Music Against the Night
Smolensk, Russia, February 1837 and February 1860
俄罗斯斯摩棱斯克，1837 年 2 月和 1860 年 2 月
B elatedly, John’s last words reached Adelaide.
约翰的遗言令人心旷神怡地传到了阿德莱德。
He had been dead for a fortnight, buried for ten days.
他已经死了两周了，埋葬了十天。
She was not at his deathbed, having been banished from their marriage bed for decades; nor did she attend the funeral, to which she received no invitation.
她并没有在他临终前，因为她已经被从婚床上被驱逐了几十年。她也没有参加葬礼，因为她没有收到任何邀请。
Another woman had long since taken her place: a usurper’s tears could wet cheeks and soak handkerchiefs equally well.
另一个女人早已取代了她的位置：篡位者的眼泪可以打湿脸颊，也可以浸湿手帕。
The news had traveled in a timelier manner.
这个消息传播得比较及时。
A letter in Adrien’s nearly illegible handwriting arrived in Smolensk the day after John’s death, on the twenty-fourth of January.
约翰去世后的第二天，即一月二十四日，一封由艾德里安书写的几乎难以辨认的信寄到了斯摩棱斯克。
My dear mother, I regret being the bearer .
我亲爱的妈妈，我很遗憾自己是这个承载者。
.
。
.
。
so on and so forth.
等等。
The wording was ridiculously formal.
措辞正式得可笑。
Adelaide had raised Adrien alone until his defection to Moscow at seventeen, a little over a year ago.
阿德莱德独自抚养阿德里安，直到一年多前，他十七岁时叛逃到莫斯科。
A father could be a stranger; still, his fame readily effaced a mother’s care.
父亲可能是陌生人；然而，他的名气很快就抹去了母亲的关心。
There was no mention of a funeral in Adrien’s letter, and for a moment, Adelaide indulged the thought of ordering a carriage for Moscow.
阿德里安的信中没有提到葬礼，一时之间，阿德莱德沉迷于订购一辆马车前往莫斯科的想法。
How flawlessly she could present herself, decked in her widow’s weeds, at the house on Povarskaya Street, surprising the servants and embarrassing the mistress.
她穿着寡妇的服装，在波瓦尔斯卡亚街的房子里完美地展现自己，让仆人们感到惊讶，让女主人感到尴尬。
How inexorably she could disapprove: the choice of black horses for the carriage, the music played at the funeral, the artist hired to make the death mask, which, already cast, it was too late to alter.
她会多么无情地反对：选择黑马作为马车，葬礼上播放的音乐，聘请艺术家制作死亡面具，面具已经铸好了，现在再改变已经太晚了。
But such an ambush would only provoke gossip.
但这样的埋伏只会引发流言蜚语。
Adelaide had no intention of providing yet more entertainment for irrelevant people.
阿德莱德无意为无关的人提供更多的娱乐。
To change her behavior simply because John had died would be a surrender.
仅仅因为约翰死了就改变她的行为就等于投降。
What did it matter if no one—not even Adrien—recalled that she, Adelaide Field, was still John’s wife by law, and that it was her right to accompany his coffin from the chapel of the Moscow Reformed Church to Vvedenskoye Cemetery?
如果没有人——甚至阿德里安也没有——记得她，阿德莱德·菲尔德，在法律上仍然是约翰的妻子，而且她有权利护送约翰的灵柩从莫斯科归正会教堂到维登斯科耶公墓，那又有什么关系呢？
Once called the German Cemetery, it now made room for all the foreigners to congregate in eternity: Germans, Italians, French, Polish, and English, among them Protestants and Catholics as well as godless men like John.
它曾经被称为德国公墓，现在为所有外国人提供了永远聚集的空间：德国人、意大利人、法国人、波兰人和英国人，其中包括新教徒和天主教徒，以及像约翰这样的不敬虔的人。
Clotilde Charpentier, who could play music no better than a hen could float and paddle in the Patriarch’s Ponds, would walk behind John’s coffin, with a heavy black veil to shield herself from the January wind and people’s appraising looks.
克洛蒂尔德·查彭蒂埃（Clotilde Charpentier）的音乐演奏能力并不比一只母鸡在族长池塘里漂浮和划桨更好，她会走在约翰的棺材后面，戴着厚重的黑色面纱，以遮挡一月的风和人们评价的目光。
When John had first taken up Clotilde as a mistress, he had compared her to a pet rabbit, soft and compliant.
当约翰第一次收克洛蒂尔德为情妇时，他把她比作一只宠物兔子，柔软而顺从。
Clotilde was a woman easy to love, he explained to Adelaide, who listened calmly, as she knew he would expect her to.
克洛蒂尔德是一个容易被爱的女人，他向阿德莱德解释道，阿德莱德平静地听着，因为她知道他会期望她这么做。
Love was surely not meant to be an easy undertaking, she said.
她说，爱情当然不是一件容易的事情。
Not for you, he said, but you’re different.
他说，不适合你，但你与众不同。
Most people don’t want to wage war in the realm of love.
大多数人不想在爱情领域发动战争。
Most people, Adelaide thought of reminding him, don’t want war of any kind, but find me a single person whose life has not been marked by wars, one after another.
阿德莱德想提醒他，大多数人不想要任何形式的战争，但要找到一个生活中没有被一场又一场战争打上烙印的人。
That conversation had taken place years ago.
那次谈话是几年前发生的。
Napoleon Bonaparte, having already lost half a million soldiers in Russia, was still an emperor dreaming of new conquests.
拿破仑·波拿巴已经在俄罗斯损失了五十万士兵，但他仍然是一位梦想着新的征服的皇帝。
John and Adelaide were both young enough to believe in their own dreams: he wanted a woman to idolize him; she aspired to be a virtuoso in her own right, an equal to him.
约翰和阿德莱德都很年轻，都相信自己的梦想：他想要一个女人崇拜他；他想要一个女人来崇拜他；他想要一个女人来崇拜他。她渴望凭借自己的能力成为一名艺术大师，与他平起平坐。
He was the first to admit defeat by leaving her for Clotilde.
他是第一个承认失败的人，把她留给了克洛蒂尔德。
No musical gift, he made amply clear, was required of a woman willing to dedicate her life to him.
他明确表示，愿意将一生奉献给他的女人不需要任何音乐天赋。
For Adelaide, the insult was as much to her as to music, the other party in the ménage à trois she thought they had both agreed to.
对于阿德莱德来说，这种侮辱既是对她的侮辱，也是对音乐的侮辱，她认为他们都同意了三人行中的另一方。
If not for music, Adelaide and John would not have met in this life.
如果没有音乐，阿德莱德和约翰这辈子就不会相遇。
His mistresses were all chance encounters.
他的情妇都是偶然遇见的。
A woman easy to love was never truly loved, though it mattered little now.
一个容易被爱的女人从来都不是真正被爱的，尽管现在这已经不重要了。
Let the Muscovites say what they wished about the widow absent at the funeral.
让莫斯科人说出他们对缺席葬礼的寡妇的愿望吧。
People could be generous when they chose to, but more often they were cruel.
人们可以选择慷慨，但更多时候他们是残酷的。
Either way, they would be wrong about Adelaide.
不管怎样，他们对阿德莱德的看法都是错误的。
So, with a swanlike equanimity, her long neck sloped ever so slightly, her face hidden behind a veil, Adelaide greeted the visitor from Moscow.
于是，阿德莱德带着天鹅般的平静，长长的脖子微微倾斜，脸庞隐藏在面纱后面，迎接这位来自莫斯科的访客。
For a few years, like a diligent bride-to-be working on her trousseau, she had been accumulating mourning and half-mourning costumes of the most desirable quality: laces and beads from the choicest vendors in Moscow, those with Parisian connections instead of Prussian; rolls of silk and satin and linen and cotton, all extravagantly black, unlike the flimsy, faded stuff worn by common widows.
几年来，她就像一个勤奋地制作嫁妆的准新娘一样，一直在收集质量最理想的丧服和半丧服：花边和珠子来自莫斯科最好的供应商，那些与巴黎有联系而不是普鲁士的；一卷卷丝绸、缎子、亚麻和棉布，全都是奢华的黑色，与普通寡妇穿的单薄、褪色的衣服不同。
She had not deigned to haggle with Madame Bassett, the best French dressmaker in Smolensk, who promised mourning attire enviable enough to make a bride yearn for old age.
她没有屈尊与斯摩棱斯克最好的法国裁缝巴塞特夫人讨价还价，她承诺提供令人羡慕的丧服，足以让新娘向往晚年。
If Madame Field must live as a widow, her dresses would suit her status.
如果菲尔德夫人必须守寡，她的衣服就适合她的身份。
And she was a widow of sort long before John’s death, though no one used the term veuve de paille to her face.
早在约翰去世之前，她就已经是一位寡妇了，尽管没有人当着她的面使用“veuve de paille”这个词。
It was time to shed the straw part and dress up in her best weeds.
是时候脱掉稻草部分，穿上她最好的杂草了。
The fashionable young man introduced himself as Nicholas Yakovlev, a friend of Adrien’s.
这位时尚的年轻人介绍自己是尼古拉斯·雅科夫列夫，阿德里安的朋友。
Naturally Adrien had neglected to make the journey himself.
阿德里安自然没有亲自去旅行。
If this pained her, it was not for the visitor to witness.
如果这让她感到痛苦，那也不是来访者能看到的。
When Yakovlev mentioned the clergyman who attended the death-bed, Adelaide expressed surprise that John had asked to see a pastor.
当雅科夫列夫提到临终时照顾的牧师时，阿德莱德对约翰要求见牧师表示惊讶。
“Monsieur Field did not, but his friends insisted.”
“菲尔德先生没有这么做，但他的朋友们坚持要这么做。”
His friends—these would have been the idle ladies of Moscow society, Countess Khomyakova and Princess Tuchkova and Countess Orlova and others in their circle.
他的朋友——这些人可能是莫斯科上流社会的闲散女士，霍米亚科娃伯爵夫人、图奇科娃公主、奥尔洛娃伯爵夫人以及她们圈子里的其他人。
Buzzing with purpose, they swarmed the scene of any promising death.
他们有目的地嗡嗡作响，聚集在任何有可能死亡的现场。
It was only fitting that their pious faces should be seen to mark the departure of a genius.
他们虔诚的面孔标志着一位天才的离去，这是再合适不过的了。
They would pride themselves on having preserved the soul of “the Englishman,” wayward for too long.
他们会为自己保存了“英国人”任性太久的灵魂而感到自豪。
That he was actually Irish would make no difference.
他实际上是爱尔兰人也没有什么区别。
“I’m surprised Adrien didn’t object,” Adelaide said.
“我很惊讶阿德里安没有反对，”阿德莱德说。
“His father was a follower of Voltaire.
“他的父亲是伏尔泰的追随者。
Adrien must know that.”
阿德里安一定知道这一点。”
“I suppose you’ll say that Adrien had to follow Leon’s orders.”
“我想你会说艾德里安必须听从里昂的命令。”
“Monsieur Leon has been in charge of the household.
“莱昂先生一直负责这个家。
Madame must not blame Adrien.”
夫人不能责怪艾德里安。”
Leon, twenty-two that year, a bastard, rarely missed an opportunity to ingratiate himself with any woman who could advance his position; a tenor, he would sing for scraps of attention.
那一年，二十二岁的莱昂是个私生子，他很少放过任何一个机会去讨好任何能够提升他地位的女人。作为一名男高音，他会唱歌来吸引注意力。
Adelaide indicated that Yakovlev should carry on.
阿德莱德表示雅科夫列夫应该继续下去。
In his accented English, Yakovlev performed John’s dying exchange with the clergyman from St. Andrew’s Church.
雅科夫列夫用带有口音的英语与圣安德鲁教堂的牧师进行了约翰临终前的交谈。
“Are you a Protestant?” he was asked.
“你是新教徒吗？”有人问他。
“No.” “So perhaps you’re a Catholic?” “No.” “Then perhaps you’re a Calvinist?” “Not exactly that.
“不。” “那么也许你是天主教徒？” “不。” “那么也许你是加尔文主义者？” “不完全是这样。
I’m not a Calvinist, but a claveciniste .”
我不是加尔文主义者，而是克拉夫西尼斯特。”
Adelaide lifted her veil to look at Yakovlev.
阿德莱德掀开面纱，看着雅科夫列夫。
“Did he say claveciniste ?”
“他说的是claveciniste吗？”
“Monsieur Field was always fond of a good pun,” Yakevlov said with a smile.
“菲尔德先生总是喜欢双关语，”亚克夫洛夫微笑着说道。
“The world will remember his wit.”
“世界将记住他的智慧。”
People often preferred quotable mediocrity to a true masterpiece.
人们往往更喜欢可引用的平庸之作，而不是真正的杰作。
Adelaide lowered her veil.
阿德莱德放下了面纱。
“Rehearsed,” she said.
“排练过，”她说。
“He didn’t speak French well.
“他法语说得不好。
He must have prepared those final words.”
他一定已经准备好最后那句话了。”
Yakovlev again bowed his head, reluctant to conspire with a jilted woman.
雅科夫列夫再次低下了头，不愿与一个被抛弃的女人共谋。
“I used to correct his French correspondence.”
“我曾经纠正过他的法语信件。”
Adelaide wondered from which crevice Adrien had excavated this insolent creature.
阿德莱德想知道阿德里安是从哪个缝隙里挖出这个无礼的生物的。
“He may even have considered other valedictions,” she said.
“他甚至可能考虑过其他告别，”她说。
“I wouldn’t be surprised if there were twenty such compositions.”
“如果有二十首这样的作品，我不会感到惊讶。”
“Perhaps Madame has forgotten that Monsieur Field was not renowned as prolific.”
“也许夫人忘记了菲尔德先生并不以多产而闻名。”
What was Adrien’s intention in sending her this man?
艾德里安派这个男人来的目的是什么？
Adrien must know she was not to be crushed by anything.
艾德里安一定知道她不会被任何事情压垮。
To sting her, then?
那是要蜇她吗？
That gadfly had enlisted a comrade in his campaign against his mother.
那只牛虻招募了一位同志来反对他的母亲。
“How did you meet Adrien?” Adelaide asked.
“你是怎么认识艾德里安的？”阿德莱德问道。
“My son makes such clever friends in Moscow.”
“我儿子在莫斯科交到了非常聪明的朋友。”
“I wouldn’t presume any close friendship,” Yakovlev replied.
“我不认为有任何亲密的友谊，”雅科夫列夫回答道。
“But Adrien thought Madame might help clear up a business matter.”
“但艾德里安认为夫人可能会帮忙解决一件生意问题。”
“He owes you money?
“他欠你钱？
Is he not his father’s heir?”
他不是他父亲的继承人吗？”
“Monsieur Field,” the young man said, with an air of genuine sadness, “left him some unresolved business.”
“菲尔德先生，”年轻人带着真正的悲伤说道，“给他留下了一些未解决的事情。”
So, Yakovlev was more spider than gadfly.
所以，雅科夫列夫更像是蜘蛛而不是牛虻。
A husband destined for immortality had ended up a debt-ridden, third-rate comedian, laboring over his closing lines; a gifted child who’d squandered his promise, consorting with moneylenders.
一个注定永垂不朽的丈夫最终成为了一个负债累累的三流喜剧演员，为他的结尾台词而苦苦挣扎；一个有天赋的孩子，却兑现了自己的诺言，与放债人勾结。
Adelaide nodded, acknowledging Yakovlev’s claim.
阿德莱德点点头，承认了雅科夫列夫的说法。
Then, in a warmer tone, she asked if he had heard the news that Pushkin had died the previous day.
然后，她用温和的语气问他是否听说前一天普希金去世的消息。
“One of my husband’s most brilliant friends,” she added.
“我丈夫最出色的朋友之一，”她补充道。
Yakovlev said he had heard.
雅科夫列夫说他听到了。
“An irredeemable loss,” he said.
“这是无法挽回的损失，”他说。
“For Russia and for mankind.”
“为了俄罗斯，为了人类。”
Would this young man, so ready to parrot the general opinion, cause pain to his mother?
这个年轻人如此愿意人云亦云，会给他的母亲带来痛苦吗？
Adelaide said that no doubt Pushkin would be remembered in perpetuity by friends and strangers.
阿德莱德说，毫无疑问，朋友和陌生人都会永远记住普希金。
She did not add: unlike John Field.
她没有补充：与约翰·菲尔德不同。
And yet Pushkin’s body, like any other, would be food for worms.
然而，普希金的身体和其他人一样，会成为蠕虫的食物。
What did it signify, to be remembered?
被记住意味着什么？
When a life ends, night falls.
当生命结束时，夜幕降临。
All the daybreaks hence belong to others.
因此，所有的黎明都属于别人。
Men die, nearly always to be forgotten.
人死了，几乎总是被遗忘。
This thought returned to Adelaide when, seventeen years later, the news reached her that Adrien had died, in a roadside tavern where he often played the pianoforte or the fiddle in exchange for vodka.
十七年后，当阿德莱德接到阿德里安去世的消息时，这种想法又回到了她的脑海中，死在路边的一家小酒馆里，他经常在那里弹钢琴或小提琴来换取伏特加。
Adelaide had no tears.
阿德莱德没有流泪。
A weeping mother could disarm people.
哭泣的母亲可以解除人们的武装。
She would be called callous because she did not allow herself to be subjugated by grief.
她会被称为冷酷无情，因为她不允许自己被悲伤所征服。
Six years after that, death came for Adelaide.
六年后，阿德莱德迎来了死亡。
She had arranged everything, just as she had for her bridehood and her widowhood, but she did not rehearse any last words for the hoverers near her bed.
她已经安排好了一切，就像她为新娘和丧偶所做的那样，但她没有为床边的盘旋者排练任何遗言。
Only once, she opened her eyes and looked at the ceiling.
只有一次，她睁开眼睛，看着天花板。
Hold your tongue , she was heard to say.
闭嘴，有人听见她说。
Madame Field must be addressing herself, the women said, but Katerina, the orphan Adelaide had raised as a daughter, insisted that she was talking to a ghost.
女人们说，菲尔德夫人一定是在对自己说话，但阿德莱德从小养大的孤儿卡特琳娜却坚称她是在跟鬼魂说话。
Ghost, what ghost, the women laughed; Madame Field was not superstitious.
鬼，什么鬼，女人们笑了；菲尔德夫人并不迷信。
Adelaide did not defend Katerina.
阿德莱德没有为卡特琳娜辩护。
By then she was no longer attend-ing to any human conversation.
那时她已经不再参与任何人类谈话了。
Rather, she heard music.
相反，她听到了音乐。
For a moment, she fancied that it was John, playing his compositions for her, waiting for her to reunite with him.
有那么一刻，她以为那是约翰，正在为她演奏他的作品，等待着她与他重逢。
Wouldn’t that be a kind-enough ending?
这难道不是一个足够善意的结局吗？
Listening again, she recognized Chopin’s nocturnes rather than John’s.
再听一遍，她认出了肖邦的夜曲，而不是约翰的。
Performed by someone more adept than John.
由比约翰更熟练的人执行。
God, perhaps.
上帝，也许吧。
Poor John.
可怜的约翰。
Who would remember him after her death?
她死后谁还会记得他？
And his music?
他的音乐呢？
Adelaide was to join Adrien in the Smolensk Cemetery, far from where John was buried.
阿德莱德将前往斯摩棱斯克公墓与阿德里安会合，该公墓远离约翰埋葬的地方。
She had known both men well.
她很了解这两个人。
Knowing John had made it easier to relinquish him; knowing Adrien had made it harder.
了解约翰让放弃他变得更容易。知道阿德里安让事情变得更加困难。
They had been men of prodigious talents, their ambitions more prodigious, but their failures had been greater still.
他们都是才华横溢、野心更大的人，但他们的失败也更大。
If she felt any disappointment, it was in how little they had known her, how little they had cared to know.
如果说她感到失望的话，那就是他们对她的了解是多么的少，他们对她的了解是多么的少。
Adrien left no trace, another nameless musician.
阿德里安没有留下任何痕迹，是另一位无名的音乐家。
John, with his minor fame, would become a footnote in the life of Frédéric Chopin.
约翰虽然名气不大，但却成为弗雷德里克·肖邦一生中的一个脚注。
If someone were to write John Field’s biography, it would be a meager volume, and Adelaide, his estranged wife, would occupy only a few lines.
如果有人为约翰·菲尔德写传记，那将是一本薄薄的书，而他分居的妻子阿德莱德也只会占据几行字。
Music had been chosen for him, and he remained its puppet.
音乐是为他选择的，而他仍然是音乐的傀儡。
Music had come to her by chance, yet she had forged a life from serendipities, from Pondicherry to Paris to Moscow.
她的音乐纯属偶然，但她的生活却是从本地治里到巴黎再到莫斯科的机缘巧合中创造出来的。
Her story was more surprising, less predictable.
她的故事更令人惊讶，更难以预测。
And now, like him, she would die, to be forgotten soon.
而现在，她也会像他一样死去，很快就会被遗忘。
“Enough!” Adelaide said, with a vehemence that frightened Masha, the maid trying to spoon medicine into her clenched mouth.
“足够的！”阿德莱德说道，语气中的激烈程度让玛莎感到害怕，女仆正试图将药舀进她紧闭的嘴里。
In eleven years of service, Masha had never heard her mistress speak with such lack of composure.
在服役十一年里，玛莎从未听过她的女主人如此不冷静地说话。
She looked up at Doctor Staudt, wondering if he had given her the wrong instructions, unaware that Madame Field was saying no not to the medicine but, for the first time, to life.
她抬头看着施陶特医生，想知道他是否给了她错误的指示，却没有意识到菲尔德夫人不是在对药物说“不”，而是在对生命说“不”。
From Music Against the Night by Yiyun Li .
选自李翊云的《夜音乐》。
Used with permission of the publisher, Fararr, Straus, and Giroux.
经出版商 Fararr、Straus 和 Giroux 许可使用。
Copyright © 2026 by Yiyun Li.
版权所有 © 2026 李一云。
All rights reserved.
版权所有。