ain. He feared it; for he had a big wound from old contacts. He felt if he could not be alone, and if he could not be left alone, he would die. His recoil away from the outer world was complete; his last refuge was this wood; to hide himself there!

更何况，他不再想和女人扯上关系。他对男女关系充满恐惧，过去失败的婚姻曾让他深受重创。他的想法是，如果不能保持孑然独立的状态，如果遭到他人的侵扰，那还不如一死了之。他已经完全与外界脱离开来，而最后的避难所就是这片树林，他可以藏身于此！

Connie grew warm by the fire, which she had made too big: then she grew hot. She went and sat on the stool in the doorway, watching the man at work. He seemed not to notice her, but he knew. Yet he worked on, as if absorbedly, and his brown dog sat on her tail near him, and surveyed the untrustworthy world.

坐在炉火旁，康妮渐渐暖和过来，但她却又把火生得太旺，搞得自己燥热不安。她离开壁炉，坐在门边的板凳上，注视着劳作的男人。他似乎没有注意到她，但其实心中有数。他不动声色，继续干活，似乎非常专注，那条棕色的猎犬蹲在一旁，审视着眼前这个难以捉摸的世界。

Slender, quiet and quick, the man finished the coop he was making, turned it over, tried the sliding door, then set it aside. Then he rose, went for an old coop, and took it to the chopping log where he was working. Crouching, he tried the bars; some broke in his hands; he began to draw the nails. Then he turned the coop over and deliberated, and he gave absolutely no sign of awareness of the woman's presence.

他身材修长，朴素沉静，动作敏捷，把鸡笼做好，随即翻转过来，试过拉门，便放在一旁。接着，他起身去取旧鸡笼，把它放在刚才干活的木墩上。他蹲下来，试试木条是否依然坚固，不觉便扯断几根，然后又开始拔钉子。他把笼子倒过来，思索应该如何处理，装作毫未觉察康妮在注视着自己。

So Connie watched him fixedly. And the same solitary aloneness she had seen in him naked, she now saw in him clothed: solitary, and intent, like an animal that works alone, but also brooding, like a soul that recoils away, away from all human contact. Silently, patiently, he was recoiling away from her even now. It was the stillness, and the timeless sort of patience, in a man impatient and passionate, that touched Connie's womb. She saw it in his bent head, the quick quiet hands, the crouching of his slender, sensitive loins; something patient and withdrawn. She felt his experience had been deeper and wider than her own; much deeper and wid