第三章（第6/7页）

“你感到不解么？难不成你以为他整日行善积德？”“我认为他有种宽宏的气度。”“对谁？”“我不太清楚。”“你当然不清楚。恐怕你只是误把寡廉鲜耻当成了宽宏大量。”康妮无言以对。当真如此么？确有这种可能。但正是米凯利斯不知廉耻的品性让她为之着迷。相对于克利福德的蹒跚学步，他早已功成名就。他以自己的方式征服世界，而这正是克利福德梦寐以求的。至于方法和途径……？米凯利斯所用的手段比克利福德的更加卑劣么？这个被社会边缘化的倒霉蛋，凭借自身的奋斗以及偷偷摸摸的伎俩扬名立万，而克利福德则依靠自我标榜和吹嘘上位，难道两者有什么本质的不同？成功，这位堕落女神，被千万只耷拉着舌头的狗，气喘吁吁地尾随在后。因此，米凯利斯大可以趾高气昂地翘起尾巴。但出人意料的是，他并没有如此地得意忘形。

He came back towards tea-time with a large handful of violets and lilies, and the same hang-dog expression. Connie wondered sometimes if it were a sort of mask to disarm opposition, because it was almost too fixed. Was he really such a sad dog? His sad-dog sort of extinguished self persisted all the evening, though through it Clifford felt the inner effrontery. Connie didn't feel it, perhaps because it was not directed against women; only against men, and their presumptions and assumptions. That indestructible, inward effrontery in the meagre fellow was what made men so down on Michaelis. His very presence was an affront to a man of society, cloak it as he might in an assumed good manner.

他果然在下午茶时分回到拉格比，手里捧着一大束紫罗兰和百合，垂头丧气的卑怯表情依然如故。康妮有时怀疑，这种神态是否是他用来瓦解对方敌对的面具，因为他总是那副可鄙的模样。他当真是只丧家犬么？整晚他都摆出那副可怜巴巴的丧气相，而在克利福德眼中，这不过是为了掩饰其厚颜无耻的本质。康妮却并不这么认为，或许这样的伎俩不会用在女人身上，而只针对男人，针对他们的专横和狂妄。这个瘦小枯干的家伙厚颜无耻到根深蒂固的程度，而正因为此，人们才会对他如此地深恶痛绝。无论装得多么斯文得体，他的存在对于上流社会的人们而言，都无异于公然侮辱。

Connie was in love with him, but she managed to sit with her embroidery and let the men talk, and not give herself away. As for Michaelis, he was perfect; exactly the same melancholic, attentive, aloof young fellow of the previous evening, millions of degrees remote from his hosts, but laconically playing up to them to the required amount, and never coming forth to them for a moment. Connie felt he must have forgotten the morning. He had not forgotten. But he knew where he was...in the same old place outside, where the born outsiders are. He didn't take the love-making altogether personally. He knew it would not change him from an ownerless dog, whom everybody begrudges its golden collar, into a comfortable society dog.

康妮爱上了他，但还是竭力坐在那里刺绣，聆听着男人们谈天说地，不露出任何蛛丝马迹。至于米凯利斯，他表现得无懈可击，依然是昨晚那个忧郁专注而又冷漠的青年，与克利福德夫妇远远地保持着距离，说话时言简意赅，既能投其所好，又做到适可而止，绝不大献殷勤。康妮甚至感觉他准是已经忘记上午的缠绵。他并未遗忘。但他深知自己所处的位置……被边缘化的处境未曾改变，依然游离在上流社会之外。他并没有太把那次偷情放在心上。他明白这并不能让自己从一只无主的流浪狗，摇身一变成为生活安逸的贵族狗，脖颈上套着的金项圈依然是人们嫉恨的目标。

The final fact being that at the very bottom of his soul he WAS an outsider, and anti-social, and he accepted the fact inwardly, no matter how Bond-Streety he was on the outside. His isolation was a necessity to him; just as the appearance of conformity and mixing-in with the smart people was also a necessity.

但最终的真相是，在灵魂深处，米凯利斯的确与上流社会格格不入，他厌恶虚情假意的交际，甚至在心底早已接受了这一事实，不管外表装扮得如何光鲜亮丽。孤独是其性格中不可或缺的组成部分，就像他表现出来的见贤思齐、力争跻身上流同样必不可少。

But occasional love, as a comfort arid soothing, was also a good thing, and he was not ungrateful. On the contrary, he was burningly, poignantly grateful for a piece of natural, spontaneous kindness: almost to tears. Beneath his pale, immobile, disillusioned face, his child's soul was sobbing with gratitude to the woman, and burning to come to her again; just as his outcast soul was knowing he would keep really clear of her.

偶尔涉足爱河，给身心以慰藉，倒也是件好事，而他也并非忘恩负义之辈。相反却对真诚自然的情感，抱有强烈而深切的感激，几乎因此潸然泪下。那张苍白的面孔流露出沉静寂寥的神态，而隐藏在其后的那孩童般的灵魂，更是对眼前女子感激涕零，迫不及待地想再度与她亲近，但那颗被放逐的心灵却深知，自己应该与她划清界限。

He found an opportunity to say to her, as they were lighting the candles in the hall: "May I come?" "I'll come to you," she said.

借着在走廊燃亮蜡烛的机会，他对她说：“我能去找你么？”“我会去找你的。”她应道。

"Oh, good!" He waited for her a long time...but she came.

“哦，太好了！”他等了很久……她姗姗而来。

He was the trembling excited sort of lover, whose crisis soon came, and was finished. There was something curiously childlike and defenceless about his naked body: as children are naked. His defences were all in his wits and cunning, his very instincts of cunning, and when these were in abeyance he seemed doubly naked and like a child, of unfinished, tender flesh, and somehow struggling helplessly.

床笫上的他总是激动异常，全身战栗，高潮来得快，去得也快。他赤裸的身体尤其如同婴孩般无助，因为孩童们总会不着一缕。全赖机智的头脑与狡黠的天性，他才能保全自我，而当此两者无从发挥之时，他就变得加倍赤裸，愈发与孩童无异，肉体娇嫩纤弱，发育尚未完全，徒劳的挣扎显得那样无力。

He roused in the woman a wild sort of compassion and yearning, and a wild, craving physical desire. The physical desire he did not satisfy in her; he was always come and finished so quickly, then shrinking down on her breast, and recovering somewhat his effrontery while she lay dazed, disappointed, lost.

他激发出康妮狂野的怜爱和渴望，还有疯狂的、按耐不住的情欲。但他却无法令她的欲望得以满足，来去匆匆的高潮过后，就会蜷缩在她的胸口，逐渐恢复他无耻的嘴脸，而她却只能怔怔地躺在那里，怅然若失。