无人生还28
时间：2026-03-19 03:02:09
（单词翻译:单击）
V
General Macarthur tossed from side to side.
Sleep would not come to him.
In the darkness he kept seeing Arthur Richmond’s face.
He’d liked Arthur—he’d been damned fond of Arthur. He’d been pleased
that Leslie liked him too.
Leslie was so capricious. Lots of good fellows that Leslie would turn up
her nose at and pronounce dull. ‘Dull!’ Just like that.
But she hadn’t found Arthur Richmond dull. They’d got on well together
from the beginning. They’d talked of plays and music and pictures to-
gether. She’d teased him, made fun of him, ragged him. And he, Macar-
thur, had been delighted at the thought that Leslie took quite a motherly
interest in the boy.
Motherly indeed! Damn’ fool not to remember that Richmond was
twenty-eight to Leslie’s twenty-nine.
He’d loved Leslie. He could see her now. Her heart-shaped face, and her
dancing deep grey eyes, and the brown curling mass of her hair. He’d
loved Leslie and he’d believed in her absolutely.
Out there in France, in the middle of all the hell of it, he’d sat thinking of
her, taken her picture out of the breast pocket of his tunic.
And then—he’d found out!
It had come about exactly in the way things happened in books. The let-
ter in the wrong envelope. She’d been writing to them both and she’d put
her letter to Richmond in the envelope addressed to her husband. Even
now, all these years after, he could feel the shock of it—the pain…
God, it had hurt!
And the business had been going on some time. The letter made that
clear. Weekends! Richmond’s last leave…
Leslie—Leslie and Arthur!
God damn the fellow! Damn his smiling face, his brisk ‘Yes, sir.’ Liar and
hypocrite! Stealer of another man’s wife!
It had gathered slowly—that cold murderous rage.
He’d managed to carry on as usual—to show nothing. He’d tried to make
his manner to Richmond just the same.
Had he succeeded? He thought so. Richmond hadn’t suspected. Inequal-
ities of temper were easily accounted for out there, where men’s nerves
were continually snapping under the strain.
Only young Armitage had looked at him curiously once or twice. Quite a
young chap, but he’d had perceptions, that boy.
Armitage, perhaps, had guessed—when the time came.
He’d sent Richmond deliberately to death. Only a miracle could have
brought him through unhurt. That miracle didn’t happen. Yes, he’d sent
Richmond to his death and he wasn’t sorry. It had been easy enough. Mis-
takes were being made all the time, officers being sent to death needlessly.
All was confusion, panic. People might say afterwards ‘Old Macarthur lost
his nerve a bit, made some colossal blunders, sacrificed some of his best
men.’ They couldn’t say more.
But young Armitage was different. He’d looked at his commanding of-
ficer very oddly. He’d known, perhaps, that Richmond was being deliber-
ately sent to death.
(After the War was over—had Armitage talked?)
Leslie hadn’t known. Leslie had wept for her lover (he supposed) but
her weeping was over by the time he’d come back to England. He’d never
told her that he’d found her out. They’d gone on together—only, somehow,
she hadn’t seemed very real any more. And then, three or four years later
she’d got double pneumonia and died.
That had been a long time ago. Fifteen years—sixteen years?
And he’d left the Army and come to live in Devon—bought the sort of
little place he’d always meant to have. Nice neighbours—pleasant part of
the world. There was a bit of shooting and fishing. He’d gone to church on
Sundays. (But not the day that the lesson was read about David putting
Uriah in the forefront of the battle. Somehow he couldn’t face that. Gave
him an uncomfortable feeling.)
Everybody had been very friendly. At first, that is. Later, he’d had an un-
easy feeling that people were talking about him behind his back. They
eyed him differently, somehow. As though they’d heard something—some
lying rumour…
(Armitage? Supposing Armitage had talked.)
He’d avoided people after that—withdrawn into himself. Unpleasant to
feel that people were discussing you.
And all so long ago. So—so purposeless now. Leslie had faded into the
distance and Arthur Richmond too. Nothing of what had happened
seemed to matter any more.
It made life lonely, though. He’d taken to shunning his old Army friends.
(If Armitage had talked, they’d know about it.)
And now—this evening—a hidden voice had blared out that old hidden
story.
Had he dealt with it all right? Kept a stiff upper lip? Betrayed the right
amount of feeling—indignation, disgust—but no guilt, no discomfiture?
Difficult to tell.
Surely nobody could have taken the accusation seriously. There had
been a pack of other nonsense, just as far-fetched. That charming girl—the
voice had accused her of drowning a child! Idiotic! Some madman throw-
ing crazy accusations about!
Emily Brent, too—actually a niece of old Tom Brent of the Regiment. It
had accused her of murder! Any one could see with half an eye that the
woman was as pious as could be—the kind that was hand and glove with
parsons.
Damned curious business the whole thing! Crazy, nothing less.
Ever since they had got here—when was that? Why, damn it, it was only
this afternoon! Seemed a good bit longer than that.
He thought: ‘I wonder when we shall get away again.’
Tomorrow, of course, when the motor-boat came from the mainland.
Funny, just this minute he didn’t want much to get away from the is-
land…To go back to the mainland, back to his little house, back to all the
troubles and worries. Through the open window he could hear the waves
breaking on the rocks—a little louder now than earlier in the evening.
Wind was getting up, too.
He thought: Peaceful sound. Peaceful place…
He thought: Best of an island is once you get there—you can’t go any
farther…you’ve come to the end of things…
He knew, suddenly, that he didn’t want to leave the island.
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