Daisy Miller / Дэйзи Миллер. Книга для чтения на английском языке

“Oh, I think she’ll enjoy it!” Winterbourne declared. And he desired more and more to make it a certainty that he was to have the privilege of a tête-à-tête with the young lady, who was still strolling along in front of them, softly vocalising. “You are not disposed, madam,” he inquired, “to undertake it yourself?”

Daisy’s mother looked at him, an instant, askance, and then walked forward in silence. Then – “I guess she had better go alone,” she said, simply.

Winterbourne observed to himself that this was a very different type of maternity from that of the vigilant matrons who massed themselves in the forefront of social intercourse in the dark old city at the other end of the lake. But his meditations were interrupted by hearing his name very distinctly pronounced by Mrs. Miller’s unprotected daughter.

“Mr. Winterbourne!” murmured Daisy.

“Mademoiselle!” said the young man.

“Don’t you want to take me out in a boat?”

“At present?[15 - At present? – (зд.) Прямо сейчас?]” he asked. “Of course!” said Daisy.

“Well, Annie Miller!” exclaimed her mother.

“I beg you, madam, to let her go,” said Winterbourne, ardently; for he had never yet enjoyed the sensation of guiding through the summer starlight a skiff freighted with a fresh and beautiful young girl.

“I shouldn’t think she’d want to,” said her mother. “I should think she’d rather go indoors.”

“I’m sure Mr. Winterbourne wants to take me,” Daisy declared. “He’s so awfully devoted!”

“I will row you over to Chillon, in the starlight.”

“I don’t believe it!” said Daisy.

“Well!” ejaculated the elder lady again.

“You haven’t spoken to me for half-an-hour,” her daughter went on.

“I have been having some very pleasant conversation with your mother,” said Winterbourne.

“Well; I want you to take me out in a boat!” Daisy repeated. They had all stopped, and she had turned round and was looking at Winterbourne. Her face wore a charming smile, her pretty eyes were gleaming, she was swinging her great fan about. No; it’s impossible to be prettier than that, thought Winterbourne.

“There are half-a-dozen boats moored at that landing-place,” he said, pointing to certain steps which descended from the garden to the lake. “If you will do me the honour to accept my arm, we will go and select one of them.”

Daisy stood there smiling; she threw back her head and gave a little light laugh. “I like a gentleman to be formal!” she declared.

“I assure you it’s a formal offer.”

“I was bound I would make you say something,” Daisy went on.

“You see it’s not very difficult,” said Winterbourne. “But I am afraid you are chafing me[16 - you are chafing me – (разг.) вы подшучиваете надо мной].”

“I think not, sir,” remarked Mrs. Miller, very gently.

“Do, then, let me give you a row,” he said to the young girl.

“It’s quite lovely, the way you say that!” cried Daisy.

“It will be still more lovely to do it.”

“Yes, it would be lovely!” said Daisy. But she made no movement to accompany him; she only stood there laughing.

“I should think you had better find out what time it is,” interposed her mother.

“It is eleven o’clock, madam,” said a voice, with a foreign accent, out of the neighbouring darkness; and Winterbourne, turning, perceived the florid personage who was in attendance upon the two ladies. He had apparently just approached.

“Oh, Eugenio,” said Daisy, “I am going out in a boat!”

Eugenio bowed. “At eleven o’clock, mademoiselle?”

“I am going with Mr. Winterbourne. This very minute.”

“Do tell her she can’t,” said Mrs. Miller to the courier.

“I think you had better not go out in a boat, mademoiselle,” Eugenio declared.

Winterbourne wished to Heaven this pretty girl were not so familiar with her courier; but he said nothing.

“I suppose you don’t think it’s proper!” Daisy exclaimed. “Eugenio doesn’t think anything’s proper.”

“I am at your service,” said Winterbourne.

“Does mademoiselle propose to go alone?” asked Eugenio of Mrs. Miller.

“Oh, no; with this gentleman!” answered Daisy’s mamma.

The courier looked for a moment at Winterbourne – the latter thought he was smiling – and then, solemnly, with a bow. “As mademoiselle pleases!” he said.

“Oh, I hoped you would make a fuss!” said Daisy. “I don’t care to go now.”

“I myself shall make a fuss if you don’t go,” said Winterbourne.

“That’s all I want – a little fuss!” And the young girl began to laugh again.

“Mr. Randolph has gone to bed!” the courier announced, frigidly.

“Oh, Daisy; now we can go!” said Mrs. Miller.

Daisy turned away from Winterbourne, looking at him, smiling and fanning herself. “Good night,” she said; “I hope you are disappointed, or disgusted, or something!”

He looked at her, taking the hand she offered him. “I am puzzled,” he answered.

“Well; I hope it won’t keep you awake!” she said, very smartly; and, under the escort of the privileged Eugenio, the two ladies passed towards the house.

Winterbourne stood looking after them; he was indeed puzzled. He lingered beside the lake for a quarter of an hour, turning over the mystery of the young girl’s sudden familiarities and caprices. But the only very definite conclusion he came to was that he should enjoy deucedly “going off ” with her somewhere.

Two days afterwards he went off with her to the Castle of Chillon. He waited for her in the large hall of the hotel, where the couriers, the servants, the foreign tourists were lounging about and staring. It was not the place he would have chosen, but she had appointed it. She came tripping downstairs, buttoning her long gloves, squeezing her folded parasol against her pretty figure, dressed in the perfection of a soberly elegant travelling-costume. Winterbourne was a man of imagination and, as our ancestors used to say, of sensibility; as he looked at her dress and, on the great staircase, her little rapid, confiding step, he felt as if there were something romantic going forward. He could have believed he was going to elope with her. He passed out with her among all the idle people that were assembled there; they were all looking at her very hard; she had begun to chatter as soon as she joined him. Winterbourne’s preference had been that they should be conveyed to Chillon in a carriage; but she expressed a lively wish to go in the little steamer; she declared that she had a passion for steamboats. There was always such a lovely breeze upon the water, and you saw such lots of people. The sail was not long, but Winterbourne’s companion found time to say a great many things. To the young man himself their little excursion was so much of an escapade – an adventure – that, even allowing for her habitual sense of freedom, he had some expectation of seeing her regard it in the same way. But it must be confessed that, in this particular, he was disappointed. Daisy Miller was extremely animated, she was in charming spirits; but she was apparently not at all excited; she was not fluttered; she avoided neither his eyes nor those of any one else; she blushed neither when she looked at him nor when she saw that people were looking at her. People continued to look at her a great deal, and Winterbourne took much satisfaction in his pretty companion’s distinguished air. He had been a little afraid that she would talk loud, laugh overmuch, and even, perhaps, desire to move about the boat a good deal. But he quite forgot his fears; he sat smiling, with his eyes upon her face, while, without moving from her place, she delivered herself of a great number of original reflections. It was the most charming garrulity he had ever heard. He had assented to the idea that she was “common” ; but was she so, after all, or was he simply getting used to her commonness? Her conversation was chiefly of what metaphysicians term the objective cast; but every now and then it took a subjective turn.