前言
我之前读过这篇黄色墙纸，没读懂。我不知道该用心理学还是用女权主义的角度去看这篇文章，于是我找来了英文原文看。忽然我突发奇想，想要边读原文，边用自己的语言翻译这篇文章，看看能不能有些新收获。试试看吧！
PS：最近认识了一个新朋友，虽然认识时间不长，但是我特别想要拉着他一起疯~果不其然他被我带入坑了，哈哈哈哈，101篇英文小说，这篇最长，哈哈哈哈哈~~~谁让你的男神是赵元任呢(*^▽^*)
The Yellow Wallpaper
黄色墙纸
by Charlotte Perkins Gilman
作者：夏洛特·铂金斯·吉尔曼
It is very seldom that mere ordinary people like John andmyself secure ancestral halls for the summer.
像我和约翰这样的普通人，居然要躲在一栋祖传老宅中避暑，这可真是太荒谬了。
A colonial mansion, a hereditary estate, I would say ahaunted house, and reach the height of romantic felicity--butthat would be asking too much of fate!
一栋殖民时期建在世袭领土上的豪宅，我真希望它是一栋鬼宅！那样才真的够浪漫——算了，谁也不能对命运这东西奢求太多，对吗？
Still I will proudly declare that there is something queer about it.
不过我还是要骄傲地宣布我的发现：这个宅子里面确实还是有些稀奇古怪的东西的
Else, why should it be let so cheaply? And why have stood so long untenanted?
要不然，它的租金怎么能这么便宜，而且这么长时间无人问津呢？
John laughs at me, of course, but one expects that in marriage.
约翰又嘲笑我了，没办法，结婚后的人生就是这样的
John is practical in the extreme. He has no patience with faith, an intense horror of superstition, and he scoffs openly at any talk of things not to be felt and seen and put down in figures.
约翰是个纯粹的务实主义者。他可没有耐心听那些关于信仰的鬼话，他说那叫封建迷信，只要让他听见这种言论，他马上当场开怼。
John is a physician, and PERHAPS—(I would not say it to a living soul, of course, but this is dead paper and a great relief to my mind)—PERHAPS that is one reason I do not get well faster.
约翰是个持证医生，而且可能吧——（我可不会和活人说这话，好在这张纸是死的，这让我感觉放松多了）——只是可能啊，可能这才是我病情不见好转的原因。
You see he does not believe I am sick!
关键他根本不相信我有病！
And what can one do?
这可怎么办，我能怎么办？
If a physician of high standing, and one’s own husband, assures friends and relatives that there is really nothing the matter with one but temporary nervous depression—a slight hysterical tendency—what is one to do?
如果你的丈夫是个高级医师，他告诉你们身边所有的亲朋好友——你一点问题都没有，只是有那么一点点的...歇斯底里，或者说间发性神经衰弱？那你告诉我你能怎么办？
My brother is also a physician, and also of high standing, and he says the same thing.
我哥哥也是个医生，也是高级的那种，他表示完全赞同我丈夫的意见。
So I take phosphates or phosphites—whichever it is, and tonics, and journeys, and air, and exercise, and am absolutely forbidden to “work” until I am well again.
所以我吃了一堆的硝酸盐（要不就是亚硝酸盐，谁记得住这堆专业名词啊），还得遵医嘱去旅行、呼吸新鲜空气、做运动等等这些可以分泌一个叫做多巴胺还是上肾腺素的东西。总之就是一条：完全健康之前，不许“工作”
Personally, I disagree with their ideas.
要按我说，他们才是有病呢
Personally, I believe that congenial work, with excitement and change, would do me good.
以我对自己的认知，我相信要是能让我做一些富有激情和挑战的工作，没两天我就又能活蹦乱跳了~
But what is one to do?
唉，我也就是想想了
I did write for a while in spite of them; but it DOES exhaust me a good deal—having to be so sly about it, or else meet with heavy opposition.
不过他们说他们的，我写我的。你别说，我觉得真的很见效——不过得偷偷地写，要是让他们看到了，哼哼...
I sometimes fancy that in my condition if I had less opposition and more society and stimulus—but John says the very worst thing I can do is to think about my condition, and I confess it always makes me feel bad.
我有时在想：要是我能多到社会上和人接触接触，应该会好些吧？但约翰总告诉我别胡思乱想，病就是想太多想出来的。说实话，我真希望他别总这么对我直言不讳，听完这些话我感觉更难受了
So I will let it alone and talk about the house.
算了，说点高兴的事吧。接着说这间老宅子吧！
The most beautiful place! It is quite alone, standing well back from the road, quite three miles from the village. It makes me think of English places that you read about, for there are hedges and walls and gates that lock, and lots of separate little houses for the gardeners and people.
这真是个美轮美奂的地方！地点很僻静，临街很远，到最近的村庄也得有三英里。它让我想起来报纸上写的那些英国的居住环境，是那种有树篱、围墙、能上锁的大门，还有给园丁和佣人住的小房子环绕在周围
There is a DELICIOUS garden! I never saw such a garden—large and shady, full of box-bordered paths, and lined with long grape-covered arbors with seats under them.
真是个妙趣横生的花园啊！我从没见过这么漂亮的花园——大大的，有着一片片方方正正的树荫，椅子们在一排排的葡萄藤下静静地坐着
There were greenhouses, too, but they are all broken now.
以前这还有一些温室，现在完了，都废弃掉了
There was some legal trouble, I believe, something about the heirs and coheirs; anyhow, the place has been empty for years.
我估计，这里应该是发生了一些法律纠纷，比如属于贵族家庭之间庶子夺嫡之类的狗血剧情。反正这地方确实是很多年没有人住了
That spoils my ghostliness, I am afraid, but I don’t care—there is something strange about the house—I can feel it.
我身体里住着个幽灵，现在她似乎是被激活了。我有点害怕，不过无所谓——这房子肯定有哪里不对劲——我能感觉到
I even said so to John one moonlight evening, but he said what I felt was a DRAUGHT, and shut the window.
我和约翰也说了我的想法，在一个月明星稀之夜。但是他说我感觉到的其实是气流，说完就把窗户关上了
I get unreasonably angry with John sometimes. I’m sure I never used to be so sensitive. I think it is due to this nervous condition.
总有一股无名火在我和约翰之间燃烧着。我敢肯定，以前的我绝对不像现在这样敏感，我估计是神经系统太紧张了。
But John says if I feel so, I shall neglect proper self-control; so I take pains to control myself—before him, at least, and that makes me very tired.
但是约翰说要是我有这种感觉，那就别控制，发泄出来。所以我每天都在努力压抑自己——其实就是压抑给他看的，说实话，这样真累。
I don’t like our room a bit. I wanted one downstairs that opened on the piazza and had roses all over the window, and such pretty old-fashioned chintz hangings! but John would not hear of it.
我一点都不喜欢我们这件卧室，我想要楼下那间，面朝广场、窗户上爬满了玫瑰的那间，还有一件漂亮的老式印花窗帘在旁边！但是约翰无视了我的想法。
He said there was only one window and not room for two beds, and no near room for him if he took another.
他说楼下那间房只有一扇窗户，地方也不够放下两张床。要是他不和我住在一间屋，旁边也没有能让他挨着我住的屋子。
He is very careful and loving, and hardly lets me stir without special direction.
约翰真是又贴心又爱我，他从不让我在他的视线以外活动。
I have a schedule prescription for each hour in the day; he takes all care from me, and so I feel basely ungrateful not to value it more.
我每天的时间表已经被精确地安排到每个小时了；约翰对我的照顾可以说是无微不至，我要是再不懂事的话就太忘恩负义了。
He said we came here solely on my account, that I was to have perfect rest and all the air I could get. “Your exercise depends on your strength, my dear,” said he, “and your food somewhat on your appetite; but air you can absorb all the time.” So we took the nursery at the top of the house.
他说我们来这里的目的就是为了让我得到绝对的休息，好好呼吸一下新鲜空气。“亲爱的，在这段时间里，你的运动量取决于你的精力，”他说，“你的饭量取决于你的胃口。但是新鲜空气这里有的是，可以吸个够。”然后我们就住在了楼顶的育儿室。
It is a big, airy room, the whole floor nearly, with windows that look all ways, and air and sunshine galore. It was nursery first and then playroom and gymnasium, I should judge; for the windows are barred for little children, and there are rings and things in the walls.
这是一间通风流畅的大房间，这一层都是这样的房间，四方都有窗户，空气流通阳光充足。这本来是间育儿室，后来又变成了游戏房和健身房——这是我自己猜的。窗户为了防止孩子跌到外面都已经封死了，墙上还挂着很多铃铛类的东西。
The paint and paper look as if a boys’ school had used it. It is stripped off—the paper—in great patches all around the head of my bed, about as far as I can reach, and in a great place on the other side of the room low down. I never saw a worse paper in my life.
油漆和墙纸的风格和男校的风格差不多。墙纸被撕烂了——就在我床头上方——能够得到的地方全被撕了下来，房间另一端的部分更是壮观，我这辈子都没见过这么惨的景象。
One of those sprawling flamboyant patterns committing every artistic sin.
那些向四处蔓延的艳丽图案，真像是种艺术的原罪
It is dull enough to confuse the eye in following, pronounced enough to constantly irritate and provoke study, and when you follow the lame uncertain curves for a little distance they suddenly commit suicide—plunge off at outrageous angles, destroy themselves in unheard of contradictions.
这暗淡的颜色看的我眼都花了，但是它似乎有种魔力，让你忍不住去看去研究。等到你的视线刚刚跟上这堆稀奇古怪的花纹的走向，它们又突然开始自寻死路——从一个匪夷所思的角度，以闻所未闻的方式自我毁灭。
The color is repellent, almost revolting; a smouldering unclean yellow, strangely faded by the slow-turning sunlight.
墙纸的颜色也真是让人反胃，不，简直是令人作呕！这是种脏了吧唧的黄色，但是阳光照进来后，这股黄色就开始奇怪地变淡了。
It is a dull yet lurid orange in some places, a sickly sulphur tint in others.
有些地方是明暗交互的橘色，有些地方算是...算是硫磺色吧，真恶心。
No wonder the children hated it! I should hate it myself if I had to live in this room long.
我要是孩子我也讨厌它们！如果我长期住在这，我也会恨死它的。
There comes John, and I must put this away,—he hates to have me write a word.
约翰来了，我先先不写了——我写的这些要是让他看到了，他又得气坏了。
We have been here two weeks, and I haven’t felt like writing before, since that first day.
我们来这儿已经两周了，然而从第一天以后我就一直没有写东西的欲望了
I am sitting by the window now, up in this atrocious nursery, and there is nothing to hinder my writing as much as I please, save lack of strength.
我现在就坐在楼上这间令人作呕的育儿房的窗户边上，其实只要我想写，没什么能阻止我接着写，除了精力不足。
John is away all day, and even some nights when his cases are serious.
约翰整天都不在家，有时要是来了病情严重的病人，他整晚都回不了家。
I am glad my case is not serious!
我真庆幸我病得没那么严重！
But these nervous troubles are dreadfully depressing.
但是这种紧张的情绪还是让我越来越消沉
John does not know how much I really suffer. He knows there is no REASON to suffer, and that satisfies him.
约翰根本不知道我在承受着什么。他认为我没有任何需要去承受的，并且他还很认同自己的观点。
Of course it is only nervousness. It does weigh on me so not to do my duty in any way!
当然，这只是神经质而已，我懂。但对于我来说这份“神经质”实在太沉重了，它压在我身上让我都做不好我的分内工作了！
I meant to be such a help to John, such a real rest and comfort, and here I am a comparative burden already!
我本来是想帮助约翰的，给他关怀与呵护，但现在我反而成了他的负担！
Nobody would believe what an effort it is to do what little I am able,—to dress and entertain, and order things.
没人能明白仅仅做好我力所能及的事对我来说是多么大的一个负担——真的就只是穿衣打扮、吃喝玩乐和整理东西而已。
It is fortunate Mary is so good with the baby. Such a dear baby!
还好玛丽很会带孩子。多可爱的孩子啊！
And yet I CANNOT be with him, it makes me so nervous.
可是我就做不到，那样只会让我更紧张。
I suppose John never was nervous in his life. He laughs at me so about this wall-paper!
我猜约翰这辈子也没体会过神经质的感觉。墙纸这件事上他就笑话了我半天。
At first he meant to repaper the room, but afterwards he said that I was letting it get the better of me, and that nothing was worse for a nervous patient than to give way to such fancies.
一开始他准备重新贴一次墙纸，但是后来他又说，要是现在换了墙纸，就等于我对墙纸屈服了。他还说对于一个神经质病人来说，被这种对墙纸产生的臆想打败真是太糟了。
He said that after the wall-paper was changed it would be the heavy bedstead, and then the barred windows, and then that gate at the head of the stairs, and so on.
他说要是现在换了墙纸，过两天就得换床（很重），然后就是窗户（已被钉死），再然后是门，那样就没完没了了。
“You know the place is doing you good,” he said, “and really, dear, I don’t care to renovate the house just for a three months’ rental.”
“这地方其实真的很适合你，”他说，“而且说实话，宝贝儿，我是真的不想把一栋只租三个月的房子再重新装修一遍。”
“Then do let us go downstairs,” I said, “there are such pretty rooms there.”
“那我们就搬到楼下去住吧，”我说，“楼下的房间都漂亮啊。”
Then he took me in his arms and called me a blessed little goose, and said he would go down to the cellar, if I wished, and have it whitewashed into the bargain.
我刚说完，他就一把把我搂在怀里，管我叫幸福的傻丫头，还说只要我想，他去把酒窖粉刷一遍都没问题。
But he is right enough about the beds and windows and things.
不过关于床和窗户的事上我觉得他说的没错。
It is an airy and comfortable room as any one need wish, and, of course, I would not be so silly as to make him uncomfortable just for a whim.
这个房间确实住起来很舒服，空气也清新，谁来了都会这么说。而且我也不会真的蠢到为了自己心血来潮的想法惹约翰不高兴。
I’m really getting quite fond of the big room, all but that horrid paper.
我是真的开始喜欢上这间大房间了，除了那堆可怕的壁纸。
Out of one window I can see the garden, those mysterious deepshaded arbors, the riotous old-fashioned flowers, and bushes and gnarly trees.
从一扇窗可以看到花园，那些神秘成荫的藤架，茂盛的老式花卉，还有成堆的灌木丛与枝干交错的一棵棵树。
Out of another I get a lovely view of the bay and a little private wharf belonging to the estate. There is a beautiful shaded lane that runs down there from the house. I always fancy I see people walking in these numerous paths and arbors, but John has cautioned me not to give way to fancy in the least. He says that with my imaginative power and habit of story-making, a nervous weakness like mine is sure to lead to all manner of excited fancies, and that I ought to use my will and good sense to check the tendency. So I try.
从另一扇窗我发现了一些更迷人的风景：一片海港，和一个小型的私人码头。一条美丽的林荫小径从我们这栋房子一直通到那里。我一直幻想着能看到人们走在这条小路上，但约翰提醒过我不要幻想。他说以我的想象力和爱编故事的毛病，一点点神经质所暴露出的弱点就能让我陷入无穷无尽的臆想之中，而我现在要做的就是用意志力和理性思维来战胜这种趋势。我也只好尽力而为吧。
I think sometimes that if I were only well enough to write a little it would relieve the press of ideas and rest me.
有时我会想，如果我能有足够的精力去写些东西就好了，那样可以减轻我心头的压力，让我得到放松。
But I find I get pretty tired when I try.
但我发现我一动笔就感到累的要死。
It is so discouraging not to have any advice and companionship about my work. When I get really well, John says we will ask Cousin Henry and Julia down for a long visit; but he says he would as soon put fireworks in my pillow-case as to let me have those stimulating people about now.
更令我沮丧的是，我的写作事业得不到任何建议和支持。约翰说等我恢复得差不多了，就邀请我的表哥表嫂——亨利和茱莉娅——来这里多待上一段时间。但他说要是我现在就叫他们，那对我的病就是火上浇油，他就真的要生我的气了。
I wish I could get well faster.
真希望我能快点好起来。
But I must not think about that. This paper looks to me as if it KNEW what a vicious influence it had!
There is a recurrent spot where the pattern lolls like a broken neck and two bulbous eyes stare at you upside down.
I get positively angry with the impertinence of it and the everlastingness. Up and down and sideways they crawl, and those absurd, unblinking eyes are everywhere. There is one place where two breadths didn’t match, and the eyes go all up and down the line, one a little higher than the other.
I never saw so much expression in an inanimate thing before, and we all know how much expression they have! I used to lie awake as a child and get more entertainment and terror out of blank walls and plain furniture than most children could find in a toy store.
I remember what a kindly wink the knobs of our big, old bureau used to have, and there was one chair that always seemed like a strong friend.
I used to feel that if any of the other things looked too fierce I could always hop into that chair and be safe.
The furniture in this room is no worse than inharmonious, however, for we had to bring it all from downstairs. I suppose when this was used as a playroom they had to take the nursery things out, and no wonder! I never saw such ravages as the children have made here.
The wall-paper, as I said before, is torn off in spots, and it sticketh closer than a brother—they must have had perseverance as well as hatred.
Then the floor is scratched and gouged and splintered, the plaster itself is dug out here and there, and this great heavy bed which is all we found in the room, looks as if it had been through the wars.
But I don’t mind it a bit—only the paper.
There comes John’s sister. Such a dear girl as she is, and so careful of me! I must not let her find me writing.
She is a perfect and enthusiastic housekeeper, and hopes for no better profession. I verily believe she thinks it is the writing which made me sick!
But I can write when she is out, and see her a long way off from these windows.
There is one that commands the road, a lovely shaded winding road, and one that just looks off over the country. A lovely country, too, full of great elms and velvet meadows.
This wall-paper has a kind of sub-pattern in a different shade, a particularly irritating one, for you can only see it in certain lights, and not clearly then.
But in the places where it isn’t faded and where the sun is just so—I can see a strange, provoking, formless sort of figure, that seems to skulk about behind that silly and conspicuous front design.
There’s sister on the stairs!
Well, the Fourth of July is over! The people are gone and I am tired out. John thought it might do me good to see a little company, so we just had mother and Nellie and the children down for a week.
Of course I didn’t do a thing. Jennie sees to everything now.
But it tired me all the same.
John says if I don’t pick up faster he shall send me to Weir Mitchell in the fall.
But I don’t want to go there at all. I had a friend who was in his hands once, and she says he is just like John and my brother, only more so!
Besides, it is such an undertaking to go so far.
I don’t feel as if it was worth while to turn my hand over for anything, and I’m getting dreadfully fretful and querulous.
I cry at nothing, and cry most of the time.
Of course I don’t when John is here, or anybody else, but when I am alone.
And I am alone a good deal just now. John is kept in town very often by serious cases, and Jennie is good and lets me alone when I want her to.
So I walk a little in the garden or down that lovely lane, sit on the porch under the roses, and lie down up here a good deal.
I’m getting really fond of the room in spite of the wall-paper. Perhaps BECAUSE of the wall-paper.
It dwells in my mind so!
I lie here on this great immovable bed—it is nailed down, I believe—and follow that pattern about by the hour.
It is as good as gymnastics, I assure you. I start, We’ll say, at the bottom, down in the corner over there where it has not been touched, and I determine for the thousandth time that I WILL follow that pointless pattern to some sort of a conclusion.
I know a little of the principle of design, and I know this thing was not arranged on any laws of radiation, or alternation, or repetition, or symmetry, or anything else that I ever heard of.
It is repeated, of course, by the breadths, but not otherwise.
Looked at in one way each breadth stands alone, the bloated curves and flourishes—a kind of “debased Romanesque” with delirium tremens—go waddling up and down in isolated columns of fatuity.
But, on the other hand, they connect diagonally, and the sprawling outlines run off in great slanting waves of optic horror, like a lot of wallowing seaweeds in full chase.
The whole thing goes horizontally, too, at least it seems so, and I exhaust myself in trying to distinguish the order of its going in that direction.
They have used a horizontal breadth for a frieze, and that adds wonderfully to the confusion.
There is one end of the room where it is almost intact, and there, when the crosslights fade and the low sun shines directly upon it, I can almost fancy radiation after all,—the interminable grotesques seem to form around a common centre and rush off in headlong plunges of equal distraction.
It makes me tired to follow it. I will take a nap I guess.
I don’t know why I should write this.
I don’t want to.
I don’t feel able.
And I know John would think it absurd. But I MUST say what I feel and think in some way—it is such a relief!
But the effort is getting to be greater than the relief.
Half the time now I am awfully lazy, and lie down ever so much.
John says I musn’t lose my strength, and has me take cod liver oil and lots of tonics and things, to say nothing of ale and wine and rare meat.
Dear John! He loves me very dearly, and hates to have me sick. I tried to have a real earnest reasonable talk with him the other day, and tell him how I wish he would let me go and make a visit to Cousin Henry and Julia.
But he said I wasn’t able to go, nor able to stand it after I got there; and I did not make out a very good case for myself, for I was crying before I had finished.
It is getting to be a great effort for me to think straight. Just this nervous weakness I suppose.
And dear John gathered me up in his arms, and just carried me upstairs and laid me on the bed, and sat by me and read to me till it tired my head.
He said I was his darling and his comfort and all he had, and that I must take care of myself for his sake, and keep well.
He says no one but myself can help me out of it, that I must use my will and self-control and not let any silly fancies run away with me.
There’s one comfort, the baby is well and happy, and does not have to occupy this nursery with the horrid wall-paper.
If we had not used it, that blessed child would have! What a fortunate escape! Why, I wouldn’t have a child of mine, an impressionable little thing, live in such a room for worlds.
I never thought of it before, but it is lucky that John kept me here after all, I can stand it so much easier than a baby, you see.
Of course I never mention it to them any more—I am too wise,—but I keep watch of it all the same.
There are things in that paper that nobody knows but me, or ever will.
Behind that outside pattern the dim shapes get clearer every day.
It is always the same shape, only very numerous.
And it is like a woman stooping down and creeping about behind that pattern. I don’t like it a bit. I wonder—I begin to think—I wish John would take me away from here!
It is so hard to talk with John about my case, because he is so wise, and because he loves me so.
But I tried it last night.
It was moonlight. The moon shines in all around just as the sun does.
I hate to see it sometimes, it creeps so slowly, and always comes in by one window or another.
John was asleep and I hated to waken him, so I kept still and watched the moonlight on that undulating wall-paper till I felt creepy.
The faint figure behind seemed to shake the pattern, just as if she wanted to get out.
I got up softly and went to feel and see if the paper DID move, and when I came back John was awake.
“What is it, little girl?” he said. “Don’t go walking about like that—You’ll get cold.”
I though it was a good time to talk, so I told him that I really was not gaining here, and that I wished he would take me away.
“Why darling!” said he, “our lease will be up in three weeks, and I can’t see how to leave before.
“The repairs are not done at home, and I cannot possibly leave town just now. Of course if you were in any danger, I could and would, but you really are better, dear, whether you can see it or not. I am a doctor, dear, and I know. You are gaining flesh and color, your appetite is better, I feel really much easier about you.”
“I don’t weigh a bit more,” said I, “nor as much; and my appetite may be better in the evening when you are here, but it is worse in the morning when you are away!”
“Bless her little heart!” said he with a big hug, “she shall be as sick as she pleases! But now let’s improve the shining hours by going to sleep, and talk about it in the morning!”
“And you won’t go away?” I asked gloomily.
“Why, how can I, dear? It is only three weeks more and then we will take a nice little trip of a few days while Jennie is getting the house ready. Really dear you are better!”
“Better in body perhaps—” I began, and stopped short, for he sat up straight and looked at me with such a stern, reproachful look that I could not say another word.
“My darling,” said he, “I beg of you, for my sake and for our child’s sake, as well as for your own, that you will never for one instant let that idea enter your mind! There is nothing so dangerous, so fascinating, to a temperament like yours. It is a false and foolish fancy. Can you not trust me as a physician when I tell you so?”
So of course I said no more on that score, and we went to sleep before long. He thought I was asleep first, but I wasn’t, and lay there for hours trying to decide whether that front pattern and the back pattern really did move together or separately.
On a pattern like this, by daylight, there is a lack of sequence, a defiance of law, that is a constant irritant to a normal mind.
The color is hideous enough, and unreliable enough, and infuriating enough, but the pattern is torturing.
You think you have mastered it, but just as you get well underway in following, it turns a back-somersault and there you are. It slaps you in the face, knocks you down, and tramples upon you. It is like a bad dream.
The outside pattern is a florid arabesque, reminding one of a fungus. If you can imagine a toadstool in joints, an interminable string of toadstools, budding and sprouting in endless convolutions—why, that is something like it.
That is, sometimes!
There is one marked peculiarity about this paper, a thing nobody seems to notice but myself, and that is that it changes as the light changes.
When the sun shoots in through the east window—I always watch for that first long, straight ray—it changes so quickly that I never can quite believe it.
That is why I watch it always.
By moonlight—the moon shines in all night when there is a moon—I wouldn’t know it was the same paper.
At night in any kind of light, in twilight, candle light, lamplight, and worst of all by moonlight, it becomes bars! The outside pattern I mean, and the woman behind it is as plain as can be.
I didn’t realize for a long time what the thing was that showed behind, that dim sub-pattern, but now I am quite sure it is a woman.
By daylight she is subdued, quiet. I fancy it is the pattern that keeps her so still. It is so puzzling. It keeps me quiet by the hour.
I lie down ever so much now. John says it is good for me, and to sleep all I can.
Indeed he started the habit by making me lie down for an hour after each meal.
It is a very bad habit I am convinced, for you see I don’t sleep.
And that cultivates deceit, for I don’t tell them I’m awake—O no!
The fact is I am getting a little afraid of John.
He seems very queer sometimes, and even Jennie has an inexplicable look.
It strikes me occasionally, just as a scientific hypothesis,—that perhaps it is the paper!
I have watched John when he did not know I was looking, and come into the room suddenly on the most innocent excuses, and I’ve caught him several times LOOKING AT THE PAPER! And Jennie too. I caught Jennie with her hand on it once.
She didn’t know I was in the room, and when I asked her in a quiet, a very quiet voice, with the most restrained manner possible, what she was doing with the paper—she turned around as if she had been caught stealing, and looked quite angry—asked me why I should frighten her so!
Then she said that the paper stained everything it touched, that she had found yellow smooches on all my clothes and John’s, and she wished we would be more careful!
Did not that sound innocent? But I know she was studying that pattern, and I am determined that nobody shall find it out but myself!
Life is very much more exciting now than it used to be. You see I have something more to expect, to look forward to, to watch. I really do eat better, and am more quiet than I was.
John is so pleased to see me improve! He laughed a little the other day, and said I seemed to be flourishing in spite of my wall-paper.
I turned it off with a laugh. I had no intention of telling him it was BECAUSE of the wall-paper—he would make fun of me. He might even want to take me away.
I don’t want to leave now until I have found it out. There is a week more, and I think that will be enough.
I’m feeling ever so much better! I don’t sleep much at night, for it is so interesting to watch developments; but I sleep a good deal in the daytime.
In the daytime it is tiresome and perplexing.
There are always new shoots on the fungus, and new shades of yellow all over it. I cannot keep count of them, though I have tried conscientiously.
It is the strangest yellow, that wall-paper! It makes me think of all the yellow things I ever saw—not beautiful ones like buttercups, but old foul, bad yellow things.
But there is something else about that paper—the smell! I noticed it the moment we came into the room, but with so much air and sun it was not bad. Now we have had a week of fog and rain, and whether the windows are open or not, the smell is here.
It creeps all over the house.
I find it hovering in the dining-room, skulking in the parlor, hiding in the hall, lying in wait for me on the stairs.
It gets into my hair.
Even when I go to ride, if I turn my head suddenly and surprise it—there is that smell!
Such a peculiar odor, too! I have spent hours in trying to analyze it, to find what it smelled like.
It is not bad—at first, and very gentle, but quite the subtlest, most enduring odor I ever met.
In this damp weather it is awful, I wake up in the night and find it hanging over me.
It used to disturb me at first. I thought seriously of burning the house—to reach the smell.
But now I am used to it. The only thing I can think of that it is like is the COLOR of the paper! A yellow smell.
There is a very funny mark on this wall, low down, near the mopboard. A streak that runs round the room. It goes behind every piece of furniture, except the bed, a long, straight, even SMOOCH, as if it had been rubbed over and over.
I wonder how it was done and who did it, and what they did it for. Round and round and round—round and round and round—it makes me dizzy!
I really have discovered something at last.
Through watching so much at night, when it changes so, I have finally found out.
The front pattern DOES move—and no wonder! The woman behind shakes it!
Sometimes I think there are a great many women behind, and sometimes only one, and she crawls around fast, and her crawling shakes it all over.
Then in the very bright spots she keeps still, and in the very shady spots she just takes hold of the bars and shakes them hard.
And she is all the time trying to climb through. But nobody could climb through that pattern—it strangles so; I think that is why it has so many heads.
They get through, and then the pattern strangles them off and turns them upside down, and makes their eyes white!
If those heads were covered or taken off it would not be half so bad.
I think that woman gets out in the daytime!
And I’ll tell you why—privately—I’ve seen her!
I can see her out of every one of my windows!
It is the same woman, I know, for she is always creeping, and most women do not creep by daylight.
I see her on that long road under the trees, creeping along, and when a carriage comes she hides under the blackberry vines.
I don’t blame her a bit. It must be very humiliating to be caught creeping by daylight!
I always lock the door when I creep by daylight. I can’t do it at night, for I know John would suspect something at once.
And John is so queer now, that I don’t want to irritate him. I wish he would take another room! Besides, I don’t want anybody to get that woman out at night but myself.
I often wonder if I could see her out of all the windows at once.
But, turn as fast as I can, I can only see out of one at one time.
And though I always see her, she MAY be able to creep faster than I can turn!
I have watched her sometimes away off in the open country, creeping as fast as a cloud shadow in a high wind.
If only that top pattern could be gotten off from the under one! I mean to try it, little by little.
I have found out another funny thing, but I shan’t tell it this time! It does not do to trust people too much.
There are only two more days to get this paper off, and I believe John is beginning to notice. I don’t like the look in his eyes.
And I heard him ask Jennie a lot of professional questions about me. She had a very good report to give.
She said I slept a good deal in the daytime.
John knows I don’t sleep very well at night, for all I’m so quiet!
He asked me all sorts of questions, too, and pretended to be very loving and kind.
As if I couldn’t see through him!
Still, I don’t wonder he acts so, sleeping under this paper for three months.
It only interests me, but I feel sure John and Jennie are secretly affected by it.
Hurrah! This is the last day, but it is enough. John is to stay in town over night, and won’t be out until this evening.
Jennie wanted to sleep with me—the sly thing! but I told her I should undoubtedly rest better for a night all alone.
That was clever, for really I wasn’t alone a bit! As soon as it was moonlight and that poor thing began to crawl and shake the pattern, I got up and ran to help her.
I pulled and she shook, I shook and she pulled, and before morning we had peeled off yards of that paper.
A strip about as high as my head and half around the room.
And then when the sun came and that awful pattern began to laugh at me, I declared I would finish it today!
We go away tomorrow, and they are moving all my furniture down again to leave things as they were before.
Jennie looked at the wall in amazement, but I told her merrily that I did it out of pure spite at the vicious thing.
She laughed and said she wouldn’t mind doing it herself, but I must not get tired.
How she betrayed herself that time!
But I am here, and no person touches this paper but me—not ALIVE!
She tried to get me out of the room—it was too patent! But I said it was so quiet and empty and clean now that I believed I would lie down again and sleep all I could; and not to wake me even for dinner—I would call when I woke.
So now she is gone, and the servants are gone, and the things are gone, and there is nothing left but that great bedstead nailed down, with the canvas mattress we found on it.
We shall sleep downstairs tonight, and take the boat home tomorrow.
I quite enjoy the room, now it is bare again.
How those children did tear about here!
This bedstead is fairly gnawed!
But I must get to work.
I have locked the door and thrown the key down into the front path.
I don’t want to go out, and I don’t want to have anybody come in, till John comes.
I want to astonish him.
I’ve got a rope up here that even Jennie did not find. If that woman does get out, and tries to get away, I can tie her!
But I forgot I could not reach far without anything to stand on!
This bed will NOT move!
I tried to lift and push it until I was lame, and then I got so angry I bit off a little piece at one corner—but it hurt my teeth.
Then I peeled off all the paper I could reach standing on the floor. It sticks horribly and the pattern just enjoys it! All those strangled heads and bulbous eyes and waddling fungus growths just shriek with derision!
I am getting angry enough to do something desperate. To jump out of the window would be admirable exercise, but the bars are too strong even to try.
Besides I wouldn’t do it. Of course not. I know well enough that a step like that is improper and might be misconstrued.
I don’t like to LOOK out of the windows even—there are so many of those creeping women, and they creep so fast.
I wonder if they all come out of that wall-paper as I did?
But I am securely fastened now by my well-hidden rope—you don’t get ME out in the road there!
I suppose I shall have to get back behind the pattern when it comes night, and that is hard!
It is so pleasant to be out in this great room and creep around as I please!
I don’t want to go outside. I won’t, even if Jennie asks me to.
For outside you have to creep on the ground, and everything is green instead of yellow.
But here I can creep smoothly on the floor, and my shoulder just fits in that long smooch around the wall, so I cannot lose my way.
Why there’s John at the door!
It is no use, young man, you can’t open it!
How he does call and pound!
Now he’s crying for an axe.
It would be a shame to break down that beautiful door!
“John dear!” said I in the gentlest voice, “the key is down by the front steps, under a plantain leaf!”
That silenced him for a few moments.
Then he said—very quietly indeed, “Open the door, my darling!”
“I can’t,” said I. “The key is down by the front door under a plantain leaf!”
And then I said it again, several times, very gently and slowly, and said it so often that he had to go and see, and he got it of course, and came in. He stopped short by the door.
“What is the matter?” he cried. “For God’s sake, what are you doing!”
I kept on creeping just the same, but I looked at him over my shoulder.
“I’ve got out at last,” said I, “in spite of you and Jane. And I’ve pulled off most of the paper, so you can’t put me back!”
Now why should that man have fainted? But he did, and right across my path by the wall, so that I had to creep over him every time!
网友评论