第四章: 苏菲发现怪事连连 Sophie discovers several strange things
“Ow!” she exclaimed. “I ache all over!” The voice that exclaimed was a weak, cracked piping. She put her knobby hands to her face and felt wrinkles. At that, she discovered she had been in a state of shock all yesterday. She was very angry indeed with the Witch of the Waste for doing this to her, hugely, enormously angry. “Sailing into shops and turning people old!” she exclaimed. “Oh, what I won’t do to her!”
“哎哟！”她呼喊，“我全身都痛！”尖叫声又轻又哑。她抬起关节突出的双手捂在脸上，摸到了皱纹。而且，她发现昨天一整天她都处在惊慌中。荒地女巫的所作所为真的让她很生气，十分生气，生气得不得了。“飘进店里把人变老！”她大喊，“哼，看我怎么还给你！”
When Sophie woke up, daylight was streaming across her. Since Sophie remembered no windows at all in the castle, her first notion was that she had fallen asleep trimming hats and dreamed of leaving home. The fire in front of her had sunk to rosy charcoal and white ash, which convinced her that she had certainly dreamed there was a fire demon. But her very first movements told her that there were some things she had not dreamed. There were sharp cracks from all over her body.
苏菲醒来时，阳光正照在她身上。因为苏菲记得城堡一扇窗都没有，她首先闪过的念头是自己做帽子时睡着了，还在梦中离家出走。眼前的火已经熄成红色木炭和白色炭灰，这更让她确定自己还梦见个火魔。但她刚一动身，便感到有些东西并非是做梦。她全身上下都响着刺耳的嘎吱声。
Her anger made her jump up in a salvo of cracks and creaks and hobble over to the unexpected window. It was above the workbench. To her utter astonishment, the view from it was a view of a dockside town. She could see a sloping, unpaved street, lined with small, rather poor-looking houses, and masts sticking up beyond the roofs. Beyond the masts she caught a glimmer of the sea, which was something she had never seen in her life before.
借着怒火她一跃而起，骨头响起一串噼啪嘎吱声，而后她踽踽走向意料之外的窗户。它在工作台上方。令她大吃一惊的是，窗外是一个港口小镇。她看到一条未经铺砌的斜坡的街道，街道两边的小破房，以及撑得高过屋顶的桅杆。越过桅杆，她瞥到一眼大海。她之前从未见过如此景象。
“Wherever am I?” Sophie asked the skull standing on the bench. “I don’t expect you to answer that, my friend,” she added hastily, remembering this was a wizard’s castle, and she turned round to take a look at the room.
“我在哪里？”苏菲问台上的骷髅头。“我没奢望你回答，伙计。”想起这是巫师的城堡，她立马补充，而后转过身打量房间。
It was quite a small room, with heavy black beams in the ceiling. By daylight it was amazingly dirty. The stones of the floor were stained and greasy, ash was piled within the fender, and cobwebs hung in dusty droops from the beams. There was a layer of dust on the skull. Sophie absently wiped it off as she went to peer into the sink beside the workbench. She shuddered at the pink-and-gray slime in it and the white slime dripping from the pump above it. Howl obviously did not care what squalor his servants lived in.
这是间很小的屋子，天花板上有粗重的黑色横梁。大白天里显得惊人肮脏。地上的石板污迹斑斑，滑腻不堪，炉围里面的炭灰积成了堆，蜘蛛网灰蒙蒙地挂在横梁上。骷髅头上蒙了层灰。苏菲有意无意地抹去灰尘，一边打量着工作台边上的水槽。看到水槽里的粉灰色粘液，上方水泵滴落的白色粘液，苏菲颤抖起来。哈尔显然毫不在意他的仆人住在多么肮脏的地方。
The rest of the castle seemed to be beyond one or the other of the four low black doors around the room. Sophie opened the nearest, in the end wall beyond the bench. There was a large bathroom beyond it. In some ways it was a bathroom you might find normally only in a palace, full of luxuries such as an indoor toilet, a shower stall, an immense bath with clawed feet, and mirrors on every wall. But it was even dirtier than the other room. Sophie winced form the toilet, flinched at the color of the bath, recoiled form the green weed growing in the shower, and quite easily avoided looking at her shriveled shape in the mirrors because the glass was plastered with blobs and runnels of nameless substances. The nameless substances themselves were crowded onto a very large shelf over the bath. They were in jars, boxes, tubes, and hundreds of tattered brown packets and paper bags. The biggest jar had a name. It was called DRYING POWER in crooked letters. Sophie was not sure whether there should be a D in that or not. She picked up a packet at random. It had SKIN scrawled on it, and she put it back hurriedly. Another jar said EYES in the same scrawl. A tube stated FOR DECAY.
城堡其余部分看来在房间四周的四扇黑门之后。苏菲走到工作台后的墙边，打开最近的一扇。门后是一个浴室。通常在宫殿才能看到这样奢华的浴室：内置马桶，淋浴房，蟹脚型底座的浴缸，以及满墙的镜子。但它比刚才的房间还要脏。苏菲被马桶吓退，被浴缸的颜色吓晕，被淋浴房里长满的绿草吓倒。倒是不容易看到她自己枯萎的身影，因为镜面上糊满不知什么东西，斑斑驳驳一塌糊涂。这些不知名的东西来自浴缸上的大柜子。它们装在罐子、盒子、试管，以及千百个褐色的破包裹和纸袋里。最大的罐子有名字。歪歪扭扭的字体写着“干燥分”。苏菲不确定是不是应该写作“粉”。她随手拿起个小盒子。上面潦草地写着“皮肤”，她赶快放了回去。另一个罐子也潦草地写着“眼睛”。一个试管写着“腐蚀用”。
That one opened onto a flight of rickety wooden stairs, Sophie heard someone move up there and shut the door hurriedly. It seemed only to lead to a sort of loft anyway. She hobbled to the next door. By now she was moving quite easily. She was a hale old woman, as she discovered yesterday.
这扇门后是一段晃晃悠悠的木楼梯，苏菲听到那头有人在走动，立马关上门。看起来只可能通到阁楼之类的地方。她蹒跚地走向下一扇门。此时她已经能行动自如了。正如她昨天发觉的，她是个老当益壮的老太婆。
“It seems to work too,” Sophie murmured, looking into the washbasin with a shiver. Water ran into the basin when she turned a blue-green knob that might have been brass and washed some of the decay away. Sophie rinsed her hands and face in the water without touching the basin, but she did not have the courage to use DRYING POWER. She dried the water with her skirt and then set off to the next black door.
“看样子也用得着。”苏菲喃喃说，一边颤抖地打量着洗脸池。她拧开蓝绿色的龙头———估计是铜的———水流到池子里，洗刷去一些陈渍。苏菲洗了洗手和脸，没有碰到洗脸池，但她不敢去用“干燥分”。她用裙子拭干水，向下一扇黑门进军。
The third door opened onto a poky backyard with high brick walls. It contained a big stack of logs, and higgledy-piggledy heaps of what seemed to be scrap iron, wheels, buckets, metal sheeting, wire, mounded almost to the tops of the walls. Sophie shut that door too, rather puzzled, because it did not seem to match the castle at all. There was no castle to be seen above the brick walls. They ended at the sky. Sophie could only think that this part was the round side where the invisible wall had stopped her the night before.
第三扇门打开后是一个狭小的后院，有高高的砖墙。院子里有一大捆木柴，还有一大堆废铁，轮子、水桶、金属片、电线之类乱七八糟的东西几乎堆积到墙顶。苏菲满是疑惑地关上门，因为那些东西和城堡一点不配。砖墙以上就看不到城堡了。墙外就是天空。苏菲只能想到这块地方就是昨晚她被隐形墙所挡住的转角。
She opened the fourth door and it was just a broom cupboard, with two fine but dusty velvet cloaks hanging on the brooms. Sophie shut it again, slowly. The only other door was in the wall with the window, and that was the door she had come in by last night. She hobbled over and cautiously opened that.
她打开第四扇门，发现只是个扫帚柜，两件精美却覆满灰尘的丝绒斗篷挂在扫帚上。苏菲又一次轻轻关上门。剩下的唯一一扇门在有窗的墙上，也正是她昨晚进来的门。她踽踽走了过去，小心地打开。
She stood for a moment looking out at a slowly moving view of the hills, watching heather slide past underneath the door, feeling the wind blow her wispy hair, and listening to the rumble and grind of the big black stones as the castle moved. Then she shut the door and went to the window. And there was the seaport town again. It was no picture. A woman had opened a door opposite and was sweeping dust into the street. Behind that house a grayish canvas sail was going up a mast in brisk jerks, disturbing a flock of seagulls into flying round and round against the glimmering sea.
她站了一会，望着山脉徐徐移动，看着石楠从门下滑过，感受着风吹着她的疏发，听着城堡移动时大黑石发出的隆隆吱吱声。然后她关上门，走到窗边。那边又是港口小镇的景象了。不是幻象。对面有个妇人打开门，向着街上扫地。房子后，一面灰蒙蒙的布帆正轻快地升上桅杆，惊扰了一群海鸥，它们随即在波光粼粼的海面上盘旋。
“I don’t understand,” Sophie told the human skull. Then, because the fire looked almost out, she went and put on a couple of logs and raked away some of the ash.
“我搞不明白。”苏菲对骷髅头说。炉火快要熄灭了，她添了些柴火，耙出些炭灰。
So none of it was dream. Sophie was not much given to crying, but she said in the chair for quite a while staring at a blurred and sliding fire demon, and did not pay much attention to the sounds of Michael getting up, until she found him standing beside her, looking embarrassed and a little exasperated.
一切都不是梦境。苏菲不太喜欢哭鼻子，但还是坐了老半天，瞪着模糊闪烁的火魔，没注意到麦可起床弄出的响声，等她发现时他已经站在了身旁，神情尴尬，有点恼怒。
Green flames climbed between the logs, small and curly, and shot up into a long blue face with flaming green hair. “Good morning,” said the fire demon. “Don’t forget we have a bargain.”
绿色火焰在柴火中燃起，小而蜷曲，而后蹿起化成一张蓝色的长脸。“早上好。”火魔说，“别忘了我们的交易。”
Sophie sniffed. “I’m old,” she began.
苏菲吸了吸鼻子。“我老了。”她说。
“You’re still here,” he said. “Is something the matter?”
“你还在这里。”他说，“有什么问题吗？”
But it was just as the Witch had said and the fire demon had guessed. Michael said cheerfully, “Well, it comes to us all in time. Would you like some breakfast?”
但这不正如女巫咒的和火魔猜的一样么。麦可轻松地说，“我们都会老嘛。吃早餐吗？”
Sophie discovered she was a very hale old woman indeed. After only bread and cheese at lunchtime yesterday, she was ravenous. “Yes!” she said, and when Michael went to the closet in the wall, she sprang up and peered over his shoulder to see what there was to eat.
苏菲发现自己真是个健壮的人。前一天只在中午吃了点面包奶酪，她饿坏了。“好啊！”她回答。麦可向壁柜走去，苏菲跃起身，想探看有什么吃的。
“I’m afraid there’s only bread and cheese,” Michael said rather stiffly.
“恐怕只有面包和奶酪。”麦可相当肯定地说。
Sophie turned and looked at the fire demon. He flickered back at her wickedly. “I refuse to be exploited,” he said.
苏菲转过身看着火魔。他狡黠地向她摇曳着。“我拒绝被剥削。”他说。
“But there’s a whole basket of eggs in there!” Sophie said. “And isn’t that bacon? What about a hot drink as well? Where’s your kettle?”
“可那儿有满满一篮鸡蛋！”苏菲说，“那个不是培根吗？再来点热茶怎么样？水壶在哪儿？”
“There isn’t one,” Michael said. “Howl’s the only one who can cook.”
“没有。”麦可说。“只有哈尔能煮。”
“I can cook,” said Sophie. “Unhook that frying pan and I’ll show you.”
“我能煮。”苏菲说，“把那只平底锅取下来，我煮给你看。”
“You mean,” Sophie said to Michael, “that you have to do without even a hot drink unless Howl’s here?” Michael gave an embarrassed nod. “Then you’re the one that’s being exploited!” said Sophie. “Give that here.” She wrenched the pan from Michael’s resisting fingers, plonked the bacon into it, popped a handy wooden spoon into the egg basket, and marched with the lot to the fireplace. “Now, Calcifer,” she said, “let’s have no more nonsense. Bend down your head.”
“你是说，”苏菲对麦可说，“除非哈尔在这里，不然你连一壶热饮都煮不了？”麦可尴尬地点了点头。“那你就得受剥削了！”苏菲说。“拿过来。”她从麦可抗争的手中扳过锅子，把培根扔了进去，将长柄木勺往鸡蛋篮里一插，然后提着一堆东西来到壁炉前。“好啦，卡西弗，”她说，“我们别胡闹了。把头低下。”
She reached for the large black pan hanging on the closet wall, in spite of Michael trying to prevent her. “You don’t understand,” Michael said. “It’s Calcifer, the fire demon. He won’t bend down his head to be cooked on for anyone but Howl.”
尽管麦可试图阻止，她还是够到了邻近墙上挂着的大黑锅。“你不明白。”麦可说，“那是卡西弗，是火魔。除了哈尔，他不会为任何人低头效劳的。”
“Oh, yes I can!” Sophie crackled back, with the ferocity that had often stopped both her sisters in mid-fight. “If you don’t, I shall pour water on you. Or I shall pick up the tongs and take away both your logs,” she added, as she got herself creaking onto her knees by the hearth. There she whispered, “Or I can go back on our bargain, or tell Howl about it, can’t I?”
“哈，看我能不能！”苏菲沙哑地吼道，那种凶暴劲常常用来阻止打闹的妹妹。“如果你不听话，我就用水泼你。要么我会抄起钳子拿掉木柴。”她补充说，一边嘎嘎吱吱地跪倒在壁炉边。然后又低声说，“要么我可以反悔我们的交易，或者告诉哈尔，好不好？”
“Thank you,” Sophie said, and slapped the heavy pan onto the green ring to make sure Calcifer did not suddenly rise up again.
“谢谢你。”苏菲说着，将一个重重的锅子扣压在绿色火圈上，确保卡西弗不会突然升起来。
“I hope your bacon burns,” Calcifer said, muffled under the pan.
“但愿你的培根焦掉！”卡西弗在锅子下呜咽道。
“You can’t make me!” crackled the fire demon.
“你不能强迫我！”火魔噼里啪啦大叫。
“Oh, curses!” Calcifer spat. “Why did you let her in here, Michael?” Sulkily he bent his blue face forward until all that could be seen of him was a ring of curly green flames dancing on the logs.
“啊，好一个祸害！”卡西弗唾骂道。“你干吗放她进来，麦可？”他闷闷不乐地垂下蓝脸，直到只剩下一圈卷曲的绿火苗在木柴上舞蹈。
Sophie slapped slices of bacon into the pan. It was good and hot. The bacon sizzled, and she had to wrap her skirt round her hand to hold the handle. The door opened, but she did not notice because of the sizzling. “Don’t be silly,” she told Calcifer. “And hold still because I want to break in the eggs.”
苏菲把培根摔进锅子。锅子已经烫了。培根咝咝响着，她得用裙子裹住手才握得住锅柄。门开了，但她光顾着咝咝声没有听到。“别犯傻，”她告诉卡西弗，“别动，我要打蛋了。”
“Oh, hello, Howl,” Michael said helplessly.
“啊，你好，哈尔。”麦可无助地说。
“Who on earth are you?” said Howl. “Where have I seen you before?”
“你到底是谁？”哈尔问，“我们哪儿见过？”
Sophie turned round at that, rather hurriedly. She stared. The tall young fellow in a flamboyant blue-and-silver suit who had just come in stopped in the act of leaning a guitar in the corner. He brushed the fair hair from his rather curious glass-green eyes and stared back. His long, angular face was perplexed.
听到这句话，苏菲猛然转身。她愣住了。刚进门的高个子年轻人身着华丽的银蓝套装，正将吉他靠在角落，这时也停滞了。他拨开漂亮的头发，晶莹剔透的绿眼睛充满好奇地望着她。修长的面孔棱角分明，写满困惑。
“I am a total stranger,” Sophie lied firmly. After all, Howl had only met her long enough to call her a mouse before, so it was almost true. She ought to have been thanking her stars for the lucky escape she’d had then, she supposed, but in fact her main thought was, Good gracious! Wizard Howl is only a child in his twenties, for all his wickedness! It made such a difference to be old, she thought as she turned the bacon over in the pan. And she would have died rather than let this overdressed boy know she was the girl he had pitied on May Day. Hearts and souls did not enter into it. Howl was not going to know.
“我是个彻底的陌生人。”苏菲一口咬定。毕竟，哈尔仅仅见过她一面，叫她老鼠，所以这基本上是实话。她觉着，她应该谢谢她的幸运星让她躲过一劫，但实际上她更强烈的念头是：老天！哈尔只是个二十多岁的小毛孩，却如此邪恶！人老了真是大不一样，她边想边将培根翻了个面。她宁愿死，也不想让这个盛装打扮的男孩知道她就是他在五朔节可怜过的那个女孩。这和心啊灵魂啊没关系。不能让哈尔知道。
Sophie stared at the blue jewel hanging from Howl’s ear and passed him egg after egg. “Why I came, young man?” she said. It was obvious after what she had seen of the castle. “I came because I’m your new cleaning lady, of course.”
苏菲盯着哈尔耳朵上垂下的蓝色耳环，把鸡蛋一个接一个递给他。“为什么我来，年轻人？”她见识过城堡后，答案便不言而喻了，“当然是因为我是你新来的清洁女工。”
“Not many people can do that,” Howl said thoughtfully. He popped his guitar in the corner and came over to the hearth. The smell of hyacinths mixed with the smell of bacon as he shoved Sophie firmly aside. “Calcifer doesn’t like anyone but me to cook on him,” he said, kneeling down and wrapping one trailing sleeve round his hand to hold the pan. “Pass me two more slices of bacon and six eggs please, and tell me why you’ve come here.”
“很少有人能做到。”哈尔若有所思地说。他拨了下角落里的吉他，走到壁炉边。他用力把苏菲推到一边，风信子的味道和培根的味道混合在一起。“除了我，卡西弗不喜欢其他人在他上面煮东西。”他说着，跪下来用一只垂袖裹住手去拿锅子。“请再给我两片培根，六个鸡蛋，还有告诉我你为什么来这里。”
“How did she make Calcifer bend down?” said Howl.
“她是怎么让卡西弗听话的？”哈尔问。
“She says her name’s Sophie,” Michael said. “She came last night.”
“她说她叫苏菲。”麦可说，“她昨晚来的。”
“She bullied me!” Calcifer said in a piteous, muffled voice from under the sizzling pan.
“她欺负我！”卡西弗在嘶嘶作响的锅底说道，声音哀怨呜咽。
“Are you indeed?” Howl said, cracking the eggs one-handed and tossing the shells among the logs, where Calcifer seemed to be eating them with a lot of snarling and gobbling. “Who says you are?”
“你真是吗？”哈尔问，一边单手将蛋打碎，把蛋壳扔到木柴堆中，卡西弗狼吞虎咽地吃了起来。“谁说你是的？”
Wizard Howl said nothing but “Plates, please, Michael,” and stood up holding the smoking pan. Calcifer sprang up with a roar of relief and blazed high in the chimney.
哈尔巫师只说了一句“请给我盘子，麦可”，然后站起来握住热气腾腾的锅子。卡西弗发出释然的吼叫声，在烟囱里蹿得老高，熊熊燃烧。
There were tall stools under the workbench. Michael was pulling them out to sit on and pushing aside all the things on top of it to make room for some knives and forks he had taken from the drawer in the side of it. Sophie went to help him. She had not expected Howl to welcome her, of course, but he had not even so far agreed to let her stay beyond breakfast. Since Michael did not seem to need help, Sophie shuffled over to her stick and put it slowly and showily in the broom cupboard. When that did not seem to attract Howl’s attention, she said, “You can take me on for a month’s trial, if you like.”
工作台下有高脚凳。麦可把凳子拉了出来；又把台子上的东西推向一边，为台侧抽屉取出的刀叉留出空间。苏菲过去帮他。她自然没期望哈尔欢迎她，但到目前为止，他还没答应她可以在早餐后留下。由于麦可看样子不需要帮忙，苏菲慢慢拖着步子，将她的拐杖缓缓地，故作郑重地放进扫帚柜。发现这个举动没有引起哈尔的注意，她说，“你可以试用我一个月，要是你愿意。”
“Howl’s not wicked,” Michael said.
“哈尔心眼不坏。”麦可说。
“I do,” said Sophie, and she added piously, “I can clean the dirt from this place even if I can’t clean you from your wickedness, young man.”
“我说的，”苏菲回答，又故作正经地补充，“我能扫干净这地方的灰尘，虽然我扫不净你的坏心眼，年轻人。”
“Yes I am,” Howl contradicted him. “You forget just how wicked I’m being at the moment, Michael.” He jerked his chin at Sophie. “It you’re so anxious to be of use, my good woman, find some knives and forks and clear the bench.”
“不，我坏。”哈尔反驳他，“你忘了我这会儿正使坏心眼哪，麦可。”他下巴一抬，示意苏菲，“既然你这么迫切想一展身手，好妇人，找点刀叉，腾清台子。”
Sophie made another attempt to pin the Wizard down. “If I’m going to be cleaning here for the next month,” she said, “I’d like to know where the rest of the castle is. I can only find this one room and the bathroom.”
苏菲再次试探，企图让巫师表明态度。“要是我接下来一个月都在这儿打扫，”她说，“我想熟悉下城堡的其他部分。我就只找到这个屋子和浴室。”
To her surprise, both Michael and the Wizard roared with laughter.
让她意料不到的是，麦可和巫师爆笑起来。
It was not until they had almost finished breakfast that Sophie discovered what made them laugh. Howl was not only hard to pin down. He seemed to dislike answering any questions at all. Sophie gave up asking him and asked Michael instead.
直到早餐快吃完时，苏菲才明白他们在笑什么。让哈尔表明态度很难。他似乎根本不喜欢回答问题。苏菲放弃了，转身问麦可。
“There isn’t any more of the castle,” Michael said, “except what you’ve seen and two bedrooms upstairs.”
“城堡没有其他部分了，”麦可说，“就是你看到的部分，和楼上的两间卧室。”
“Tell her,” said Howl. ‘It will stop her pestering.”
“告诉她吧，”哈尔说，“好让她停止纠缠。”
“What?” Sophie exclaimed.
“什么？”苏菲大呼。
Howl and Michael laughed again. “Howl and Calcifer invented the castle,” Michael explained, “and Calcifer keeps it going. The inside of it is really just Howl’s old house in Porthaven, which is the only real part.”
哈尔和麦可又大笑起来。“哈尔和卡西弗创造了城堡，”麦可解释说，“卡西弗维持它移动。内部其实不过是哈尔在庇护港的老房子，是唯一真实的部分。”
“But Porthaven’s miles down near the sea!” Sophie said. “I call that too bad! What do you mean by having this great, ugly castle rushing about the hills and frightening everyone in Market Chipping to death?”
“但庇护港在几英里开外的海边！”苏菲说，“这太邪恶了！你算什么意思，让这个庞大丑陋的城堡在山上跑来跑去，把齐坪镇的人都吓得半死？”
Howl shrugged. “What an outspoken old woman you are! I’ve reached that stage in my career when I need to impress everyone with my power and wickedness. I can’t have the King thinking well of me. And last year I offended someone very powerful and I need to keep out of their way.”
哈尔耸耸肩。“多么心直口快的老妇人啊！我的魔法生涯正好到了一个需要让大家见识我的能力和邪恶的阶段。我不能让国王注意到我。去年我冒犯了一个权势很大的人，我得避开他们。”
Outside stood a personage wearing a stiff white wig and a wide hat on top of that. He was clothed in scarlet and purple and gold, and he held up a little staff decorated with ribbons like an infant maypole. He bowed. Scents of cloves and orange blossom blew into the room.
门外站着一个戴白色假发的人，假发上戴着宽边帽。他浑身上下穿着红紫金三色，手持一个装饰彩带的小杖，像一根婴儿版的五朔节花柱。他鞠躬行礼。丁香与橙子的芬芳飘进房间。
Howl, who was on his way to the bathroom, went to the door instead. There was a square wooden knob above the door, set into the lintel, with a dab of paint on each of its four sides. At that moment, there was a green blob on the side that was the bottom, but Howl turned the knob around so that it had a red blob downward before he opened the door.
哈尔本要去浴室，听到这话转身走向大门。门上方有个方形木把手，安在门楣上，四面都草草上过漆。这时朝下的一面标着绿色，但哈尔转动把手，让标着红色的一面朝下时才开了门。
It seemed a funny way to avoid someone, but Sophie supposed wizards had different standards from ordinary people. And she shortly discovered that the castle had other peculiarities. They had finished eating and Michael was piling the plates on the slimy sink beside the bench when there came a loud, hollow knocking at the door.
这种躲避人的方式很好笑，但苏菲料想巫师与常人的标准有异。很快她便发现城堡还有其他古怪之处。他们吃完饭，麦可将盘子叠放在台边黏滑的水槽里，这时传来一阵响亮空洞的敲门声。
Calcifer blazed up. “Kingsbury door!”
卡西弗扬起身，“金斯伯里的门！”
“If he is, you’ll never pin him down,” Michael answered. “He hates being pinned down to anything.”
“即便他会，你也别逼他表明态度，”麦可回答，“他讨厌被逼迫。”
Behind him Sophie had glimpses of a coach waiting in a street full of sumptuous houses covered with painted carvings, and towers and spires and domes beyond that, of a splendor she had barely before imagined. She was sorry it took so little time for the person at the door to hand over a long, silken, chinking purse, and for Howl to take the purse, bow back, and shut the door. Howl turned the square knob back so that the green blob was downward again and stowed the long purse in his pocket. Sophie saw Michael’s eyes follow the purse in an urgent, worried way.
苏菲瞥见他身后马车停靠的街道满是奢华的房子，饰满了精美雕塑，以及塔楼、尖顶和穹顶，那是她从来都没想象到的壮观景象。那人呈上叮当作响的丝质长钱袋，哈尔接过钱袋，鞠躬回礼，关门，整个过程那么短暂，让她有些遗憾。哈尔转回方形把手，让绿标一面重新向下，把长长的钱包放进口袋。苏菲看见麦可以急切而担忧的眼神盯着钱包。
“His Majesty the King presents his compliments and sends payment for two thousand pair of seven-league boots,” this person said.
“国王殿下致以问候，送来两千双七里靴的款项。”这人说道。
Sophie could not restrain her curiosity. “Whoever was that at the door?” she asked Michael. “Or do I mean wherever?”
苏菲压抑不住她的好奇。“门口那人是谁？”她问麦可，“或者说那是哪里？”
“That door gives on Kingsbury,” Michael said, “where the King lives. I think that man was the Chancellor’s clerk. And,” he added worriedly to Calcifer, “I do wish he hadn’t given Howl all that money.”
“那扇门通向金斯伯里，”麦可说，“国王住的地方。我觉得那人是总理的办事员。还有，”他担心地对卡西弗说，“我真希望他没把那些钱给哈尔。”
Howl went straight to the bathroom then, calling out, “I need hot water in here, Calcifer!” and was gone for a long, long time.
哈尔径直走去浴室，喊道，“我需要热水，卡西弗！”而后待了很久，很久。
“Is Howl going to let me stay here?” Sophie asked.
“哈尔会让我待在这里吗？”苏菲问。
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