作者：卡拉·凯利
出版社：外语教学与研究出版社
格式: AZW3, DOCX, EPUB, MOBI, PDF, TXT
爱的慈悲试读：
Prologue
Robert Inman, sailing master, had a cheery temperament. He had always been inclined to take the bitter with the sweet and chalk everything else up to experience. Still, it was a hard slog to reconcile himself to another year of captivity in Dartmoor, a prison newly built but scarcely humane.
Recently, among the Orontes survivors, he had noticed a change in conversational topics. A year ago in 1813, conversation had been almost exclusively of their capture off Land's End, where they had been toying with British merchant shipping.
With a monumental sigh, Captain Daniel Duncan had handed over his letter of marque and reprisal to the victor. The captain of the Royal Navy's sloop of war was a mere ensign, but regrettably had had the weather gauge, so capture had come as a matter of course. Rob had felt a serious pang to see the triumphant crew haul down the Stars and Stripes and fly British colours from the elegant, slanted mast of the privateer Orontes.
When the humiliation of capture turned to resignation, tongues loosened up. The powder monkey boasted there wasn't a jail in En gland that could hold him long. Duncan's first and only mate declared that war would end soon and their discomfort would be a mere annoyance.
Both the powder monkey and the mate had been wise beyond their years, apparently. No jail held the monkey long. He claimed the distinction of being the first to die, courtesy of an infected tooth that the prison governor felt deserved little attention, since it resided in an American mouth.
The first mate's discomfort—indeed, his final one— had proved to be a serious annoyance after rampant scurvy opened up an old wound inflicted by Tripolitan pirates. The scar in his thigh had separated, gaped wider until blood poisoning accepted the invitation and waltzed in, a most unwelcome guest.
As for the war ending soon, no one's expectations were high. The carpenter keeping the calendar had to be reminded to cross off yet another day on the wall, one very much like the day before, with thin gruel for breakfast, and gruel and a crust of bread for supper, and nothing in between.
Earlier conversations had revolved around food and women, as in what each seaman would eat, upon liberation, and just how many women he would sport with at the first opportunity. Food was too tantalising to discuss any more, and women not even a distraction, not to starving men. Rob had spent one fruitless hour trying to remember the pleasures of the flesh, only to realise he had not enough energy for what would follow, even in his generally fertile imagination.
For the most part, everyone sat in silence all the day. Evenings were reserved for night terrors ranging from rats on the prowl to memories of battle, near drownings to other incarcerations during this pesky war brought on by Napoleon. Those were the good dreams. Worse was the reality of scarecrow prisoners crawling among the men, preying on the more feeble.
The eternal optimist, considering his origins, Rob knew things could be worse. He had to say one thing about Dartmoor: the place was built solid, one cold stone on top of another. The wind found its way inside, though, through iron bars that no warden thought should be covered in winter, because that would be too great a comfort for prisoners.
And that was the problem for Robert Inman, sailing master. More than food and women's bodies, he craved the feel of wind on his face, but not the wailing wind that filtered into the prison over high walls. He knew what the right wind could do to a sail. He knew he could stand in one spot on any slanting deck and know precisely what to do with wind. In Dartmoor, he could only dream about wind on his face—the fair winds of summer, the fitful puffs of the dog latitudes, the humid offerings of southeast Asia.
All he wanted was the right wind.序
领航员罗伯特·英曼性格达观开朗。无论顺境逆境，他总是能泰然处之，一切凭经验做事。不过，要让他在新建的惨无人道的达特穆尔监狱再忍上一年的话，简直是度日如年。
最近，他察觉到奥龙特斯号的幸存者们谈论的话题变了。一年前，也就是1813年，他们的话题几乎还围绕着他们在兰兹角被俘的事打转，他们曾在那里猫玩耗子似的捉弄英国商船船队。
当时，船长丹尼尔·邓肯重重叹了一口气，把缉拿敌船许可证和拘捕证交给了战胜他们的人。指挥那艘英国皇家海军单桅战船的船长只是个海军少尉。但遗憾的是，这位海军少尉在战斗中占了上风，所以投降也无可避免了。看着那些得意洋洋的英国皇家海军船员把星条旗从自己的奥龙斯特号优雅的斜桅杆上卸下来，升上他们的英国国旗时，罗布感到极度的痛苦。
被俘后，耻辱转为顺从，人们开始信口开河起来。火药猴子吹嘘英国没有哪个监狱能长时间关得住他。邓肯的第一个、也是唯一的一名大副则断言战争将很快结束，他们目前的关押之苦不过是烦人的小事罢了。
显然，火药猴子和大副都有超出他们年龄的智慧。没有一个监狱能长时间关押得了火药猴子。他声称，托他一颗受感染牙齿的福，自己将有幸成为第一个牺牲的人。因为监狱长认为，这颗牙齿是长在一个美国人嘴里的，不值得重视。
结果证明，大副的第一个痛苦变成了一场大麻烦，这其实也是他最后一个痛苦。黎波里海盗原来给他留下的伤口感染了严重的坏血病，他大腿上的疤痕又裂开、裂口越来越大，他最终还是患上了败血症。
没人对战争很快结束抱太大的期望。总有人提醒负责翻日历的大副在墙上划去一天，每一天都和前一天没什么两样：早餐燕麦粥，晚餐燕麦粥和一片面包，中间什么也没得吃。
之前的聊天还涉及食物和女人，比如一旦出狱每个人要吃什么，以及一有机会会要多少女人陪伴。食物一谈起来就咽口水，还不如不说；女人们也不能分散饥饿的男人们的注意力了。罗布曾试图花一小时回忆贪欢之乐，但也是徒然。即使他的想象力比常人丰富，他也意识到自己已经没有足够的精力去应付想象完之后的事。
在大多数情况下，每个人都整天默不作声地坐着。夜晚只剩恐怖：四处乱窜的老鼠，战场的回忆，险些溺死的经历，还有在拿破仑发动的可恶战争期间的种种监禁。这些梦算是好的了。更糟的梦则是现实——衣衫褴褛的犯人爬到狱友身上，弱肉强食。
想到自己的出身，罗布这个永恒的乐天派明白事情可能会更糟。不过他还是想说一件与达特穆尔有关的事情：这个监狱非常牢固，由一块块冰冷的石头垒砌而成。但风还是会钻进来，没有一个铁栏杆前的看守认为冬天的时候应该将这些缝隙封住，因为那样对犯人们来说日子该过得太舒服了。
而这也是领航员罗伯特·英曼的问题。相比食物和女人的身体，他更渴望有风吹到他脸上，但不是这种穿墙渗透到监狱的风。他知道船帆要如何回应风向。他知道他能够站在任何倾斜甲板上，也清楚地知道他要怎么对付风。在达特穆尔监狱，他只会梦见吹在他脸上的风——夏日里的和风，狗喘出的阵阵粗气，以及东南亚潮湿的风。
他唯一想要的就是正确的风向。
Chapter One
If Grace Curtis, formerly known as the Honourable Miss Grace Curtis, had decided to waste her life in fruitless selfpity, she knew several genteelly poor persons to use as her character models.
Agatha Ralls lived in rented rooms over the Hare and Hound, a steep decline from her childhood in Ralls Manor, a structure built during the reign of one Edward or the other, which now housed bats. Family fortunes had taken a dismal turn when a now-distant earl had backed the wrong horse in the era of Cavaliers and Round-heads. That the family's resounding crash had taken some 150 years was some testament to earlier wealth. Now Miss Ralls lived on very little and everyone knew it.
Or Grace could have looked to the ludicrous spectacle of Sir George Armisted, who maintained a precarious existence on the family estate, when it would have been much wiser to sell it to a merchant with more money than class. Instead, Sir George sat in threadbare splendour in a leaking parlour.
Grace had watched her own father shake his head over Sir George, asking out loud how such a fool justified the expensive snuff he dipped and wine he decanted. That Sir Henry Curtis was doing the same thing never seemed to have occurred to him, even when he lay dying and advised Grace, his only child, to 'make a good match in London during the next Season'.
Grace had been too kind to point out to her father that there were no funds left to finance anything as ambitious as a Season in London, much less induce any gentleman of her social sphere to ally himself with a cheerful face and nothing else. It wouldn't have been sporting to point out her father's deficiencies as he was forced to pay attention to death, as he had never paid much attention to anything of consequence before.
Grace had closed his eyes, covered his face and left his bedroom, resolved to learn something from misfortune and build a life for herself, rather than gently glide into discreet poverty and reduced circumstances. Poor she would be, but it did not follow that she couldn't be happy.
Dressed in black and wearing a jet brooch, Grace had endured the reading of the will. Papa had had nothing to leave except debts. In the weeks before his death, his solicitor had made discreet enquiries throughout the district in an attempt to smoke out potential buyers from among the merchant class who hankered after property far removed from the High Street. He had found one, so Grace had had to suffer his presence as the solicitor read the will.
There had been paltry gifts for the few servants—all of them superannuated and with no hope of other employment— who had hung on until the bitter end, because their next place of residence would surely be the poorhouse. When the old dears turned sad eyes on her, Grace could only shake her head in sorrow, as she writhed inside.
What followed was precisely what she had expected, particularly since the solicitor had told her the night before that the manor and its contents were all going to the new landlord, an enterprising fellow who had made a fortune importing naval stores from the Baltic. With that knowledge, Grace had deposited her amethyst brooch, her only keepsake, in her pocket for safety.
And that was that. Grace had signed a document forfeiting any interest in her home, then had led the new owners through the threadbare rooms.
It was almost too much when the wife demanded to know how quickly Grace could quit the place, but Grace had always been pragmatic.
'I can be gone tomorrow morning,' Grace had said, and so she was.
That she might have nowhere to go never occurred to the new owners, so intent were they to take possession. Her two bags packed, Grace had lain awake all night in her room, teasing herself with the one plan in her mind. She discarded it, reclaimed it, discarded it again, then shouldered it for the final time after breakfast. She straightened her shoulders, picked up her valise and walked away from her home of eighteen years.
Grace had had only one egg in her basket. That it proved to be the right one had given her considerable comfort through the next ten years. It had been but a short walk from her former home to Quimby, a village close to Exeter. The day was pleasantly cool for August, with only the slightest breeze swaying the sign of Adam Wilson's bakery.
She had hoped the bakery would be empty, and it was, except for the owner and his wife. Grace set down her valise and came to the counter. Adam Wilson wiped his floury hands on his apron and gave her the same kindly look he had been giving her for years, even when she suffered inside to beg for credit.
'Yes, my dear?' Mrs Wilson asked, coming to stand beside her husband.
Grace took a deep breath. 'We owe you a large sum, I know,' she said calmly. 'I have a proposal.'
Both Wilsons looked at her, and she saw nothing in their gaze except interest. They had all the time in the world to listen.
'I will work off that debt,' Grace said, 'if you can provide me with a place to live. When I have paid the debt, and if my work has been satisfactory, I'll work for you for wages. I know you have recently lost your all-around girl to marriage with a carter in Exeter.'
To her relief, nothing in Mr Wilson's face exhibited either surprise or scepticism. 'What do you know about baking?' he asked.
'Very little,' Grace replied honestly. 'What I am is loyal and a hard worker.'
The Wilsons looked at each other, while Grace stared straight ahead at a sign advertising buns six for a penny.
'My dear, you have a pretty face. Suppose a member of your class decides to offer for you, and then we are out all of our training?' Mrs Wilson was the shrewder of the two.
'No one will offer for me, Mrs Wilson,' Grace said. 'I have no dowry to tempt anyone among the gentry. By the same token, no man among the labouring class will want a wife who he fears would take on airs and give him grief, because she is elevated in station above him and can't—or won't—forget. I am completely marriage-proof and therefore the ideal employee.'
So she had proved to be. The Wilsons lived above the bakery on the High Street, but had gladly cleared out a small storeroom behind the ovens for her use, a fragrant spot smelling of yeast and herbs. She had cried her last tear, walking to Quimby. Once that was done, she became an all-around girl and never looked back.
The first time one of her acquaintances from her former days had come into the shop, Grace had realised she could never afford to look back. She knew the moment would happen sooner or later; blessedly, it was sooner. The morning that one of her dearest friends had come into the shop with her mama and ignored Grace completely, she knew the wind blew differently. Discreetly put, Grace Curtis had slid.
The matter bothered her less than she had thought it might, considering that she had debated long and hard about throwing herself on the mercy of that particular family. Grace's decision had been confirmed most forcefully a year later. She overheard Lady Astley say to an acquaintance that they had taken in a poor cousin. And there she was, middle-aged and obsequious, always nervously alert in public to do her cousin's bidding, for fear of being turned off to an unkind world. No, Grace knew she had been wise in casting her lot with the Wilsons.
When two years had passed, Mr Wilson declared the family debt eliminated. He seemed surprised when she took a deep breath and asked, 'Will you keep me on still?'
'I thought that was the term,' he told her, as he set yeast to soften by the mixing bowls.
'I hoped it was,' she replied, reaching for the salt, afraid to look at him.
'Then it is, Gracie. Let us shake on it.' He smiled at her. 'You're the best worker I ever hired.'
The years had passed easily enough. After a brief peace, the war set in again. The Wilsons' two sons sailed with the Channel Fleet, one dying at Trafalgar and the other rising to carpenter's mate. Their daughters all married Navy men and lived in Portsmouth. Grace found herself assuming more and more responsibility, particularly in keeping the books.
She had never minded that part of her job because she was meticulous. Her real pleasure, though, came in making biscuits: macaroons, pretty little Savoy cakes, lemon biscuits, all pale brown and crisp, and creamy biscuits with almond icing.
It was these last biscuits—she named them Quimby Crèmes—that had attracted the attention of Lord Thomson, Marquis of Quarle. Mr Wilson always thought he was aptly named, because the old man always seemed to be picking one. Colonel of a regiment of foot serving in New York City during the American War, Lord Thomson suffered no fools gladly, be they titled like himself, merchants with more pretension than the Pope, or the smelly knacker man, who regularly cleared the roads of dead animals. Lord Thomson was equally disposed to resent everyone.
Grace was the only person in Quimby who had a knack for managing the marquis and she did it through his stomach. She had noticed his marked preference for her Quimby Crèmes when he visited the bakery, something he did regularly.
His bakery visits puzzled Mrs Wilson. 'My cousin is an upstairs maid in his employ and I know for a fact he has any number of footmen to fetch biscuits on a whim. Why does he do it?'
Grace knew. She remembered her own treks to the bakery for the pleasure of the fragrance inside the glass door, and the fun of choosing three of these and a half-dozen of those. Invariably, after Lord Thomson made his selection, Grace watched him open his parcel outside the shop and sit in the sun, eating one biscuit after another. She understood.
She probably never would have realised her eventual fondness for Lord Thomson if he had not come up short in her eyes. One morning—perhaps his washing water had been cold—he elbowed his way into the shop, snarling at a little boy who took too long to make his selection at the counter. He poked the lad with his umbrella. The boy's eyes welled with tears.
'That's enough, Lord Thomson,' Grace declared.
'What did you say?' the marquis demanded.
'You heard me, my lord,' she said serenely, adding an extra lemon biscuit to the boy's choice. 'Tommy was here first. Everyone gets a chance to choose.'
After a filthy look at her, the marquis turned on his heel and left the bakery, slamming the door so hard that the cat in the window woke up.
'I fear I may have cost you a customer,' Grace told Mr Wilson, who had watched the whole scene.
'I can be philosophical,' Mr Wilson said, patting Tommy on the head. 'He's a grouchy old bird.'
She worried, though, acutely aware that Lord Thomson didn't come near the shop for weeks. Easter came and went, and so did everyone except the marquis. Quimby was a small village. Even those who had not witnessed the initial outburst knew what had happened. When he eventually returned, even those in line stepped out of the way, not willing to incur any wrath that might reflect poorly on Grace.
With a studied smile, Lord Thomson waited his turn. As he approached the front of the line eventually, an amazing number of patrons had decided not to leave until they knew the outcome. Grace felt her cheeks grow rosy as he stood before her and placed his order.
She chose to take the bull by the horns. 'Lord Thomson, I've been faithfully making Quimby Crèmes, hoping you would return.'
'Here I am,' he said quietly. 'I'll take all you have, if you'll join me in the square to help me eat them.'
She had not expected that. One look at his triumphant face told her that he had known she would be surprised and it tickled him. She smiled again. 'You have me, sir,' she said simply. She looked at Mr Wilson, who nodded, as interested in the conversation as his customers.
To her relief, they ate Crèmes and parted as friends.
Year in and year out he visited the bakery, even when the decade started to weigh on him. When an apologetic footman told her one morning that Lord Thomson was bedridden now, and asked if she would please bring the crèmes to Quarle, she made her deliveries in person.
Standing in the foyer at Quarle, Grace had some inkling of the marquis's actual worth, something he had never flaunted. The estate was magnificent and lovingly maintained. She felt a twinge of something close to sadness, that her own father had been unable to maintain their more modest estate to the same standard. Quarle was obviously in far better hands.
She brought biscuits to Lord Thomson all winter, sitting with him while he ate, and later dipping them in milk and feeding them to him when he became too feeble to perform even that simple task. Each visit seemed to reveal another distant relative—he had no children of his own—all with the marquis's commanding air, but none with his flair for stories of his years on the American continent, fighting those Yankee upstarts, or even his interest in the United States.
His relatives barely tolerated Grace's visits. Her cheeks had burned with their scorn, but in the end, she decided it was no worse than the slights that came her way now and then. She found herself feeling strangely protective of the old man against his own relatives, who obviously would never have come around, had they not been summoned by Lord Thomson's new solicitor.
At least, he introduced himself to her one afternoon as the new solicitor, although he was not young. 'I'm Philip Selway,' he said. 'And you are Miss Grace Curtis?'
'Just Gracie Curtis,' she told him. 'Lord Thomson likes my Quimby Crèmes.'
'So do I,' he assured her.
She returned her attention to Lord Thomson. She squeezed his hand gently and he opened his eyes.
'Lean closer,' he said, with just a touch of his former air of command.
She did as he said.
'I'm dying, you know,' he told her.
'I was afraid of that,' she whispered. 'I'll bring you Quimby Crèmes tomorrow.'
'That'll keep death away?' he asked, amused.
'No, but I'll feel better,' she said, which made him chuckle.
She thought he had stopped, but he surprised her. 'Do you trust me?' he asked.
'I believe I do,' she replied, after a moment.
'Good. What's to come will try you. Have faith in me,' he told her, then closed his eyes.
She left the room quietly, wondering what he meant. The solicitor stood in the hall. He nodded to her.
'Coming back tomorrow?' he asked.
'Yes, indeed.'
Lord Thomson's relatives were returning from the breakfast room, arguing with each other. They darted angry glances at the solicitor as they brushed past him and ignored Grace.
'You'll be back tomorrow?'
'I said I would, sir.'
'Grace, I believe you'll do.'
'Sir?'
He followed the relatives, but not before giving her a long look.
As she considered the matter later, she wondered if she should have stayed away. But who was wise on short notice?
第一章
格雷丝·柯蒂斯，先前以尊贵的格雷丝·柯蒂斯小姐而为人所知。现在，如果她想在毫无结果的顾影自怜中浪费生命的话，她倒是认识几个可以作为她人生楷模的文雅穷人。
阿加莎·罗尔斯住的是在“野兔和猎犬”租的房子，环境比她儿时住的罗尔斯庄园差了一大截。罗尔斯庄园建于某位爱德华国王的统治时期，不过如今庄园里住着的只有蝙蝠。在保皇党和圆颅党争斗的时代，一位远房的伯爵亲戚押错了宝，导致家族财政状况急转直下。这个家族致命的衰败经历了大约150年的时间，这也侧面证明了罗尔斯家族早年拥有的财富之巨。如今罗尔斯小姐生计微薄，众人皆知。
或者格雷丝原本可以指望戴着可笑眼镜的乔治·阿米斯特德爵士扭转家族窘境。那会儿他在照看着罗尔斯家族风雨飘摇的房产。要是当初能把房子卖给一个有钱但没有什么地位的商人的话，倒算明智之举。但恰恰相反，乔治爵士选择穿着褴褛的华服坐在她家漏雨的客厅
试读结束[说明：试读内容隐藏了图片]