介绍:
The desire to flee which Jennie experienced upon seeing the Senator again was attributable(可能由于;可归因于) to what she considered the disgrace of her position. She was ashamed to think that he, who thought so well of her, should discover her doing so common a thing. Girl-like, she was inclined to imagine that his interest in her depended upon something else than her mere personality.
When she reached home Mrs. Gerhardt had heard of her flight from the other children.
“What was the matter with you, anyhow?” asked George, when she came in.
“Oh, nothing,” she answered, but immediately turned to her mother and said, “Mr. Brander came by and saw us.”
“Oh, did he?” softly exclaimed her mother. “He’s back then. What made you run, though, you foolish girl?”
“Well, I didn’t want him to see me.”
“Well, maybe he didn’t know you, anyhow,” she said, with a certain sympathy for her daughter’s predicament(困境;窘境).
“Oh yes, he did, too,” whispered Jennie. “He called after me three or four times.”
Mrs. Gerhardt shook her head.
“What is it?” said Gerhardt, who had been hearing the conversation from the adjoining(紧挨;邻接) room, and now came out.
“Oh, nothing,” said the mother, who hated to explain the significance which the Senator’s personality had come to have in their lives. “A man frightened them when they were bringing the coal.”
The arrival of the Christmas presents later in the evening threw the household into an uproar(喧嚣;骚动) of excitement. Neither Gerhardt nor the mother could believe their eyes when a grocery wagon halted in front of their cottage and a lusty clerk began to carry in the gifts. After failing to persuade the clerk that he had made a mistake, the large assortment of good things was looked over with very human glee.
“Just you never mind,” was the clerk’s authoritative words. “I know what I’m about. Gerhardt, isn’t it? Well, you’re the people.”
Mrs. Gerhardt moved about, rubbing her hands in her excitement, and giving vent to an occasional “Well, isn’t that nice now!”
Gerhardt himself was melted at the thought of the generosity of the unknown benefactor, and was inclined to lay it all to the goodness of a great local mill owner, who knew him and wished him well. Mrs. Gerhardt tearfully suspected the source, but said nothing. Jennie knew, by instinct, the author of it all.
The afternoon of the day after Christmas Brander encountered the mother in the hotel, Jennie having been left at home to look after the house.
“How do you do, Mrs. Gerhardt,” he exclaimed genially(亲切地；和蔼地) extending his hand. “How did you enjoy your Christmas?”
Poor Mrs. Gerhardt took it nervously; her eyes filled rapidly with tears.
“There, there,” he said, patting her on the shoulder. “Don’t cry. You mustn’t forget to get my laundry to-day.”
“Oh no, sir,” she returned, and would have said more had he not walked away.
From this on, Gerhardt heard continually of the fine Senator at the hotel, how pleasant he was, and how much he paid for his washing. With the simplicity of a German workingman, he was easily persuaded that Mr. Brander must be a very great and a very good man.
Jennie, whose feelings needed no encouragement in this direction, was more than ever prejudiced in his favor.
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