第三章: 圣克雷芒症候群 The San Clemente Syndrome |《请以你的名字呼唤我》

We arrived at Stazione Termini around 7 p. m. on a Wednesday evening. The air was thick and muggy, as if Rome had been awash in a rainstorm that had come and gone and relieved none of the dampness. With dusk scarcely an hour away, the streetlights glistened through dense halos, while the lighted storefronts seemed doused in gleaming colors of their own invention. Dampness clung to every forehead and every face. I wanted to caress his face. I couldn’t wait to get to our hotel and shower and throw myself on the bed, knowing all the while that, unless we had good air-conditioning, I’d be no better off after the shower. But I also loved the languor that sat upon the city, like a lover’s tired, unsteady arm resting on your shoulders.

我们在周三傍晚七点左右抵达罗马终点站。空气混浊闷热，仿佛暴风雨来了又走，而湿气丝毫不散。距离黄昏不到一小时，街灯透过浓密的光晕闪闪发亮，点着灯的临街铺面似乎沉浸在它们自己创造出来的闪烁色彩中。湿气黏附在每个人的额头、面颊上。我想抚摸他的脸。虽然知道除非有空调，否则淋浴后也不会比较舒服，但我还是等不及想快点抵达旅馆，淋浴，把自己扔到床上。但我也热爱坐落在这城市的慵懒，好似情人搭在你肩上那疲倦摇晃的臂膀。

Maybe we’d have a balcony. I could use a balcony. Sit on its cool marble steps and watch the sun set over Rome. Mineral water. Or beer. And tiny snacks to munch on. My father had booked us one of the most luxurious hotels in Rome.

或许我们会有一个阳台。我很想要一个阳台。坐在阳台凉快的大理石阶上，看落日罗马。矿泉水。或啤酒。还有小零嘴。父亲替我们订了罗马数一数二的奢华旅馆。

Oliver wanted to take the first taxi. I wanted to take a bus instead. I longed for crowded buses. I wanted to go into a bus, wedge my way into the sweating mass of people, with him pushing his way behind me. But seconds after hopping on the bus, we decided to get out. This was too real, we joked. I backed out through the incoming press of infuriated home-goers who couldn’t understand what we were doing. I managed to step on a woman’s foot. “E non cbiede manco scusa, doesn’t even say he’s sorry,” she hissed to those around her who had just jostled their way into the bus and were not letting us squeeze out.

奥利弗想搭第一辆出租车。我却想搭公车。我想搭拥挤的公交。我想走进公车，挤进汗流侠背的人群，让他跟在我后面冲锋陷阵。才跳上公车不久，我们就决定下车。这太可怕了，我们打趣说。我回头往车门外走，与进来的人擦肩而过。这些赶着回家的愤怒乘客不理解我们要做什么。我甚至踩到一个女人的脚。“他连声道歉也没有！”女人压低嗓子，对身边刚挤上公交而不肯让我们硬挤出去的人说。

To our delight the larger of our adjoining bedrooms had both a balcony and a window, and when we opened the French windows, the glistening domes of numberless churches reflected the setting sun in the vast, unencumbered vista below us. Someone had sent us a bunch of flowers and a bowl filled with fruit. The note came from Oliver’s Italian publisher: “Come to the bookstore around eight-thirty. Bring your manuscript. There’s a party for one of our authors. Ti aspettiamo, we’re awaiting you.”

很高兴两间相邻的卧室够大，我们各有一个阳台和一扇窗。打开落地窗，无数教堂闪亮的圆顶衬着夕阳，映照在我们脚下一望无际的远景里。有人送我们一束花、一整盆水果，随附的纸条来自奥利弗的意大利出版商：八点三十分左右请到书店来。带着你的手稿。今晚有个作者的发表会。我们等你。

Finally, we hailed a cab. Noting the name of our hotel and hearing us speak English, the cabby proceeded to make several unexplained turns. “Inutile prendere tante scorciatoie, no need for so many shortcuts. We’re in no rush!” I said in Roman dialect.

最后，我们招了一辆出租车。一听到下榻旅馆的名称，听到我们以英文交谈，出租车司机竟转了几个莫名其妙的弯。“没必要抄这么多近路吧，我们又不赶路！”我用罗马方言说。

We picked at the bowl of fruit sitting by the television cabinet and peeled figs for each other.

我们拨弄电视机旁那盆水果，替彼此剥了无花果。

We had not planned on doing anything except go for dinner and wander the streets afterward. “Am I invited, though?” I asked, feeling a tad uncomfortable. “You are now,” he replied.

除了吃晚饭和其后的逛街，我们没有任何计划。“我也在受邀之列？”我有点不自在地问。“现在我邀请你啦。”他回答。

These words, spoken from a height of bliss it seemed no one could steal from us, would take me back to this hotel room and to this damp ferragosto evening as both of us leaned stark-naked with our arms on the windowsill, overlooking an unbearably hot Roman late-late afternoon, both of us still smelling of the stuffy compartment on the southbound train that was probably nearing Naples by now and on which we’d slept, my head resting on his in full view of the other passengers. Leaning out into the evening air, I knew that this might never be given to us again, and yet I couldn’t bring^ myself to believe it. He too must have had the same thought as we surveyed the magnificent cityscape, smoking and eating fresh figs, shoulder to shoulder, each wanting to do something to mark the moment, which was why, yielding to an impulse that couldn’t have felt more natural at the time, I let my left hand rub his buttocks and then began to stick my middle finger into him as he replied, “You keep doing this, and there’s definitely no party.” I told him to do me a favor and keep staring out the window but to lean forward a bit, until I had a brainstorm once my entire finger was inside him: we might start but under no condition would we finish. Then we’d shower and go out and feel like two exposed, live wires giving off sparks each time they so much as flicked each other. Look at old houses and want to hug each one, spot a lamppost on a street corner and, like a dog, want to spray it, pass an art gallery and look for the hole in the nude, cross a face that did no more than smile our way and already initiate moves to undress the whole person and ask her, or him, or both, if they were more than one, to join us first for drinks, for dinner, anything. Find Cupid everywhere in Rome because we’d clipped one of his wings and he was forced to fly in circles.

在似乎没人能从我们手中夺走的幸福顶点上说的这些话，把我带回这个旅馆房间，回到现实世界中这个潮湿的圣母升天节①傍晚，我们浑身光溜溜，双双把手臂靠在窗台，俯瞰热到令人吃不消的罗马黄昏，两人身上残留着南下列车里的沉闷气味。在车上，我在其他乘客的睽睽众目之下头靠着他的头跟他一起睡，此时火车或许快到那不勒斯了吧。探出身子贴近傍晚的空气，我知道这或许是我们绝无仅有的机会，却无法说服自己相信。眺望城市美景的时候，他必定也有同样的想法，肩并肩，抽烟，吃无花果，各自都想做些什么为这一刻留下记号，因此，我屈服于当时显得再自然不过的冲动…旋即突发奇想：我们可以开始，但决不结束。接着我们要冲澡，然后出门，感觉像两条裸露且通电的电线，只要彼此轻触就会冒出火花。罗马处处可见丘比特，因为我们剪了他一只翅膀，逼得他不得不兜圈子飞。【注：①圣母升天节（ferragosto）：于八月十五日庆祝的意大利节日，原本是庆祝盛夏与农忙结束的日子，后来罗马天主教来用这一天当作圣母升天节。通常在这个节日前后会放约两周到一个月的长假，意大利人利用这段时间去度假，是罗马一年中人烟最稀少的时候。】

He said he was going to take a shower. When I saw him naked I immediately got undressed as well. “Just for a second,” I said as our bodies touched, for I loved the dampness that clung all over his. “I wish you didn’t have to wash.” His smell reminded me of Marzia’s, and how she too always seemed to exude that brine of the seashore on those days when there isn’t a breeze on the beaches and all you smell is the raw, ashen scent of scalding sand. I loved the salt of his arms, of his shoulders, along the ridges of his spine. They were still new to me. “If we lie down now, there’ll be no book party,” he said.

他说他要冲个澡。我看他脱光，也立刻褪下衣服。“一会儿就好。”身体接触时我说，因为我喜欢他浑身的湿气。“但愿你不必洗澡。”他的气味让我想起玛琪雅的味道。海边无风、只闻得到灼热沙子原始死白味道的日子里，玛琪雅似乎总散发出海边的咸水味。我喜欢他手臂、肩膀、背脊上的曲线。这些对我来说还很新鲜。“如果我们现在躺下，新书发表会就泡汤了。”他说。

I wanted no secrets, no screens, nothing between us. Little did I know that if I relished the gust of candor that bound us tighter each time we swore my body is your body, it was also because I enjoyed rekindling the tiny lantern of unsuspected shame. It cast a spare glow precisely where part of me would have preferred the dark. Shame trailed instant intimacy. Could intimacy endure once indecency was spent and our bodies had run out of tricks?

我希望我们之间没有秘密，没有帘幕，什么都没有。这时我还不明了，若我享受每次我们向彼此誓言“我的身体就是你的身体”时，那份随之而来、令我们结合得更紧密的坦诚，那也是因为我同时欣赏着重又点燃的、意外来到的羞耻之火。这火光恰好在我宁可保持黑暗的地方投射出一道光辉。羞耻紧跟着刹那的亲密而来。一旦猥亵用尽，我们的身体再也没有戏法可变，亲密还能持久吗？

We had never taken a shower together. We had never even been in the same bathroom together. “Don’t flush,” I’d said, “I want to look.” What I saw brought out strains of compassion, for him, for his body, for his life, which suddenly seemed so frail and vulnerable. “Our bodies won’t have secrets now,” I said as I took my turn and sat down. He had hopped into the bathtub and was just about to turn on the shower. “I want you to see mine,” I said. He did more. He stepped out, kissed me on the mouth, and, pressing and massaging my tummy with the flat of his palm, watched the whole thing happen.

我们从来没有一起冲过澡。甚至不曾同时共用浴室。“别冲，我想看。”我看到的，令我对他、对他的身体、对他的生活，产生怜悯的感觉，他的各方面突然显得脆弱而易受伤害。“我们的身体不再有秘密了。”轮到我时，我边坐下边说。他跳进浴缸，正准备扭开莲蓬头。“我要你看我的。”我说。但他更进一步。他跨出浴缸，吻我的嘴，以手掌按摩我下腹，目睹整个过程。

All I knew was that I had nothing left to hide from him. I had never felt freer or safer in my life.

我只知道我对他已毫无隐藏。此刻正是我这辈子最自由、最安全的时候。

Or is intimacy the desired product no matter where you find it, how you acquire it, what you pay for it — black market, gray market, taxed, untaxed, under the table, over the counter?

或者无论在哪儿找到、如何取得、得以何种方式偿付（无论合不合法、秘密或公开），亲密关系永远令人向往？

I don’t know that I asked the question, just as I am not sure I am able to answer it today. Was our intimacy paid for in the wrong currency?

我忘了我已问过这个问题，就像我不确定如今我能否回答。为了偿付亲密带来的喜悦，我们是否付出了错误的代价？

We were alone together for three days, we knew no one in the city, I could be anyone, say anything, do anything. I felt like a war prisoner who’s suddenly been released by an invading army and told that he can start heading home now, no forms to fill out, no debriefing, no questions asked, no buses, no gate passes, no clean clothes to stand in line for — just start walking.

我们独处三天，在这个城市里谁也不认识，我能是任何一个人，说任何话，做任何事。我觉得自己像个战犯，入侵的军队解放了我，让我回家；不必填表格，不必简报，没有盘问。不必搭公车，不必通过关口，不必排队领干净的衣服——开步走就是了。

We showered. We wore each other’s clothes. We wore each other’s underwear. It was my idea.

我们淋浴，我们穿彼此的衣服。我们穿彼此的内衣。这是我的点子。

Perhaps all this gave him a second wind of silliness, of youth.

或许这一切能让他找回年轻人愚蠢的活力。

Perhaps he had already been “there” years earlier and was stopping for a short stay on his return journey home.

或许多年前，他已经到过“那儿”，此时不过是在返乡途中暂时停下来歇歇脚。

Perhaps he had never done it with anyone and I’d showed up in the nick of time.

或许他从来没跟别人做过这种事，而我出现的正是时候。

Perhaps he was playing along, watching me.

或许他在迁就我，观察我。

He took his manuscript, his sunglasses, and we shut the door to our hotel room. Like two live wires. We stepped outside the elevator door. Broad smiles for everyone. To the hotel personnel. To the flower vendor in the street. To the girl in the newspaper kiosk.

他带着他的手稿，他的太阳眼镜，我们关上旅馆房间的门。像两根通了电的电线。我们走出电梯门。对每个人笑容可掬。对旅馆员工。对街上的花贩。对报亭的姑娘。

He looked at me in wonderment. “You’re just horny.”

他惊讶地打量我。“你只是性奋。”

Smile, and the world smiles back. “Oliver, I’m happy,” I said.

你微笑，世界也会报以微笑。“奥利弗，我好幸福。”我说。

Along the way we caught sight of a human statue of Dante cloaked in red with an exaggerated aquiline nose and the most scornful frown limned on all his features. The red toga and the red bell cap and the thick-rimmed wooden spectacles gave his already stern face the wizened look of an implacable father confessor. A crowd had gathered around the great bard, who stood motionless on the pavement, his arms crossed defiantly, the whole body standing erect, like a man waiting for Virgil or for an overdue bus. As soon as a tourist threw a coin into a hollowed-out, antique book, he simulated the besotted air of a Dante who’s just spied his Beatrice ambling across the Ponte Vecchio and, craning his cobralike neck, would right away moan out, like a street performer spitting fire,

在路上，我们看到一个街头艺人穿着红袍扮演但丁。他有个夸张的鹰钩鼻，一张脸勾画出最轻蔑的不悦表情。红色宽外袍、红色钟形帽、粗木框眼睛，让他原本严厉的脸又多了一种顽固告解神父的干瘪相。一群人聚在这位伟大的吟游诗人四周，他站在人行道上一动也不动，手臂傲然交叉，全身挺直，好似等侯维吉尔或延误的公车到来。旅客一把钱投进挖空的古书里，他就模仿但丁窥视贝翠丝②漫步走过佛罗伦斯老桥时那种被爱冲昏头的举止，伸长眼镜蛇般的脖子，像表演吐火的街头艺人般，马上要以呻吟的声音说话：【注：②贝翠丝·波提纳利（Beatrice Portinarl）：意大利佛罗伦斯人。但丁九岁在宴会上遇到她便深受吸引，虽无缘结为连理，时她的爱却持续一生。她是但丁创作《新生》（La Vita Nuova）的主要灵感来源，也出现在《神曲》的最后一部“天堂篇”（Paradise）里，担任但丁的向导。】

“No, happy.”

“不对，是幸福。”

e chinando la mano a la sua faccia, (And to his face my hand inclining down,)

我手伸向他的脸，

rispuosi: “Siete voi qui, ser Brunetto?” (I answered, “Ser Brunetto, are you here?”)

并回答：“布鲁涅托先生，您在这儿吗？”

per mare andasse a voter vostro e mio. (With winds at will, where’er our thoughts might wend.)

与风比翼，追随我们的思想而去。

si che ‘i viso abbrusciato non difese (Fixed them, until beneath the mask of hurt)

直到受伤的面具之下

fossimo presi per incantamento, (Led by some strong enchantment, might ascend)

拉波以及你、我，登上

How very true, I thought. Oliver, I wish that you and I and all those we’ve held dear might live forever in one house…

多么贴切啊，我想。奥利弗，我希望你和我和所有我们珍视的人，都能永远住在我们家…

la conoscenza sua al mio ‘ntelletto; (Did the remembered lineaments appear.)

记忆中的轮廓浮现。

Guido, vorrei che tu e Lapo ed io (Guido, I would that Lapo, thou, and I)

吉多，我愿强大的魔法带领

E io, quando ‘i suo braccio a me distese, (Soon as he touched me, I could no more avert)

就在他碰触我的时候，我再也无法避开

ficcai li occhi -per lo cotto aspetto, (Mine eyes, but on his visage scorched and sered)

我的眼光，只能凝视着他烤焦枯萎的容颜，

Having muttered his sotto voce verses, he would slowly resume his glaring, misanthropic stance until another tourist tossed him a coin.

低声念完诗句，那站在街头的但丁又恢复成原本太过显眼且遁世的姿态，直到另一名旅客投钱为止。

e messi ad un vascel, cb’ad ogni vento (A magic ship, whose charmed sails should fly)

一艘神奇的船舰。其魔法的帆将

se I’oste ar vino cia messo I’acqua: (If the innkeeper watered down our wine.)

掌柜的是不是在我们的酒里掺水。

Ma che ciarifrega, che ciarimporta, (What do we care, why do we give a damn)

我们哪里在乎，我们何需在意，

e noi je dimo, e noi je famo, (We’ll just tell him, and we’ll just say:)

我们只诉他，我们只会说：

I told him I’d show him a shortcut to the bookstore. He didn’t mind the long way. Maybe we should take the long way, what’s the rush? he said. Mine was better. Oliver seemed on edge and insisted. “Is there something I should know?” I finally asked. I thought it was a tactful way of giving him a chance to voice whatever was bothering him. Something he was uncomfortable with? Something having to do with his publisher? Someone else? My presence, perhaps? I can take perfectly good care of myself if you prefer to go alone. It suddenly hit me what was bothering him. I’ll be the professor’s son tagging along.

我说我会带他抄近路去书店。他说不在乎绕远路：绕远路没什么不好，急什么呢？我的主意比较好。奥利弗似乎很紧张也很坚持。“有什么我该知道的事吗？”我总算问他。我以为这么做很得体，让他有机会说出他的困扰。有什么让他不自在的事吗？和他的出版商有关？还是别人？因为我在场？如果你喜欢自个儿去，我就自己逛逛。我突然想到他在烦什么。我是教授的儿子，小跟班。

Same scornful look. Same rictus. The crowd dispersed. No one seemed to recognize the passage from the Fifteenth Canto of the Inferno where Dante meets his former teacher, Brunetto Latini. Two Americans, who had finally managed to fish out a few coins from their knapsack, tossed Dante a hail of tiny coins. Same glowering, pissed-off stare:

同样鄙夷的表情。同样的龇牙咧嘴。群众散去。似乎没人听出《地狱篇》第十五节这段描述但丁遇见老师布鲁涅托·拉提尼③的诗句。两个美国人好不容易总算从背包里掏出几枚硬币，用力对但丁撒了过去。但丁露出同样阴沉恼火的瞪视：【注：③布鲁涅托·拉提尼（Brunetta L.atini，1220—1294）：意大利哲学家、学者、政治家。】

Oliver couldn’t understand why everyone had burst out laughing at the hapless tourists. Because he’s reciting a Roman drinking song, and, unless you know it, it’s not funny.

奥利弗不明白为什么众人对着无助的游客爆笑出声。那是因为但丁朗诵了罗马的饮酒歌呀，除非你了解这一点，否则不会觉得有趣。

“ciai messo I’acqua e nun te pagamo.” (“You’ve added water, and we won’t pay.”)

“你掺了水，我们不付钱。”

As we walked he put an arm around my waist.

他一手环着我的腰走路。

“Who’s the goose?”

“谁才是呆头鹅？”

We decided to proceed my way, crossing over from Piazza Montecitorio to the Corso. Then up via Belsiana. “This is around where it started,” I said.

我们决定照我的方式，从蒙特奇托利欧（Palzzo Montecitorio）广场到科索。接着顺贝西亚纳路（via Belsiana）走。“就是从这附近开始的。”我说。

“That’s why you wanted to come by here?”

“所以你想到这里来？”

“It.”

“那件事。”

“Then what is it?”

“那究竟为什么？”

He took a long look at me.

他凝视我许久。

“What?”

“什么？”

“That’s not it at all, you goose.”

“根本不是那回事，呆头鹅。”

“With you.”

“跟你一起。”

I had already told him the story. A young man on a bicycle three years ago, probably a grocer’s helper or errand boy, riding down a narrow path with his apron on, staring me straight in the face, as I stared back, no smile, just a troubled look, till he passed me by. And then I did what I always hope others might do in such cases. I waited a few seconds, then turned around. He-had done the exact same thing. I don’t come from a family where you speak to strangers. He clearly did. He whisked the bicycle around and pedaled until he caught up with me. A few insignificant words uttered to make light conversation. How easily it came to him. Questions, questions, questions — just to keep the words flowing — while I didn’t even have breath to utter “yes” or “no.” He shook my hand but clearly as an excuse to hold it. Then put his arm around me and pressed me to him, as if we were sharing a joke that had made us laugh and drawn us closer. Did I want to get together in a nearby movie house, perhaps? I shook my head. Did I want to follow him to the store — boss was most likely gone by this time in the evening. Shook my head again. Are you shy? I nodded. All this without letting go of my hand, squeezing my hand, squeezing my shoulder, rubbing the nape of my neck with a patronizing and forgiving smile, as if he’d already given up but wasn’t willing to call it quits just yet. Why not? he kept asking. I could have — easily — I didn’t.

我对他说过那件事。三年前，某个或许是食品杂货商助手或跑腿的年轻单车骑士，穿着围裙骑车顺着狭窄的路来，他直勾勾盯着我的脸看，我不带笑容，以困扰的表情回瞪他，直到他与我擦身而过。接着我做了一件我一直希望别人遇到这种情况会做的事。我等了几秒，然后转过身。他也做了一模一样的事。我的家教并未教我怎么跟陌生人搭汕，他则显然是。他很快掉过头来，骑车追上我，吐出几句无足轻重的话，想聊点轻松的话题。这对他来说多么不容易啊。问题，问题，问题——只是为了不让话题中断，我却连吐出个“是”或“不是”的一口气都没有。他跟我握手，但那显然只是想握住我的手的借口。接着他伸出一只手臂环着我，搂紧，仿佛我们在分享一个让我们拉近彼此距离的笑话。问我想不想一起去附近的电影院？我摇摇头。问我想不想跟他去店里——傍晚这时候，老板很可能已经走了。我再度摇头。你害羞吗？我点头。他一直没放开我的手，带着一抹施恩与宽恕的微笑，紧握我的手，紧搂我的肩膀，摩擦我的颈背，好像他已经放弃，却仍不愿意就此打住。“为什么不要？”他继续问。我或许能够（轻易）接受，但我没有。

“I don’t want anything to change or to come between us tonight.”

“我不希望今晚我们之间有任何改变，或发生任何事。”

“You went after me.”

“你追过我。”

“I turned down so many. Never went after anyone.”

“我拒绝过好多人。从来没追求过任何人。”

Via Frattina, via Borgognona, via Condotti, via delle Car-rozze, della Croce, via Vittoria. Suddenly I loved them all. As we approached the bookstore, Oliver said I should go along, he’d just make a quick local phone call. He could have called from the hotel. Or perhaps he needed privacy. So I kept walking, stopping at a local bar to buy cigarettes. When I reached the bookstore with its large glass door and two clay Roman busts sitting on two seemingly antique stumps, I suddenly got nervous. The place was packed, and through the thick glass door, with spare bronze trimming around it, you could make out a throng of adults, all of them eating what appeared to be petits fours. Someone inside saw me peering into the store and signaled me to come in. I shook my head, indicating with a hesitant index finger that I was waiting for someone who was just coming up this road here. But the owner, or his assistant, like a club manager, without stepping down on the sidewalk, pushed the glass door wide open with his arm totally extended and held it there, almost ordering me to come in. “Venga, su, venga!” he said, the sleeves of his shirt rakishly rolled up to his shoulders. The reading had not started yet but the bookstore was filled to capacity, everyone smoking, chatting loudly, leafing through new books, each holding a tiny plastic cup with what looked like scotch whiskey. Even the upstairs gallery, whose banister was lined with the bare elbows and forearms of women, was tightly packed. I recognized the author right away. He was the same man who had signed both Marzia’s and my copy of his book of poems, Se l’amore, He was shaking several hands.

法拉蒂纳路（viaFrattina），波歌诺那路（via Borgognona），康多堤路（viaCondotti），卡罗切路（via delleCarrozze），克罗齐路（dellsC rote），维托里亚路（aria Vittoria }。我爱这每一条路。走到书店附近，奥利弗要我继续往前走，他要打一通市内电话。他原本可以在旅馆打。或许他需要隐私。我继续走，在一家酒吧停下来买烟。书店有大片玻璃门，两尊罗马土胸像放在看似古老残株的底座上。抵达时我紧张起来。店里挤满了人，透过青铜雕饰的厚玻璃门，我看见很多人在里头吃着迷你蛋糕。里面的人见我一直往店里看，便示意要我进去。我摇摇头，迟疑地以食指表示我在等人，那人正在路上，就快到了。一个看似店主或助手的人，像俱乐部经理一样，没走到人行道来，而是伸长手臂顶着两扇玻璃门，几乎是下令似地要我进去。“来，这里，进来！”他衬衫的袖子潇洒地卷到肩膀的位置。朗诵还没开始，不过书店挤满人，人人都在抽烟，高声聊天，翻阅新书，手上都有个小塑胶杯，里面装了像是苏格兰威士忌的饮料。一群女人支着光溜溜的肘臂，靠在楼上走廊的栏杆旁。我立刻认出作者。他就是那个为玛琪雅和我在他的诗集《就说是爱吧》签字的人。他正在跟几个人握手寒暄。

“You let me.”

“是你让我追的。”

When he walked by me, I couldn’t help but extend my hand and shake his and tell him how much I had enjoyed reading his poems. How could I have read his poems, if the book wasn’t even out yet? Someone else overheard his question — were they going to throw me out of the store like an impostor?

他走到我身边时，我忍不住伸出手和他握手，告诉他我多么喜欢读他的诗。书都还没出版，我怎么可能读过？其他人无意中听到他的问题。他们想把我当骗子撵出书店？

“I purchased it in the bookstore in B. a few weeks ago, and you were kind enough to sign it for me.”

“我是几星期前在B城的书店买的，你还很亲切地帮我签名。”

He remembered the evening, so he said. “Un veto fan, a real fan, then,” he added loudly, so that the others within hearing distance might hear. In fact, they all turned around. “Maybe not a fan — at his age they’re more likely to be called groupies,” added an elderly woman with a goiter and loud colors that made her look like a toucan.

他记得那个晚上。“这位才是真正的书迷啊！”他大声补了一句，好让其他人听见，他们全转过身来。“或许不是书迷。就他的年纪来说，成为追星族比较恰当。”一个老妇人补充说；她的甲状腺肿和身上俗丽的色彩让她看起来像一只巨嘴鸟。

“Alfredo, you’re behaving like a teacher at an oral exam,” jibed a thirty-something woman.

“阿佛列多，你别像个口试老师啊。”一个三十几岁的女人嘲弄道。

“Which poem did you like best?”

“你最喜欢哪首诗？”

“I just wanted to know which poem he liked best. There’s no harm in asking, is there?” he whined with quivering mock exasperation in his voice.

“我只是想知道他最喜欢哪首诗。问问无妨吧，对不对？”他抱怨道，声音里有假装恼怒的抖音。

For a moment I believed that the woman who had stood up for me had gotten me off the hook. I was mistaken.

我一度以为替我出头的女人已经帮我解围。我错了。

“So tell me,” he resumed, “which one.”

“告诉我，哪一首？”

“The one comparing love to San Clemente,” he corrected, as though meditating the profundity of both our statements. “The San Clemente Syndrome.'” The poet stared at me. “And why?”

“是拿爱与圣克雷芒相提并论的那首诗。”他纠正我，仿佛沉思两种说法的深度。“你喜欢《圣克雷芒症候群》啊…”诗人盯着我看。“为什么呢？”

“A pauper’s feet. Walked barefoot all his life, and still buys shoes a size bigger, in case he grows before next Christmas when the family stocks up for the holidays!” Playing the embittered or forsaken shrew.

“一双乞丐脚。一生打赤脚，却还买大一号的鞋，以免还不到下一次的圣诞节，脚又长大了！”她扮演一个心有怨怼或遭遗弃的泼妇。

“They. Are. Too. Big. Don’t they look huge?” she was asking me. “Poets can’t have such big feet.”

“太、大、啦。不觉得看起来很大吗？”女子问我。“诗人不能有这么大的脚。”

“My shoes? What’s wrong with my shoes?” asked the poet.

“我的鞋？我的鞋有什么问题？”诗人问。

“The one comparing life to San Clemente.”

“拿生命与圣克雷芒相提并论的那首诗。”

“My God, just leave the poor boy alone, will you? Here,” interrupted another woman who had overheard my other advocate. She grabbed hold of my hand. “I’ll lead you to the food so that you can get away from this monster with an ego the size of his feet — have you seen how big his shoes are? Alfredo, you should really do something about your shoes,” she said from across the crowded bookstore.

“老天爷，你饶了这个可怜的男孩好吗？过来。”无意间我听到我另一位辩护者说话的另一个女人打岔道。她抓起我的手。“我带你去吃东西，好让你远离这个自尊跟脚一样大的怪物。你有没有看到他的脚有多大？阿佛列多，你真的该想个办法弄弄你的鞋。”她在拥挤书店的另一头讲。

Someone else took pity on the poet. “Don’t mock his feet, Lucia. There’s nothing wrong with his feet.”

另一个人发出同情之语。“别取笑他的脚啦，露西雅。他的脚没问题。”

“Leave my feet alone.”

“饶了我的脚吧。”

But I did not let go of her hand. Nor she of mine. City camaraderie. How nice to hold a woman’s hand, especially when you don’t know a thing about her. Se l’amore, I thought. And all these tanned arms and elbows that belonged to all these women looking down from the gallery. Se l’amore.

但我没放开她的手。她也没放开我的。城市的伙伴情谊。女人的手多美好啊，尤其在你对她一无所知的时候。就说是爱吧，我想。还有那些自走廊俯瞰下方的女人的手臂手肘，那些晒成棕色的肌肤。就说是爱吧。

The bookstore owner interrupted what could just as easily have been a staged tiff between husband and wife. “Se l’amore,” he shouted. Everyone laughed. It was not clear whether laughter was a sign of relief in having the marital spat broken up or because the use of the words Se l’amore implied, If this is love, then…

书店老板打断这段好似事先安排的夫妻吵架。“就说是爱吧！”他大喊。每个人都笑了。我们不清楚笑声究竟是因为夫妻停止口角而松了一口气的征兆，还是因为用了“就说是爱吧”这句话，暗示“如果这是爱，那么…”

But people understood that this was also a signal for the reading to start and everyone found a comfortable corner or a wall against which to lean. Our corner was the best, right on the spiral staircase, each of us sitting on a tread. Still holding hands. The publisher was about to introduce the poet when the door squeaked open. Oliver was trying to squeeze his way in accompanied by two stunning girls who were either flashy models or movie actresses. It felt as though he had snatched them along the way to the bookstore and was bringing one for him and one for me. Se l’amore.

众人也了解这是朗诵会开始的信号，纷纷找个舒服的角落或一堵墙靠着。我们这块地方最好，就在螺旋梯上，一人坐一边，仍然手牵手。出版商正准备介绍诗人出场，门吱吱嘎嘎打开，奥利弗在两位可能是服装模特儿或电影女星的辣妹陪伴下，努力往前挤。她们像是奥利弗在途中拐到的，打算一个给他，一个给我。就说是爱吧。

Everyone turned around.

大家都转过身去。

The poet agreed. His wife turned to me and whispered, “Such babes, aren’t they?” The publisher came down the little stepladder and hugged Oliver. He took hold of the large X-ray envelope in which Oliver had stuffed his pages. “Manuscript?”

诗人表示同意。他的妻子转向我悄声说：“她们很漂亮吧？”出版商从书梯上下来，拥抱奥利弗。他接下奥利弗拿来装稿件的X光片大信封。“手稿吗？”

“Manuscript,” replied Oliver. In exchange, the publisher handed him tonight’s book. “You gave me one already.”

奥利弗回答：“是的。”出版商将今晚的书交给他作为交换。“你给过我一本了。”

“That’s right.” But Oliver politely admired the cover, then looked around and finally spotted me sitting next to Lucia. He walked up to me, put an arm around my shoulder, and leaned over to kiss her. She looked at me again, looked at Oliver, sized up the situation: “Oliver, sei un dissoluto, you’re debauched.”

“是的。”但奥利弗还是很有礼貌地称赞了封面，然后环顾四周，总算看到我坐在露西雅旁边。他向我走来，搂搂我的肩，倾身吻她。她看看我，看看奥利弗，评估情况：“奥利弗，你太放荡了。”

“Oliver! Finally!” shouted the publisher, holding up his glass of scotch. “Welcome, welcome.”

“奥利弗！你总算来了！”出版商大声嚷嚷，举起手中那杯威士忌。“欢迎，欢迎。”

“One of the youngest, most talented American philosophers,” he said, “accompanied by my lovely daughters, without whom Se l’amore would never have seen the light of day.”

“最年轻、最有才华的美国哲学家！由我可爱的女儿陪伴。没有她们，《就说是爱吧》不可能面世。”

“Se l’amore,” he replied, displaying a copy of the book, as if to say that whatever he did in life was already in her husband’s book, and therefore quite permissible.

“就说是爱吧。”他回答，秀出那本书，仿佛说：无论他这辈子做什么，都已经写在她丈夫的书里，因此都是颇能容许的。

“Se l’amore yourself.”

“说个鬼啦。”

I couldn’t tell whether he was being called dissolute because of the two babes he had wandered in with or because of me. Or both.

我无法判断露西雅说他放荡，是因为与他一起晃进来的两个漂亮宝贝，还是因为我。或者两者都有。

Oliver introduced me to both girls. Obviously he knew them well, and both cared for him. “Set l’amico di Oliver, vero? You’re Oliver’s friend, right?” one of them asked. “He spoke about you.”

奥利弗将我介绍给两位女孩。显然他和她们很熟，而且两人都很在意他。其中一个问：“你是奥利弗的朋友吧？他提过你的事。”

“Saying?”

“说我？”

“Good things.”

“好话。”

She leaned against the wall next to where I was now standing by the poet’s wife. “He’s never going to let go of my hand, is he?” said Lucia, as though speaking to an absent third party. Perhaps she wanted the two babes to notice.

这时我和诗人之妻站在一起，女孩就倚着我旁边的墙。“他永远不打算放开我的手是吧？”露西雅好像在跟不在场的第三者说。或许她希望两个漂亮宝贝注意到。

“Se l’amore,” she said, all the while shaking her head to simulate a reprimand. “No less dissolute than the other, just sweeter. I leave him to you.”

“就说是爱吧。”她边说边摇头，装出责备的样子。“他放荡不输其他人，只是比较可爱。我把他留给你们了。”

I did not want to let go of her hand immediately but knew that I must. So I held it in both hands, brought it to my lips, kissed its edge close to the palm, then let it go. It was, I felt, as though I’d had her for an entire afternoon and was now releasing her to her husband as one releases a bird whose broken wing had taken forever to mend.

我不想立刻放开她的手，但我知道我非这么做不可。于是我捧起她的手掌，捧到唇边，吻了掌侧，然后放开。我感觉仿佛拥有她一整个下午，现在却要放她回丈夫身边，像是放走受伤的翅膀花了很久才痊愈的小鸟。

Drinks were being passed around.

饮料到处传。

“Get on with it, Alfredo,” said the goitered toucan.

“继续说，阿佛列多。”貌似巨嘴鸟的女子说。

One of the daughters gave a forced giggle. “We’ll see what we can do with him.”

其中一个女孩发出勉强的咯咯笑声。“我们看看能拿他怎么办。”

Laughter.

笑声四起。

I was in heaven.

我仿佛置身天堂。

“There.”

“赞成。”

The poet cleared his throat. The usual words of thanks to everyone. Last but not least, to the light of his eyes, Lucia. Why she puts up with him? Why ever does she? hissed the wife with a loving smile aimed at the poet.

诗人清了清喉咙，发表了很平常的谢辞：最后但同样重要的，在他看来，是露西雅。为什么她能忍受他呢？究竟为什么她能做得到呢？妻子对诗人面露爱的微笑，同时发出嘘声。

“Se l’amore. Se l’amore is a collection of poems based on a season in Thailand teaching Dante. As many of you know, I loved Thailand before going and hated it as soon as I arrived. Let me rephrase: I hated it once I was there and loved it as soon as I left.”

“就说是爱吧。《就说是爱吧》是以我在泰国教了一季但丁的经验为基础所创作的诗集。如各位所知，我还没去泰国以前，好爱那里，到了之后却立刻痛恨那里。让我换个说法：我一去就痛恨那里，一离开就爱那里。”

“Because of his shoes,” he said.

“因为他的鞋。”他说。

“In Bangkok I kept thinking of Rome — what else?– of this little roadside shop here, and of the surrounding streets just before sunset, and of the sound of church bells on Easter Sunday, and on rainy days, which last forever in Bangkok, I could almost cry. Lucia, Lucia, Lucia, why didn’t you ever say no when you knew how much I’d miss you on these days that made me feel more hollow than Ovid when they sent him to that misbegotten outpost where he died? I left a fool and came back no wiser. The people of Thailand are beautiful — so loneliness can be a cruel thing when you’ve had a bit to drink and are on the verge of touching the first stranger that comes your way — they’re all beautiful there, but you pay for a smile by the shot glass.” He stopped as though to collect his thoughts. “I called these poems ‘Tristia.'”

“在曼谷，我不断想着罗马。还能想什么？想路边的这家小书店，想日落前一刻的街道，想复活节和下雨天的教堂钟声，那声音在曼谷回荡，我几乎要哭了。露西雅，露西雅，露西雅，你明知在这些日子里，在这些让我觉得自己比被流放边睡客死他乡的奥维德更加空虚的日子里，我会多么想你，为什么不拒绝？我离开时是个傻瓜，回来时也没变聪明。泰国人个个都美。当你有一点儿酒喝，还想去摸摸第一个朝你走来的陌生人时，寂寞可就是件残酷的事。那儿的人都很美，但微笑是论酒计价的。”他停下来，仿佛整理思绪。“我把这些写成叫做《悲伤》④的诗。”【注：④《悲伤》（Tristia）：奥维德遭流放后，于公元八年完成的诗作也名为《悲伤》。】

She knew my name. Hers was Amanda. Her sister’s Adele. “There’s a third one too,” said Amanda, making light of their number. “She should already be around here somewhere.”

她知道我的名字。她叫阿曼达。她姐姐叫阿黛勒。“还有第三个。”阿曼达说，对数字轻描淡写。“她应该已经到了。”

“Tristia” took up the better part of twenty minutes. Then came the applause. The word one of the two girls used was forte. Molto forte. The goitered toucan turned to another woman who had never stopped nodding at almost every syllable spoken by the poet and who now kept repeating, Straordinario-fantastico. The poet stepped down, took a glass of water, and held his breath for a while — to get rid of a bad case of hiccups. I had mistaken his hiccups for suppressed sobs. The poet, looking into all the pockets of his sports jacket and coming out empty, joined his index and middle fingers tightly together and, waving both fingers next to his mouth, signaled to the bookstore owner that he wanted to smoke and maybe mingle for a couple of minutes. Straordinario-fantastico, who intercepted his signal, instantly produced her cigarette case. “Stasera non dormo, tonight I won’t be able to sleep, the wages of poetry,” she said, blaming his poetry for what was sure to be a night of throbbing insomnia.

光是朗诵《悲伤》一篇，几乎占去二十分钟。掌声响起。其中一个出版商的女儿用了“强”这个字。“超强。”貌似巨嘴鸟的女子转身面对另一个女人，刚刚这女人几乎对诗人说的每个音节都不停点头，这时则不断重复说“超了不起”。诗人走下台，喝了一杯水，屏息片刻，好摆脱打隔。我误把他打嗝当做忍住的啜泣。诗人察看休闲外套的每个口袋，却什么也没找到，他夹紧食指和中指，两根指头在嘴边挥了挥，对书店老板示意他想抽烟，然后或许到处交际个几分钟。“超了不起”女子看懂他的信号，立刻拿出烟盒。“今晚我睡不着了，这是诗带来的报应。”她说，为铁定因悸动而失眠的一夜责怪他的诗。

By now everyone was sweating, and the greenhouse atmosphere both inside and outside the bookstore had become unbearably sticky.

大家汗涔涔的，书店内外的温湿空气黏腻得令人吃不消。

“No. But at least we know the door is open.”

“没有。但我们至少知道门开着。”

“Better?” he asked deferentially.

“好一点了吗？”他恭敬问道。

“For the love of God, open the door,” cried the poet to the owner of the bookstore. “We’re suffocating in here.” Mr. Venga took out a tiny wedge of wood, opened the door, and prodded it in between the wall and the bronze frame.

“看在老天的分上，打开门吧！”诗人对书店老板大喊。“我们快闷死啦。”范加先生拿出楔形木门挡，打开门，顶在墙壁和青铜门框之间。

Perhaps what I liked far more was the evening. Everything about it thrilled me. Every glance that crossed my own came like a compliment, or like an asking and a promise that simply lingered in midair between me and the world around me. I was electrified — by the chaffing, the irony, the glances, the smiles that seemed pleased I existed, by the buoyant air in the shop that graced everything from the glass door to the petits fours, to the golden ochre spell of plastic glasses filled with scotch whiskey, to Mr. Venga’s rolled-up sleeves, to the poet himself, down to the spiral staircase where we had congregated with the babe sisters — all seemed to glow with a luster at once spellbound and aroused.

或许我更喜欢的是这一晚。今晚的一切令我激动。与我相逢的每个眼光都像恭维，或像是一个询问，一个承诺。徘徊在我与周遭世界之间的半空。我有触电的感觉——因为那戏谑、那讥讽、那眼光，那似乎对我的存在感到欢喜的微笑，也因为店里愉悦的空气。玻璃门、迷你蛋糕、装满金褚色苏格兰威士忌的塑胶杯、范加先生卷起的衣袖、诗人、我们与漂亮姐妹所在的螺旋梯，这一切皆因店里愉快的空气而更添风采，发出既魅人又兴奋的光辉。

Oliver looked at me, meaning, Did you like it? I shrugged my shoulders, like someone reserving judgment for later. But I was not being sincere; I liked it a lot.

奥利弗看着我，意思是：喜欢吗？我耸耸肩，想慢一点再判断。但我并不老实；我非常喜欢。

“For me?”

“给我的吗？”

An older man with a scraggly large beard and Falstaff’s paunch brought me a glass of scotch.

一个有着大把蓬乱络腮胡和法斯塔夫⑤大肚子的长辈，拿了杯威士忌给我。【注：⑤约翰·法斯塔夫爵士（Sir John Falstaff）：莎士比亚笔下的虚构人物，出现在《亨利四世》（Henry IV）及《温莎的风流妇人》（the merry wives of Windsor）等剧中。法斯塔夫已经成为体形臃肿的吹牛大王和老饕的同义词。】

“In a few years I promise you there won’t be much youth left,” I said, trying to assume the resigned irony of men who’ve been around and know themselves.

“我向您保证，再过几年，青春就所剩无几了。”我努力装得老成世故、了解自我，摆出对现实不再抱幻想的讥讽态度。

I envied these lives and thought back to the thoroughly delibidinized lives of my parents with their stultifying lunches and dinner drudges, our dollhouse lives in our dollhouse home, and of my senior year looming ahead. Everything appeared like child’s play compared to this. Why go away to America in a year when I could just as easily spend the rest of my four years away coming to readings like this and sit and talk as some were already doing right now? There was more to learn in this tiny crammed bookstore than in any of the mighty institutions across the Atlantic.

我嫉妒这些生命，并回想起我父母那种完全禁欲的生活、他们空虚无聊的正餐苦差。我们在娃娃屋里过的娃娃屋人生，还有我未来隐约可见的高年级岁月。与此相较，一切都像儿戏。如果我能同样安逸地在外度过其余四年，来参加这样的朗诵会，像某些人这样坐着谈话，一年后又何必到美国去？比起到大西洋彼岸的任何大机构，这家拥挤的小书店有更多东西可学。

“Of course for you. Did you like the poems?”

“当然是给你的。你喜欢这些诗吗？”

“Very much,” I said, trying to look ironic and insincere, I don’t know why.

“非常喜欢。”不知何故，我边说边努力做出讥讽和言不由衷的样子。

“Ecco.”

“喏。”

“I’m his godfather and I respect your opinion,” he said, as though he’d seen through my first bluff and gone no further. “But I respect your youth more.”

“我是他的教父，我尊重你的意见。”他仿佛看透我一开始的虚张声势，而且不再追究。“但我更尊重你的青春。”

“You’re speaking volumes, my friend, and tonight we’re doing short poems only.”

“亲爱的朋友，你讲得好深奥。今晚我们只讨论短诗。”

“What’s missing in my life?” I was going to say Everything, but corrected myself. “Friends — the way everyone seems to be fast friends in this place — I wish 1 had friends like yours, like you.”

“我的人生有什么欠缺？”我本来想说一切，却还是改了口。“朋友，这里的每一个人似乎都很熟。我希望我有像你所拥有的朋友、像你这样的朋友。”

Was he hitting on me?

他在挑逗我吗？

She kept looking at me. “I feel for you.” She brought her palm in a sad and lingering caress to my face, as if I had suddenly become her child.

她看着我。“我同情你。”她带着悲伤和依恋的感觉，手心抚摸我的脸，仿佛我是她的孩子。

“There’ll be plenty of time for these friendships. Would friends save you from being dissoluto?”

“你会有很多时间培养这样的友谊。朋友能够让你免于放荡吗？”

“I wish I were dissolute,” I said, turning to her and ignoring Falstaff.

“我希望我是放荡的。”我丢下长辈，转向她说。

Lucia, who had caught the exchange, said: “Tanto, one scotch more or less won’t make you any less dissolute than you already are.”

听到这段对话的露西雅说：“毕竟，多一杯或少一杯威士忌都不会让你比现在少放荡些。

She looked at me with a pensive smile.

她带着沉思的微笑望着我。

The word kept coming back like an accusation of a deep and ugly fault in my character.

那个字不断出现，仿佛指控我性格中有某个严重丑陋的缺陷。

“Why, what’s missing in your life?”

“怎么？你的人生有什么欠缺吗？”

“So take it,” he said, offering me the plastic cup. I hesitated before accepting. It was the same brand of scotch my father drank at home.

“拿去吧。”他把塑胶杯递给我。我迟疑了一下才接受。那和父亲在家喝的，是同一种牌子的威士忌。

“Yes, but by then I won’t be around to notice.”

“是啊，但到时候我也没办法在场目睹了。”

“I wish I had one friend I wasn’t destined to lose.”

“我希望有一个永不失去的朋友。”

I loved that too.

那也令我好喜欢。

“You’re too young to know what I’m saying — but one day soon, I hope we’ll speak again, and then we’ll see if I’m big enough to take back the word I used tonight. Scherzavo, I was only joking.” A kiss to my cheek.

“你太年轻，无法理解我现在说的话，但很快，总有一天，我希望我们还有机会再聊，到时候再看看我是否宽大到愿意收回我今晚用的那个字眼。玩笑，我只是开玩笑。”她在我脸颊上吻了一下。

What a world this was. She was more than twice my age but I could have made love to her this minute and wept with her.

这是什么世界。她的年纪大我两倍，但此刻的我却可能跟她做爱、跟她一起哭泣。

“Are we toasting or what?” shouted someone in another corner of the shop.

“我们到底要不要干杯啊？”店里另一角有人喊道。

There was a melee of sounds.

一阵混乱的声音。

“And I’m Ada,” someone said almost by way of apology, as though aware she’d taken far too long to work her way to our end of the store and was now making it up to us by letting everyone in our corner know that she was the Ada everyone had surely been speaking about. Something raucous and rakish in her voice, or in the way she took her time saying Ada, or in the way she seemed to make light of everything — book parties, introductions, even friendship — suddenly told me that, without a doubt, this evening I’d stepped into a spellbound world indeed.

“我是艾达。”有人几乎道歉似地说，仿佛意识到她花了太多时间才走到店里我们所在的这一头，现在为了补偿我们，要让我们这一角落的每个人知道，她就是人人都在谈论的艾达。她声音里的嘶哑和潇洒，或她慢条斯理说“艾达”的方式，或她似乎把一切（新书发表会、引言、甚至友谊）都不当一回事的态度，让我知道今晚我真的踏进了一个魅人的世界。

And then it came. A hand on my shoulder. It was Amanda’s. And another on my waist. Oh, I knew that other hand so well. May it never let go of me tonight. I worship every finger on that hand, every nail you bite on every one of your fingers, my dear, dear Oliver — don’t let go of me yet, for I need that hand there. A shudder ran down my spine.

接着，来了。一只手搭上我的肩。是阿曼达。另一只手环抱我的腰。喔，这手的感觉我好熟悉。希望这只手今晚都别放开我。我崇拜那只手上的每根手指，每根手指上你啃的每片指甲，我亲爱的，亲爱的奥利弗——还不要放开我，因为我要你的手放在那儿。一阵战粟顺着我的背脊而下。

The poet spoke. “I was not going to read this poem tonight, but because someone”

诗人说：“今晚我本来不打算读这首诗，但因为某个人…”

“here,” he altered his voice.

“来了“他换了音调。

The bookstore owner chimed a bell by the cash register and everyone was quiet.

书店老板敲敲收音机旁的钟，大伙儿安静下来。

Everyone was available, lived availably — like the city — and assumed everyone else wished to be so as well. I longed to be like them.

如同这座城市本身，这儿的每个人为生活留有一方余裕，而且假设其他人也希望如此。我渴望像他们一样。

I’d never traveled in this world. But I loved this world. And I would love it even more once I learned how to speak its language — for it was my language, a form of address where our deepest longings are smuggled in banter, not because it is safer to put a smile on what we fear may shock, but because the inflections of desire, of all desire in this new world I’d stepped into, could only be conveyed in play.

我未曾在这个世界旅行。但我爱这个世界。一旦学会如何说这个世界的语言，我将更爱它——因为这就是我的语言，一种以戏谑偷渡最深渴望的说话方式。不是因为替我们唯恐造成惊吓的东西戴上一抹微笑比较安全，而是因为欲望的曲折、在我所踏进的这个新世界的所有欲望的曲折，都只能透过游戏传达。

“someone mentioned it, I could not resist. It’s entitled ‘The San Clemente Syndrome.’ It is, I must admit, i. e., if a versifier is allowed to say this about his own work, my favorite.” (I later found out that he never referred to himself as a poet.) “Because it was the most difficult, because it made me terribly, terribly homesick, because it saved me in Thailand, because it explained my entire life to me. I counted my days, my nights, with San Clemente in mind. The idea of coming back to Rome without finishing this long poem scared me more than being stranded at Bangkok’s airport for another week. And yet, it was in Rome, where we live not two hundred meters away from the Basilica of San Clemente, that I put the finishing touches to a poem which, ironically enough, I had started eons ago in Bangkok precisely because Rome felt galaxies away.”

“因为某个人提到这首诗，我就再也忍不住了。这首诗叫做《圣克雷芒症候群》。我必须承认——我是说，如果一个诗人也能说这种话，那么，这是我最喜欢的一首诗。”我后来发现，他从不自称诗人，或说自己的作品是诗。“因为这一首最难。因为这首诗让我非常、非常想家。因为这首诗在泰国拯救了我。因为这首诗向我解释了我的一生。我数算着我的日日、夜夜，从未或忘圣克雷芒。还没完成这首长诗就得回罗马的念头，比多困在曼谷机场一星期更令我害怕。然而，我是在罗马，在我距离圣克雷芒教堂不到两百公尺的住处，为这首诗做最后润饰。讽刺的是，我是在记不清多久以前在曼谷的时候，因为感觉罗马有如银河系那么远才开始写这首诗的。”

As he read the long poem, I began thinking that, unlike him, I had always found a way to avoid counting the days. We were leaving in three days — and then whatever I had with Oliver was destined to go up in thin air. We had talked about meeting in the States, and we had talked of writing and speaking by phone-but the whole thing had a mysteriously surreal quality kept intentionally opaque by both of us — not because we wanted to allow events to catch us unprepared so that we might blame circumstances and not ourselves, but because by not planning to keep things alive, we were avoiding the prospect that they might ever die. We had come to Rome in the same spirit of avoidance: Rome was a final bash before school and travel took us away, just a way of putting things off and extending the party long past closing time. Perhaps, without thinking, we had taken more than a brief vacation; we were eloping together with return-trip tickets to separate destinations.

听他读这首长诗，我想着：我与他不同，我一直都有办法避免数算日子。我们三天后就要离开，之后，无论我和奥利弗曾有过什么，注定要消失于无形。我们讨论过在美国见面，也讨论过写信或打电话，但整件事带着一种神秘、超现实的氛围，是我们俩刻意保持不透明的。不是因为我们想让事情不期然地找上我们，好归咎于环境，而是借着不计划维系感情来避免感情的消逝。我们抱着同样的回避精神来到罗马：罗马是我们被开学和旅行带走以前的最后一场派对，只是一个推迟或让派对延长的办法。或许，我们已经不假思索地不仅休了一个短假；我们拿着前往不同目的地的往返票一起私奔。

Perhaps it was his gift to me.

或许这是他给我的礼物。

Perhaps it was my father’s gift to the two of us.

或许这是父亲给我们俩的礼物。

There would be others, of course, and others after others, but calling them by my name in a moment of passion would feel like a derived thrill, an affectation.

当然，会有其他人，无数个在他之后的其他人。但在激情的一刻以我的名字呼唤他们，感觉会像是一种延伸的兴奋，一种爱恋。

Would I be able to live without his hand on my tummy or around my hips? Without kissing and licking a wound on his hip that would take weeks to heal, but away from me now? Whom else would I ever be able to call by my name?

如果没有他抚摸我或环抱我；如果不吻舔他腰臀那处数周才能痊愈但已不在我身边的伤口，我活得下去吗？我还能以我的名字呼唤谁？

I remembered the emptied closet and the packed suitcase next to his bed. Soon I’d sleep in Oliver’s room. I’d sleep with his shirt, lie with it next to me, wear it in my sleep.

我记得清空的衣柜、放在他床边打包好的行李。很快我又会睡在奥利弗的房间。我会与他的衬衫共眠，躺在它旁边，穿着它睡。

After the reading, more applause, more conviviality, more drinks. Soon it was time to close the store. I remembered Marzia when the bookstore in B. was closing. How far, how different. How thoroughly unreal she’d become.

朗读后，响起更多掌声，众人继续宴乐交际，喝更多酒。打烊的时间就快到来。我记起B城书店快要打烊那晚的玛琪雅。多么遥远，多么不同。她变得多么不真实啊。

Someone said we should all head out to dinner together. There were about thirty of us. Someone else suggested a restaurant on Lake Albano. A restaurant overlooking a starlit night sprang to my imagination like something out of an illuminated manuscript from the late Middle Ages. No, too far, someone said. Yes, but the lights on the lake at night… The lights on the lake at night will have to wait for another time. Why not some- where on via Cassia? Yes, but that didn’t solve the problem of the cars: there weren’t enough of them. Sure there were enough cars. And if we had to sit on top of each other for a little while, would anyone mind? Of course not. Especially if I get to sit in between these two beauties. Yes, but what if Falstaff were to sit on the beauties?

有人提议一起去吃晚餐。大概有三十个人同行。有人建议奥巴诺湖⑥畔一家餐厅，我想象起那家能够眺望星夜的餐厅，涌现的画面仿佛出自灯火照亮的中世纪末手稿。不行，太远了，有人说。对，可是那里夜晚湖上的灯光…下次吧。何不到喀西亚路附近？好吧，但是还有车子的问题：车子不够。车子当然够。有人介意大家挤一会儿吗？当然不。如果我有幸坐在两位漂亮宝贝中间的话。是啊，可是如果法斯塔夫得坐在两位美女身上呢？【注：⑥奥巴诺湖（Lake Albano）：位于罗马东南方的火口湖。】

We arrived more than forty-five minutes later — more than the time needed to reach distant Albano, where the lights on the lake at night… The place was a large al fresco trattoria with checkered tablecloths and mosquito candles spread out sparely among the diners. By now it must have been eleven o’clock. The air was still very damp. You could see it on our faces, and on our clothes, we looked limp and soggy. Even the tablecloths felt limp and soggy. But the restaurant was on a hill and occasionally a breathless draft would sough through the trees, signifying that tomorrow it would rain again but that the mugginess would remain unchanged.

我们四十五分钟后才到，花的时间比前往遥远的奥巴诺那家可眺望湖上灯光的餐厅少…我们去的是一家大型露天意大利式平价餐馆，桌上铺着格子布巾，驱蚊蜡烛俭省地散布在用膳者之间。应该十一点钟了。空气仍然非常潮湿。我们的脸上、衣服上散发疲倦沉闷的气息，连桌布都令人觉得疲倦沉闷。餐厅在山丘上，偶尔有令人窒息的气流飒飒穿过树木，意谓明天又要下雨，但闷热不变。

There were only five cars, and all were parked in different tiny side alleys not far from the bookstore. Because we could not depart en masse, we were to reconvene somewhere by Ponte Milvio. From there up via Cassia to the trattoria whose precise whereabouts someone, but no one else, knew.

只有五辆车，全停在几条离书店不远的小巷里。既然没办法一票人同时出发，只好决定在米尔维奥桥附近会合，再从那里顺喀西亚路走到一家意大利大众餐馆，那家店的确切位置只有一个人知道。

The waitress, a woman nearing her sixties, made a quick count of how many we were and asked the help to set the tables in a double-sided horseshoe, which was instantly done. Then she told us what we were going to eat and drink. Thank God we don’t have to decide, because with him deciding what to eat — said the poet’s wife — we’d be here for another hour and by then they’d be out of food in the kitchen. She ran down a long list of antipasti, which materialized no sooner than invoked, followed by bread, wine, mineral water, frizzante and naturale. Simple fare, she explained. Simple is what we want, echoed the publisher. “This year, we’re in the red again.”

年近六十的女侍很快算了一下人数，请雇工把桌子排成马蹄铁形。桌子很快排好，接着她告诉我们有哪些食物和饮料。谢天谢地我们不必决定，诗人之妻要是由诗人点菜，我们恐怕得再耗上一小时，届时就没东西吃了。女侍念了一长串开胃菜的名称，每念出一道菜名，菜就像变魔术般端上来，接着是面包、酒、有气泡和没气泡的矿泉水。都是简单的菜，她解释。我们要的就是简单，出版商附和说：“今年我们又亏钱了。”

Once again a toast to the poet. To the publisher. To the store owner. To the wife, the daughters, who else?

再敬诗人一杯。敬出版商。敬书店老板。敬妻子。敬女儿，还有谁？

Then cheeses.

接着是乳酪。

Laughter and good fellowship. Ada made a small improvised speech — well, not so improvised, she conceded. Falstaff and Toucan admitted having had a hand in it.

笑声与美好的友谊。艾达即兴说了一小段话——嗯，也没那么即兴啦，她坦承。法斯塔夫和巨嘴鸟女子承认他们也有分。

Second course much later: Pot roast, peas. Salad.

第二道菜又过了很久才上：焖烧牛肉。豌豆。沙拉。

The tortellini in cream sauce arrived more than half an hour later. By then I had decided not to drink wine because the two scotch whiskeys gulped down in a rush were only now starting to have their full effect. The three sisters were sitting between us and everyone on our bench was sitting pressed together. Heaven.

半小时后才送上奶油饺。那时我已经决定不再喝酒，因为匆促大口吞下的两大杯威士忌正要发威。三姐妹坐在我们之间，我们这张板凳上的人全挤在一起。天堂。

One thing led to another, and we began speaking of Bangkok. “Everyone is beautiful, but beautiful in an exceptionally hybrid, crossbred manner, which is why I wanted to go there,” said the poet. “They’re not Asiatic, not Caucasian, and Eurasian is too simple a term. They’re exotic in the purest sense of the word, and yet not alien. We instantly recognize them though we’ve never seen them before, and have no words either for what they stir in us or for what they seem to want from us.

我们自然而然地聊起曼谷。“每个人都很美，特别混杂的美，那是我想去当地的理由。”诗人说。“他们不是亚洲人，不是高加索人，欧亚人这个词又太简化。他们代表的正是‘异国情调’最纯粹的意义，却又不是异乡人。虽然我们从未见过他们，对于他们在我们体内激起或似乎想从我们身上获取的东西，都无法言喻，却能够一眼认出他们。”

“At first I thought that they thought differently. Then I realized they felt things differently. Then that they were unspeakably sweet, sweet as you can’t imagine anyone being sweet here. Oh, we can be kind and we can be caring and we can be very, very warm in our sunny, passionate Mediterranean way, but they were sweet, selflessly sweet, sweet in their hearts, sweet in their bodies, sweet without a touch of sorrow or malice, sweet like children, without irony or shame. I was ashamed of what I felt for them. This could be paradise, just as I’d fantasized. The twenty-four-year-old night clerk of my rinky-dink hotel, who’s wearing a visorless cap and has seen all types come and go, stares and I stare back. His features are a girl’s. But he looks like a girl who looks like a boy. The girl at the American Express desk stares and I stare back. She looks like a boy who looks like a girl and who’s therefore just a boy. The younger ones, men and women, always giggle when I give them the look. Even the girl at the consulate who speaks fluent Milanese, and the undergraduates who wait at the same hour of each and every morning for the same bus to pick us up, stare at me and I stare back — does all this staring add up to what I think it means, because, like it or not, when it comes to the senses all humans speak the same beastly tongue.”

“起初我以为他们的思考方式不同。接着我发现他们对事物的感受不同。此外，他们是难以形容的温柔，到了令你无法想象这里有人堪称温柔的地步。喔，我们这儿的人是仁慈的，体贴的，以地中海式的阳光与热情表现得非常、非常温暖；但他们是温柔，无私的温柔。心地温柔，身体温柔，没有一丝悲伤或恶意的温柔，孩子般温柔，不带讥讽或羞耻。我对他们的感觉令我羞愧。这里可能是天堂，就像我幻想的。我住的那家破旅馆有个二十四岁的晚班职员，戴着无边便帽，看过形形色色的人来来去去。他盯着我看，我也回望他。他有一张女孩儿般的脸，看起来像个男孩子气的女孩。美国运通柜台的女孩盯着我看，我也回看她。她看起来像带女孩子气的男孩，因此只是个男孩。每次我盯着那些年轻人瞧，无论男女，他们都会咯咯发笑。连领事馆里能说流利米兰话的女孩，以及每天早上在同一时间跟我等同一班公交的大学生也盯着我看，我也回望他们。这些凝视是否有我所想的那个意思？因为无论喜欢与否，等你明白过来，全人类都操着同样野蛮的语言。”

“I wanted to sleep with all of Thailand. And all of Thailand, it turns out, was flirting with me. You couldn’t take a step without almost lurching into someone.”

“我想跟全泰国睡。结果，全泰国都在跟我调情。你每走一步都难免踉跄跌倒向某个人。”

He watched me down part of the glass. “Do you feel it?”

他看着我喝口酒。“感觉到了吗？”

“Here, take a sip of this grappa and tell me it’s not the work of a witch,” interrupted the bookstore owner. The poet allowed the waiter to pour another glass. This time he sipped it slowly. Falstaff downed it in one gulp. Straordinario-fantastico growled it down her gullet. Oliver smacked his lips. The poet said it made you young again. “I like grappa at night, it reinvigorates me. But you”– he was looking to me now –“wouldn’t understand. At your age, God knows, invigoration is the last thing you need.”

“来，吸一口格巴拉酒，告诉我这不是妖术变的。”书店老板插嘴道。诗人让侍者再为他倒一杯。这次他慢慢吸饮。法斯塔夫则是一口喝干。“超了不起”女子咕噜噜喝下肚。奥利弗顺顺嘴。诗人说格巴拉酒让人回春。“我喜欢在夜里来点格巴拉酒，它为我注人活力。可是你啊…”这时他看着我：“不会懂的。在你这个年纪，天晓得，活力是你最不需要的。”

“The invigoration.”

“活力充沛。”

“Feel what?” I asked.

“感觉到什么？”我问。

I swilled the drink again. “Not really.”

我又喝一大口。“没有吧。”

A second round of grappa and sambuca.

第二轮的格巴拉酒和萨布卡酒也送上来了。

“That’s because, at his age, it’s already there, the invigoration,” added Lucia.

“那是因为在他这个年纪，他有的就是活力。”露西雅补充说。

“Not really,” he repeated with a puzzled, disappointed look.

“没有吧。”他用困惑失望的表情重复一次。

“True,” said someone, “your ‘invigoration’ works only on those who no longer have it.”

“没错，你的‘注入活力’只适用于那些缺乏活力的人。”

The poet: “Invigoration is not hard to come by in Bangkok. One warm night in my hotel room I thought I would go out of my mind. It was either loneliness, or the sounds of people outside, or the work of the devil. But this is when I began to think of San Clemente. It came to me like an undefined, nebulous feeling, part arousal, part homeisickness, part metaphor. You travel to a place because you have this picture of it and you want to couple with the whole country. Then you find that you and its natives haven’t a thing in common. You don’t understand the basic signals which you’d always assumed all humanity shared. You decide it was all a mistake, that it was all in your head. Then you dig a bit deeper and you find that, despite your reasonable suspicions, you still desire them all, but you don’t know what it is exactly you want from them, or what they seem to want from you, because they too, it turns out, are all looking at you with what could only be one thing on their mind. But you tell yourself you’re imagining things. And you’re ready to pack up and go back to Rome because all of these touch-and-go signals are driving you mad. But then something suddenly clicks, like a secret underground passageway, and you realize that, just like you, they are desperate and aching for you as well. And the worst thing is that, with all your experience and your sense of irony and your ability to overcome shyness wherever it threatens to crop up, you feel totally stranded. I didn’t know their language, didn’t know the language of their hearts, didn’t even know my own. I saw veils everywhere: what I wanted, what I didn’t know I wanted, what I didn’t want to know I wanted, what I’d always known I wanted. This is either a miracle. Or it is hell.

诗人说：“在曼谷不难获得活力。有个温暖的晚上，我在旅馆房间里，还以为我就要发疯了。可能是寂寞，或外面的人声，或魔鬼作祟，我就是在这时候想到圣克雷芒。我有个念头，犹如不确定而难以捉摸的感觉，有些兴奋，有些想家，有些隐喻的成分。你到了一个地方，因为你脑中有那里的影像，你想与整个国家结合。接着你发现你和那儿土生土长的人没有任何交集。你不了解那些你一直假定是人类共有的基本信号。你认定一切都是错误，一切都是你的想象而已。接着你挖得更深一点，你发现尽管你的怀疑合理，但你还是想要这一切，却不确定你到底想从他们身上得到什么，或他们似乎想从你身上得到什么。因为到头来，他们也抱着唯一可能的同一种心思看你。但你告诉自己，这全是幻想。所有这一触即发的信号快要把你逼疯，于是你准备打包回罗马。但接下来，像走出秘密地下通道，你豁然开朗，发现他们跟你一样，也拼了命地渴望你。最糟的是，尽管你经验丰富，懂得反讽，能压抑自己的羞怯，却觉得动弹不得。我不懂他们的语言，不懂他们心里的语言，甚至不明白我自己的。我觉得到处都覆了一层纱：我想要的、我不知道我想要的、我不想知道我想要的、我始终知道我想要的…这若非奇迹，就是地狱。”

“Like every experience that marks us for a lifetime, I found myself turned inside out, drawn and quartered. This was the sum of everything I’d been in my life — and more: who I am when I sing and stir-fry vegetables for my family and friends on Sunday afternoons; who I am when I wake up on freezing nights and want nothing more than to throw on a sweater, rush to my desk, and write about the person I know no one knows I am; who I am when I crave to be naked with another naked body, or when I crave to be alone in the world; who I am when every part of me seems miles and centuries apart and each swears it bears my name.

“犹如每个为我们留下终生印记的经验，我感觉全身掏空了，被挖去脏腑，一一肢解。这是我过去生命经历的总和。周日下午边唱歌边为家人朋友大火炒青菜的我；在冰冷的夜晚醒来，只想匆忙披上长袖运动衫赶到书桌前，写下不为人知的自己的我；渴望赤身与另一个裸露的躯体在一起，或渴望独立于世的我；当我的每个部分似乎都天差地远，但每个部分都发誓自己能承载我的名字的我。”

“I called it the San Clemente Syndrome. Today’s Basilica of San Clemente is built on the site of what once was a refuge for persecuted Christians. The home of the Roman consul Titus Flavius Clemens, it was burnt down during Emperor Nero’s reign. Next to its charred remains, in what must have been a large, cavernous vault, the Romans built an underground pagan temple dedicated to Mithras, God of the Morning, Light of the World, over whose temple the early Christians built another church, dedicated — coincidentally or not, this is a matter to be further excavated — to another Clement, Pope St. Clement, on top of which came yet another church that burnt down and on the site of which stands today’s basilica. And the digging could go on and on. Like the subconscious, like love, like memory, like time itself, like every single one of us, the church is built on the ruins of subsequent restorations, there is no rock bottom, there is no first anything, no last anything, just layers and secret passageways and interlocking chambers, like the Christian Catacombs, and right along these, even a Jewish Catacomb.

“我称之为圣克雷芒症候群。今日，圣克雷芒教堂就建立在过去受迫害基督徒的避难所上。罗马执政官克雷芒⑦的寓所在尼禄⑧统治期间焚毁。废墟旁，一个巨大、洞穴般的拱顶地下室里，罗马人盖了一座地下异教徒神殿来供奉早晨之神、世界之光密特拉，而在密特拉⑨的神殿上，早期的基督徒又盖了另一座教堂，来供奉另一位克雷芒，也就是教宗圣克雷芒⑩——这不是巧合，还要再进一步发掘。教宗圣克雷芒的教堂上，又盖了另一座教堂，连这座教堂也焚毁后，当今的圣克雷芒教堂就立在同一个地点。再挖掘下去没完没了。像潜意识、像爱、像记忆、像时间本身像我们每一个个体，教堂是盖在后来修复的废墟上的，没有底，没有最初，没有最后，只有一堵堵墙、秘密通道环环相扣的房间，那儿除了有基督徒的地下墓穴，还包括犹太人的地下墓穴。”【注：⑦提特拉·弗拉维乌斯·克雷芒（Titus Flavius Clemens，生卒年不详）。⑧尼禄（Nero，37—38）：罗马慕君，即位时未满十七岁，公元59年以前实施仁政，后来实施一连串暴政，以焚烧罗马城、迫害基督徒而恶名昭彰。⑨密塔拉（Mithras）：原为印度一伊朗古代神话中的光明之神，后经波斯传到希腊世界。到三四世纪，对密特拉的崇拜得到罗马军人的传播与支持，成为发展中的新宗教基督教的主要对手。⑩圣克雷芒，指教宗圣克雷芒一世（Pope st. Clement 1，生于公元一世纪）：可能于88—97年或92—101年期间在位，据说他由圣彼得立为圣彼得之后的第三任主教。谣传他最后遭放逐到克里米亚，缚于铁锚上投入海中殉教，但无法确证。】

“I stare at him. And he stares at me.

“我盯着他看。他也盯着我瞧。”

By then the management of the restaurant had figured that we weren’t about to leave yet, and so, once again, served grappa and sambuca for everyone.

餐厅主管猜到我们还不打算离开，因此又再度给大家倒格拉巴酒和萨布卡酒。

“Alfredo, my love, please, make it brief.”

“阿佛列多，亲爱的，拜托，长话短说。”

“So on that warm night when I thought I was losing my mind, I’m sitting in the rinky-dink bar of my rinky-dink hotel, and who should be seated at the table right next to mine but our night clerk, wearing that strange visorless cap. Off duty? I ask. Off duty, he replies. Why don’t you head home, then? I live here. Just having a drink before turning in.

“在我觉得我快发疯的那个温暖的夜，我坐在下榻的那家破旧旅馆的破旧酒吧里，除了戴着奇怪无边便帽的夜班职员之外，还有谁会坐在我旁边的那一桌？下班了？我问。下班了。他回答。那你怎么不回家？我住这里。睡前喝一杯而已。”

“Without letting another moment go by, he picks up his drink with one hand, the decanter with the other — I thought I’d intruded and offended him and that he wanted to be alone and was moving to a table farther away from mine — when lo and behold, he comes right to my table and sits right in front of me. Want to try some of this? he asks. Sure, why not, I think, when in Rome, when in Thailand… Of course, I’ve heard all manner of stories, so I figure there’s something fishy and unsavory in all this, but let’s play along.

“毫不耽搁，他一手拿起酒，一手拿着酒瓶。我以为我打扰、冒犯了他，他想独处，想换到离我远一点的桌子去，怪的是，他却往我这桌来，坐在我正对面。想试试这个吗？他问。当然，有何不可，我想，在罗马的时候，在泰国的时候…当然，我听过各种故事，或许眼下也有可疑、令人不快的地方，不过咱们还是虚与委蛇吧。”

“But, as Nietzsche says, my friends, I have given you the moral before the tale.”

“不过，尼采也说了：吾友，在说故事之前，我已经先把教训告诉你了。”

“Have one anyway.” He pours some for me and some for him.

“喝一口就是了。”他替我倒一点，也给自己倒一点。

“He snaps his fingers and peremptorily orders a tiny cup for me. No sooner said than done.

“他弹了一下手指，专横地替我点了一小杯。立刻。”

“I may not like it, I say.

“我可能不喜欢，我说。”

“Look –, I begin.”

“听着…我发话。”

“Have another sip — just to make sure.”

“再啜一口——只是确认一下。”

“Have a sip.

“啜一口。”

“I down this one as well. No question about it. It’s a little like grappa, only stronger but less tart.”

“我也干了这杯。毫无疑问。有点像格拉巴酒，只是比较烈，但没那么酸。”

“Why are you staring?”

“为什么盯着我看？”

“You’re staring at me, I finally say.”

“你一直盯着我看。我总算说出来。”

“Let me put it this way: I’m not –” But he won’t let me finish.

“我这么说好了，我不是…”可是他不让我说完。

“I know.

“我知道。”

“Meanwhile, the night clerk keeps staring at me. I don’t like being stared at so intensely. His glance is almost unbearable. I can almost detect the beginnings of a giggle.”

“同时，晚班职员一直盯着我看。我不喜欢别人这样热烈凝视。他的扫视几乎让人受不了。我几乎察觉到就快有人发出傻笑。”

“The brew is quite delicious. The glass is scarcely bigger than my grandmother’s thimble, with which she used to darn socks.”

“那酒蛮好喝的。玻璃杯几乎不比我祖母补袜子用的顶针大。”

“He leans over to my side of the table: Because I like you.”

“他靠向我这边的桌子说：因为我喜欢你。”

“Have another. Pours himself one, one for me.”

“再来一杯。他给自己倒一杯，也给我倒一杯。”

“My mind is flashing red signals all over the place. They get you drunk, they take you somewhere, they rob you clean, and when you complain to the police, who are no less corrupt than the thieves themselves, they make all manner of allegations about you, and have pictures to prove it. Another worry sweeps over me: the bill from the bar could turn out to be astronomical while the one doing the ordering downs dyed tea and pretends to get drunk. Oldest trick in the book — what am I, born yesterday?

“我整颗心红色警报大作。这些人灌醉你，带你去某个地方，把你洗劫一空，等你向腐败贪污的警察申诉，他们会对你做各种指控，还有照片佐证。另一层忧虑扫过我心里：纵使点酒的人喝染色茶假装酒醉，但酒吧账单也会是天文数字。最老套的诡计。我是怎么了？又不是无知小孩。”

“All the more reason why you should have another.”

“所以你更应该再喝一杯。”

“I’m not sleeping with you.”

“我可不跟你上床。”

“Little bourgeois me has finally spoken out. I know all about these mincing niceties that always, always end up taking advantage of foreigners.”

“小资产阶级的我总算说出口。我很清楚这种装模作样的周到，到头来总是要占外国人便宜。”

“Ironically, he is not offended. He must have known this was coming. Must have done it a million times — comes with the job, probably.”

“讽刺的是，他不觉得被冒犯。他一定早料到这样，肯定做过百万次——说不定这就是他的工作。”

“I’m about to repeat my tired protestation, but I can already hear him say, Have another. I’m almost on the point of laughing.”

“我正打算重复我老套的说辞拒绝，却听到他说‘再来一杯’。我几乎快要笑出来。”

“Look, amigo, I hope you don’t think I’m paying for these drinks.”

“听着，朋友，希望你别误以为我会付这些酒的钱“

“You have nothing to fear from me.”

“你不必怕我。”

“Here, have another — in the name of friendship.”

“来，再来一杯…敬友谊。”

“I don’t think I’m really interested. Please, let’s just –“

“我想我没什么兴趣。拜托，我们这就…”

“Maybe you won’t. Maybe you will. The night is young. And I haven’t given up.”

“或许你不愿意。或许你愿意。夜还不深。我也还没放弃。”

“Friendship?”

“友谊？”

“I didn’t ask you to pay for the drinks. Or, for that matter, to pay me.”

“我没要你付酒钱。或说，我不会要你付钱给我。”

“He sees my laugh, doesn’t care where it’s coming from, all he cares is I’m smiling. Now he’s pouring himself one.”

“他看我笑，不在乎我为什么笑，只在乎我笑了。这时他给自己倒了一杯。”

“Have another. Smiles.”

“再来一杯。他微笑。”

“At which point he removes his cap and lets down so much hair that I couldn’t understand how such a huge tumble could have been wrapped and tucked under so small a bonnet. He was a woman.”

“这时，他摘掉帽子，露出头发，多到我无法理解，这么一大堆头发竟然能盘起来塞在这么小的无边便帽里。他是女的。”

“No, on the contrary.”

“不，正好相反。”

“Disappointed?

“失望吗？”

“The tiny wrists, the bashful air, the softest skin under the sun, tenderness that seemed to spill out of her eyes, not with the smirking boldness of those who’ve been around but with the most heartrending promises of utter sweetness and chastity in bed. Was I disappointed? Perhaps — because the sting of the situation had been dispelled.”

“纤细的手腕，害羞的气质，天底下最柔软的肌肤，似乎要从她眼里溢出来的柔情，脸上没有老江湖奸笑的大胆，而是床上绝对温柔、贞节、令人心碎的保证。我失望吗？或许。因为紧张情势的不快已经消散。”

“I nodded.”

“我点头。”

“I asked her why she purposely misled people into thinking she was a man. I was expecting, It’s safer for business — or something a bit more rakish, like: For moments such as these.”

“我问她为什么故意误导，让人以为她是男人？我以为她会说‘这样做生意比较安全’，或者更放荡一点的理由，例如‘为了这样的时刻’

“Then came the giggle, this time for real, as if she had committed a naughty prank but was not in the least bit displeased or surprised by the result. But I am a man, she said.”

“接着是一阵傻笑，这次是真的，仿佛她刚刚完成一个恶作剧，对结果却没有一丝不快或惊讶。但我是男人，她说。”

“Out came a hand that touched my cheek and stayed there, as if to soothe away the shock and surprise. Better now?”

“她伸手碰我的脸颊，停在那里，好像想抚平震撼与惊讶。好些了吗？”

“You need another.”

“你需要再来一杯。”

“She was nodding away at my disbelief, as if the nod itself were part of the same prank.”

“她点头不理会我的无法置信，仿佛点头本身是恶作剧的一部分。”

“And you do too, I said, pouring her a drink this time.”

“你也是。我说，这次给她倒了一杯酒。”

“I stared at him, at her, who knows. Let’s have another, I said.”

“我盯着他（或‘她’，天晓得）打量。再来一杯吧，我说。”

“I was going to suggest it, said my impish friend.”

“我正打算建议这么做。我淘气的朋友说。”

“You’re a man? I asked, no less disappointed than when I discovered she was a woman.”

“你是男人？我问，失望的程度不亚于发现她是女人的时候。”

“Do you want me man or woman? she/he asked, as if one could scale one’s way back up our phylogenetic tree.”

“你希望我是男人还是女人？她/他问，仿佛我们能够逆转一个人的性别。”

“I’m afraid so.”

“我恐怕是。”

“With both elbows on the table he leaned forward and al most touched my nose with the tip of his and said: I like you very, very much, Signor Alfredo. And you like me too, very, very much — and the beautiful thing is we both know it.”

“他两肘撑着桌面，身体往前倾，鼻尖几乎碰到我的鼻子，说道：‘我非常、非常喜欢你，阿佛列多先生。你也非常、非常喜欢我——美好的是，我们彼此都知道。”，

“I didn’t know what answer to give. I wanted to say, I want you as intermezzo. So I said, I want you as both, or as in between.”

“我不知道该怎么回答。我想说，‘我希望你只是一段插曲’。所以我说：‘我希望你都是，或介于两者之间。”

“He seemed taken aback.”

“他似乎大吃一惊。”

“Naughty, naughty, he said, as though for the first time that night I’d actually managed to shock him with something thoroughly debauched.”

“真调皮、真调皮，他说，仿佛那晚我的败德终于吓着他。”

“When he stood up to go to the bathroom, I noticed she was indeed a woman wearing a dress and high-heeled shoes. I couldn’t help staring at the most lovely skin on her most lovely ankles.”

“他站起来走进盥洗室，我注意到他真的是个穿洋装、踩高跟鞋的女人。我忍不住凝视她最可爱的脚踝上最可爱的肌肤。”

“This, in a nutshell, is what I call the San Clemente Syndrome.”

“总之，这就是我所谓的圣克雷芒症候群。”

“She knew she had caught me yet once more and started to giggle in earnest.”

“她知道她已经再度俘获我，便开始发自内心地傻笑。”

There was applause, and it was affectionate applause. We not only liked the story but the man telling the story.

掌声响起，而且是深情的掌声。我们喜欢这个故事，也喜欢讲这个故事的男人。

“Evviva il sindromo di San Clemente,” said Straordinario-fantastico.

“圣克雷芒症侯群万岁（Evviva il sindromo di San Clemente）！”老爱说“超了不起”的那个女人说。

“Will you watch my purse? she asked. She must have sensed that if she hadn’t asked me to watch something of hers, I would probably have paid the bill and left the bar.”

“帮我看着我的钱包好吗？她问。她一定察觉，如果不要求我替她看着东西，我可能会买单离开酒吧。”

“Sindromo is not masculine, it’s feminine, la sindrome” corrected someone sitting next to her.

“Sindromo（症侯群）这个字不是阳性，是阴性。应该是la syndrome o”坐她旁边的人更正道。

“Evviva la sindrome di San Clemente,” hailed someone who was clearly aching to shout something. He, along with a few others, had arrived very late for dinner, crying in good Roman dialect Lassatece passà, let us through, to the restaurant owners as a way of announcing his arrival to the company. Everyone had long since started eating. His car had taken a wrong turn around Ponte Milvio. Then he couldn’t find the restaurant, etc. As a result he missed the first two courses. He was now sitting at the very end of the table and he as well as those he had brought with him from the bookstore had been given the last of the cheeses remaining in the house. This plus two flans for each, because this was all that was left. He made up for the missing food with too much wine. He had heard most of the poet’s speech on San Clemente.

“圣克雷芒症候群万岁（EvvivalasindromediSan Clemente）！”某个显然很想喊点什么的人高呼。他和其他几个很晚才来吃晚餐的人以标准罗马方言对餐厅老板大喊借过，以此宣示他来跟同伴会合了。大家早就开始用餐了。他说他在米尔维奥桥附近转错弯，又找不到餐厅。结果他错过前面两道菜。这时他坐在桌子最末端，他和他从书店载来的那些人只得到店里仅剩的乳酪。此外，每个人还有两份水果馅饼，因为就只剩这些了。他用酒弥补错过的食物。不过诗人关于圣克雷芒的演说他倒是大部分都听到了。

“Evviva!” everyone else toasted.

“万岁！（Evviva）”其他人也举杯庆祝。

“Evviva!” interrupted Amanda, toasting to the latecomer, in a desperate effort to shut him up.

“万岁！（Evviva）”阿曼达打断他，向晚来者敬酒，拼命想让他闭嘴。

“I think that all this clementizing” he said, “is quite charming, though I’ve no idea how your metaphor will help us see who we are, what we want, where we’re headed, any more than the wine we’ve been drinking. But if the job of poetry, like that of wine, is to help us see double, then I propose another toast until we’ve drunk enough to see the world with four eyes — and, if we’re not careful, with eight.”

“我认为这所有的‘克雷芒化’相当吸引人，可是我不知道，比起我们喝的酒，你的隐喻如何更能帮助我们看清自己是谁，看清我们的想望，看清我们将何去何从？但如果诗像酒一样，是让我们看见双重影像的工具，那么我建议再干一杯，直到我们醉到用四只眼睛——甚至，一个不小心，用八只眼睛，来看世界！”

“Better write another book of poems — and soon,” said Straordinario-fantastico.

“最好再写一本诗集——而且要快。超了不起”女人说。

In the car, I was happy. But I kept thinking of the basilica and how similar to our evening, one thing leading to the next, to the next, to something totally unforeseen, and just when you thought the cycle had ended, something new cropped up and after it something else as well, until you realized you could easily be back where you started, in the center of old Rome. A day ago we had gone swimming by the light of the moon. Now we were here. In a few days he’d be gone. If only he’d be back exactly a year from now. I slipped my arm around Oliver’s and leaned against Ada. I fell asleep.

在车上，我非常开心。但我一直在想：圣克雷芒教堂与我们度过的这个夜晚多么相似。事事相连，一件接着一件，发展出意想不到的情况；正当你以为循环已经结束，新的状况又突然出现，之后同样还有别的事情，直到你明白你能够轻易回到起点，置身古罗马中心。一天前，我们在月光下游泳，此刻我们却在这里。再过几天他就不在了。如果他一年后能回来多好。我悄悄伸出一只手臂搂着奥利弗，一边靠着艾达，睡着了。

Someone suggested an ice cream place not far from the restaurant. No, skip the ice cream, let’s go for coffee. We all massed into cars and headed along the Lungotevere, toward the Pantheon.

有人提议去离餐厅不远的一家冰淇淋店。不要，跳过冰淇淋吧，我们去喝咖啡。我们全挤上车，顺隆古特佛列堤防往万神殿去。

It was well past one in the morning when the party arrived at Caffè Sant’Eustachio. We ordered coffees for everyone. I thought I understood why everyone swears by Sant’Eustachio’s coffee; or perhaps I wanted to think I understood, but I wasn’t sure. I wasn’t even sure I liked it. Perhaps no one else did but felt obliged to fall in with the general opinion and claimed that they too couldn’t live without it. There was a large crowd of coffee drinkers standing and sitting around the famed Roman coffeehouse. I loved watching all these lightly dressed people standing so close to me, all of them sharing the same basic thing: love for the night, love for the city, love for its people, and an ardent desire to couple — with anyone. Love for anything that would prevent the tiny groups of people who had come together here from disbanding. After coffee, when the group considered separating, someone said, “No, we can’t say goodbye yet.” Someone suggested a pub nearby. Best beer in Rome. Why not? So we headed down a long and narrow side alley leading in the direction of Campo de’ Fiori. Lucia walked between me and the poet. Oliver, talking with two of the sisters, was behind us. The old man had made friends with Straordinario-fantastico and they were both confabulating about San Clemente. “What a metaphor for life!” said Straordinario-fantastico. “Please! No need to overdo things either with clementification this and clementization that. It was just a figure of speech, you know,” said Falstaff, who probably had had his fill of his godson’s glory for the night. Noticing that Ada was walking by herself, I walked back and held her by the hand. She was dressed in white and her tanned skin had a sheen that made me want to touch every pore in her body. We did not speak. I could hear her high heels tapping the slate pavement. In the dark she seemed an apparition.

一票人到达圣埃乌斯塔乔咖啡馆时，早就过了一点钟。每个人都点了咖啡。我以为我了解人人在圣埃乌斯塔乔咖啡馆旁发誓的原因，或我希望自己了解，但我不确定。我甚至不确定我喜不喜欢。或许没有其他人喜欢，却觉得有义务从众，宣称没有这家咖啡馆他们也活不下去。大批喝咖啡的人围着著名的罗马咖啡馆或坐或站。我爱看这么多穿着轻便的人站得离我这么近，他们都有基本的共同点：爱夜晚，爱这个城市，爱这里的人，而且热烈渴望成双成对——和任何一个人。只要能避免解散一同来到这儿的小团体，什么都爱。喝过咖啡之后，就在这群人考虑解散时，有人说：“不行，我们还不能说再见。”有人提议到附近的一家酒吧，那儿有罗马最棒的啤酒。有何不可？所以我们朝一条通往花田广场的狭窄小长巷走去。露西雅走在我和诗人中间。跟两姐妹聊天的奥利弗尾随我们后面。法斯塔夫跟超了不起女人交上了朋友，随意聊着圣克雷芒。“多么棒的人生隐喻啊！”超了不起女子说。“拜托，没必要做得太过火，把这个也克雷芒化，把那个也克雷芒化。那只是言语的象征，你也知道。”法斯塔夫说，他或许受够了他的教子今晚出尽风头。我注意到艾达一个人走，便往回走，去牵她的手。她一身白衣，晒黑的皮肤有一种光泽，让我想碰触她身上每一寸肌肤。我们没说话。我听见她的高跟鞋敲在石板路上的声音。黑暗中，她看起来像幽灵。

As we ambled down an emptied labyrinth of sparely lit streets, I began to wonder what all this talk of San Clemente had to do with us — how we move through time, how time moves through us, how we change and keep changing and come back to the same. One could even grow old and not learn a thing but this. That was the poet’s lesson, I presume. In a month or so from now, when I’d revisit Rome, being here tonight with Oliver would seem totally unreal, as though it had happened to an entirely different me. And the wish born three years ago here when an errand boy offered to take me to a cheap movie theater known for what went on there would seem no less unfulfilled to me three months from now than it was three years ago. He came. He left. Nothing else had changed. I had not changed. The world hadn’t changed. Yet nothing would be the same. All that remains is dreammaking and strange remembrance.

我们漫步在灯火稀疏、恍若无人迷宫的街道上，我好奇这所有关于圣克雷芒的谈话跟我们有什么关系——我们如何穿越时间，时间如何穿越我们；我们如何改变，不断改变，然后回到相同的状态。一个人逐渐老去却可能只学会了这一点。那是诗人的教训，我猜。距离现在一个月左右，当我再度造访罗马，今夜与奥利弗在这里的事将显得毫不真实，仿佛发生在一个完全不同的我身上。三年前，因为跑腿男孩提议带我去一家廉价电影院（那家戏院以里面所干的勾当出名）而萌发的希望，在三个月后，也变得如同三年前一样，未曾实现。他到来。他离去。其他什么都没改变。我没改变。世界没改变。但一切都将不同。剩下的只有梦和奇怪的回忆。

I wanted this walk never to end. The silent and deserted alley was altogether murky and its ancient, pockmarked cobblestones glistened in the damp air, as though an ancient carrier had spilled the viscous contents of his amphora before disappearing underground in the ancient city. Everyone had left Rome. And the emptied city, which had seen too many and seen them all, now belonged to us alone and to the poet who had cast it, if only for one night, in his own image. The mugginess was not going to break tonight. We could, if we wished, have walked in circles and no one would have known and none would have minded.

我希望这段路没有尽头。这条安静荒凉的巷子很黑，巷子里斑斑点点的古老鹅卵石在潮湿的空气里闪闪发亮，仿佛古代搬运工消失在古城的地底之前，将他双耳细颈壶里黏稠的东西溢洒出来。大家都离开罗马了。这座看过太多也看尽一切的空城，现在只属于我们，属于（即使只有一夜）以他自己的意象塑造罗马的诗人。今晚的闷热不会消散。我们原本可以兜圈子走，没有人知道，也没有人介意。

The bar was closing when we arrived. “We close at two.”

我们抵达时，酒吧就要打烊。“我们两点打烊。”

“Well, we still have time for drinks.” Oliver wanted a martini, an American martini. What a beautiful idea, said the poet. “Me too,” chimed in someone else. On the large jukebox you could hear the same summer hit we’d heard during the entire month of July. On hearing the word “martini,” the old man and the publisher also dittoed the order. “Ehi! Taverniere!” shouted Falstaff. The waiter told us that we could either have wine or beer; the bartender had left earlier that evening, on account of because his mother was taken gravely ill to the hospital where she had to be taken. Everyone smothered a laugh at the waiter’s garbled speech. Oliver asked what they charged for martinis. The waiter yelled the question to the girl at the cash register. She told him how much. “Well, what if I make the drinks and you charge us your price on account of because we can mix the drinks we are mixing?”

“嗯，我们还有时间喝几杯。”奥利弗想要一杯马丁尼，美国的马丁尼。多美好的主意，诗人说。“我也要。”另一个人插话道。大型点唱机正在播我们听了整个七月的同一首夏季畅销曲。一听到“马丁尼”三个字，法斯塔夫和出版商也点了。“嘿，掌柜的！”法斯塔夫大喊。侍者说我们只能点葡萄酒或啤酒，因为酒保提早走了，去医院探视病重的母亲。侍者语焉不详，大家都忍住笑。奥利弗问他马丁尼的价钱。侍者朝收银小姐大声问，收银小姐才告诉他。“我们知道怎么调自己想要的酒。由我调酒，你们照定价收费，如何？”

There was hesitation on the part of the waiter and of the cashier. The owner had long since left. “Why not?” said the girl. “If you know how to make them, faccia pure, go right ahead.”

侍者和收银小姐有些迟疑。老板早就离开了。收银小姐说：“有何不可。如果你知道怎么调的话，请便。”

“Maybe I could entice you to accept a martini from us,” he said. “This has been a crazy evening. A drink could not possibly make it any crazier. Make it a small one.”

“让我们请你喝一杯马丁尼。好疯狂的一夜。多喝一杯也不可能更疯狂了。调一杯小的吧。”

Round of applause for Oliver, who sauntered his way behind the bar and, in a matter of seconds, after adding ice to the gin and a bit of vermouth, was vigorously shaking the cocktail mixer. Olives couldn’t be found in the tiny refrigerator by the bar. The cashier came and checked and produced a bowl. “Olives,” she said, staring Oliver straight in the face, as if to mean, It was under your very nose — had you looked? And what else?

一阵掌声为奥利弗响起，他从容走到吧台后，只消几秒，在琴酒和少许苦艾酒里加冰块之后，用力摇晃调酒瓶。吧台旁的小冰箱没有橄榄。收银小姐走过来看看，拿出一碗。“嗒！”她直视奥利弗的脸说，意思好像是：就在你眼前啊——你找过吗？还要什么？

“Where did you learn this?” I asked.

“你在哪里学的？”我问。

“Want me to teach you?”

“要我教你吗？”

And he proceeded to explain the intricacies of a straight-up dry martini. He was okay being a bartender to the bar’s help.

接着他开始解释不加冰块的干马丁尼的复杂细微之处。他不介意在吧台的协助之下担任酒保。

“Mixology 101. Courtesy Harvard. Weekends, I made a living as a bartender all through college. Then I became a chef, then a caterer. But always a poker player.”

“鸡尾酒入门。多亏哈佛。大学期间，每个周末我当酒保赚钱。接着我成为大厨，然后开始承接宴席业务。只有扑克牌是摆脱不了的习惯。”

His undergraduate years, each time he spoke of them, acquired a limelit, incandescent magic, as if they belonged to another life, a life^te which I had no access since it already belonged to the past. Proof of its existence trickled, as it did now, in his ability to mix drinks, or to tell arcane grappas apart, or to speak to all women, or in the mysterious square envelopes addressed to him that arrived at our house from all over the world.

他每次提到他的大学时代，就会成为众所瞩目的焦点，散发闪亮的魔力，仿佛那些都属于另一段人生，一段已经成为过去、我因而无缘参与的人生。其曾经存在的证明慢慢滴流，像现在这样，呈现在他调酒的能力，或分辨鲜为人知的格拉巴酒，或对所有的女人说话，或从世界各自寄到我家来署名给他的信封中。

I had never envied him the past, nor felt threatened by it. All these facets of his life had the mysterious character of incidents that had occurred in my father’s life long before my birth but which continued to resonate into the present. I didn’t envy life before me, nor did I ache to travel back to the time when he had been my age.

我从未嫉妒他拥有过去，也未因此感受到威胁。他人生的这些面向，和远在我出生之前、发生在我父亲生命中但至今仍回响不已的种种事件，同样具有神秘的特质。我不嫉妒在我之前的生命，也不渴望回到他与我同龄时的过去。

“Did I shock you?” asked the poet.

“我吓着你了吗？”诗人问。

“Me?” I asked, not certain why, of all people at the table, he should have addressed me.

“我？”我问，不确定为什么这么多人围在桌边，却偏偏挑我说。

There were at least fifteen of us now, and we occupied one of the large wooden rustic tables. The waiter announced last call a second time. Within ten minutes, the other customers had left. The waiter had already started lowering the metal gate, on account of because it was the closing hour of the chiusura. The jukebox was summarily unplugged. If each of us kept talking, we might be here till daybreak.

我们至少有十五个人，大伙儿占据其中一张乡村风格的大粗木桌。侍者第二次通知打烊。十分钟不到，其他客人就都离开了。侍者把金属门往下拉，因为已经到了打烊时间。点唱机插头立刻被拔掉。如果大家继续聊天，我们可能会在这里待到天亮。

Lucia stared at us. “Alfredo, I’m afraid he knows more than you know about corrupting youth. E un dissoluto assoluto,” she intoned, as always now, her hand to my cheek.

露西雅盯着我们看。“阿佛列多，恐怕他比你更了解堕落的年轻人，而且是完全放荡的那一种。”她摸着我的脸颊（至此已是她惯有的动作），慢条斯理地说。

Third last call.

第三次通知打烊。

“This poem is about one thing and one thing only,” said Straordinario-fantastico.

“这首诗是关于一件事，而且只关于一件事。”超了不起女人说。

“Listen,” interrupted the owner of the bookstore to the waiter, “why don’t you let us stay? “We’ll put the young lady in a cab when we’re done. And we’ll pay. Another round of martinis?”

书店老板制止侍者：“听我说…何不让我们继续留在这里？结束后我们会送这位小姐去坐出租车。而且我们会付钱。再让我们喝一轮马丁尼？”

“Do as you please,” said the waiter, removing his apron. He’d given up on us. “I’m going home.”

“随你们高兴。”侍者脱下围裙。他对我们绝望了。“我要回家了。”

“San Clemente is really about four — at the very least!” retorted the poet.

“《圣克雷芒》其实谈到四件事——至少至少！”诗人回嘴道。

Oliver came up to me and asked me to play something on the piano.

奥利弗走向我，要我弹几首曲子。

“What would you like?” I asked.

“你想听什么？”我问。

“Anything.”

“什么都好。”

This would be my thanks for the most beautiful evening of my life. I took a sip from my second martini, feeling as decadent as one of those jazz piano players who smoke a lot and drink a lot and are found dead in a gutter at the end of every film.

这将是我对我此生最美好的一夜表达感谢的方式。我啜了一口第二杯马丁尼，感觉像每部电影最后都有的爵士钢琴师一样堕落，磕药、酗酒、最后落得死在贫民窟。

I wanted to play Brahms. But an instinct told me to play something very quiet and contemplative. So I played one of the Goldberg Variations, which made me quiet and contemplative. There was a sigh among the fifteen or so, which pleased me, since this was my only way of repaying for this magical evening.

我本来想弹勃拉姆斯，但直觉该弹点安静而沉思的曲子。所以我弹了一段能让我安静、沉思的哥德堡变奏曲⑪。人群中传出一声叹息，我感到欣慰，因为我只能用这种方式回报这神奇的一夜。【注：⑪哥德堡变奏曲（Goldberg Viariations）为巴赫的作品。】

When I was asked to play something else, I proposed a capriccio by Brahms. They all agreed it was a wonderful idea, until the devil took hold of me and, after playing the opening bars of the capriccio, out of nowhere I started to play a stornello. The contrast caught them all by surprise and all began to sing, though not in unison, for each sang the stornello he or she knew. Each time we came to the refrain, we agreed we’d all sing the same words, which earlier that evening Oliver and I had heard Dante the statue recite. Everyone was ecstatic, and I was asked to play another, then another. Roman stornelli are usually bawdy, lilting songs, not the lacerating, heart-wrenching arias from Naples. After the third, I looked over at Oliver and said I wanted to go out to take a breath of fresh air.

有人要我弹点别的，我提议弹布拉姆斯的随想曲。他们都同意这是个好点子，直到我着了魔，弹了起始的几个小节之后，突然弹起意大利小歌谣⑫。其中的对比让他们很惊讶，大家唱了起来，尽管声音并不和谐，因为每个人唱的是他们各自所知道的意大利小歌谣。来到副歌，我们约好一起唱同样的歌词，那是傍晚时我和奥利弗听那个但丁街头艺人朗诵过的。人人浑然忘我，有人要我弹另一首，然后又是另一首。罗马的意大利小歌谣通常是淫秽、轻快的歌谣，而不是那不勒斯那种悲伤锥心的曲调。弹完第三首之后，我看了看奥利弗，说我想出去呼吸一点新鲜空气。【注：⑫意大利小歌谣（stornello）：结构简单，流行于市井的意大利民歌。】

“What is it, doesn’t he feel well?” the poet asked Oliver.

“怎么了？他不舒服吗？”诗人问奥利弗。

“No, just needs some air. Please don’t move.”

“没有，只是需要透透气。请不要动。”

The cashier leaned all the way down, and with one arm lifted up the rolling shutter. I got out from under the partly lowered shutter and suddenly felt a fresh gust of wind on the empty alley. “Can we walk a bit?” I asked Oliver.

收银小姐弯下腰来，单手抬起卷动式百叶窗。我从收拢一半的百叶窗下钻出去，感觉无人小巷吹来一阵清新的风。“我们走走好吗？”我问奥利弗。

“Bend down and stick your finger all the way inside your mouth.”

“弯腰，然后把手指往嘴里伸到底。”

“How?”

“怎么做？”

We sauntered down the dark alley, exactly like two shades in Dante, the younger and the older. It was still very hot and I caught the light from a streetlamp glistening on Oliver’s forehead. We made our way deeper into an extremely quiet alley, then through another, as if drawn through these unreal and sticky goblin lanes that seemed to lead to a different, nether realm you entered in a state of stupor and wonderment. All I heard were the alley cats and the splashing of running water nearby. Either a marble fountain or one of those numberless municipal fontanelle found everywhere in Rome.

我们顺着暗巷散步，和但丁诗里一年轻、一年长的亡灵一模一样。天气依旧炎热，我看见街灯的光芒照在奥利弗额头上。我们往鸦雀无声的小巷深处走，然后穿越另一条，仿佛受到牵引，通过这些不真实而私腻的妖精巷弄，通往一个在麻木与惊叹状态下才能进入的地狱界。我只听见小巷里的猫叫、附近流水飞溅的声音。可能是大理石喷泉，或罗马多到数不清、四处可见的市设饮水泉。

“Water,” I gasped. “I’m not made for martinis. I’m so drunk.”

“水…”我喘着气说。“马丁尼不适合我，我醉得很厉害。”

He snickered. “You look pale.”

他窃笑说：“你看起来很苍白。”

We found a garbage bin on the sidewalk. “Do it inside here.”

我们在人行道上找到一个垃圾箱。“吐在里面。”

I shook my head. No way.

我摇摇头。绝对不干。

“Best remedy is to make it happen.”

“最好的解药就是吐出来。”

“I think I’m going to be sick.”

“我好像快吐了。”

“So much for the evening’s sexual buildup.”

“今晚‘性’致培养够了。”

“You shouldn’t have had any. You had scotch, then wine, grappa, now gin.”

“你根本不该喝。你喝了威士忌，接着是葡萄酒、格拉巴酒，现在又喝琴酒。”

“They’re not shoes, they’re sandals.”

“这不是鞋，是凉鞋。”

When I looked around, I saw that I had vomited right next to the statue of the Pasquino. How like me to vomit right in front of Rome’s most venerable lampoonist.

我看看四周，发现我吐的地方紧邻帕斯基诺像⑬。在罗马最受尊敬的讽刺家正前方吐，多像我的作风。【注：⑬帕斯基诺像（Pasquino）：岁马一出土古塑像，目前安置在拿佛纳广场（Piazza Navona）区。塑像上常贴有讽刺诗文，是罗马第一尊“会说话的塑像（talking statue）”，因为人民通过它表达不满，揭露不公不义，故有此名。】

I normally resisted throwing up. But I was too ashamed to be childish now. I was also uncomfortable puking in front of him. I wasn’t even sure that Amanda had not followed us.

我通常抗拒呕吐这件事。现在却是因为太过羞耻，做不出这么幼稚的举动。在他面前吐也令我不自在。我甚至不确定阿曼达有没有跟来。

But what a solace to have my head held, what selfless courage to hold someone’s head while he’s vomiting. Would I have had it in me to do the same for him?

但有人扶着我的头，多么令人安慰。在别人吐的时候扶着他的头，这是多么无私的勇气。我能够为他做同样的事吗？

Both of us almost burst out laughing.

我们俩几乎爆笑出来。

“I think I’m done,” I said.

“我想我吐完了。”我说。

I was resisting. “It will pass. I’m sure it will.”

我抗拒。“会过去的。我确定会。”

“Don’t you chew your peas?” he asked, smiling at me.

“你豌豆都不嚼的吗？”他笑着问我。

“Let’s see if more doesn’t come out.”

“我没看还有没有。”

How I loved being made fun of that way.

我多么喜欢他这样取笑我啊

“I just hope I didn’t get your shoes dirty,” I said.

“只希望我没弄脏你的鞋。”我说。

Sure enough, another heave brought out more of tonight’s food and drink.

果然，又吐了一次，吐出更多今晚的食物和饮料。

I opened my mouth. Before I knew it I was sick as soon as he touched my uvula.

我张开嘴。他一碰到我的小舌，我还搞不清状况就吐了。

“Here, bend down, I’ll hold your head.”

“来，弯腰，我会扶住你的头。”

“Open your mouth.”

“张开你的嘴。”

We returned by another equally dark, deserted, glistening side alley, then onto via Santa Maria dell’Anima. Above us was a weak square streetlight mounted to the wall of a tiny old corner building. In the old days, they probably had a gas jet in its place. I stopped and he stopped.

我们沿着另一条同样黑暗、荒凉、闪亮的小巷回去，接着走到灵魂圣母教堂。上方，微晕的方形街灯嵌在角落老旧小屋的墙上。从前，同一个地方装的可能是煤气灯。我停下来，他也停下来。

More laughter. I washed my face and rinsed my mouth with the water of a fountain we found on our way back.

更多笑声。我洗洗脸，然后用在回程途中看到的泉水漱口。

Right before us we caught sight of the human statue of Dante again. He had removed his cape and his long black hair was all undone. He must have sweated five pounds in that costume. He was now brawling with the statue of Queen Nefertiti, also with her mask off and her long hair matted together by sweat. “I’m picking up my things tonight and good night and good riddance.”

我又看见扮演但丁的街头艺人再度出现在我们正前方。他脱了帽子，黑色的长发散开来。穿那身服装，他肯定流了五磅的汗吧。这时他正和扮演娜芙蒂蒂皇后⑭的人吵架，娜芙蒂蒂也摘下面具，头发因为汗水纠结在一起。“今晚我会去拿我的东西，晚安，离开你真是可喜可贺。”

“I swear, there were peas there that hadn’t even been bitten into and could have fed the children of India.”

“我发誓，里面有连咬都没咬过，原本可以拿去给印度小孩吃的豌豆喔。”

“Fanculo yourself, e poi t’inculo.” And so saying, Nefertiti threw a handful of coins at Dante, who ducked the coins, though one hit him on the face. “Aiiiio,” he yelped. For a moment I thought they were going to come to blows.

“操你自己吧。”娜芙蒂蒂边说边朝但丁丢了一把硬币，他躲开，不过还是有一枚打中他的脸。“唉咿唷！”他尖声叫道。我一度以为他们会打起来。【注：⑭娜芙蒂蒂皇后（Queen Nefertiti，1379—1330 B.C。）：古埃及第十八王朝阿肯那顿（Akhenaton，？—1336/1334 B.C。）的王妃。】

“Good riddance to you too, and vaffanculo.”

“彼此彼此，我操！”

“The most beautiful day of my life and I end up throwing up.” He wasn’t listening. He pressed me against the wall and started to kiss me, his hips pushing into mine, his arms about to lift me off the ground. My eyes were shut, but I knew he had stopped kissing me to look around him; people could be walking by. I didn’t want to look. Let him be the one to worry. Then we kissed again. And, with my eyes still shut, I think I did hear two voices, old men’s voices, grumbling something about taking a good look at these two, wondering if in the old days you’d ever see such a sight. But I didn’t want to think about them. I didn’t worry. If he wasn’t worried, I wasn’t worried. I could spend the rest of my life like this: with him, at night, in Rome, my eyes totally shut, one leg coiled around his. I thought of coming back here in the weeks or months to come — for this was our spot.

“在我生命中最美好的一天，我竟然吐了。”他没听。他把我压到墙上，吻我，臀部顶着我，双手几乎把我抬离地面。我闭着眼睛，但我知道他曾经为了察看四周有没有人经过而停下。我不想看。让他去担心吧。接着我们再度接吻。然后，虽然我闭着眼睛，但我确实听到两个声音，是老人家的声音，他们愤恨不平地抱怨着，说要仔细看看这两个家伙，质疑从前哪会看到这副光景。但我不理会他们。我不担心。如果他不担心，我也不担心。就让我这样过下半辈子；跟他，在夜里，在罗马，紧闭双眼，一腿缠绕着他。我考虑几星期或几个月后再度回到这里——因为这里是我们的地方。

We returned to the bar to find everyone had already left. By then it must have been three in the morning, or even later. Except for a few cars, the city was dead quiet. When, by mistake, we reached the normally crowded Piazza Rotonda around the Pantheon, it too was unusually empty. There were a few tourists lugging huge knapsacks, a few drunks, and the usual drug dealers. Oliver stopped a street vendor and bought me a Lemonsoda. The taste of bitter lemons was refreshing and made me feel better. Oliver bought a bitter orange drink and a slice of watermelon. He offered me a bite, but I said no. How wonderful, to walk half drunk with a Lemonsoda on a muggy night like this around the gleaming slate cobblestones of Rome with someone’s arm around me. We turned left and, heading toward Piazza Febo, suddenly, from nowhere, made out someone strumming a guitar, singing not a rock song, but as we got closer, an old, old Neapolitan tune. “Fenesta ca lucive.” It took me a moment to recognize it. Then I remembered.

我们回到酒吧，却发现大家都离开了。当时应该已是凌晨三点，或甚至更晚。除了几辆车之外，市区一片死寂。后来我们不小心走到万神殿附近、一向人潮拥挤的圆形建筑广场（Piazza Rotonda），那里也是不寻常地空洞洞，只有几名拖着巨大背包的旅人、为数不多的醉汉和平常就有的毒贩。奥利弗拦下街头小贩，替我买了一杯柠檬苏打。苦苦的柠檬味很清爽，让我觉得比较舒服。他还买了一杯苦橙汁、一片西瓜。他要分我吃一口，可是我没接受。多美妙啊，在这样湿热的夜晚，拿着柠檬苏打，有人搂着我，半醉地走在罗马闪闪发亮的鹅卵石路上。我们向左转，往菲波广场走，听到一阵吉他声。我们走近，发觉那人唱的不是摇滚乐，而是很老很老的那不勒斯歌谣《窗口照进来的光》。我花了好一会儿才听明白。接着我想起来了。

The song reminded him of the Israeli national anthem, he said. Or was it inspired by the Moldau? On second thought, it might have been an aria from Bellini’s Sonnambula. Warm, but still off, I said, though the song has often been attributed to Bellini. We’re clementizing, he said.

这首歌让他想起以色列国歌，他说。或许是受《伏尔塔瓦河》⑮启发？想了想，也可能出自贝里尼⑯歌剧《梦游女》（La Sannambula）中的一首咏叹调。温暖，但还是不对，我说，虽然这首歌常被归为贝里尼的作品。我们正在克雷芒化，他说。【注：⑮《伏尔塔瓦河》（Moldau）：斯美塔纳所作交响诗《我的祖国》（Má Vlast）中最有名的一段。⑯贝里尼（Vincenzo Bellini，1801—1835）：意大利歌剧作曲家。】

Mafalda had taught me that song years ago when I was a boy. It was her lullaby. I hardly knew Naples, and, other than for her and her immediate entourage, and a few casual visits to Naples with my parents, had never had contact with Neapolitans. But the strains of the doleful song stirred such powerful nostalgia for lost loves and for things lost over the course of one’s life and for lives, like my grandfather’s, that had come long before mine that I was suddenly taken back to a poor, disconsolate universe of simple folk like Mafalda’s ancestors, fretting and scurrying in the tiny vi-coli of an old Naples whose memory I wanted to share word for word with Oliver now, as if he too, like Mafalda and Manfredi and Anchise and me, were a fellow southerner whom I’d met in a foreign port city and who’d instantly understand why the sound of this old song, like an ancient prayer for the dead in the deadest of languages, could bring tears even in those who couldn’t understand a syllable.

多年前，我还是个小男孩时，玛法尔达教过我这首歌。这是她的摇篮曲。我对那不勒斯几乎一无所知，除了玛法尔达夫妇说过的事，以及随父母去过几次之外，我从来没接触过那不勒斯人。但这首悲歌的乐音，激起对逝去的爱、对人生过程中丧失的事物以及对许多生命（譬如远比我早出生的祖父）强烈的怀旧之情，这情感让我回忆起像玛法尔达的祖先那样单纯的老百姓，他们贫穷、沮丧的世界，在老那不勒斯的小巷弄（vicoli）里苦恼匆忙地生活。此刻我想一字一句与奥利弗分享他们的记忆，仿佛他也像玛法尔达、曼弗雷迪、安喀斯和我一样，都是我在异乡港市会遇见的南方老乡，能够立刻了解何以这首老歌的声音如同以最枯萎的语言为死者做的古老祷词让那些一个音节也听不懂的人热泪盈眶。

I translated the words from Neapolitan to Italian to English. It’s about a young man who passes by his beloved’s window only to be told by her sister that Nennella has died. From the mouth where flowers once blossomed only worms emerge. Farewell, window, for my Nenna can no longer look out again.

我把歌词从那不勒斯语译成意大利文，再译成英文。这首歌叙述一个年轻人经过爱人窗前，却听到她的姐妹说爱人娜娜已经死了。花朵曾经盛开的嘴里，只有虫儿探出头来。再会，窗户，因为我的娜娜再也无法往外看了。

A German tourist, who seemed all alone and quite drunk himself that night, had overheard me translating the song into English and approached us, begging in halting English to know if I could be so kind as to translate the words into German as well. Along the way to our hotel, I taught Oliver and the German how to sing the refrain, which all three of us repeated again and again, our voices reverberating in the narrow, damp alleys of Rome as each mangled his own version of Neapolitan. Finally we said goodbye to the German on Piazza Navona. On our way to our hotel, Oliver and I began to sing the refrain again, softly,

当晚某个似乎落单且醉意颇浓的德国游客听到我把歌翻译成英文，便往我们这边走来，用结结巴巴的英语问我，能不能好心把歌词也译成德文。回旅馆的路上，我教奥利弗和德国人怎么唱副歌，我们三个一次又一次重复，我们的声音在狭窄潮湿的罗马巷弄里回响，各自胡乱唱着属于自己的那不勒斯语。最后，我们在拿佛纳广场向德国人道别。往旅馆的路上，奥利弗和我又开始轻声唱起副歌。

She always wept because she slept alone,

她总因一人独眠而泣，

I can, from the distance of years now, still think I’m hearing the voices of two young men singing these words in Neapolitan toward daybreak, neither realizing, as they held each other and kissed again and again on the dark lanes of old Rome, that this was the last night they would ever make love again.

经过了这么许多年，如今我仍然觉得我听到两个年轻人在即将破晓的时候，用那不勒斯语唱这些字句的声音。他们在古罗马的暗巷里相拥，一次一次吻着彼此，不知道那是他们能够做爱的最后一夜。

“Tomorrow let’s go to San Clemente,” I said.

“明天我们去圣克雷芒吧。”我说。

“Tomorrow is today,” he replied.

“明天就是今天，”他回答。

Now she sleeps among the dead.

然此刻她与亡者同寝。