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presque léthargique des gens de Starkfield. Mais, quand parut

      12

      Ethan Frome ~Chapter I

      and had seen this phase of crystal clearness followed by long stretches of sunless cold; when the storms of February had pitched their white tents about the devoted village and the wild cavalry of March winds had charged down to their sup-port; I began to understand why Starkfield emerged from its six months’ siege like a starved garrison capitulating without quarter. Twenty years earlier the means of resistance must have been far fewer, and the enemy in command of almost all the lines of access between the beleaguered villages; and, considering these things, I felt the sinister force of Harmon’s phrase: “Most of the smart ones get away.” But if that were the case, how could any combination of obstacles have hin-dered the flight of a man like Ethan Frome?

      During my stay at Starkfield I lodged with a mid-dle-aged widow colloquially known as Mrs. Ned Hale. Mrs. Hale’s father had been the village lawyer of the previous generation, and “lawyer Varnum’s house,” where my land-lady still lived with her mother, was the most considerable mansion in the village. It stood at one end of the main street, its classic portico and small-paned windows looking down a flagged path between Norway spruces to the slim white steeple of the Congregational church. It was clear that the Varnum fortunes were at the ebb, but the two women did what they could to preserve a decent dignity; and Mrs. Hale, in particular, had a certain wan refinement not out of keep-ing with her pale old-fashioned house.

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      Sous la neige~ Chapitre I

      février, tout changea. Le ciel se voila. Les journées sombres et courtes ressemblèrent aux nuits longues et glaciales. La neige s'amoncela autour des frêles maisons, qui parurent recroque-villées sur elles-mêmes. Les habitants du village, la besogne quotidienne achevée, se hâtaient de rentrer chez eux. Pendant les interminables soirées, ils sommeillaient autour du poêle. Toute vie, au dehors, semblait suspendue. Chacun mesurait ses gestes au strict nécessaire pour se nourrir, se chauffer et accomplir les rares besognes que n'avaient point arrêtées les rigueurs de la saison.

      Je logeais chez une veuve entre deux âges qu'on appe-lait familièrement Mrs. Ned Hale. Elle était fille de l'ancien notaire du bourg, et « la maison du notaire Varnum », qu'elle occupait avec sa mère, était l'habitation la plus considérable de Starkfield. C'était une vieille demeure à fronton classique, supporté par des colonnes blanches. De menus carreaux bleutés piquaient ses fenêtres à guillotine, qui regardaient la haute et claire façade de l'église. Elle s'élevait au bout de la rue principale du village. Deux sapins de Norvège intro-duisaient à son petit jardin, que traversait un sentier dallé d'ardoises. Les deux veuves, bien que réduites à vivre assez modestement, mettaient leur point d'honneur à maintenir la propriété familiale en état. Mrs. Hale était une femme aim-able et effacée. Elle avait conservé dans les manières quelque chose de la tradition que figurait cette construction d'un autre âge.

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      Ethan Frome ~Chapter I

      In the “best parlour,” with its black horse-hair and mahogany weakly illuminated by a gurgling Carcel lamp, I listened every evening to another and more delicately shaded version of the Starkfield chronicle. It was not that Mrs. Ned Hale felt, or affected, any social superiority to the people about her; it was only that the accident of a finer sensibility and a little more education had put just enough distance between herself and her neighbours to enable her to judge them with detachment. She was not unwilling to exercise this faculty, and I had great hopes of getting from her the miss-ing facts of Ethan Frome’s story, or rather such a key to his character as should co-ordinate the facts I knew. Her mind was a store-house of innocuous anecdote and any question about her acquaintances brought forth a volume of detail; but on the subject of Ethan Frome I found her unexpectedly reticent. There was no hint of disapproval in her reserve; I merely felt in her an insurmountable reluctance to speak of him or his affairs, a low “Yes, I knew them both… it was aw-ful…” seeming to be the utmost concession that her distress could make to my curiosity.

      So marked was the change in her manner, such depths of sad initiation did it imply, that, with some doubts as to my delicacy, I put the case anew to my village oracle, Har-mon Gow; but got for my pains only an uncomprehending grunt.

      “Ruth Varnum was always as nervous as a rat; and, come to think of it, she was the first one to see ‘em after they was picked up. It happened right below lawyer Varnum’s, down at the bend of the Corbury road, just round about the time that Ruth got engaged to Ned Hale. The young folks was all friends, and I guess she just can’t bear to talk about it. She’s had troubles enough of her own.”

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      Sous la neige~ Chapitre I

      Chaque soir, dans le salon meublé d'acajou, aux sièges recouverts de crin, sous la lampe Carcel qui faisait entendre ses glouglous monotones, j'apprenais un nouvel épisode de la chronique du village, et il m'était plus délicatement raconté. Non pas que Mrs. Hale se crût ou affectât quelque supériorité sociale sur les gens qui l'entouraient : sa libre façon de juger les événements n'avait pas une telle origine. Une sensibilité plus développée, une éducation un peu mieux soignée, créaient seules cette distance entre elle et ses voisins. Ces conditions me faisaient espérer qu'auprès de Mrs. Hale je parviendrais à éclaircir les points obscurs de la vie d'Ethan Frome. La mémoire de l'excellente femme était un admirable répertoire d'anecdotes sans méchanceté ; toute question ayant trait à ses relations attirait aussitôt un flot de détails. J'amenai donc la conversation de ce côté ; mais je sentis aussitôt que Mrs. Hale se dérobait. Cette attitude n'impliquait d'ailleurs aucun blâme à l'égard de Frome. On devinait seulement qu'elle éprouvait une invincible répugnance à parler de lui et de ses affaires. Quelques bribes de phrase murmurées : « Oui, je les connais tous les deux… Ce fut horrible… » paraissaient la seule concession qu'elle pût faire à ma curiosité.

      Le changement de son attitude était si marqué, il sup-posait une telle initiation à de tristes secrets que, malgré cer-tains scrupules, je m'adressai une fois encore à Harmon Gow. Tout ce que je pus obtenir de lui fut un vague grognement.

      — Oh ! — fit-il, — Ruth Varnum… elle a toujours été impressionnable comme une souris… C'est elle qui les a vus la première lorsqu'on les a ramassés… Tenez, c'était justement au bas de la maison des Varnum, au tournant de la route de Corbury… Ruth venait alors de s'accorder avec Ned Hale… Tout ce jeune monde était ami… La pauvre femme, elle a eu assez de ses propres malheurs !

      16

      Ethan Frome ~Chapter I

      All the dwellers in Starkfield, as in more notable communities, had had troubles enough of their own to make them comparatively indifferent to those of their neighbours; and though all conceded that Ethan Frome’s had been beyond the common measure, no one gave me an explana-tion of the look in his face which, as I persisted in thinking, neither poverty nor physical suffering could have put there. Nevertheless, I might have contented myself with the story pieced together from these hints had it not been for the provocation of Mrs. Hale’s silence, and—a little later—for the accident of personal contact with the man.

      On my arrival at Starkfield, Denis Eady, the rich Irish grocer, who was the proprietor of Starkfield’s nearest ap-proach to a livery stable, had entered into an agreement to send me over daily to Corbury Flats, where I had to pick up my train for the Junction. But about the middle of the win-ter Eady’s horses fell ill of a local epidemic. The illness spread to the other Starkfield stables and for a day or two I was put to it to find a means of transport. Then Harmon Gow sug-gested that Ethan Frome’s bay was still on his legs and that his owner might be glad to drive me over.

      I stared at the suggestion. “Ethan Frome? But I’ve nev-er even spoken to him. Why on earth should he put himself out for me?”

      Harmon’s answer surprised me still more. “I don’t know as he would; but I know he wouldn’t be sorry to earn a dollar.”

      17

      Sous la neige~ Chapitre I

      Les

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