Chapter 22

CHAPTER XXII Anne is Invited Out to Tea "And what are your eyes popping out of your head about. Now?" asked Marilla, when Anne had just come in from a run to the post office. "Have you discovered another kindred spirit?" Excitement hung around Anne like a garment, shone in her eyes, kindled in every feature. She had come dancing up the lane, like a wind-blown sprite, through the mellow sunshine and lazy shadows of the August evening. "No, Marilla, but oh, what do you think? I am invited to tea at the manse tomorrow afternoon! Mrs. Allan left the letter for me at the post office. Just look at it, Marilla. `Miss Anne Shirley, Green Gables." That is the first time I was ever called `Miss." Such a thrill as it gave me! I shall cherish it forever among my choicest treasures." "Mrs. Allan told me she meant to have all the members of her Sunday-school class to tea in

第二十二章 安妮受邀赴茶约 “你怎么眼睛都快瞪出来了， 现在呀？” 安妮刚从邮局跑回家，玛莉拉就开口问她。 “你又发现一个灵魂知己对不对？” 兴奋像外衣一样裹着安妮，她眼睛发亮，眉眼嘴角都透着激动。 她蹦蹦跳跳跑过小路，像被风吹着的小精灵，穿过八月傍晚柔和的阳光和懒懒的树影。 “不是呀，玛莉拉，可是哦，你猜怎么着？ 我明天下午收到邀请，去牧师宅邸喝茶啦！ 艾伦太太把信留在邮局给我了。 你快看看呀，玛莉拉。 “格林盖布尔斯 安妮·雪莉小姐”。 这还是头一回有人叫我“小姐”呢。 这可太让我激动啦！ 我要永远把它当成宝贝好好珍藏起来。” “艾伦太太说，她打算轮着请主日学校所有学生都去家里

turn," said Marilla, regarding the wonderful event very coolly. "You needn't get in such a fever over it. Do learn to take things calmly, child." For Anne to take things calmly would have been to change her nature. All "spirit and fire and dew," as she was, the pleasures and pains of life came to her with trebled intensity. Marilla felt this and was vaguely troubled over it, realizing that the ups and downs of existence would probably bear hardly on this impulsive soul and not sufficiently understanding that the equally great capacity for delight might more than compensate. Therefore Marilla conceived it to be her duty to drill Anne into a tranquil uniformity of disposition as impossible and alien to her as to a dancing sunbeam in one of the brook shallows. She did not make much headway, as she sorrowfully admitted to herself. The downfall of some dear hope or plan plunged Anne into "deeps of affliction." The fulfillment thereof exalted her to dizzy realms of delight. Marilla had almost begun to despair of ever fashioning this waif of the world into her model little girl of demure manners and prim

喝茶，”玛莉拉冷冰冰地说，完全没把这件大事放在心上。 “你用不着这么激动上火嘛。 孩子，学着点遇事沉住气呀。” 要让安妮遇事沉住气，不如直接让她改了自己的天性。 她生来就是“灵气、热忱又鲜活”，生活里的快乐和痛苦到她这儿，都会放大三倍的强度。 玛莉拉明白这点，也隐隐有些担心，她知道生活起起落落，对这个冲动的小家伙来说肯定熬得辛苦，却没弄懂，安妮那同样强烈的感受快乐的能力，早就足够弥补这一切了。 所以玛莉拉觉得，自己有责任把安妮训练成沉稳平和的性格，可这对安妮来说，就像让溪洼里跳舞的阳光变安静，不可能也不符合本性。 她也暗自难过地承认，这事一点进展都没有。 心爱的希望或计划落了空，安妮就会掉进“痛苦的深渊”。 要是愿望成真，她又会开心得飘飘然，飞到快乐的云顶。 玛莉拉都快绝望了，她根本没法把这个流浪来的小家伙，改造成她想要的那种举止文静、规矩

deportment. Neither would she have believed that she really liked Anne much better as she was. Anne went to bed that night speechless with misery because Matthew had said the wind was round northeast and he feared it would be a rainy day tomorrow. The rustle of the poplar leaves about the house worried her, it sounded so like pattering raindrops, and the full, faraway roar of the gulf, to which she listened delightedly at other times, loving its strange, sonorous, haunting rhythm, now seemed like a prophecy of storm and disaster to a small maiden who particularly wanted a fine day. Anne thought that the morning would never come. But all things have an end, even nights before the day on which you are invited to take tea at the manse. The morning, in spite of Matthew's predictions, was fine and Anne's spirits soared to their highest. "Oh, Marilla, there is something in me today that makes me just love everybody I see," she exclaimed as she washed the breakfast dishes. "You don't know how good I feel! Wouldn't it be nice if it could last? I believe I could be a model child if I were just invited out to tea every day.

端正的小女孩。 她也根本想不到，其实她更喜欢原本模样的安妮。 那天晚上安妮上床的时候，难过得说不出话，因为马修说风向转成东北，他担心明天会下雨。 房子周围杨树叶沙沙响，把安妮愁坏了，那声音听起来太像雨滴哒哒打下来，远处海湾轰隆隆的浪声，别的时候安妮听得开开心心，爱它那奇特洪亮、让人忘不掉的韵律，今天听在安妮耳朵里，就像是暴风雨和灾祸的预言，她太盼着明天是大晴天了呀。 安妮觉得，早晨永远都不会来了。 可不管什么事总有尽头，哪怕是受邀去牧师家喝茶前的那一夜，也会过去。 结果第二天早晨，根本不像马修预言的那样，天气好极了，安妮一下子开心到了最高点。 “哦，玛莉拉，我今天心里暖暖的，看谁都觉得好喜欢呀，”安妮擦早餐盘子的时候兴奋地喊。 “你根本不知道我感觉有多棒！ 要是这种好心情能一直留着该多好呀？ 要是每天都能受邀出去喝茶，我肯定能变成模范乖小孩的。

But oh, Marilla, it's a solemn occasion too. I feel so anxious. What if I shouldn't behave properly? You know I never had tea at a manse before, and I'm not sure that I know all the rules of etiquette, although I've been studying the rules given in the Etiquette Department of the Family Herald ever since I came here. I'm so afraid I'll do something silly or forget to do something I should do. Would it be good manners to take a second helping of anything if you wanted to VERY much?" "The trouble with you, Anne, is that you're thinking too much about yourself. You should just think of Mrs. Allan and what would be nicest and most agreeable to her," said Marilla, hitting for once in her life on a very sound and pithy piece of advice. Anne instantly realized this. "You are right, Marilla. I'll try not to think about myself at all." Anne evidently got through her visit without any serious breach of "etiquette," for she came home through the twilight, under a great, high-sprung sky gloried over with trails of saffron and rosy cloud, in a beatified state of mind and told Marilla all about it happily, sitting on the big red-

可是哦，玛莉拉，这也是件挺严肃的大事呀。 我心里好慌呀。 要是我表现不好该怎么办呢？ 你知道，我从来没去过牧师宅邸喝茶，虽然我来这儿之后就一直在看《家庭先驱报》礼仪专栏学规则，可我还是不确定自己懂不懂所有礼节呀。 我好怕我会做傻事，或是忘了该做的事。 要是我特别特别想吃某样东西，再添一勺算不算有礼貌呀？” “安妮呀，你的问题就是太在意自己了。 你该多想想艾伦太太，想想怎么做才会让她舒服开心，”玛莉拉说，这可是她这辈子少有的，说出这么一针见血的好建议。 安妮一下子就反应过来了。 “你说得对，玛莉拉。 我努力不想自己的事了。” 很明显，安妮这次拜访没有出什么大岔子，一点都没违反“礼仪”，因为她踏着暮色回了家，高远的天空飘着金红玫瑰色的云带，美得发亮，她整个人都浸在幸福里，开开心心地坐在大红

sandstone slab at the kitchen door with her tired curly head in Marilla's gingham lap. A cool wind was blowing down over the long harvest fields from the rims of firry western hills and whistling through the poplars. One clear star hung over the orchard and the fireflies were flitting over in Lover's Lane, in and out among the ferns and rustling boughs. Anne watched them as she talked and somehow felt that wind and stars and fireflies were all tangled up together into something unutterably sweet and enchanting. "Oh, Marilla, I've had a most FASCINATING time. I feel that I have not lived in vain and I shall always feel like that even if I should never be invited to tea at a manse again. When I got there Mrs. Allan met me at the door. She was dressed in the sweetest dress of pale-pink organdy, with dozens of frills and elbow sleeves, and she looked just like a seraph. I really think I'd like to be a minister's wife when I grow up, Marilla. A minister mightn't mind my red hair because he wouldn't be thinking of such worldly things. But then of course one would have to be naturally good and I'll never be that, so I suppose there's no use in thinking about it. Some people are naturally

安妮靠在厨房门口的砂岩板上，满是倦意的卷发脑袋枕在玛丽拉穿的格子布裙盖住的腿上。 凉爽的风从长满冷杉的西山吹来，吹过长长的丰收田野，又穿过白杨树沙沙作响。 一颗明亮的星星挂在果园上空，萤火虫在情人巷飞舞，在蕨草和沙沙作响的树枝间钻进钻出。 安妮一边说话一边看着它们，莫名觉得风、星星和萤火虫缠在一起，凝成了一样难以形容、甜蜜又迷人的东西。 “噢，玛丽拉，我今天玩得太尽兴啦！ 我觉得我的人生没有白费，就算以后再也没人邀请我去牧师住宅喝茶，我也永远会记得今天这份快乐。 我到那儿的时候，艾伦太太在门口迎接我。 她穿了一条最好看的浅粉色蝉翼纱裙子，有好多荷叶边，还是中袖，她看起来就像天使一样。 玛丽拉，我真觉得我长大以后想当牧师的妻子。 牧师不会在意我的红头发，因为他才不会操心这种世俗的事儿呢。 不过话说回来，当牧师妻子得天生就是好人，我永远成不了那样，所以我觉得想这个也没用。 有些人天生就是

good, you know, and others are not. I'm one of the others. Mrs. Lynde says I'm full of original sin. No matter how hard I try to be good I can never make such a success of it as those who are naturally good. It's a good deal like geometry, I expect. But don't you think the trying so hard ought to count for something? Mrs. Allan is one of the naturally good people. I love her passionately. You know there are some people, like Matthew and Mrs. Allan that you can love right off without any trouble. And there are others, like Mrs. Lynde, that you have to try very hard to love. You know you OUGHT to love them because they know so much and are such active workers in the church, but you have to keep reminding yourself of it all the time or else you forget. There was another little girl at the manse to tea, from the White Sands Sunday school. Her name was Laurette Bradley, and she was a very nice little girl. Not exactly a kindred spirit, you know, but still very nice. We had an elegant tea, and I think I kept all the rules of etiquette pretty

好人，你知道的，另一些人不是。 我就是另一种人。 林德太太说我满身都是原罪。 不管我多努力想要变好，都没法像那些天生的好人做得那么好。 我觉得这跟学几何差不多。 可是你不觉得，努力了就应该有点用吗？ 艾伦太太就是天生的好人。 我特别喜欢她。 你知道，有些人，比如马修和艾伦太太，你一下子就能毫无负担地喜欢上他们。 还有些人，比如林德太太，你得非常努力才能喜欢她。 你知道你本来就该喜欢他们，因为他们懂得多，在教会又很热心，可你得一直提醒自己这点，不然就忘了。 今天还有另一个小女孩也去牧师住宅喝茶，她来自白沙镇主日学校。 她叫洛雷特·布拉德利，是个非常友善的小女孩。 算不上是志趣相投，你懂的，但人真的很好。 我们享用了很棒的茶点，我觉得我在礼仪方面做得相当