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“Oh, he’s awfully well, thank you,” said Miss Henley. “He’d put the wrong address on all the letters and they were all returned to him. So that explains how it was, you see. He’s awfully excited about the Lindberghs being in England. He’s working on a newspaper now and he’s been trying to find out where they are so as to get a peep at them and perhaps a word or two for a story.”
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● awfully=very。
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● He’d put=he had put。前面她不是说故意不让人家把信往这儿寄吗？怎么现在又说是人家写错了地址（address）呢？作者虽未加按语，但亨利小姐的话显然自相矛盾。
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● how it was：为什么老没有信。
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● Lindberghs：林白夫妇。Charles Lindbergh：美国飞行家，为不着陆飞渡大西洋第一人（时在1927年）。
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● get a peep at them：看到他们一眼，a peep和下面的a word在修辞学上都是“弱说法”（understatement），事实上当然不止希望看到一眼或听到一两句话而已。a story：新闻特稿，这里不作“小说”解。
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“Well, we’ll get a good bottle of wine tonight,” said father, “and we’ll all drink to Rudolpho!”
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“Oh, that’s so nice of you,” said Miss Henley, “but you know how little I drink.”
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● drink to Rudolpho：为他干杯。
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● how little I drink：我多么的不会喝酒。亨利小姐得意之余，犹不失其小姐架子。但是她是真的得意吗？
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It wasn’t until after the bottle of wine had been drunk and Miss Henley had taken Francis up to bed that father said anything about it. Then he said to mother at the table:
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“There wasn’t any mail at all today. The bus broke down on the road and nothing ever came through. The porter told me when we came back this evening. The mailbag was still hanging there waiting in the hall.”
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“I think the girls had better go up to bed,” said mother. “They’ve been up a mountain and they’re awfully tired.”
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● until是介词。after the bottle…to bed是名词性从句。
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● at the table：在餐桌上。
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● broke down：机件损坏，无法行走；俗语“抛锚”。mailbag：邮件袋（相当于邮箱）。waiting：等候邮差到来，把信放进去。
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● 亨利小姐的高兴，原来并无根据。做老师的撒谎，孩子们的母亲也许不会原谅的，但是读者会不会原谅她呢？我们细读全文，看不出有什么迹象可以证实她确有一位名叫Rudolpho的男朋友。她说收到了信固然是谎话，她的那些关于男朋友的话（虽然说得那么活龙活现），可能也都是向壁虚构。她撒了那许多谎，有什么动机呢？当然她不想害什么人，她假如存心想骗人，也无非想维持自己的尊严（她的自尊心非常之强，文章中屡次提到这一点），免得因为没有男朋友，因为没有亲人和她写信，而遭人看轻，受人怜悯。假如她是在自己骗自己，想从幻想里面得到感情的满足，那么亨利小姐是个很可怜的人了。但是请记得：亨利小姐是不要别人可怜的。
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现代英文选评注 Rosie露西姑娘
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William Van Buskirk (1922—？)
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本文选自《新声：美国新作选》（New Voices: American Writing Today），1953年出版。《新声》收美国新作家约六十人，大多皆无藉藉名，然就其一般成绩观之，实可代表美国文坛之新作风。此数十作家皆态度谨严，刻意求精，其忠于艺术，敢于尝试之精神，大致盖秉承Flaubert、Henry James、Conrad诸大师之遗教规范。书中所收各篇，皆正视人生，取材现实，故事自不落窠臼；慧心妙悟，无遮无隔，描写亦必多奇句。全书文字，大多可读，其运思之精，功力之深，比之世界名作，亦无愧色。虽曰后生可畏，实亦文章正宗也。《露西姑娘》一文，寥寥数段（此处未加节删），而意味深长，精心之作也。作者范·勃斯寇克生于美国纽约市，为会计师之子，第二次大战时，随美国空军第十三大队转战所罗门群岛、菲律宾一带，战后执业广告设计。写作虽非其专业，然其文字造诣之深，读本文便知。
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I am remembering now my small Filipina, Rosie, in the far away, long ago islands of wartime. Perhaps it was only because she had few English words, and I had no Tagalog, that we spoke so little together. Certainly she chattered freely enough with her sisters. But because I could not understand their lilting, exotic jargon, the sound was more of music than of talk, their gentle voices rising and falling, tinkling yet sibilant, like the sound of distant bells borne on a rushing wind. The gossiping sisters were as restful and as little distracting as the playful splashings in a park.
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● Filipina：菲律宾人（阴性；阳性为Filipino）。far away, long ago：此四字当形容词来形容islands，用法颇特别。作者大致但求表达方式的简单经济，顾不得习惯的用法了。
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● Tagalog：菲律宾之一种方言。
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