Читать книгу Человек, который смеется / The Man Who Laughs. Уровень 4 - Виктор Мари Гюго, Clara Inés Bravo Villarreal - Страница 13

The beginning of day is sinister. A sad pale light penetrated the hut. It was the frozen dawn. The caravan was warm. The light of dawn was slowly taking possession of the horizon. Only a few large stars resisted.

The boy opened his eyes. He lay in a state of semi-stupor, without knowing where he was or what was near him, without making an effort to remember, gazing at the ceiling. He gazed dreamily at the letters of the inscription – “Ursus, Philosopher”. The sound of the key turning in the lock caused him to turn his head.

The boy awoke. The wolf gave him a morning yawn, showing two rows of very white teeth. The boy, seeing the wolf in the caravan, got out of the bear-skin, and placed himself in front of the little infant, who was sleeping more soundly than ever.

Ursus had just hung the lantern up on a nail in the ceiling. His eyes were glassy. He exclaimed, -

“Happy, doubtless! Dead!”

He bent down, -

“I found her. The mischief had buried her under two feet of snow. Homo helped me. How cold she was! I touched her hand – a stone! What silence in her eyes! How can any one be such a fool as to die and leave a child behind? A pretty family I have now! A boy and a girl!”

Whilst Ursus was speaking, Homo sidled up close to the stove. The hand of the sleeping infant was hanging down between the stove and the chest. The wolf licked it so softly that he did not awake the little infant. Ursus turned round.

“Well done, Homo. I shall be father, and you shall be uncle. Adoption! Homo is willing.”

Raising his eyes, they met those of the boy, who was listening. Ursus addressed him abruptly, -

“What are you laughing about?”

The boy answered, -

“I am not laughing.”

Ursus looked at him fixedly for a few minutes, and said, -

“Then you are frightful.”

The interior of the caravan, on the previous night, had been so dark that Ursus had not yet seen the boy’s face. The broad daylight revealed it. He placed the palms of his hands on the two shoulders of the boy, and exclaimed, -

“Do not laugh any more!”

“I am not laughing,” said the child.

Ursus was seized with a shudder from head to foot.

“You do laugh, I tell you.”

Then he asked him: roughly, -

“Who did that to you?”

The child replied, -

“I don’t know what you mean.”

“How long have you had that laugh?”

“I have always been thus,” said the child.

Ursus turned towards the chest. Then the sun arose. The red rays gleamed through the glass, and struck against the face of the infant, which was turned towards him. Her eyeballs reflected his purple orbit like two mirrors. The eyeballs were immovable, the eyelids also.

“See!” said Ursus. “She is blind.”