Cranford

第十一章

This chapter follows the Cranford community’s reaction to the discovery that the mysterious Signor Brunoni is actually Samuel Brown, an injured conjuror, and the resulting softening of their supernatural fears. The narrative centers on the communal effort to care for him and culminates in Miss Matty’s quiet, poignant reflection on her own unmarried life and the hopes she once held.

Discussion of Mrs Forrester’s Ghost Fear

The narrator encounters Lady Glenmire and Miss Pole setting out on a walk. Miss Pole, with a smile half-kind and half-contemptuous, attributes Mrs Forrester’s terror of ghosts to her solitary life and the influence of her servant Jenny’s bug-a-boo stories. Although the narrator feels sheepish about her own relief at Miss Pole’s earlier proposal to walk together on the dark Headingley Causeway, she says nothing and changes the subject.

Miss Pole Recounts the Morning Walk Adventure

In the afternoon, Miss Pole visits Miss Matty to share the true adventure of their morning walk. While inquiring for directions at the Rising Sun, a public house on the London road, the ladies learned of a small girl and her parents who had been lodging there for six weeks after their light cart broke down. The father had been seriously hurt, and although no bones were broken, the landlady believed he had sustained internal injuries from which he had languished ever since.

Discovery of the Injured Signor Brunoni

The landlady described the injured man as neither gentleman nor common, prompting Mrs Roberts to summon his wife, whose honest, worn, bronzed face won the ladies’ complete belief in her sorrowful tale. Miss Pole’s skepticism turned to fervent advocacy when it emerged that the sufferer was none other than Signor Brunoni, whom all Cranford had suspected of villainy. His wife confirmed his proper name was Samuel Brown, though Cranford preferred to keep calling him “the Signor” because it sounded better.