Northanger Abbey - Chapter 22

The housemaid's folding back her window-shutters at eight o'clock the next day was the sound which first roused Catherine; and she opened her eyes, wondering that they could ever have been closed, on objects of cheerfulness; her fire was already burning, and a bright morning had succeeded the tempest of the night. Instantaneously, with the consciousness of existence, returned her recollection of the manuscript; and springing from the bed in the very moment of the maid's going away, she eagerly collected every scattered ¹ sheet which had burst from the roll on its falling to the ground, and flew back to enjoy the luxury of their perusal ² on her pillow. She now plainly saw that she must not expect a manuscript of equal length with the generality of what she had shuddered ³ over in books, for the roll, seeming to consist entirely ⁴ of small disjointed sheets, was altogether but of trifling ⁵ size, and much less than she had supposed it to be at first., ,Her greedy eye glanced rapidly over a page. She started at its import. Could it be possible, or did not her senses play her false? An inventory ⁶ of linen ⁷, in coarse and modern characters, seemed all that was before her! If the evidence of sight might be trusted, she held a washing-bill in her hand. She seized another sheet, and saw the same articles with little variation; a third, a fourth, and a fifth presented nothing new. Shirts, stockings, cravats ⁸, and waistcoats faced her in each. Two others, penned by the same hand, marked an expenditure ⁹ scarcely more interesting, in letters, hair-powder, shoe-string, and breeches-ball. And the larger sheet, which had enclosed the rest, seemed by its first cramp ¹⁰ line, "To poultice chestnut ¹¹ mare"—a farrier's bill! Such was the collection of papers (left perhaps, as she could then suppose, by the negligence ¹² of a servant in the place whence she had taken them) which had filled her with expectation and alarm, and robbed her of half her night's rest! She felt humbled ¹³ to the dust. Could not the adventure of the chest have taught her wisdom? A corner of it, catching ¹⁴ her eye as she lay, seemed to rise up in judgment ¹⁵ against her. Nothing could now be clearer than the absurdity ¹⁶ of her recent fancies. To suppose that a manuscript of many generations back could have remained undiscovered in a room such as that, so modern, so habitable!—Or that she should be the first to possess the skill of unlocking a cabinet, the key of which was open to all!, ,How could she have so imposed on herself? Heaven forbid that Henry Tilney should ever know her folly ¹⁷! And it was in a great measure his own doing, for had not the cabinet appeared so exactly to agree with his description of her adventures, she should never have felt the smallest curiosity about it. This was the only comfort that occurred. Impatient to get rid of those hateful evidences of her folly, those detestable papers then scattered over the bed, she rose directly, and folding them up as nearly as possible in the same shape as before, returned them to the same spot within the cabinet, with a very hearty ¹⁸ wish that no untoward ¹⁹ accident might ever bring them forward again, to disgrace her even with herself., , ,She got away as soon as she could from a room in which her conduct produced such unpleasant reflections, and found her way with all speed to the breakfast-parlour, as it had been pointed ²² out to her by Miss Tilney the evening before. Henry was alone in it; and his immediate ²³ hope of her having been undisturbed by the tempest, with an arch reference to the character of the building they inhabited, was rather distressing ²⁴. For the world would she not have her weakness suspected, and yet, unequal to an absolute falsehood, was constrained ²⁵ to acknowledge that the wind had kept her awake a little. "But we have a charming morning after it," she added, desiring to get rid of the subject; "and storms and sleeplessness ²⁶ are nothing when they are over. What beautiful hyacinths! I have just learnt to love a hyacinth.", ,"And how might you learn? By accident or argument?", ,Peter Cooke undertook to send each of us a sample contract for perusal.彼得・库克答应给我们每人寄送一份合同样本供阅读。