his advantage.

“l(fā)et’s go back,” said Frau Blumental at last, exasperated, feeling she would have to scream if the tension continued.

“What a pity,” rejoined her son placidly, “It’s such a lovely afternoon.”

Both the elders noted that the lad was making fun of them. But neither dared a rebuke, for the youngster’s outward conduct was exemplary. In two days he had acquired a self-mastery beyond his years. Not a sign could be read upon that tender face...Without further discussion the trio made their way home. Alone in their suite, mother and son let fall the mask of reserve. She threw down her sunshade and gloves in a pet, thus revealing to Edgar’s watchful eyes that her nerves were on edge and that her emotions craved an outlet. Nothing better, thought the boy, than that she should give way to her exasperation. In order to provoke her he remained fidgeting about in her room. She walked feverishly to and fro, sat down, drummed with her fingers on the table, sprang to her feet again.

“How untidy your hair is,” she scolded. “Your hands are grubbywash them at once. It’s disgusting to go about in such a state. A boy of your age, too; aren’t you ashamed?”

Edgar grinned as he betook himself to the bathroom. “She can’t stand my being with her,” he reflected maliciously.

He knew now that they were frightened of him and his relentless eyes, that they dreaded the moment when the three of them were forced to share one another’s company. Proportionally as they grew uneasy, the boy grew happy and content. They were defenceless against the child’s tactics. Sternfeldt, still hoping to gain his end, was furious,and determined to pay the boy back at the first suitable opportunity. Frau Blumental was fast losing control. It was a relief to her feelings to rebuke Edgar and find fault at every turn. “Don’t fidget with your spoon,” she would say at table. “Where are your manners? You are not fit to take your meals among grown-ups.”

The boy grinned, and continued to grin with his head a little to one side. He knew well enough what lay behind such reproofs, and was proud at having provoked them. His expression was as calm and collected as that of a doctor by a patient’s bedside. Hate is an excellent master for teaching the young self-discipline. A day or two ago Edgar would have made scenes under such trying circumstances. Now he kept silent and always silent, until they both squirmed under his silence.

The meal over, Frau Blumental got up, and Edgar prepared to follow her in the most natural way in the world. She turned on him with the irritation of a horse pestered with flies, and said vehemently:

“Why do you cling to me in this silly fashion as if you were a baby of three? I don’t want you constantly hanging around, d’you hear? Children should not always be with their elders. Go and amuse yourself on your own for a bit. Read, or do anything else you have a fancy for, but for heaven’s sake leave me in peace. I’m fed up with you and your stupid, tiresome ways.”

So he had got her to speak frankly at last! Edgar continued to grin, whereas the baron and she seemed at a loss. The woman turned her back, furious with herself for having given the show away to the child, while Edgar said complacently:

“Dad does not wish me to wander about here alone. Dad made me promise to be careful and to stick by you.”

The word “Dad” seemed to exercise a paralysing effect upon the couple, and Edgar, therefore, took a fresh delight in stressing it. His father, he felt, must also have a place in this burning secret, must wield power over the twain from a distance, otherwise why should they look so distressed at the mere mention of his name. Without deigning to answer, the woman led the way from the dining-room. The baron followed. The boy brought up the rear, not humbly as an inferior, but with the air of a warder, hard, severe, ruthless. In fancy he held them on a chain whose links he could hear rattling and which was indestructible. Hate had steeled his childish strength. He, the innocent, was more invulnerable than they who were under the ban of their secret.