Chapter 10 Part three two

two There was no one on the street.This is not surprising: everyone is eating at this time.Lunch time on the island is much later than on the mainland; the owner of the shop serves Mathias's meal earlier so that he can eat on time as usual without interruption.The last house in town shut its doors and windows like the others.The silence is reassuring... After going uphill, Mathias soon came to the intersection of two main roads—one that he was now walking to go to Heizhi, and the other in an S-shape, running from the east coast of the island to the west coast—and also It was the same road he took yesterday when he visited the "Gunma" Haijia for the last time.

A few steps further on, a smaller path emerges on the right, flanked by two small walls covered with gorse--actually a grassy path with no grass in the middle, and There are still two cars to withdraw one by one one by one just enough for a small car to drive.Mathias thought it difficult for him to get to the farmhouse before the others had finished their lunch, so he had enough time to try the path and see if it happened to be the one Maria Leduc took. , when he came back from Hanging Rock this morning, he still couldn't find the way. This path is different from other paths in the wilderness. There is no fork here, and it is impossible to go the wrong way: there are low embankments or small dry mud walls on both sides. This path is consistent, continuous, and lonely. , is obviously straight.Mathias walked about a kilometer on this small road, and the road changed direction and turned to the left.The angle was a rather obtuse one, and perhaps it was better that way, not to go too quickly to the shore.In fact, there is no other road to choose from.

After walking for about ten minutes, he was on the main road again, just at the beginning of the corner.He saw a freshly painted white road sign that read: "From here to Black Rock Lighthouse—Kilometer 6." This is an ordinary stele: a rectangular parallelepiped joined to a semi-cone of equal thickness (with a common transverse axis).The two main planes—a semicircle above and a square below—are engraved with black lettering; the circular top, newly painted yellow, glistens.Mathias wiped his eyes.He should take some aspirin before lunch.He had woken up in the morning with a drowsy headache, and now it was really starting to bite him.

Mathias wiped his eyes.He will beg some pills from his good friend Malik later.Fifty meters further he turned left onto the road leading to the farmhouse. The scene changed visibly: the embankment by the side of the road was higher, even covering part of the things on both sides, and there was an almost continuous growth of shrubs on the embankment, and a pine trunk appeared from time to time behind the shrubs.At least so far, everything seems normal. There are more and more trunks.They tip and bend in every direction, but the general tendency is to bow with the direction of the wind, in other words, to the southeast.Some trunks lay almost on the ground, only holding up their stunted, irregular, and three-quarters bare tops.

The road ends at the farmhouse.The end of the road suddenly widens to form the yard of the farmhouse. On the whole, the farmhouse had nothing to repeat: a hay shed, a hedged vegetable garden, a gray house with thorn roses, windows lined on either side, wide and smooth. The door marriage made of big stones... The whole picture in his past imagination almost completely matches the reality. The traveling salesman trod along the mud without the sound of footsteps at all.The four windows were closed, but all the shutters were open--of course they were.On the front of the house, the only objectionable thing is the distance between the two windows on the second floor.Obviously, something must be missing here, such as a niche cut into the wall where a small Madonna, a wedding bouquet covered by a glass globe, or What an idol of exorcism.

He was about to knock at the door when he noticed that one of the thorn roses was dying, if not completely dead; There are a few brown leaves that are half shriveled and covered with black spots. The door didn't have a latch.Mathias pushed Fi and walked into the front porch, hearing voices very close—what seemed to be a violent argument.He stopped. As soon as he let go of the door, the door automatically and slowly turned back to its original position without any sound.The kitchen door was ajar. "How? Can't you answer?" Let him go, boy; hasn't he told you already that he's always home and waiting for you in the yard? "

It was the voice of the old peasant woman.Her tone sounded impatient.Mathias took a step forward, stepping carefully on the flagstones with his large leather shoes.The door gap is about 10 to 15 centimeters wide, and only a corner of the table can be seen through the door gap. On the table is a piece of oilcloth with colorful prints, on which there are a pair of glasses and a paper knife, two stacks side by side. a clean white basin of the same height as the table; behind the table a very young man sat upright in a chair, a calendar pinned to the wall above his head; on your knees, hold your head up, and look straight ahead.He was about fifteen or sixteen.Though his lips were tightly shut, one could guess from his face--his face was shining and his manner was stubborn--that he was the main player in the quarrel.In addition, no one could be seen. In fact, these people were talking and moving in other places in this room, but they were just invisible.Now I heard the man's voice again.

"He said...he said! He lied, as always. You see how obstinate he is, can you imagine what's going on in his head? The boy is not sane . . . Can't answer!" "But he has said and said..." "He sits in the chair like a dumb man!" "That's because he has said what he has to say several times. You always repeat what has been said." "Of course, I'm being unreasonable!" Heavy footsteps on the concrete floor, the sound of a man's footsteps (Robert Malick's footsteps, no doubt, because it could only be him talking).But nothing caught Mathias's eyes, and the straight crack of the door remained unchanged: the cement blocks remained on the ground, a round corner of oilcloth with small flowers printed on it, a pair of Glasses with steel frames, a long knife with a black handle, a stack of four soup pots, and another stack of the same soup pots behind, the upper body of the young man, the back of the chair on his left, his iron face , pursed lips, fixed gaze, illustrated calendar hanging on the wall.

"If I'd known it was him..." growled my father. The old woman began to sob.Amid the cries and prayers were several words repeated: "A murderer...a murderer...who believed his son was a murderer...,, "Don't do that again, Mom!" the man yelled.The crying stopped. There was silence for a while, only the sound of the man's footsteps could be heard in the silence.Then the man said in a slower voice: "You told us yourself, that . It's about sitting on the threshold, and the traveling salesman should have seen him!" "He probably walked away for a while...right, baby?"

Mathias suddenly felt amused: the island is used to calling children "Baby", but how incongruous is this dear title with that rigid face.While suppressing a laugh, he missed a few lines of conversation that were not very clear, but he also heard an unfamiliar voice interrupting the conversation—it was the voice of a relatively young woman.As for the young man, he did not even bat an eyelash, leading one to suspect that the conversation might not really be about him, but that someone else might be being questioned.The voice of the second woman speaking behind the scenes could have been his mother's... no, his mother had gone out.At this point the father interrupted the ignorant woman roughly, and went on to reproach the young man:

"In the first place, Julien himself said that he never left the door. In any case he lied... A wretched fellow can't even keep a place as an apprentice in a bakery! Liar, robber, murderer..." "Robar! You're crazy!" "Yes! I'm crazy... You answer me, you, do you answer? You were over there—was that?—on the cliff, when the traveling salesman was here; Come back before you go home—you didn't take the road because Grandmother didn't meet you... Speak up, stubborn fellow! You met the little Leduc girl and you got into trouble with her again, didn't you? Oh! I know, she's not a well behaved girl...you just leave her alone...what happened? did you fight? or something else? maybe you didn't mean to push her off? you were on the edge of a rock, arguing or do you want revenge for throwing you off the jetty that night? What the hell? You gotta talk—eh?—if you don’t say I’ll blow your head off too!” "Robar! You're angry again, you..." The traveling salesman retreated involuntarily to the shadows of the front porch, feeling a sudden fever all over his body.He felt a change in the line of sight facing him between the two stacks of pots and the calendar (but since when did it start to change?)—the line of sight was fixed on him now.He immediately regained his composure and walked towards the door without haste. At this moment, the father's voice repeated more and more loudly: "Ask him to answer, tell him to answer!" "There's someone inside," said the boy. Mathias, deliberately stomping the soles of his shoes on the flagstones, knocked with his thick ring on the half-open door.All the sounds in the kitchen stopped suddenly. Then Robert Malick said, "Come in!" and the door was flung open from the room.The traveling salesman went by.The people in the room also came towards him.Everyone seemed to know him: the yellow-faced old lady, the man in the leather jacket, the young girl washing dishes in the corner.The girl stopped what she was doing, still holding a pot in her hand, turned her head halfway towards the door, and nodded to him.Only the boy in the chair didn't move.He only moved his eyes slightly, and continued to fix his gaze on Mathias. After Mathias shook hands with the people in the room, although he said a few cheerful "Hello!", the tension in the room still could not be eased; he finally walked to the calendar pinned on the wall: "That's Julien, really! How big he's grown! Let me see... how many years I've been gone..." "Can't you get up when you're being talked to?" said the father. "What a stubborn boy! That's why I called him just now: he was kicked out of the bakery—yesterday morning." — he's apprenticed there. I'd love to send him a midshipman in the navy if he keeps going like this... getting into trouble all day... last week he got into a fight with a drunk fisherman and he fell in the water, Nearly drowned...that's why I yelled at him just now. I want to yell at him...' Julien got up, looked from his father to the traveling salesman.A faint smile played on his tightly pursed lips.He didn't say anything.Mathias dared not reach out to shake his hand.The walls were painted in a stone-colored color with no luster, and the top layer of paint had peeled off in some places, and polygonal scales were exposed in many places.The illustration for the calendar shows a little girl playing hide and seek with a handkerchief over her eye.The traveling salesman turned to the grandmother and said: "Where are the kids? Where are they? I'd love to see them..." "They're at school again," replied Robert Malick. Julien never took his eyes off the traveling salesman, and the traveling salesman was compelled to speak, as quickly as he could, with the constant fear of saying the wrong thing, or of saying something irrevocable: he had yesterday Missed the steamer in the afternoon; he revisited the farmhouse this time because he thought e had forgotten something (wrong)... so he had to wait until Friday.He used these days to rest.He revisited the farmhouse because he wanted to sell another watch or two (wrong)...he missed the boat three minutes late because the rented bike was at the last minute (wrong)...just the chain on the bike in the morning It gave him a lot of trouble: he was putting the chain back on the car when Mrs. Malick met him at the intersection, at the intersection, at the corner.Today he came on foot resolutely; he revisited the farmhouse because he wanted to meet the family... "Did you bring your watch too?" asked the old peasant woman. Mathias was about to answer in the affirmative, when he suddenly remembered that the small box had been left with the landlady.He reached into his short pocket and took out the only watch he had with him: the little gold-plated ladies' watch that was… returned to him this morning. "That's all I have left," he said, trying to escape the embarrassment. "Didn't Mrs. Malick say she wanted to buy a watch for a family member who was always late for work?" The man in the leather jacket never listened to him again.At first the old woman didn't seem to understand what he said, and then she suddenly realized: "Oh! you mean Josephine," she exclaimed, pointing to the young girl, "no, no, I won't give her the watch! She'll forget to wind it. She'll never remember to put it on." Where. In less than three days she'll lose her watch and never get it back!" These words amused both herself and the young girl.Mathias put the watch in his pocket.Thinking that things were a little better, he ventured a glance in the lad's direction; the lad did not move, nor did he abandon the object of his gaze.The father, who was silent for a few minutes, suddenly asked the traveling salesman a straightforward question: "I'm very sorry that I came back late and didn't receive you yesterday. Huh? Do you remember what time you got here?" "It's about this time, almost noon." Mathias replied evasively. Robert Malick looked at his son: "How strange! Where the hell were you then?" There was another tense silence in the room.At last the boy finally spoke: "I was in the hayloft across the yard," he said, looking the traveling salesman in the eye. "Oh, yes, that's quite possible," continued the traveling salesman hastily, "the hay must have blocked me from seeing him." "Okay! You're satisfied!" cried the grandmother. "I've said it before." "What does that prove?" replied the man. "It's too easy to say that now!" The child continued: "You got off your bike, you knocked on the door. Then you went to look at the garden door. Before you left here, you took a key from a pouch behind the seat and screwed it on the transmission mechanism. .” "Yes, yes, that's right!" Mathias confirmed every word he said, trying to put on a smile, as if these imaginary actions were natural and unimportant. Taken together, all this only serves to further prove that he was not at the scene of the crime.Since Julien Malick proved that he had been to the farmhouse and was still there for a considerable time, waiting for the absent owner, how could the traveling salesman have been able to go to the cliff at the same time—in other words to Go in the opposite direction—to the place where the shepherdess tends her sheep?Therefore, he is completely free from suspicion, and from now on... At least Mathias managed to convince himself of this.But this unexpected witness only added to his worries: the boy was too confident in his fabrications.If the boy had been in the yard or in the hayloft toward noon that day, he would have known that no one had knocked on the door then.On the other hand, if the kid wasn't there at the time and he was just trying to convince his father that he was, why would he have dreamed up that set of small bags, keys, shifters, and so on, with such characteristic little things?Everything he said is completely in line with the reality. If it is a coincidence, the possibility is very small; because if it is fabricated, the other party will immediately categorically deny it, and the risk will be great.The only explanation—besides madness—could only be that Julien knew in advance that the traveling salesman would not deny it, because his own situation was abnormal and he was trying to get out of it, and because he, too, was afraid that the other party would also deny it. A denial—a denial that he had been to the farmhouse. If Julien knew that the traveling salesman was at such a disadvantage, it was evident that Julien happened to be at the farmhouse at the time of the so-called traveling salesman's visit: he knew perfectly well that no one had come to knock l'1.That's why he's looking at his guests so impolitely while he's accumulating that set of invented details... Then the question returned to the original starting point: in this case, what reason does the child have to support Mathias' statement?Since he had told his father at the outset that he had been sitting at the door, why couldn't he contradict what a passer-by had said to his grandmother?Was he really afraid that his family would trust a passer-by instead of himself? Will not.Now that Julien lied—and so boldly—it seemed that the events were not quite the same: the boy must not have been at the farmhouse (certainly not, as he had been accused of being) at the farmhouse towards noon that day. in the hollow of the overhanging rock—he is somewhere else).So he really believed that the traveling salesman had been to the farmhouse.But since his father wanted him to come up with real evidence, he had to invent some more precise details—one by one, one by one, xx came up at random.In order to get Mathias's help--he thinks all this has nothing to do with Mathias--so he watched him closely, hoping that Mathias would understand his difficulties and cooperate with him.What Mathias thought was an impolite gaze was actually a pleading.Otherwise, is that young man trying to perform health clothing on him? The traveling salesman walked back along the path between the crooked pine trees, turning all sides of the problem over and over.His inability to come to a conclusion, he thought, was perhaps due to his headache; if he had exerted all his energy, it was impossible not to come to an indisputable conclusion.He hurried out of the unfriendly kitchen, avoiding the boy's dogged gaze, so that he left without begging them for a few aspirins, as he had expected.On the contrary, speaking, concentration, and various thoughts made his headache worse.How much better it would have been for him not to go as far as that damned farmhouse! Then again, isn't it worth eliciting such a testimony?Julien Malick's public statement, whatever his motives, was evidence—proof that Mathias had longed for—that he had stopped there for a considerable time, exactly between eleven-thirty and ten o'clock. Between two and a half o'clock, the place where he stayed was far away from the accident site...was it "far" from the accident site?Was it off for a "quite" long time...long enough to do anything?As for the distance, it is still within the range of this island, and the longest of the whole island is less than six kilometers!On a good bike... Having expended so much effort to construct the argument that he was not there—as if this argument was enough to clear him of all suspicions—Madias now found that this argument was still insufficient.He stayed on the cliff for too long, and this argument is not enough to completely deny that he has been there.There is still a hole in the timetable. Mathias began to think about where he had been and where he had stayed since he left the coffee shop and garage.It was eleven ten or eleven fifteen when he started.The distance to Don Duke's house was hardly a journey, and the time of arrival could be fixed at exactly fifteen past eleven.The first stop must have lasted less than fifteen minutes, though Mrs. Leduc's incessant conversation made the quarter seem to pass very slowly.There are very few places to stay in the future, and the time is very short-it only adds up to two or three minutes.The distance from the town along the main road to the corner was two kilometers, and he pedaled very fast without turning the corner. At best, it would not take more than five minutes.Five plus three is eight, and adding fifteen makes twenty-three... So it took him less than twenty-five minutes to reach the place where he met Mrs. Malick from the square.In fact he met the old peasant woman almost an hour later. ．In order to close the gap as much as possible, Mathias counted backwards from the time he looked at his watch to the time when he met Mrs. Malick.He checked his watch in the coffee shop in Heiyan Village, and it was seven minutes past one.He had been in the coffee shop for about ten minutes—maybe a quarter of an hour—before he looked at his watch.The time it took to sell the second watch (at the sick couple's house) was ten minutes at most, and the first watch (including a long conversation with Mrs. Malik) was about fifteen minute.He wasn't going too fast on this stretch of the road, and could have added ten minutes to the total.Unfortunately, all of these figures appear to be a bit exaggerated.But the total number barely exceeded three quarters of an hour.Then the time when I met the old peasant woman should be twelve twenty at the earliest, maybe twelve twenty-five. That extra, abnormal, suspicious, unexplained period of time amounted to forty if not fifty minutes.During this period of time, it is more than enough to go to two places in a row: first to the farmhouse, back and forth, including a little time to repair the bicycle in front of the closed door of the farmhouse; then to the edge of the hanging rock, back and forth , including... Mathieu Yasi only needed to step a little faster at that time. He quickened his pace.After crossing the main road, he took the opposite path; it was quite wide at first, and then narrowed to a dirt path, with clusters of shrubs and low trees on either side. In the gorse bushes, there were sections of ruts from time to time, some more obvious, some more indistinct.The fields have disappeared.At the end there is a half-collapsed stone wall, which shows that this is the beginning of the road.On both sides of the road now stretched continuous hillocks, covered with low red and yellow plants, nothing taller than a gray rock protruding from time to time, a bush of thorns, or a blur in the distance. It's hard to tell what it is at first glance. The terrain gradually lowered.Mathias noticed that in front of him at the level of the eyes, there was a darker horizontal line, which separated the unchanging and motionless gray sky from another equally flat and vertical gray plane-the sea. open. This path leads to the center of a horseshoe-shaped ridge. This horseshoe-shaped opening faces the sea and surrounds a long funnel-shaped land that extends to the edge of the hanging rock, with an area of ​​no more than 20x10 meters.Something of a light color on the ground caught the eye of the traveling salesman; he reached it in a few strides, stooped to lift it up: it turned out to be nothing more than a small cylindrical stone, smooth, It was so white it looked like a cigarette butt. The flat bottom of the depression, not as bare as the heath, is covered with lusher grass, but suddenly—with no transition in between—becomes, at thirty paces away, a sheer rock, about fifteen feet high. Meters, down into the swirling water.The rocks fall almost straight at first, and then the rock surface becomes irregular, with sharp points, platforms or small peaks protruding in many places.At the bottom, between some huge rocks, there is a group of conical rocks rising from the spray, with the spiers upwards. They are repeatedly and violently impacted by the waves and back waves, causing countless splashes, sometimes even splashing beyond the rocks. flat. A little higher, there are two seagulls crossing and drawing circles in the sky—sometimes flying in opposite directions, forming two side-by-side circles, sometimes flying crossed, forming a complete figure 8; Its flight is smooth and slow, its wings do not move, and it only changes the direction of inclination to form various graphics.Tilting their heads slightly, their round, expressionless eyes are turned sideways into the circle to gaze out at the sea; their motionless eyes peer out, like the lidless eyes of a fish, as if an absolute insensibility made them Impossible to blink.The traveling salesman watched the water beat rhythmically against the wet smooth rocks, watched the long streams of white spray, the jets of water at regular intervals, the cascades that appeared in regular intervals, and the rocky rocky surface beyond... Enron In the meantime, Mathias caught a glimpse of a piece of clothing material—more precisely, a sweater—a gray wool sweater hanging on a protruding corner of the rock, about two meters from the top of the rock—to the right. — That is to say, at heights that the tide can never reach. Happily, there did not appear to be much difficulty in getting there.Without hesitation for a minute, the traveling salesman immediately took off his short skirt and put it on the ground. He circled a few meters along the edge of the rock and found - on the far right - a place where he could climb down.So he grasped the protruding part of the rock with both hands, stepped on the cracks and corners carefully with his two feet, and slid down with his whole body against the rock, even with his belly against the rock; beyond his expectation, it took a lot of effort With a lot of strength, he reached a place, not his destination, but about two meters below his destination.Now all he had to do was stand upright, hold the rock with one hand, and reach out with the other to grab the thing he craved.The dress finally came into his hands without any difficulty.There was no doubt that it was the gray woolen coat that Violet was wearing—she was not wearing the sweater, which had been lying on the grass beside her at the time. But Mathias obviously threw this sweater away with other things, and when throwing away, he checked each item to prevent any item from being caught on the rock halfway and not falling down.He didn't understand how such a mistake could have happened.He might as well have left the sweater on the overhang; it lay on the ground and the frightened sheep circled the stake.Since she had taken the sweater off herself, it was more natural for her to fall without it.Anyway, if she stumbled and fell with her sweater on, it seemed unbelievable that the sharp point of the rock would have ripped off the whole sweater without turning it inside out or tearing it a little.It was luck that they didn't find the sweater when they were looking for someone. But at the same time, Mathias also considered that such an idea was completely unreliable, because someone might see the dress hanging there, but thought that there was no need to take any risks, so they did not take it down.That being the case, wouldn't it be a more serious mistake to remove the clothes now?If anyone ever found this garment hanging on a rock, wouldn't it be best to put it back where it was, and let it hang there exactly as it was wrinkled? After thinking for a while, Mathias asked himself: Who might have found this sweater?If it was Maria Leduc, when she saw her sister's sweater, she would have guessed that her sister had fallen and led everyone to look for it here, but no one did that yesterday.As for the fishermen who brought the bodies back this morning, they were under the rocks, and the seaweed exposed at low tide may block their sight, not to mention the distance is too far, it is impossible to see clearly what it is.Therefore, this evil thing has not been seen so far. On the other hand, it would be impossible to put the sweater back on the grass in the hollow now, because, if it had been left there, Maria would have picked it up yesterday.Therefore, there is only one solution.Mathias spread his legs, stood firmly on the narrow rock, rolled up the little woolen sweater, and then supported the betrayed rock with one hand, and threw the sweater vigorously with the other hand. to the sea. The sweater fell softly to the water - floating on the water between the rocks.The two seagulls uttered a scream, broke their circle, and plunged downward.They recognized it as nothing more than a piece of rag without rushing to the surface, and immediately flew upwards towards the cliffs, their cries louder.At this moment the traveling salesman saw a man leaning over the edge of the straight rock, also looking at the sea; that man was standing near the spot where he had just taken off his shorts.It turned out that it was young Julien Malick. Mathias lowered his head so quickly that he almost fell into the sea.By this time the gray coat was half soaked with water, and was being pinched by a small swell and a back swell.The waves overwhelmed it, and it sank slowly, and was soon carried out to sea by the receding water beyond the rocks.Another wave hit, the tide was high, and nothing could be seen. It was time to look up and look at the kid again.Evidently the boy had seen the woolen coat and the incomprehensible behavior of the traveling salesman... No; he must have seen the throwing motion, but what he saw was probably only the rolled up gray cloth.The most important thing now is to explain clearly to him. In addition, Mathias also knew the embarrassing situation he was in, and this had to be explained.He estimated the distance between the summit and him.He was shocked again by the human figure that appeared clearly against the background of the sky.He almost forgot the danger of his situation. Julien gazed at him without a word, his expression always icy, his eyes fixed and his lips tightly shut. "Why, hello, little one," cried Mathias, with an air of surprise, as if he had just seen him. The kid didn't answer.He had put on an old jacket and a cap over his overalls, making him look older—eighteen, at least.His face was thin and pale, a little frightened. "They thought I threw them a fish," said the traveling salesman, pointing to some seagulls circling above them.Since the other party remained silent, he had to add: "It's actually a piece of rag." As he spoke, he watched the sea closely: the waves rolled up and spread out, the water rolled between the parallel lines of the waves, nothing came to the surface... "A sweater." The words came from above, in a tone that was nonchalant, smooth, and undeniable—just as he said those words: "Before you leave here, take out your A key..." The traveling salesman turned his head and looked up at Julien.Julien's attitude, his expression—or rather his lack of expression—had not changed at all.It looked as if the child hadn't spoken. "A sweater"?Mathias, did you hear me clearly?Did he even hear the voice? Fortunately, the distance between the two sides was seven or eight meters, and thanks to the sound of wind and waves (even though the sound of wind and waves today is relatively small), he can still pretend not to hear clearly.His eyes roamed the gray rock face again, inspecting every nook and cranny, and then rested on the water, concentrating on a notch where the waves couldn't hit, where the water swelled along the smooth plane of the rock. When the time falls, it is calmer and more rhythmic. "A rag," he said, "I found it here." "A sweater." The bystander corrected in a composed voice. Although he didn't yell, he spoke louder.There is no longer any possibility of doubt.The same scene was repeated again: he looked up at the top of the rock, and the other party bent over, his lips were tightly shut, and his face was expressionless.Mathias made a gesture to further explain: "Right here, on the rock." "I know, it was here yesterday," replied the young man.When Mathias bowed his head, he added: "It belongs to Petit Jacques." This time, the traveling salesman thought it best not to answer at all, so that he had time to think about what was going on and how he should act.So he climbed up the rock along the old road.It was much easier than coming down, and it was all over the top in no time. But once he stepped onto the rocky plane, he still didn't know what to do.He walked towards Julien Malick as slowly as possible.What else could he be thinking about?实际上，他只不过是在威胁的面前退却，也许他认为这样可以使对方主动说出更多的话来吧。 可是那孩子却坚持沉默，使得旅行推销员不得不先把短祆穿起来再说。他把两只手插进衣袋，摸摸看里面的东西是否齐全。什么也不缺少。 “你吸烟吗？”他问，同时把已经开了的那盒香烟递过去。 于连摇摇头，表示“不吸”，同时后退一步。旅行推销员自己也没有拿出香烟来吸，又把那盒蓝色的香烟放进衣袋。他的手碰到了那个玻璃纸袋。 “那么你吃块糖吧！”他伸长臂膀递过去那个透明的小纸袋，里面装着五颜六色的糖果纸。 对方冰冷的面孔开始表示拒绝，可是一个几乎觉察不着的变化同时在脸部表情上出现。于连仿佛改变了主意。他瞧了瞧纸袋，又瞧了瞧旅行推销员，再瞧了瞧纸袋。马弟雅思在这时候才弄明白对方的目光特殊在什么地方：这双眼睛既没流露出无耻，也没流露出恶意，而仅仅是带有一点斜视。这个发现使他放了心。 接受了对方好意的于连，走过来伸手在纸袋里取糖果。他不是随意取一颗，而是把手深深地伸进袋里，选了一颗包着红纸的。他并没有拆开，只是仔细地打量着那颗糖果。然后他又注视马弟雅思…毫无疑问，这小伙子的视觉上存在缺陷，因而影响了他的表情，不过他也并不完全斜视。一定是还有别的原因……也许是过度的近视吧？不，因为他现在把糖果放到正常的距离来加以观察。