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I confess that when I had finished your letter I felt almost polluted, as if by associating with one of such a nature I had soiled and shamed my life irretrievably. I had, it is true, done so, but I was not to learn how fully till just six months later on in life. I settled with myself to go back to London on the Friday, and see Sir George Lewis personally and request him to write to your father to state that I had determined never under any circumstances to allow you to enter my house, to sit at my board, to talk to me, walk with me, or anywhere and at my time to be my companion at all. This done I would have written to you just to inform you of the course of action I had adopted; the reasons you would inevitably have realised for yourself. I had everything arranged on Thursday night, when on Friday morning, as I was sitting at breakfast before starting, I happened to open the newspaper and saw in it a telegram stating that your elder brother, the real head of the family, the heir to the title, the pillar of the house, had been found dead in a ditch with his gun lying discharged beside him.[22.1] The horror of the circumstances of the tragedy, now known to have been an accident, but then stained with a darker suggestion; the pathos of the sudden death of one so loved by all who knew him, and almost on the eve, as it were, of his marriage; my idea of what your own sorrow would, or should be; my consciousness of the misery awaiting your mother at the loss of the one to whom she clung for comfort and joy in life, and who, as she told me once herself, had from the very day of his birth never caused her to shed a single tear; my consciousness of your own isolation, both your other brothers being out of Europe, and you consequently the only one to whom your mother and sister could look, not merely for companionship in their sorrow, but also for those dreary responsibilities of dreadful detail that Death always brings with it[22a]; the mere sense of the lacrimae rerum, of the tears of which the world is made[22b], and of the sadness of all human things — out of the confluence of these thoughts and emotions crowding into my brain came infinite pity for you and your family. My own griefs and bitternesses against you I forgot. What you had been to me in my sickness, I could not be to you in your bereavement[22c]. I telegraphed at once to you my deepest sympathy, and in the letter that followed invited you to come to my house as soon as you were able. I felt that to abandon you at that particular moment, and formally through a solicitor, would have been too terrible for you.
坦白说在读了你的信后我觉得自己几乎是被玷污了，好像与这样一个人为伍，我已无可挽回地使自己的生命陷入了污秽和羞耻。 没错，我已经陷进去了，可只有在六个月后，才知道陷得有多深。我打定主意那个星期五回伦敦，当面去见乔治●刘易斯勋爵，请他写信给你父亲，说明我已下定决心无论如何不再让你进我的屋子、坐在我的饭桌旁、跟我讲话、同我散步，不管何时何地都绝不能与我在一起。这件事办好了，就会给你写信告知我所采取的行动；其中的理由谅你也心知肚明。星期四晚上我一切安排停当。星期五早晨上路前坐下来准备吃早餐，无意间翻开报纸，看到上面登了一则电文，说是你哥哥，你们真正的一家之主，爵位的继承人，家庭的栋梁，被发现死在一道沟里，身边是他发射后的空枪。这恐怖的悲剧，现在据知是意外事故，可当时却暗指另有蹊跷。这样一个谁见了谁喜欢的年轻人，几乎可以说是在成婚的前夜，却突然死了。如此悲惨的变故，使我想到你本人的哀伤会有多深、该有多深；使我意识到你母亲，她的幸福和欢乐之所寄的人失去了，那她会面临怎样的哀痛，她曾亲口告诉我，你哥哥从一落地就没让她掉过一滴眼泪；我也意识到你本人的孤单，因为你另外的两个兄弟都出门不在欧洲，所以你母亲和妹妹在哀恸中不但要靠你照应，还要靠你处理出了人命之后必不可免的大大小小令人伤心劳神的事务[22a]；一想到眼泪，一想到承载着这世界的泪水[22b]，一想到做人处世的种种哀愁——在这万千思绪百般情感的交汇之下，汹涌在我脑海中的便是对你及你家人的无限同情。对你的愤懑和怨恨我忘了。在我病重时你那样待我，在你痛失亲人之际我不能以牙还牙[22c]。我当即致电给你，表达我最深切的同情，并随后去信，邀请你一走得开就到我家来。我觉得在这一特殊时刻丢下你，通过律师正式的一刀两断，对你会是太可怕的一件事了。
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