The start, I think I know too well. It is the first of my mistakes.
在我的最初，我想我非常了解。那是我第一个错误。
I imagine a table, slick with blood. The blood is my mother’s. There is too much of it. There is so much of it, I think it runs, like ink. I think, to save the boards beneath, the women have set down china bowls; and so the silences between my mother’s cries are filled — drip drop! drip drop! — with what might be the staggered beating of clocks. Beyond the beat come other, fainter cries: the shrieks of lunatics, the shouts and scolds of nurses. For this is a madhouse. My mother is mad. The table has straps upon it to keep her from plunging to the floor; another strap separates her jaws, to prevent the biting of her tongue; another keeps apart her legs, so that I might emerge from between them. When I am born, the straps remain: the women fear she will tear me in two! They put me upon her bosom and my mouth finds out her breast. I suck, and the house falls silent about me. There is only, still, that falling blood — drip drop! drip, drop! — the beat telling off the first few minutes of my life, the last of hers. For soon, the clocks run slow. My mother’s bosom rises, falls, rises again; then sinks for ever.
在我的想象中，有一张桌子，桌上都是血。我母亲的血。好多血，那么多血，多到令我觉得，那血如墨水般流动起来了。我想，为保护桌下地板，一个女人在下面放了个瓷碗，如此一来，我母亲惨叫的间隙也不平静了——滴答，滴答——那是血滴落的声音，如同机械交错的钟摆声。滴答声之外，有隐约的哭喊，那是疯子在尖叫，护士在呼喝怒斥。这是一座疯人院。我母亲是个疯子。那桌上有皮带，以防她挣扎着跳到地上；还有一条皮带捆住了她的嘴和下巴，免得她咬自己舌头；另一条带子把她的腿分开，好让我从他们中间出来。我出生的时候，母亲就被皮带绑起来了，她们怕她把我扯成两半。她们把我放在母亲胸前，我的小嘴寻找到母亲的乳房，我吮吸起来，屋里顿时安静下来，只有那个声音，母亲的血滴落的声音——滴答，滴答——这节奏宣告了我生命的起点，和母亲生命的终点。因为随即，滴答的节奏减慢了。我母亲的胸脯升起，落下，又升起；又落下——永远地落下了。
I feel it, and suck harder. Then the women pluck me from her. And when I weep, they hit me.
我感觉到了，我吮吸的更用力，她们把我从她身上抱开。我哇哇大哭，她们就打我。
I pass my first ten years a daughter to the nurses of the house. I believe they love me. There is a tabby cat upon the wards, and I think they keep me, rather as they keep that cat, a thing to pet and dress with ribbons. I wear a slate-grey gown cut like their own, an apron and a cap; they give me a belt with a ring of miniature keys upon it, and call me “little nurse”. I sleep with each of them in turn, in their own beds, and follow them in their duties upon the madhouse wards. The house is a large one — seems larger to me, I suppose — and divided in two: one side for female lunatics, one side for male. I see only the female. I never mind them. Some of them kiss and pet me, as the nurses do. Some of them touch my hair and weep. I remind them of their daughters. Others are troublesome, and these I am encouraged to stand before and strike with a wooden wand, cut to my hand, until the nurses laugh and say they never saw anything so droll.
作为疯人院护士们的女儿，我度过了生命中的头十年。我相信她们是爱我的。病区里有只虎斑猫，我想她们看待我，如同看待那只猫，用丝带打扮一下，把我当宠物养着。我穿着蓝灰色袍子，式样跟她们的一样，再围上围裙，戴顶护士帽。她们给我一条带子，上面有个钥匙环儿，拴着些小钥匙，她们还叫我“小护士”。护士们轮流带我睡觉，她们在病区值班，我就在后边跟着。疯人院很大——我觉得，对幼小的我而言，似乎更大——病区分成两半，一边关女疯子，一边关男疯子。我只能看到女疯子，我从不把她们当回事儿。有的疯子会象护士一样，亲我抱我；有的疯子会抚摸着我的头发，涕泪横流。我让她们想起她们的女儿。也有些疯子很难伺候，护士们叫我勇敢地面对她们，还给我一根趁手的木棍教训她们，看到我教训疯子，护士们笑做一团，说从没见过这么滑稽的事。
So we believe, at nine and ten. Some time in my eleventh year, I am summoned to the nurses’ parlour by the matron of the house. I imagine she means to make me some treat. I am wrong. Instead, she greets me strangely, and will not meet my eye. There is a person with her — a gentleman, she says — but then, the word means little to me. It will mean more, in time.
在我九、十岁的年纪，护士们和我都坚信这一点。十一岁时的某天，我被护士长叫到办公室。我以为她要给我开小灶。我想错了。她没给我开小灶，而是不同寻常地问候我，却并不看我的眼睛。她旁边还有个人——她说是一位绅士——不过当时，这个词语对我来说无关紧要。很快，这个词对我就意味深长了。
Thus I learn the rudiments of discipline and order; and incidentally apprehend the attitudes of insanity. This will all prove useful, later. When I am old enough to reason I am given a gold ring said to be my father’s, the portrait of a lady called my mother, and understand I am an orphan; but, never having known a parent’s love — or rather, having known the favours of a score of mothers — I am not greatly troubled by the news. I think the nurses clothe and feed me, for my own sake. I am a plain-faced child but, in that childless world, pass for a beauty. I have a sweet singing voice and an eye for letters. I suppose I shall live out all my days a nurse, contentedly teasing lunatics until I die.
由此，我学到纪律和秩序的雏形，顺理成章地，我领会到对待疯子的态度。这些都很有用，后来都用上了。等我年岁成长，心智渐开，她们给我一个金质项圈，据说是我父亲的，里面有我母亲的小画像，于是我明白了，我是个孤儿；不过，从未领略过双亲挚爱——又或许，是从众位母亲身上领略到太多宠溺——我并未因此感到烦恼困惑。我想护士们供我穿衣吃饭，就是出于喜爱我。我是个相貌平常的孩子，然而，在那个没有儿童的世界里，我被当成个小美人。我有歌声般甜美的声音，还有一双能识文断字的眼睛。我曾以为，我要一辈子做护士，安心情愿地戏弄着那些疯子，以此终老。
“That will do,” he says, raising his hand. Then: “I hope you can whisper? I hope you can nod?”
“好了好了。”他抬起手说道。然后他又说：“我希望你说话能轻一点，我希望你能点头？”
“She’s undersize,” he says; “but makes enough noise with her feet, for all that. How’s her voice?”
“她人虽小，”他说道；“走路动静倒不小。她声音怎么样？”
“I am very well,” I say. Perhaps I speak stoutly. The gentleman winces.
“我非常好，”我说道。或许是我语气太坚决，这位绅士惊得缩了一下。
“Step closer,” the matron says. The gentleman watches. He wears a suit of black, and a pair of black silk gloves. He holds a cane with an ivory knob, upon which he leans, the better to study me. His hair is black tending to white, his cheek cadaverous, his eyes imperfectly hidden by a pair of coloured glasses. An ordinary child might shrink from gazing at him; but I know nothing of ordinary children, and am afraid of no-one. I walk until I stand before him. He parts his lips, to pass his tongue across them. His tongue is dark at the tip.
“走近点，”护士长说道。绅士在一旁看着。他穿黑色套装，戴一双黑色丝手套，手持一根象牙把手的手杖，人斜斜地支在手杖上。他头发黑白相杂，面颊苍白，双眼完全隐没在一副墨水镜后面。普通人家的小孩见到他，难免心生畏惧，可我不是普通人家的小孩，我无所畏惧。我径直走到他面前，他张开嘴，舌头舔了一下嘴唇，他舌头尖上是黑的。
His own voice is low, tremulous, complaining, like the shadow of a shivering man.
他语音低沉震颤，语气幽怨，仿佛瑟瑟发抖的人影。
“I can.”
“我能。”
“Say a word to the gentleman,” says the matron quietly. “Say how you are.”
“跟这位绅士说句话吧，”护士长静静说道。“说你好不好？”
I nod. “Oh yes.”
我点头。“哦，是的。”
“I hope you can be silent?”
“我希望你能安静点？”
The matron colours. “It has been a harmless sport of the women, sir, to keep her dressed in the costume of the house.”
护士长脸上变了颜色。“先生，这是护士们拾掇着玩的，让她跟这里人穿的一样，没坏处的。”
“Have I paid you, to provide sport for nurses?”
“我付钱给你，就是让护士们拾掇着玩？”
He moves his stick upon the rug, and works his jaws. He turns again to me, but speaks to her. He says, “How well does she read? How fair is her hand? Come, give her a piece of text and let her demonstrate.”
他手杖在地毯上点了点，动了动下巴。他又转向我，嘴里还在跟护士长说话。他说道，“她读书如何？她的手漂亮吗？来，给她一段文章，让她念给我听听。”
“Be silent, then.– That’s better.” He turns to the matron. “I see she wears her mother’s likeness. Very good. It will remind her of her mother’s fate, and may serve to keep her from sharing it. I don’t care at all for her lip, however. It is too plump. It has a bad promise. Likewise her back, which is soft, and slouches. And what of her leg? I shan’t want a thick-legged girl. Why do you hide her leg behind so long a skirt? Did I ask for that?”
“那就安静点。——这样好多了。”他转过去朝着护士长。“我看她样貌跟她母亲一样。很好。这能时刻提醒她，她母亲的厄运，也免她重蹈覆辙。她嘴唇太丰满，食言而肥，不过我丝毫不介意。还有她的后背，软绵绵的，太懒散了。她的腿是怎么回事？我可不想要个粗腿姑娘。你为什么要把她的腿藏在那么长的裙子里边？我这么要求过吗？”
The matron hands me an open Bible. I read a passage from it, and again the gentleman winces. “Softly!” he says, until I speak it in a murmur. Then he has me write the passage out while he looks on.
护士长递给我一本打开的《圣经》。我念了一段，绅士又被惊得缩了一下。“轻点！轻点！”他不停地说道，直到我喃喃低语。然后他让我把那段写下来，他在旁边看着。
I am also pleased. I understand from his words that I have marked the paper with the marks of angels. Later I will wish that I had scrawled and blotted the page. The fair characters are my undoing. The gentleman leans harder upon his stick and tilts his head so low I can see, above the wire of his spectacles, the bloodless rims of his eyes.
我也颇感愉快，从他的话语中，我领会到，我写在纸张上的字迹，犹如天使字迹般美好。而后来，我宁愿此刻我写的都是鬼画符，把纸搞的墨迹斑斑，一塌糊涂。美好的字迹正是我悲剧的缘起。这位绅士重重地倚在手杖上，头低下来，在他眼睛腿儿后面，我都能看到他那没有血色的眼眶。
“Well, miss,” he says, “how should you like to come and live in my house? Don’t push your pert lip at me, mind! How should you like to come to me, and learn neat ways and plain letters?”
“好的，小姐，他说道。”你愿意跟我走，住到我家里吗？注意，不要冲我撅嘴巴！没礼貌。你愿意跟我走，学着知书达礼吗？
“A girl’s hand,” he says, when I have finished, “and burdened with serifs.” But he sounds pleased, nonetheless.
等我写完，他说道，“女孩子的手，压印刷线太用力了。”他嘴上虽这么说，语气却颇愉快。
The matron says, “For shame, Maud!”
护士长说道，“真丢人，莫德！”
He might have struck me. “I should like it not at all,” I say at once.
他有点惹恼我了。“我压根就不想去。”我当即回道。
The gentleman snorts. “Perhaps,” he says, “she has her mother’s unlucky temper after all. She has her dainty foot, at least. So you like to stamp, miss? Well, my house is a large one. We shall find a room for you to stamp in, far away from my fine ears; and you may work yourself into fits there, no-one shall mind you; and perhaps we shall mind you so little we shall forget to feed you, and then you shall die. How should you like that — hmm?”
这位绅士鼻子嗤了一声。“也许，”他说道，“她遗传了她母亲不祥的性情，她至少遗传了她秀丽的脚。所以你就喜欢跺脚，是吗？好的，我的房子很大，我们可以在远离我灵敏双耳的地方，给你找个房间，随你跺脚。你可以让自己融入那儿，适应那儿，没人会注意到你；或许我们应该注意到你，你这么小，我们可能会忘了喂你吃饭，然后你就会饿死。你以为如何？嗯？”
He rises and dusts down his coat, that has no dust upon it. He gives some instruction to the matron and does not look at me again. When he has gone, I take up the Bible I have read from and throw it to the floor.
他站起来，掸掸外套上的灰尘，外套上其实没有灰。他给护士长做指示，再没看我一眼。等他走了，我把刚才念的《圣经》抓起来扔到地上。
“I will not go!” I cry. “He shall not make me!”
“我才不去！”我叫道。“他支使不了我！”
The matron draws me to her. I have seen her take a whip to fractious lunatics, but now she clutches me to her apron and weeps like a girl, and tells me gravely what my future is to be, in the house of my uncle.
护士长把我拽到自己跟前。我曾见过她对狂躁的疯子抡鞭子，而此时，她把我捂在身前的围裙里，象个姑娘一样哭哭啼啼，神色严峻地跟我说，在我舅父的家里，我的未来会如何。
Some men have farmers raise them veal-calves. My mother’s brother has had the house of nurses raise him me. Now he means to take me home and make me ready for the roast.
有些人要吃小牛肉，就让农夫为他们饲养小牛。我母亲的兄长让疯人院的护士为他养育我。现在他要带我回家，准备让我任他宰割。
All at once, I must give up my little madhouse gown, my ring of keys, my wand: he sends his housekeeper with a suit of clothes, to dress me to his fancy. She brings me boots, wool gloves, a gown of buff — a hateful, girlish gown, cut to the calf, and stiffened from the shoulder to the waist with ribs of bone. She pulls the laces tight and, at my complaints, pulls them tighter. The nurses watch her, sighing. When it comes time for her to take me, they kiss me and hide their eyes. Then one of them quickly puts a pair of scissors to my head, to take a curl of hair to keep inside a locket; and, the others seeing her do that, they seize the shears from her, or take up knives and scissors of their own, and pluck and grasp at me until my hair tears at the root. They reach and squabble over the falling tresses like gulls — their voices rousing the lunatics in their own close rooms, making them shriek.
忽然间，我得脱下我的小袍子，放下我的钥匙环，我的小木棍：他交给他女管家一套衣裳，叫她把我打扮成他喜欢的样子。她给我带来靴子，羊毛手套，和一件浅黄色袍子——一件可恨的、女里女气的袍子，裙摆裁到小腿，袍子从肩膀到腰的部分被骨片撑的硬邦邦。女管家带子拽的太紧，我抱怨起来，他拽的更紧了。护士们望着她，叹着气。到她要带我走的时候，护士们过来亲我，眼睛躲闪着，不敢看我。然后，其中一个护士迅速拿出一把剪刀，举到我头上，剪下我一绺头发装进一个小盒子里；这一来，别的护士见了，她们夺过她的剪刀，或者掏出自己的小刀和剪子，又揪又拽，又割又剪，直到我的头发见了根儿。掉落的发丝也令她们纷纷伸出手来你争我夺，吵吵闹闹不亦乐乎，象争食的海鸥一样——她们的吵闹让关在病房里疯子们激动无比，疯子们也尖叫起来。
My uncle’s servant hurries me from them. She has a carriage with a driver. The madhouse gate shuts hard behind us.
我舅舅的仆人赶忙把我从她们身边抢过来。她带来一辆马车和一个车夫。疯人院的大门在我们身后重重关上。
I will not speak to her. My strait gown cuts me and makes my breath come quick, and my boots chafe at my ankles. My wool gloves prickle — at last I tear them from my hands. She watches me do it, complacently. “Got a temper, have you?” she says. She has a basket of knitting and a parcel of food. There are bread rolls, a packet of salt and three white eggs, boiled hard. She rolls two of the eggs across her skirt, to break their shells. The flesh inside is grey, the yolk as dry as powder. I will remember the scent of it. The third egg she places on my lap. I will not eat it, but let it jerk there until it falls upon the carriage floor and is spoiled. “Tut tut,” she says at that. She takes out her knitting, then her head droops and she sleeps. I sit beside her, stiff, in a miserable rage. The horse goes slowly, the journey seems long. Sometimes we pass through trees. Then my face shows in the window-glass, dark as blood.
我是不会跟她讲话的。我的新袍子太窄，箍得我呼吸急促，靴子磨脚，羊毛手套扎手——最后我摘下手套。她颇为得意地看着我这么做。“发脾气了，是不是？”她说道。她有个装毛线活儿的篮子和一包吃的。那些吃的是面包卷儿，一小袋盐和三个煮鸡蛋。她把两个鸡蛋放在裙子上滚了滚，磕破蛋壳儿。蛋壳儿里的蛋青是灰白色的，蛋黄煮的太干，都成了粉末样儿。那气味我永志不忘。她把第三个鸡蛋放在我腿上。我是不会吃这个蛋的，只让鸡蛋在我裙子上摇摇晃晃，直到蛋摔到地上，弄脏了马车地板。“哎，哎，”她见状说道。她取出毛线活儿，织了一会儿头就垂下来，她睡着了。我坐在她身边，心中悲愤难抑。马走的很慢，旅程似乎颇为漫长。有时我们穿过树林。这时，我看见我的脸在车窗玻璃上的倒影，昏暗如血。
“What a place to raise a girl in!” she says, passing a handkerchief across her lip.
“在这么个鬼地方养育小姑娘！”她说着，拿出一块手帕按在嘴上。
The carriage stops at a door, split down the middle into two high, bulging leaves: as we watch, they are tugged from within and seem to tremble. The man who opens them is dressed in dark silk breeches and what I take to be a powdered hat.
马车在一个门口停下来，高高拱起的大门从正中间缓缓开启：我们注视着门，那门被人从里面吃力地拖动着，似乎还有些抖。开门的男人身穿黑色丝绸马裤，戴着顶扑了粉的帽子。
I have seen no house but the madhouse I was born in. I am used to grim-ness and solitude, high walls and shuttered windows. It is the stillness of my uncle’s house that bewilders and frightens me, that first day.
除了我出生的那座疯人院，我再没见过其他房子。我习惯了疯人院里的严酷无情和孤立隔绝，习惯了高墙，紧闭的窗户。到舅舅家的第一天，那宅子的巍然架势就把我镇住了，令我惊惧交加。
“That’s Mr Way, your uncle’s steward,” says the woman, her face beside mine. Mr Way observes me, then looks at her; I think she must make some gesture with her eyes. The driver puts the steps down for us, but I will not let him take my hand; and when Mr Way makes me a bow, I think he does it to tease — for I have many times seen nurses curtsey, laughing, to lady lunatics. He shows me past him, into a darkness that seems to lap at my buff gown.
“那是魏先生，你舅舅的管家，”那女人说道，她脸凑到我的脸旁边。魏先生观察着我，又看看她；我想她肯定使了什么眼色。车夫为我们放下踏步，不过我才不让他碰我的手呢；魏先生向我鞠躬，我想他这么做纯粹出于揶揄——因为有许多次，我看到护士们嬉笑着给女疯子行屈膝礼。他示意我从他面前走过去，走进漆黑的屋子，我浅黄色的袍子好象被黑暗淹没了似的。
When he closes the door, the dark at once grows deeper. My ears feel full, as if with water or with wax. That is the silence, that my uncle cultivates in his house, as other men grow vines and flowering creepers.
当他关上大门，那片漆黑立时更加深沉了，我感觉耳朵里满满当当的，仿佛被注入了水或蜡。那是寂静，是我舅舅在他家里精心营造的寂静，正如别的男人在家里养葡萄藤和会开花的爬山藤一样。
“Why do they watch?” I say to the woman.
“他们看什么？”我对那女人说道。
“Come up, child,” says the woman when I do that; and now when she puts her hand upon me, I let it stay there. We climb two flights. I grow more frightened, the higher we go. For the house seems awful to me — the ceilings high, the walls not like the smooth undecorated walls of the madhouse, but filled with portraits, shields and rusting blades, creatures in frames and cases. The staircase turns upon itself, to make a gallery about the hall; at every turning there are passages. In the shadows of these, pale and half-hidden — like expectant grubs, in the cells of a hive — there stand servants, come to see me make my progress through the house.
“起来，孩子，”我摔倒时，那女人说道；此时她手放在我身上，我就不再挣脱了。我们走了两段楼梯，越走越高，我越来越害怕——天花板高高在上，那墙壁跟疯人院里光秃秃、未经装饰的墙完全不同，挂满了肖像，盾牌，生锈的刀剑，还有摆着动物标本的支架和盒子。楼梯盘旋而上，把大厅四周变成了画廊。每个转弯处都有走廊，在走廊的阴暗处，有些面容苍白的仆人站在那儿，半个身子隐没在黑暗里——就好象蜂巢里待孵化的蜂蛹——探头探脑地张望着，看着我行进在这个房子里。
I do not know them for servants, however. I see their aprons and suppose them nurses. I think the shadowy passages must hold rooms, with quiet lunatics.
而我不知道他们是仆人。我看到他们的围裙，还以为他们是护士。我想那些阴森的走廊里肯定有好多房间，关着安静的疯子。
The woman takes me up a staircase while Mr Way looks on. The stairs are not quite even, and the rug is sometimes torn: my new boots make me clumsy, and once I fall.
那女人带我走上楼，魏先生在一旁看着。楼梯台阶不是很平，地毯不时绊到我，新靴子让我走起来很笨拙，我还摔倒了一回。
“Why, to see your face,” she answers. To see if you turned out handsome as your mother.”
“看什么，看你，”她答道。“看你是不是生的跟你母亲一样漂亮。”
The windows rattle as if battered by fists. They are chill rooms even in summer, and it is winter now. I go to the little fire — I am too small to see my face in the glass above — and stand and shiver.
窗户在咔哒作响，仿佛被拳头敲打着。即使在夏季，这房间里也很冷，而现在是冬天。我走近燃着小火的壁炉——我个子太小，够不着壁炉上的镜子，看不到自己的脸——站在那儿，瑟瑟发抖。
“Should have kept your mittens,” says the woman, seeing me breathe upon my hands.
见我往手里呵气，那女人说道，“应该戴着你的毛手套。”
“I have twenty mothers,” I say at that; “and am handsomer than any of them.”
“我有二十个母亲，”我闻言说道；“我比她们都漂亮。”
The woman has stopped before a door. “Handsome is as handsome does,” she says. “I mean your proper mother, that died. These were her rooms, and are now to be yours.”
那女人停在一扇门前。“人漂亮是因为举止漂亮。”她说道。“我是说你死去的亲生母亲。这就是她的房间，现在是你的了。”
“Mr Inker’s daughter shall have those.” She takes my cloak from me, then draws the ribbons from my hair and brushes it with a broken comb. “Tug all you like,” she says as I pull away. “It shall only hurt you, it shan’t harm me. Why, what a business those women made of your head! Anyone would have supposed them savages. How I’m to see you neat, after their work, I can’t say. Now, look here.” She reaches beneath the bed. “Let’s see you use your chamber-pot. Come along, no foolish modesty. Do you think I never saw a little girl lift up her skirts and piddle?”
她取下我的斗篷，说道，“这个可以给英克尔先生的女儿穿。”她又结开我的发带，用一把缺了齿的梳子给我梳头。当我推开她时，她说道，“想推就推吧，这样只会伤害到你自己，又伤不到我。怎么搞的，这些女人把你脑袋搞成什么样了！谁见了都会以为她们是蛮子。她们把你搞成这样，我怎么才能看到你整齐的样子？这可真没法说。好，看这个。”她钻到床下。“让我们看看你的夜壶。过来，别傻瓜样儿的扭扭捏捏了。你以为我没见过小姑娘撩开裙子解手吗？”
She takes me into the chamber beyond, and then into the dressing-room that joins it.
她把我领进屋，然后又领进旁边的更衣室。
“I saw them do this for your mother, when I was parlourmaid here,” she says, pulling me about. “She was a deal gratefuller than you are. Didn’t they teach you manners, in that house of yours?”
“我还在这儿当礼宾女仆的时候，就见过他们这样帮你母亲洗漱。”她说道，“她比你还难伺候，他们在那个疯人院里没教过你，在你房间里该有什么规矩吗？”
I long for my little wooden wand: I would show her all I’d learned of manners, then! But I have observed lunatics, too, and know how to struggle while only seeming to stand limp. At length she steps from me and wipes her hands.
我渴望我的小木棍在手边，那我能让她尝尝我都学了些什么规矩！不过我也留意过疯子们，我知道如何佯装放低身段，伺机抗争。最后她终于擦着手从我身边走开。
She folds her arms and watches me, and then she wets a cloth with water and washes my face and hands.
她双臂叠在胸前，望着我，然后用水打湿一块布，给我洗脸洗手。
There has come the stifled ringing of a bell, three times. It is a clock; I understand it, however, as a signal to the house, for I have been raised to the sound of similar bells, that told the lunatics to rise, to dress, to say their prayers, to take their dinners. I think, Now I shall see them!, but when we go from the room the house is still and quiet as before. Even the watchful servants have retired. Again my boots catch on the carpets.
这时，一阵喑哑钟声传来，钟声响过三下。那是个时钟；而我将此理解为给屋子里人发信号，因为我听类似声音成长起来，钟声告诉疯子们，起床，穿衣裳，做祷告，吃晚饭。而此刻，我以为，就要看到疯子们了！可当我们走出房间，宅子里跟先前一样冷清寂静，连张望我的仆人都不在了，都休息去了。我的靴子又绊到地毯上。
“I don’t want to be a lady!” I say. “My uncle cannot make me.”
“我不想做大家闺秀！”我说道。“我舅舅支使不了我。”
“Lord, what a child! I hope your uncle knows his business, bringing you here. He seems to think he’ll make a lady of you.”
“神啊，这孩子！你舅舅带你来这儿，我希望知道他自己在干什么，他似乎想把你调教成大家闺秀呢！”
“I should say he can do what he likes, in his own house,” she answers. “There now! How late you’ve made us.”
“我得说，在他家里，他想干什么就干什么。”她答道。“都这会儿了！你把我们耽搁到这么晚！”
“Walk softly!” says the woman in a whisper, pinching my arm. “Here’s your uncle’s room, look.”
“走路轻点！”那女人攥住我的胳膊低声说道。“这是你舅舅的房间，瞧。”
“So, miss,” he says, stepping towards me, moving his jaw. The woman makes a curtsey. “How is her temper, Mrs Stiles?” he asks her.
他朝我走过来，动动下巴说道，“那么，小姐，她脾气如何？斯黛尔太太？”他问道。
She knocks, then takes me in. He has had paint put on the windows years before, and the winter sun striking the glass, the room is lit strangely. The walls are dark with the spines of books. I think them a kind of frieze or carving. I know only two books, and one is black and creased about the spine — that is the Bible. The other is a book of hymns thought suitable for the demented; and that is pink. I suppose all printed words to be true ones.
她敲门，随后带我进去。多年前，他就把窗玻璃漆上了，冬日太阳照在玻璃上，房间里浸着奇异的光线。墙壁上黑压压的都是书。我以为那都是一种中楣或者雕饰。我只认识其中两本书，一本书脊皱着的黑皮书——那是《圣经》。另一本是赞美诗集，粉色的，人们认为适合给狂躁病人看。我以为印在书上的话都是真的。
The woman sets me very near the door and stands at my back, her hands like claws upon my shoulders. The man they have called my uncle rises from behind his desk; its surface is hidden by a mess of papers. Upon his head is a velvet cap with a swinging tassel on a fraying thread. Before his eyes is another, paler, pair of coloured glasses.
那女人让我挨着门站好，她站在我身后，手象鸡爪一样抓着我肩膀；被他们称为“你舅舅”的那个男人，从他书桌后面站起来，书桌上到处是成堆的纸。他头戴一顶绒帽，帽上悬着一根磨得起毛儿的绳，绳端系了束流苏。他眼睛上戴着另一副颜色稍淡的墨水镜。
“Rather ill, sir.”
“很不好，先生。”
“I can see it, in her eye. Where are her gloves?”
“我看得出，从她的眼睛里。她的手套呢？”
“Threw them aside, sir. Wouldn’t have them.”
“扔到一边儿了，先生。不肯戴手套。”
My uncle comes close. “An unhappy beginning. Give me your hand, Maud.”
我舅舅走近了，“令人不快的开始，把手给我，莫德。”
I will not give it. The woman catches my arm about the wrist and lifts it. My hand is small, and plump at the knuckles. I am used to washing with madhouse soap, which is not kind. My nails are dark, with madhouse dirt. My uncle holds my finger-ends. His own hand has a smear or two of ink upon it. He shakes his head.
我才不会把手给他。那女人抓住我胳膊，掰着我的手腕，把我的手拽出来。我的手很小，肥肥的指节上有肉窝。我以前用疯人院的劣质肥皂洗手。我指甲里是黑的，那是疯人院里带出来的泥。我舅舅拈着我的手指，他手上有一两块墨水印。他摇摇头。
“Now, did I want a set of coarse fingers upon my books,” he says, “I should have had Mrs Stiles bring me a nurse. I should not have given her a pair of gloves, to make those coarse hands softer. Your hands I shall have soft, however. See here, how we make children’s hands soft, that are kept out of their gloves.” He puts his own hand to the pocket of his coat, and uncoils from it — one of those things, that bookmen use — a line of metal beads, bound tight with silk, for keeping down springing pages. He makes a loop of it, seeming to weigh it; then he brings it smartly down upon my dimpling knuckles. Then, with Mrs Stiles’s assistance, he takes my other hand and does the same to that. The beads sting like a whip; but the silk keeps the flesh from breaking. At the first blow I yelp, like a dog — in pain, in rage and sheer astonishment. Then, Mrs Stiles releasing my wrists, I put my fingers to my mouth and begin to weep.
“瞧，我怎能这双粗糙的手染指我的书？”他说道，“我应该叫斯黛尔太太帮我找个保姆。我不该给她手套，让这些粗糙的手指变的细腻。不过，我还是会把你的手变细腻的。瞧这儿，我们怎么才能不用手套，又能让儿童双手细腻呢？”他手伸进外套口袋，掏出一样东西——那是藏书家们用的一种家什——一根穿着金属珠子的绳子，珠子上紧紧包着丝线，这可以压住飞起的书页。他把这绳子挽了个环儿，拿在手中掂量了一下；然后挥着它，又准又狠地抽到我长着肉窝的手指上；在斯黛尔太太的协助下，他又抽了我另一只手。那串珠子如同一根鞭子，而包在珠子外面的丝线可以防止皮开肉绽。抽第一下，我象只小狗一样叫起来——为了疼痛，愤怒，和震惊。这时，斯黛尔太太放开我的手腕，我把手指放到嘴边，哇哇大哭起来。
“Well,” he says quietly. “You shan’t forget the gloves in future, hmm?”
“好了，”他轻轻说道。“以后你还会忘记戴手套，嗯？”
“Keep silence, girl!” he says. I shake and cannot. Mrs Stiles pinches the flesh of my shoulder, and that makes me cry harder. Then my uncle draws forth the beads again; and at last I grow still.
“安静！姑娘！”他说道。我摇头，抑制不住地哭叫。斯黛尔太太掐了一下我肩膀，却让我哭的更凶了。这时，我舅舅又要掏出那串珠子，我终于停住了。
Mrs Stiles makes a curtsey and — under cover of plucking my trembling shoulder as if to keep it from falling into a slouch — gives me another pinch. The yellow window grows bright, then dim, then bright again, as the wind sends clouds across the sun.
斯黛尔太太行了个屈膝礼，又掐了我一下。天上流云蔽日，黄色的窗玻璃时明时暗，不停变幻。
My uncle winces at the sound. He returns the beads to his pocket and his hands flutter towards his ears.
我舅舅被我的哭声惊得退了一步，他把那串珠子放回口袋，手捂住耳朵。
I shake my head. He almost smiles. He looks at Mrs Stiles. “You’ll keep my niece mindful of her new duties? I want her made quite tame. I can’t have storms and tantrums, here. Very well.” He waves his hand. “Now, leave her with me. Don’t stray too far, mind! You must be in reach of her, should she grow wild.”
我摇头，他几乎要笑了。他望着斯黛尔太太。“你会让我外甥女时刻不忘她的新职责吧？我希望她温顺些。我家里不能有人大发雷霆，狂怒咆哮。很好。”他挥手。“现在，让她留在这儿。记住，别走的太远！你应该不离她左右，免得她变野了。”
“Now,” says my uncle, when the housekeeper has gone. “You know, do you not, why I have brought you here.”
女管家走后，我舅舅说道，“现在，你知不知道，我为什么带你来这儿？”
I put my crimson fingers to my face, to wipe my nose.
我把深红色的手指放到脸上，擦擦鼻子。
“To make a secretary of you. What do you see here, all about these walls?”
“为了让你变成一个秘书。看到这些墙了吗？你看到什么？”
“To make a lady of me.”
“为了让我变成大家闺秀。”
He gives a quick, dry laugh.
他干笑一下。
“Wood, sir.”
“木头，先生。”
“Books, girl,” he says. He goes and draws one from its place and turns it. The cover is black, by which I recognise it as a Bible. The others, I deduce, hold hymns. I suppose that hymn-books, after all, might be bound in different hues, perhaps as suiting different qualities of madness. I feel this, as a great advance in thought.
“是书，姑娘。”他说道…他走过去抽出一本书打开。那书封面是黑色的，看封面我认出那是本《圣经》。其他的书，我推断，都是赞美诗集。我猜想那些赞美诗集，统统是，按照颜色不同分类放置，或许是为了适应不同程度的疯病人。我想到这一点，有种恍然大悟的感觉。
My uncle keeps the book in his hand, close to his breast, and taps its spine.
我舅舅手拿着书，举到胸前，轻叩着书脊。
“Do you see this title, girl? — Don’t take a step! I asked you to read, not to prance.”
“你看到这个书名吗？姑娘？一步也别动！我要你读出来，没要你跳起来。”
But the book is too far from me. I shake my head, and feel my tears return.
可那书离我太远。我摇摇头，感觉泪珠儿去而复返。
“Ha!” cries my uncle, seeing my distress. “I should say you can’t! Look down, miss, at the floor. Down! Further! Do you see that hand, beside your shoe? That hand was set there at my word, after consultation with an oculist — an eyedoctor. These are uncommon books, Miss Maud, and not for ordinary gazes. Let me see you step once past that pointing finger, and I shall use you as I would a servant of the house, caught doing the same — I shall whip your eyes until they bleed. That hand marks the bounds of innocence here. Cross it you shall, in time; but at my word, and when you are ready. You understand me, hmm?”
“哈！”我舅舅见我不高兴，不由叫道。“我说你看不到，看下面，小姐，地板上。下面！这边！看到你鞋边上的手吗？那手是照我吩咐放的，为此我咨询过一位眼科大夫——看眼睛的大夫，这些书非同寻常，莫德，不能给寻常人看。如果让我看到，你越过那个手指尖，我会用对家里仆人一样的家法对待你——用鞭子抽你眼睛，抽到你眼睛流血。那只手标出此地的清白界限。很快，你就能越过那只手；不过得有我的吩咐，等你做好准备。你明白吗？嗯？”
The spine is a fine one, and — I will know it well, in time — a favourite of his. The title is — But now I run ahead of my own innocence; which is vouchsafed to me a little while yet.
那本书的书脊精美考究，而且——很快我就会知道这本书了——是他最珍视的一本书。那书名为——不过此时我仍保有懵懂纯真的天性；尽管上天并未令我将此天性保持太久。
After my uncle has spoken he seems to forget me. I stand for another quarter-hour before he lifts his head and catches sight of me, and waves me from the room. I struggle a moment with the iron handle of his door, making him wince against the grinding of the lever; and when I close it, Mrs Stiles darts from the gloom to lead me back upstairs. “I suppose you’re hungry,” she says, as we walk. “Little girls always are. I should say you’d be grateful for a white egg now.”
我舅舅言罢似乎就忘了我。我立着待了一刻钟，他才抬头望见我，挥手命我离去。我奋力拉开房门的铁把手，合叶的摩擦声又让他吓了一跳；待我关好门，斯黛尔太太从暗处闪身上前，领我到了后楼梯。“我猜你饿了。”我们下楼时，她说道。“小姑娘老是要饿，我敢说，现在你见了白煮蛋要感激不尽了。”
I do not. How could I? But I am already grown cautious, and nod as if I do. He puts the book back in its place, lingering a moment over the aligning of the spine upon the shelf.
我不明白。我怎么能明白？不过我已变得谨慎小心，我不懂装懂地点点头。他将书放回原处，摆弄了一会儿，将那本书的书脊对正。
I am hungry, but will not admit to it. But she rings for a girl to come, and the girl brings a biscuit and a glass of sweet red wine. She sets them down before me, and smiles; and the smile is harder to bear, somehow, than a slap would have been. I am afraid I will weep again. But I swallow my tears with my dry biscuit, and the girl and Mrs Stiles stand together, whispering and watching. Then they leave me quite alone. The room grows dark. I lie upon the sofa with my head upon a cushion, and pull my own little cloak over myself, with my own little whipped, red hands. The wine makes me sleep. When I wake again, I wake to shifting shadows, and to Mrs Stiles at the door, bringing a lamp.
我是饿了，可我是不会承认的。她摇铃唤来个姑娘，这姑娘端来一块饼干和一杯甜丝丝的红酒。她把这些东西放在我面前，笑面相迎。不知何故，那笑脸比曾经的掌掴更叫我难以忍受。我觉得我又要哇哇大哭了，然而我伴着饼干强咽下泪珠儿，那姑娘和斯黛尔太太站在一处，窃窃私语，留意着我。后来她们把我独自留在房中。房间渐渐昏暗下来。我躺在沙发上，头枕垫子，把我的小斗篷披在身上，绻着受伤红肿的小手。红酒让我昏昏睡去。等我再次醒来，我见到晃动的人影，见到斯黛尔太太拿着灯站在门口。
Mrs Stiles laughs. “Do you mean to that house, with those rough women? What a place to call your home!”
斯黛尔太太笑了，“你是说那个疯人院？和那些粗俗的女人？”
I say, “I should like, if you please, to be taken home now.”
我说道，“现在我想，你是否行行好，带我回家吧。”
I wake with a terrible fear, and a sense of many hours having passed. I think the bell has recently tolled. I believe it is seven or eight o’clock.
一阵惶恐袭来，我彻底清醒了，我感觉我睡了好几个小时。我想时钟刚刚敲过。我相信这会儿得有七点或者八点了。
“I should think they miss me.”
“我想她们想念我了。”
I say, “You’ve no right to hurt me! You’re nothing to me! I want my mothers, that love me!”
我说道，“你不能伤害我！你跟我什么关系也没有！我要我妈妈，她们爱我！”
“Here’s your mother,” she says, plucking at the portrait at my throat. “That’s all the mother you’ll have here. Be grateful you have that, to know her face by. Now, stand and be steady. You must wear this, to give you the figure of a lady.”
“这才是你妈。”她扯出我颈项上的小画像说道。“在这儿你就这一个妈。你应该感到庆幸，你还见过她的脸。现在，站着别动。你必须穿这个，这能让你有个大家闺秀的形象。”
“I should say they are glad to be rid of you — the nasty, pale-faced little thing that you are. Come here. It’s your bed-time.” She has pulled me from the sofa, and begins to unlace my gown. I tug away from her, and strike her. She catches my arm and gives it a twist.
“我得说她们很乐意摆脱你——你这个肮脏的白脸小东西。过来。到睡觉时间了。”她将我从沙发上捞起来，开始帮我解袍带。我使劲推开她，还打了她一下。她抓住我胳膊，扭成麻花。
She has taken the stiff buff dress from me, and all the linen beneath. Now she laces me tight in a girlish corset that grips me harder than the gown. Over this she puts a nightdress. On to my hands she pulls a pair of white skin gloves, which she stitches at the wrists. Only my feet remain bare. I fall upon the sofa and kick them. She catches me up and shakes me, then holds me still.
她取下我硬邦邦的浅黄色外衣和所有亚麻内衣。然后她将我紧紧捆到一件女士胸衣里，这胸衣箍我比那袍子还紧。胸衣之外，她又给我穿上件睡衣。手上给她套了一双白色手套。此时我只有脚还光着。我倒在沙发上，又踢又拽，想摆脱这些劳什子，她把我拎起来，摇晃两下，再一动不动地抓着我。
“Say your prayers,” she says, “and ask Our Father to forgive you.”
“祈祷吧，”她说道，“请求圣父宽恕你。”
“I had a little daughter once, that died. She had a fine black head of curling hair and a temper like a lamb’s. Why dark-haired, gentle-tempered children should be made to die, and peevish pale girls like you to thrive, I cannot say. Why your mother, with all her fortune, should have turned out trash and perished, while I must live to keep your fingers smooth and see you grow into a lady, is a puzzle. Weep all the artful tears you like. You shall never make my hard heart the softer.”
“我有过一个小女儿，她死了。她有一头漂亮的黑色卷发，性情象小绵羊一样乖巧，为什么黑头发好脾气的孩子就得死呢？我也说不清。为什么你妈妈那么有钱，却变成废人，死掉了，而我呢，我得看护着你，让你的手指变的细腻光洁，把你养育成大家闺秀，这真让人想不通。你就尽管哭吧，尽管抹眼泪吧，你怎么使坏，也休想让我的铁石心肠变成菩萨心肠。”
“See here,” she says, her face crimson and white, her breath coming hard upon my cheek.
“瞧这儿，”她说道，她面颊红里透白，呼吸重重地冲到我脸上。
She catches me up and takes me to the dressing-room, makes me climb into the great, high, dusty bed, then lets down the curtains. There is a door beside the chimney-breast: she tells me it leads to another chamber, and a badtempered girl sleeps there. The girl will listen in the night, and if I am anything but still and good and quiet, she will hear; and her hand is very hard.
她把我拎起来，带我进了更衣室，将我扔到又大又高，满是灰尘的床上，然后放下床帷。壁炉墙上有扇门：她告诉我那门通向另一个屋子，有个坏脾气女孩睡在那个屋子里。那个女孩夜里会听着动静，如果我有任何不乖，不安生，不安静，她都能听到，她手劲非常大。
Then she takes up the lamp and leaves, and I am plunged in an awful darkness.
说完她提灯离去，我被投入到可怕的黑暗中。
Indeed, no sooner has this idea risen in me, than I begin to hear the smothered sounds of movement, close by — unnaturally close, they seem to me to be: I imagine a thousand skulking figures with their faces at the curtain, a thousand searching hands. I begin to cry. The corset I wear makes the tears come strangely. I long to lie still, so the lurking women shall not guess that I am there; but the stiller I try to be, the more wretched I grow. Presently, a spider or a moth brushing my cheek, I imagine the throttling hand has come at last, and jerk in a convulsion and, I suppose, shriek.
实际上，我心头一冒出这个念头，就立即听见一些令人窒息的动静，就在旁边——不合常理地，在向我靠近：我想象着无数鬼祟的身影，他们面孔贴在床帷上，无数摸索着的手。我开始哇哇大哭，我身着的胸衣箍得太紧，想哭也不得便，泪珠儿来的有点不可思议。我期望能静静躺着，这样潜伏着的疯女人们就猜不到我在那儿了，可我越是想安静，就越是怕的难受。过了一会儿，一只蜘蛛还是一蛾子掠过我的面颊，我以为那只要扼杀我的手终于来了，惊慌中我猛地抽搐起来，而且，我估计，我还尖叫起来。
I think it a terrible thing to do to a child; I think it terrible, even now. I lie, in an agony of misery and fear, straining my ears against the silence — wide awake, sick, hungry, cold, alone, in a dark so deep the shifting black of my own eye-lids seems the brighter. My corset holds me like a fist. My knuckles, tugged into their stiff skin gloves, are starting out in bruises. Now and then the great clock shifts its gears, and chimes; and I draw what comfort I can from my idea that somewhere in the house walk lunatics, and with them watchful nurses. Then I begin to wonder over the habits of the place. Perhaps here they give their lunatics licence to wander; perhaps a madwoman will come to my room, mistaking it for another? Perhaps the wicked-tempered girl that sleeps next door is herself demented, and will come and throttle me with her hard hand!
我觉得如此对待一个孩子，实在骇人听闻。即使现在，我仍觉得这十分可怕。我躺在床上，心中充满悲伤和恐惧，我竖起耳朵聆听这寂静之声——我空前的警醒，不适，饿，冷，孤独，这黑暗如此深沉，连我眼睛闭起带来的一片黑都无法与之比拟。身上的胸衣箍着我，我象被个拳头攥住了，我那被强行塞进手套的手指上，伤处开始隐隐作痛。时不时传来时针转动的声音，还有报时的钟鸣声；我想象着，这宅中某处有疯子在走动，旁边还有照看他们的护士。从如此想象中，我尽力汲取着安慰。我开始对这个地方的规矩好奇起来。或许在这里，他们允许疯子四处乱逛；或许某个疯女人会走错房间，走进我的屋子？或许睡在隔壁的那个坏脾气女孩自己就是疯子，她会跑过来，用她有力的双手掐死我！
There comes the sound of an opening door, a light between the seams of the curtain. A face appears, close to my own — a kind face, not the face of a lunatic, but that of the girl who earlier brought my little tea of biscuits and sweet wine. She is dressed in her nightgown, and her hair is let down.
那边传来开门的声音，接着光线从床帷间透进来。出现了一张面孔，这张面孔凑近我的脸——那是一张好看的面孔，不是疯子的脸，而是早先给我午茶端来饼干和甜酒的那个姑娘。她穿着睡衣，头发披散着。
“Now, then,” she says softly. Her hand is not hard. She puts it to my head and strokes my face, and I grow calmer. My tears flow naturally. I say I have been afraid of lunatics, and she laughs.
“现在，好了，”她轻柔地说道。她的手一点也不硬。她把手放在我头上，拍拍我的脸，我平静下来。我的泪珠儿顺势滑落，我说我被疯子吓住了，她笑起来。
“There are no lunatics here,” she says. “You are thinking of that other place. Now, aren’t you glad, to have left there?” I shake my head. She says, “Well, it is only strange for you here. You will soon grow used to it.”
“这儿没疯子，”她说道。“你把这儿当成另外一个地方了。现在，你给人从那儿带出来，是不是很开心？”我摇摇头。她说道，“好，你就是觉得这里有点怪，你马上就会习惯这儿的。”
I say I do not like the darkness. I say I am frightened to lie alone. She hesitates, thinking perhaps of Mrs Stiles. But I dare say my bed is softer than hers; and besides, it is winter, and fearfully cold.
我说我不喜欢黑暗，我说我害怕一个人躺着。她犹疑一下，大概想起了斯黛尔太太。可我敢说，我的床比她的床软和，还有，正值冬季，寒冷令人心生惧意。最后她说她可以陪我躺着，直到我睡着。
She takes up her light. I see her do it, and begin at once again to cry. — “Why, you shall be asleep in a moment!” she says.
她拿起灯，我见状立即开始嚎啕。——“干嘛，你应该立马睡觉！”她说道。
She says at last that she will lie with me until I sleep. She snuffs her candle, I smell the smoke upon the darkness.
她吹熄了蜡烛，我嗅到黑暗中飘散的烟火味儿。
I say I think I shall like it a little, if she will lie with me every night; and at that she laughs again, then settles herself more comfortably upon the feather mattress.
我说如果她肯每天晚上陪着我睡，那我还是有点喜欢这儿；听了这话，她又笑，然后舒舒服服地躺到鸭绒床垫上。
She tells me her name is Barbara. She lets me rest my head against her. She says, “Now, isn’t this nice as your old home? And shan’t you like it here?”
她告诉我她名叫芭芭拉。她让我把头靠在她身上。她说道，“瞧，这儿不是跟你以前的家一样好吗？难道你不喜欢这儿？”
She sleeps at once, and heavily, as housemaids do. She smells of a violet facecream. Her gown has ribbons upon it, at the breast, and I find them out with my gloved hands and hold them while I wait for sleep to come — as if I am tumbling into the perfect darkness and they are the ropes that will save me.
她立时就睡了，象女仆那样睡的很香。她闻起来有股紫罗兰面霜的味道。她睡衣胸前有些带子，我用戴着手套的手把这些带子揪出来，在等待睡意降临的空挡里，我就握着这些带子——仿佛那是我堕入无边黑暗时的救命绳。
I am telling you this so that you might appreciate the forces that work upon me, making me what I am.
我跟你说这些，是想你明白，曾经有怎样的苦寒磨砺，才令我成为我。
Next day, I am kept to my two bleak rooms and made to sew. I forget my terrors of the darkness of the night, then. My gloves make me clumsy, the needle pricks my fingers. “I shan’t do it!” I cry, tearing the cloth. Then Mrs Stiles beats me. My gown and corset being so stiff, she hurts her palm in the striking of my back. I take what little consolation I might, from that.
第二天，他们让我待在那两间阴冷的屋子里，做针线。那时我忘记了夜里对黑暗的恐惧。因为戴着手套，我笨手笨脚的，针老扎到我的手。“我干不来！”我撕扯着手中的布料叫道。斯黛尔太太就打我。我的袍子和胸衣太硬，她打我的背，反倒打疼了自己的手。由此我得到些许安慰。
I am beaten often, I believe, in my first days there. How could it be otherwise? I have known lively habits, the clamour of the wards, the dotings of twenty women; now the hush and regularity of my uncle’s house drives me to fits and foaming tempers. I am an amiable child, I think, made wilful by restraint.
我到这儿最初的那些日子，经常被他们打。不然还能如何呢？我曾有过生龙活虎的生活，有过在病区的玩闹，有众位母亲的溺爱；如今，我舅舅这里噤若寒蝉、千篇一律的生活逼迫着我削足适履，令我虚火旺盛。我是个可爱的小孩，我想，我是被种种约束激得野性大发。
I dash cups and saucers from the table to the floor. I lie and kick my legs until the boots fly from my heels. I scream until my throat bleeds. My passions are met with punishments, each fiercer than the last. I am bound about the wrists and mouth. I am shut into lonely rooms, or into cupboards. One time — having overturned a candle and let the flame lap at the fringes of a chair until they smoke — I am taken by Mr Way into the park and carried, along a lonely path, to the ice-house. I don’t remember, now, the chill of the place; I remember the blocks of grey ice — I should have supposed them clear, like crystal — that tick in the wintry silence, like so many clocks. They tick for three hours. When Mrs Stiles comes to release me I have made myself a kind of nest and cannot be uncurled, and am as weak as if they had drugged me.
我把茶杯和餐盘扫翻在地，我躺到地上，跺脚撒泼，靴子也被我踢飞了，我尖叫不止，叫到喉咙出血。我激情四溢，却遭遇到一次比一次重的惩罚。我被捆住手，封住嘴，我被关进黑房子，或者壁橱。有一次——弄翻了蜡烛，烛火烧着了椅子上的流苏，冒出烟来——我被魏先生带到花园，他带我走过一条僻静的小路，走到冰室。现在我不记得那地方的寒冷；我记得灰白色的大冰块——我当时觉得那冰象水晶一样洁净无瑕——在清冷的寂静里，冰水滴答作响，就仿佛有许多的钟表。冰水滴答了三个小时。等斯黛尔太太过来放我出去时，我已蜷成一团，站也站不直了，人象被他们灌了蒙汗药一样虚弱无力。
At night, Barbara shakes her head.
晚上，芭芭拉大摇其头。
“Fierce, and snappish.”
“好斗，还有暴躁。”
My uncle waits, all that time, as he might wait for the breaking of a horse. Now and then he has Mrs Stiles conduct me to his library, and questions her as to my progress.
我舅舅一直静候着，正如静候一匹烈马放弃抗争。他时不时地命斯黛尔太太带我去他书房，询问她我有何进展。
“Still badly, sir.”
“还是很糟糕，先生。”
“You’ve tried your hand?”
“你跟她动过手？”
She nods. He sends us away. Then come more shows of temper, more rages and tears.
她点头。他把我们打发走。随之而来的，是更多的坏脾气大发作，更多的愤怒和泪珠儿。
“How do we do, Mrs Stiles?”
“现在如何？斯黛尔太太？”
“What a dot of a girl, to be so naughty! Mrs Stiles says she never saw such a little Tartar as you. Why can’t you be good?”
“一个小姑娘怎么会生得这样淘气！斯黛尔太太说她从没见过你这样的小鞑子，你为什么不能表现得好点？”
“Still fierce?”
“还是很好斗？”
This makes a period of, perhaps a month; though to my childish mind it seems longer.
这种状态持续了一段时间，大概有一个月；然而以我幼小的目光看来，这段时光格外漫长。
It is something, to see her made afraid. I complain of pains in my fingers, and weakness, for a day or two after that, and watch her flutter; then I forget myself, and pinch her — and by that, she knows my grip is a strong one, and soon punishes me again.
见她惊慌，是件令我颇感快意的事。此后一两天里，我抱怨手指疼痛，身体虚弱，就眼着她干着急；后来我得意忘形地掐了她——掐一回她就知道我手上多有劲儿了，然后马上又惩罚我。
“If she loses the use of her hands, my God, he’ll have our characters for ever!”
“如果她手没用了，我的上帝，他会让我们永世不得翻身的！”
I think that frightens her. She carries me back quietly, by the servants’ stairs, and she and Barbara bathe me, then rub my arms with spirits.
我想她被我吓坏了。她悄悄地把我从仆人楼梯带回去，跟芭芭拉一同把我泡到热水里，拿出全副精神帮我揉搓胳膊。
I was good, in my last home — and see how I was rewarded!
我表现得很好，在我以前的家里——大家都看到，我得到过怎样的奖赏！
He flinches from the sight of us. “Good God, what is it?”
我舅舅见到我们，又惊得一退。“神啊，这是什么？”
Next morning I upturn my chamber-pot and tread the mess into the carpet. Mrs Stiles throws up her hands and screams; then strikes my face. Then, half-clad and dazed as I am, she drags me from my dressing-room to my uncle’s door.
第二天，我弄翻夜壶，还用脚把秽物踩到地毯里。斯黛尔太太见状举起双手，尖叫起来，随即给了我一耳光。接着，她把衣衫不全又头昏眼花的我拖出卧室，拖到我舅舅的书房。
“Oh, a frightful thing, sir!”
“噢，可怕的事儿，先生！”
“Not more of her violence? And do you bring her here, where she might break out, among the books?”
“就是她闹事了？你带她来这儿，万一她发作起来，我的书可如何是好？”
But he lets her speak, looking all the time at me. I stand very stiff, with a hand at my hot face, my pale hair loose about my shoulders.
他让她讲明原委，眼睛始终盯着我。我身子僵硬地立着，手捂着发烫的脸，暗淡的头发披散在肩上。
At length he takes off his spectacles and closes his eyes. His eyes appear naked to me, and very soft at the lids. He raises his thumb and smudged forefinger to the bridge of his nose, and pinches.
最后，他取下眼镜，闭起双眼。他眼睛赤裸裸地呈现在我面前，眼睑非常柔软。他伸出大拇指和沾着墨迹的食指，捏捏鼻梁根儿。
“Well, Maud,” he says as he does it, “this is sorry news. Here is Mrs Stiles, and here am I, and here are all my staff, all waiting on your good manners. I had hoped the nurses had raised you better than this. I had hoped to find you biddable.” He comes towards me, blinking, and puts his hand upon my face. “Don’t shrink so, girl! I want only to examine your cheek. It is hot, I think. Well, Mrs Stiles’s hand is a large one.” He looks about him. “Come, what have we that is cool, hmm?”
“好，莫德，”他边捏边说道，“这是件令人遗憾的事。斯黛尔太太，还有我，还有这里所有人，都在等你表现好起来，我曾寄希望于那些护士们，能把你教的比现在好点，我曾希望能发现你的温良性情。”他走到我面前，眨眨眼睛，把手放在我脸上。“不要退缩，姑娘！我就是想看看你的脸，我想你的脸很烫。好了，斯黛尔太太的手很大。”他环顾身边。“来，我们用什么给你脸降温呢？嗯？”
He has a slim brass knife, blunt-edged, for cutting pages. He stoops and puts the blade of it against my face. His manner is mild, and frightens me. His voice is soft as a girl’s. He says, “I am sorry to see you hurt, Maud. Indeed I am. Do you suppose I want you harmed? Why should I want that? It is you who must want it, since you provoke it so. I think you must like to be struck. — That is cooler, is it not?” He has turned the blade. I shiver. My bare arms creep with cold. He moves his mouth. “All waiting,” he repeats, “on your good manners. Well, we are good at that, at Briar. We can wait, and wait, and wait again. Mrs Stiles and my staff are paid to do it; I am a scholar, and inclined to it by nature. Look about you here, at my collection. Do you suppose this the work of an impatient man? My books come to me slowly, from obscure sources. I have contentedly passed many tedious weeks in expectation of poorer volumes than you!” He laughs, a dry laugh that might once have been moist; moves the point of the knife to a spot beneath my chin; tilts up my face and looks it over. Then he lets the knife fall, and moves away. He tucks the wires of his spectacles behind his ears.
他有一把细长的黄铜刀，刀刃很钝，裁纸用的。他弯下腰，将刀背贴在我脸上。他手势轻缓，却令我恐惧。他声音象姑娘一样柔和。他说道，“看到你受罪，我很遗憾，莫德。我确实感到遗憾。你以为我想要你受罪吗？我怎么会那么想呢？只有你这么想，因为是你自讨苦吃。我想你肯定喜欢挨打——有没有凉一点？”他把刀背翻过来，我胳膊上泛起一阵寒意。他又开口。“都在等着，”他重复道。“等你表现好起来。是的，我们善于等待，在布莱尔。我们可以等，等啊等啊等。斯黛尔太太和我的仆人们拿了钱，就是干这个的；我是学者，我天生就善于等待。看看这儿，看看我的收藏吧。你觉得没耐心的人能做到这样吗？这些书都是从隐秘途径慢慢落到我手里的，我可以气定神闲地等很长时间，就为得到那些比你还可怜的书籍！”他干笑起来，笑声或许曾经也丰润过；他把刀尖移到我下颚上，顶起我的脑袋，端详着我。然后任刀滑落在地。他走到一旁，把眼镜的金属丝腿架到耳后。
And of course, these are thoughts that come to me later, when I know the full measure of my uncle’s particular mania.
当然，等到后来我完全了解到我舅舅的特殊嗜好，我才有了这些想法。
I have seen lunatics labour at endless tasks — conveying sand from one leaking cup into another; counting the stitches in a fraying gown, or the motes in a sunbeam; filling invisible ledgers with the resulting sums. Had they been gentlemen, and rich — instead of women — then perhaps they would have passed as scholars and commanded staffs. — I cannot say.
我曾见过疯子无休止地劳作——把沙子从一个漏杯子里倒到另一个漏杯子里；数旧袍子上的针脚，或者数光线里的尘埃；把算出来的总数填写到子虚乌有的帐本里。如果他们是绅士，是有钱人——而不是女人——那么或许他们会做学者，或手握重权的人。——我也说不清。
Perhaps children are like horses after all, and may be broken. My uncle returns to his mess of papers, dismissing us; and I go docilely back to my sewing. It is not the prospect of a whipping that makes me meek. It is what I know of the cruelty of patience. There is no patience so terrible as that of the deranged.
也许儿童都象烈马一样，都会放弃挣扎，终被驯服。我舅舅又回到他的故纸堆里，把我们打发走了。我温顺地回去做针线。使我恭顺的并非对鞭打的恐惧，而是我认识到耐性的冷酷之处。再没什么比偏执狂的耐性更可怕的了。
“I advise you to whip her, Mrs Stiles,” he says, “if she prove troublesome again.”
“斯黛尔太太，我建议你用鞭子抽她。”他说道，“如果她再惹麻烦。”
That day, in my childish way, I glimpse only its surface. But I see that it is dark, and know that it is silent — indeed, its substance is the substance of the darkness and the silence which fills my uncle’s house like water or like wax.
那天，以儿童的视角，我只窥见了这种疯狂耐性的皮毛。但我知道那是阴暗的，我知道那是悄无声息的——实际上，这耐性的本质，也就是如水似蜡般充盈在我舅舅家的阴暗和静谧的本质。
Should I struggle, it will draw me deep into itself, and I will drown. I do not wish, then, to do that.
假使我抗争，抗争会将我拖入更深的深渊里，我将在其中溺毙。此后，我对抗争不再抱有期望。
I cease struggling at all, and surrender myself to its viscid, circular currents.
我完全停止抗争，自我放逐到浑浑噩噩、循环往复的生活中，随波逐流。
That is the first day, perhaps, of my education. But next day, at eight, begin my lessons proper. I never have a governess: my uncle tutors me himself, having Mr Way set a desk and a stool for me close to the pointing finger on his library floor. The stool is high: my legs swing from it and the weight of my shoes makes them tingle and finally grow numb. Should I fidget, however — should I cough, or sneeze — then my uncle will come and snap at my fingers with the rope of silkcovered beads. His patience has curious lapses, after all; and though he claims to be free of a desire to harm me, he harms me pretty often. Still, the library is kept warmer than my own room, to ward off mould from the books; and I find I prefer to write, than to sew. He gives me a pencil with a soft lead that moves silently upon paper, and a green-shaded reading-lamp, to save my eyes.
也许，那正是我受教的第一天。而次日夜里，我的功课就正式开始了。我没有女家庭教师：舅舅亲自指导我，他命魏先生在他书房靠近那个手指的地方，为我放置了一套桌椅。椅子太高了：我腿挂在上面，沉重的靴子令我的脚麻木难当，最后完全失去知觉。然而，如果我坐立不安，如果我咳嗽或是打喷嚏，我舅舅就会过来，用那串包着丝线的珠子抽我的手。他的耐性终于消失得无影无踪；尽管他一再声称，并无意伤害我，他还是经常打我。还好，书房比我自己的房间暖和，这是为了防止灰尘落到藏书上；我发觉相比做针线，我更喜欢写字。他给我一支写起来悄无声息的软芯铅笔，还有一盏绿灯罩台灯，那是为了保护我的视力。
I call them lessons; but I am not taught as other girls are. I learn to recite, softly and clearly; I am never taught to sing. I never learn the names of flowers and birds, but am schooled instead in the hides with which books are bound — as say, morocco, russia, calf, chagrin; and their papers — Dutch, China, motley, silk. I learn inks; the cutting of pens; the uses of pounce; the styles and sizes of founts: sans-serif, antique, Egyptian, pica, brevier, emerald, ruby, pearl… They are named for jewels. It is a cheat. For they are hard and dull as cinders in a grate.
我学着朗诵，我学会以轻巧而清晰的声音朗诵；却从没学过唱歌。我没学过花鸟的名称，却学会辨认某本书的封面蒙皮是什么材质——比方说，摩洛哥皮，俄罗斯皮，小牛皮，仿皮皱纹面，还有纸张的质地——荷兰纸，中国纸，杂色纸，丝绢。我会辨识墨水，辨识羽毛笔的切口，辨识有否用过吸墨粉，还会辨识字体样式和大小：无衬线体，古体，埃及体，十二磅因的字体，八磅因的字体，绿宝石，红宝石，珍珠…这些字体以珠宝命名，其实都是骗人的。因为这些玩意儿跟壁炉里的炉渣一样生硬而无趣。
The lamp smells, as it heats, of smouldering dust: a curious smell — I shall grow to hate it! — the smell of the parching of my own youth. My work itself is of the most tedious kind, and consists chiefly of copying pages of text, from antique volumes, into a leather-bound book. The book is a slim one, and when it is filled my job is to render it blank again with a piece of india-rubber. I remember this task, more than I remember the pieces of matter I am made to copy: for the pages, from endless friction, grow smudged and fragile and liable to tear; and the sight of a smudge on a leaf of text, or the sound of tearing paper, is more than my uncle, in his delicacy, can bear. They say children, as a rule, fear the ghosts of the dead; what I fear most as a child are the spectres of past lessons, imperfectly erased.
台灯发热时挥发出的气味，有股，一种奇怪的味道——日后令我痛恨的味道！——那是我青春时光无声无息燃烧的味道。我的功课是最单调乏味的，主要是把古书上的文章，誊抄到一个蒙皮的精装本子上。本子比较薄，等本子抄满了，我再用橡皮把它擦干净。比起我抄写的那些文章段落，这些环节更令我印象深刻：因为那些书页，经过无数人的翻阅，都已泛黄发脆，一扯就碎；看到书页上的潮斑，或者听见书页破碎的丁点声响，都是我那目光如炬的舅舅所不能容忍的。人们说照常理，小孩都怕死人的幽灵；而我小时候最恐惧的，是抄好的课文没擦干净，留下一条条鬼影子。
But I learn quickly. The season turns. I am made small rewards: new gloves, soft-soled slippers, a gown — stiff as the first, but of velvet. I am allowed to take my supper in the dining-room, at one end of a great oak table, set with silver. My uncle sits at the other end. He keeps a reading-easel beside his place, and speaks very seldom; but if I should be so unlucky as to let fall a fork, or to jar my knife against my plate, then he will raise his face and fix me with a damp and terrible eye. “Have you some weakness about the hands, Maud, that obliges you to grind your silver in that way?”
不过我进步神速。季节轮换。我得到些小奖赏：新手套，软底鞋子，一件紫色的新袍子——跟第一件一样硬邦邦。我被准许在餐厅吃晚餐，坐在一张摆着银质餐具的大橡木餐桌的一端。我舅舅坐在另一端。他在座位旁边放了一个阅读架，用餐时很少说话。可如果我不幸失手，把叉子弄掉了，或者餐刀切到盘子，他就会抬起脸，用一双潮湿骇人的眼睛凝视着我。“莫德，你手上是不是没力气，才会这样折腾餐具？”
“The knife is too large and too heavy, Uncle,” I answer him fretfully once. Then he has my knife taken away, and I must eat with my fingers. The dishes he prefers being all bloody meats, and hearts, and calves’ feet, my kid-skin gloves grow crimson — as if reverting to the substance they were made from. My appetite leaves me. I care most for the wine. I am served it in a crystal glass engraved with an M. The ring of silver that holds my napkin is marked a tarnished black with the same initial. They are to keep me mindful, not of my name, but of that of my mother; which was Marianne.
“刀太大太重了，舅舅。”有一回我焦躁地回答他。然后他把我的餐刀拿走，我只好用手拿着吃。他喜欢的菜是还带着血的牛肉，牛心，小牛腿，我的小山羊皮手套变成深红色——仿佛回复到皮革最初始的样子。我胃口尽失，更愿意喝酒。我用一只刻着字母“M”的水晶玻璃杯喝酒，束着我餐巾的银环上也标着同样的大写字母，字母已褪色发黑。这些字母令我念念不忘，那不是我名字里的“M”，而是我母亲名字中的“M”，她名为玛丽安。
She is buried in the loneliest spot of all that lonely park — hers a solitary grey stone among so many white. I am taken to see it, and made to keep the tomb neat.
她被安葬在那个荒芜花园最孤寂的角落里——她的灰色墓碑孤零零地矗立在在一片白色墓碑中。我被他们带去看过，他们叫我为她扫墓。
“Be grateful that you may,” says Mrs Stiles, watching me trim the springing cemetery grass, her arms folded across her bosom. “Who shall tend my grave? I shall be all but forgotten.”
斯黛尔太太双臂交叠在胸前，看我清理墓边的杂草，说道，“你应当觉得庆幸，将来谁会来给我扫墓呢？我会被人忘得一干二净的。”
Her husband is dead. Her son is a sailor. She has taken all her little daughter’s curling black hair to make ornaments with. She brushes my own hair as if the locks are thorns and might cut her; I wish they were. I think she is sorry not to whip me. She still bruises my arms with pinches. My obedience enrages her more than ever my passions did; and seeing that, I grow meeker, with a hard, artful meekness that, receiving the edge of her sorrow, keeps it sharp, that provokes her to the pinches — they are profitless enough — and to scolds, which pay more, as being revealing of her griefs. I take her often to the graves, and make certain to sigh, to the full strength of my lungs, over my mother’s stone. In time — so cunning am I! — I find out the name of her dead daughter; then, the kitchen cat giving birth to a litter of kittens, I take one for a pet, and name it for her. I make sure to call it loudest when Mrs Stiles is near: “Come, Polly! Oh, Polly! What a pretty child you are! How fine your black fur is! Come, kiss your mama.”
她丈夫去世了。她儿子是个海员。她拿她小女儿的黑色卷发做装饰品用。她给我梳头，仿佛我的头发是荆棘，会刺伤了她，我倒希望我头发真是荆棘。我觉得她为不能拿鞭子抽我而遗憾。她还会掐我胳膊，我的顺从比以前的爆发更能激怒她；发现了这一点，我变的更温顺了，我以坚忍又虚伪的温顺，慢慢摸到她心上的伤口，并使这伤口历久弥新。这更撩拨得她掐我——丝毫没用处——责骂我，结果她更难过了，因为又被触到了伤心事。我常常带她去墓地，在我母亲的棺石上，我故意竭尽肺腑之力长吁短叹。很快——我多狡猾呀！——我发现了她死去女儿的名字；后来，厨房的猫生了几只小猫，我捉了一只做宠物，还用她女儿的名字为小猫命名。只要斯黛尔太太在附近，我就会以全副音量喊出小猫的名字：“过来，珀丽！噢，珀丽！多可爱的孩子啊！你这一身黑毛毛多好看啊！过来，亲亲妈妈。”
Mrs Stiles trembles and winks at the words.
斯黛尔太太颤抖着，听了我的话，她眨眨。
“You’re a sly, hateful child,” she says. “Don’t think Barbara don’t know it. Don’t think she can’t see through you and your designing ways.”
“你是个奸诈、讨厌的小孩，”她说道。“别以为芭芭拉不知道，别以为她看不透你和你的处心积虑。”
I run and hide my face. I think of my lost home, and the nurses that loved me, and the thought brings the hot tears coolly to my eyes.
我埋着脸跑开了。我想起我过去的家，那些爱我的护士们，思念令滚烫的泪珠儿从我眼中奔涌而出。
“Oh, Barbara!” I cry. “Say you shan’t! Say you wouldn’t!”
“噢，芭芭拉！”我叫道。“说你不会把它拿走，说你不肯！”
Do you see, what circumstances make of me?
你看到吗，我制造出的这番场面？
“Take the filthy creature and have Mr Inker drown it!” she says to Barbara, when she can bear it no more.
当她忍无可忍时，她对芭芭拉说道，“把这个肮脏的小东西拿走，叫英克尔先生淹死它！”
“Think of you?” says Mrs Stiles, with a laugh. “Why, I dare say your place at the madhouse has been filled by a new little girl with a happier temper. I am sure, they were glad to be rid of you.” In time, I believe her.
“想念你？”斯黛尔太太满面笑容地说道。“什么呀，我敢说你在疯人院的地位已经被一个新来的好脾气小女孩取代了。我敢肯定，她们很高兴摆脱你。”很快，我就信了她的话。
Barbara says she never could. Mrs Stiles sends her away.
芭芭拉说她不能这么做。斯黛尔太太把她支走了。
But it is she who cries then, in great hard sobs; and my own eyes soon dry in the studying of hers. For what is she, to me? What is anyone now? I had thought my mothers, the nurses, might send to save me; six months go by — another six, another — and they send nothing. I am assured they have forgotten me.
然而后来号啕大哭的人是她，看到她的眼泪，我自己的泪珠儿瞬间就蒸发掉了。因为她对我来说，算什么东西？这些人又算什么？我曾想到我的母亲们，护士们，她们会派人来救我；过了半年——再过了半年，又过了半年——她们谁都没派来。我确信她们已经忘了我。
My proper mother I hate. Didn’t she forsake me, before anyone? I keep her portrait in a little wooden box beside my bed; but her sweet white face has nothing of me in it, and I grow to loathe it. “Let me kiss mama good-night,” I say one time, unlocking my box. But I do it only to torment Mrs Stiles. I raise the picture to my lips and, while she looks on, thinking me sorry — “I hate you,” I whisper, my breath tarnishing the gold. I do it that night, and the night which follows, and the night which follows that; at last, as a clock must tick to a regular beat, I find I must do it or lie fretful in my bed. And then, the portrait must be set down gently, with its ribbon quite uncreased. If the frame strikes the velvet lining of the wooden box too hard, I will take it out and set it down carefully again.
我恨我的亲生母亲。难道不正是她，在其他人之前抛弃了我？我把她的小画像放在床边一个小木盒里；然而她白皙美丽的面容对我来说毫无意义，渐渐地我憎恨起这个小画像来。有一回，我打开盒子说道，“让我来给妈妈一个晚安吻。”而我这么做，就是想折磨斯黛尔太太。我把小画像举到唇边，这时斯黛尔太太望着我，以为我正难过呢——“我恨你。”我喃喃低语道，我的呼吸沾湿了小画像的金边。那天夜里我这么做了，之后的夜晚我也如此这般；最后，就好象钟表有规律的滴答转动一样，我发觉我睡前必须这么做，不然躺在床上就心神不宁。再后来，那个小画像必须妥善放置，上面的丝带不能弄皱了。如果那个相框碰到盒子的绒布衬里，我就会把它拿出来，再仔细地重新归置好。
I begin to forget. My old life grows shadowy in proportion to the new — or, sometimes emerges to darken or trouble it, in dreams and half-memories, just as those smudged strokes of forgotten lessons now and then start out upon the pages of my copy-book.
我开始遗忘。往日的生活被如今的一切冲刷得日渐模糊——也许，正如我在抄写本上抄下又擦去的课文，那些擦掉的笔画，往日偶尔会浮现出来，在梦中，在残存的记忆里，印衬出当前的阴暗，乱我心神。
So white blooms blush, before they curl and tumble. One day I arrive at my uncle’s room to find my little desk removed, and a place made ready for me among his books. He sees my look, and beckons me to him.
如此这般，白色的小花在凋零之前变成了红色。有一天，我到了舅舅的书房，发现我的小桌椅被挪了地方，挪到他的藏书中去了。他见了我的目光，招手唤我过去。
“Take off your gloves,” he says. I do, and shudder to touch the surfaces of common things. It is a cold, still, sunless day. I have been at Briar, then, two years. My cheek is round as a child’s, and my voice is high. I have not yet begun to bleed as women do.
“摘掉手套，”他说道。我摘下手套，手接触到寻常事物时不由得颤抖起来。那是个寒冷静谧的阴天，那时我在布莱尔已经待了两年，我面颊仍然如孩童般圆润，声调尖细。我还没有开始象女人一样流血。
Meanwhile my uncle observes my work and finds my letters, my hand, my voice, greatly improved. He is used occasionally to entertaining gentlemen at Briar: now he has me stand for them and read. I read from foreign texts, not understanding the matter I am made to recite; and the gentlemen — like Mrs Stiles — watch me strangely. I grow used to that. When I have finished, at my uncle’s instruction I curtsey. I curtsey well. The gentlemen clap, then come to shake or stroke my hand. They tell me, often, how rare I am. I believe myself a kind of prodigy, and pink under their gazes.
与此同时，我舅舅关注着我的功课，他发现我的字体，我的手，我的声音，都大有长进。他以前偶尔会在布莱尔招待绅士朋友：现在他叫我站在他们面前朗读。我读的是外国文本，我并不理解他叫我读的是什么东西，绅士们看我的目光很古怪，就象斯黛尔太太一样。我渐渐习惯了这些。我读完了，我舅舅示意我行屈膝礼。我的屈膝礼做得很好，绅士们纷纷鼓掌，还走上前来与我握手，拍拍我的手。他们经常跟我说，我有多杰出多难得一见。我相信我是个天才，我会在他们的注视下羞红了脸。
Mrs Stiles watches me do it, with a curious expression. I never lie quite still until Barbara comes.
斯黛尔太太一脸好奇地看着我做这些。而我从不肯安静老实地躺着，除非芭芭拉来了。
“A little, sir.”
“有一点，先生。”
“Well, I am more than that. I am a curator of poisons. These books — look, mark them! mark them well! — they are the poisons I mean. And this –” Here he reverently puts his hand upon the great pile of ink-stained papers that litter his desk — “this is their Index. This will guide others in their collection and proper study. There is no work on the subject so perfect as this will be, when it is complete. I have devoted many years to its construction and revision; and shall devote many more, as the work requires it. I have laboured so long among poisons I am immune to them, and my aim has been to make you immune, that you might assist me. My eyes — do you look at my eyes, Maud.” He takes off his spectacles and brings his face to mine; and I flinch, as once before, from the sight of his soft and naked face — yet see now, too, what the coloured lenses hide: a certain film, or milkiness, upon the surface of his eye. “My eyes grow weak,” he says, replacing his glasses. “Your sight shall save my own. Your hand shall be my hand. For you come here with naked fingers, while in the ordinary world — the commonplace world, outside this chamber — the men who handle vitriol and arsenic must do so with their flesh guarded. You are not like them. This is your proper sphere. I have made it so. I have fed you poison, by scruple and grain. Now comes the larger dose.”
“那好，我不仅是个学者。我还是个毒药看护人。这些书——瞧，注意这些书！好好看看这些书！——这就是我所说的毒药。这个——”说着，他手虔诚地放到一大摊纸堆上，那些纸张墨迹斑斑，乱糟糟堆在书桌上——“就是毒药的目录索引。这些索引将指导他人收藏或者做适当研究。当此索引编纂完成，将是此领域中无与伦比的成就。我花费多年心血，进行释义和修订；我还将投入更多时间和心血，因为这项工作需要如此。我在毒药中浸淫多年，早已对此免疫，我打算令你也对此免疫，你可以协助我完成此事。我的眼睛——莫德，看着我的眼睛。”他摘掉眼镜，将脸凑到我面前，一见到他轻柔的毫无遮挡的眼睛，我如往常一般退缩着——不过此时我也看到，他眼睛表面有一层薄膜，乳状物的样子。“我视力变差了，”他戴好眼镜说道，“你的眼睛将代替我的眼睛，你的手也将代替我的手。因为，在普通人的世界里——这屋子以外的寻常世界——掌管胆矾和砒霜的人必须用这些玩意儿做防腐剂，以使肉味保持鲜美，而你保持着最新鲜的触觉来到这儿，你跟他们不同。这里才是你的归属。此事由我一手促成，我已让你尝试过点滴毒药。现在，来点大剂量的吧。”
“Yes, sir.”
“是的，先生。”
“Well, Maud,” says my uncle. “At last you cross the finger of brass, and come to my books. You are about to learn the proper quality of your vocation. Are you afraid?”
“好，莫德，”我舅舅说道，“你终于越过那个手指，走到我藏书当中来。你将要了解你职责的真正含义。你害怕吗？”
“You do well to be. For here is fearful matter. You think me a scholar, hmm?”
“你会做的很好。因为这需要敬畏。你认为我是个学者，嗯？”
The book is called The Curtain Drawn Up, or the Education of Laura. I sit alone, and turn the cover; and understand at last the matter I have read, that has provoked applause from gentlemen.
那本书名为《帘幕大开》，又名《劳拉的教育》。我独自坐下，翻开封面，最后终于明白我读过的东西，那些令绅士们热烈鼓掌的东西究竟是什么。
“Keep this from others. Remember the rareness of our work. It will seem queer, to the eyes and ears of the untutored. They will think you tainted, should you tell. You understand me? I have touched your lip with poison, Maud. Remember.”
“这本要跟其他的区分开。记住，我们工作很罕见。在没受过教育的人眼里，这项工作或许有点怪。如果你跟他们说起，他们会认为你思想败坏。你明白吗？我已将毒药点在你嘴唇上了，莫德，要牢记。”
He turns and takes a book from his shelves, then hands it to me, pressing my fingers hard about it.
他转身从书架上抽出一本书，递给我，把我的手紧紧按在书上。
The world calls it pleasure. My uncle collects it — keeps it neat, keeps it ordered, on guarded shelves; but keeps it strangely — not for its own sake, no, never for that; rather, as it provides fuel for the satisfying of a curious lust. I mean, the lust of the bookman.
世人称之为乐趣。我舅舅收藏这种乐趣——保持整洁，顺序摆放，摆在书架上，防范周全——并不是为了书籍本身，不是，绝不是；而是因为这些书籍对满足一种奇异的欲望，起到了推波助澜的作用。我是说，读书人的占有欲。
“See here, Maud,” he will say to me softly, drawing back the glass doors of his presses, passing his fingers across the covers of the texts he has exposed. “Do you note the marbling upon these papers, the morocco of this spine, the gilt edge? Observe this tooling, look.” He tilts the book to me but, jealously, will not let me take it. “Not yet, not yet! Ah, see this one, also. Black-letter; the titles, look, picked out in red. The capitals flowered, the margin as broad as the text. What extravagance! And this! Plain board; but see here, the frontispiece” — the picture is of a lady reclined on a couch, a gentleman beside her, his member bare and crimson at the tip — “done after Borel, most rare. I had this as a young man from a stall at Liverpool, for a shilling. I should not part with it now, for fifty pounds.– Come, come!” He has seen me blush. “No schoolgirl modesty here! Did I bring you to my house, and teach you the ways of my collection, to see you colour? Well, no more of that. Here is work, not leisure. You will soon forget the substance, in the scrutiny of the form.”
“看这儿，莫德，”他会轻声对我说道，拉开他书柜的玻璃门，手指划过他显摆的书的封面，“你注意到吗？这本书纸张上有大理石花纹，书脊是摩洛哥皮，还镶着金边？注意看这个做工，看。”他斜捧着书给我看，却并不让我碰一下，惟恐有失。“还不行还不行！啊，你也看看这个。黑体字的；这些标题，看，用红字标出来。大写字母是花体的，天头、地脚、切口跟版心一样宽。多么奢侈啊！还有这个！普通版式；可是你看这儿，这幅插画”——那插画是一位女子斜靠在沙发上，身边坐个男子，男子的阳物露出来，顶端深红色——“仿波莱尔而作，最为珍贵。我年轻的时候从利物浦的小摊子上买到这本书，花了一先令，现在给我五十镑也不卖。——过来过来！”他见我面红耳赤的。“别象女学生那样矜持！我带你来这儿，传授你藏书之道，难道就是要看你面红耳赤？好了，别再让我看到你这个样子。这是工作，不是玩乐。如果你仔细研究过行文形式，很快就会忘掉那些东西。”
“Your cunt,” I answer.”Why is it so black?”
“你的阴部。”我答道。“那儿为什么那么黑？”
So he says to me, many times. I do not believe him. I am thirteen. The books fill me, at first, with a kind of horror: for it seems a frightful thing, that children, in becoming women and men, should do as they describe — get lusts, grow secret limbs and cavities, be prone to fevers, to crises, seek nothing but the endless joining together of smarting flesh. I imagine my mouth, stopped up with kisses. I imagine the parting of my legs. I imagine myself fingered and pierced… I am thirteen, as I have said. The fear gives way to restlessness: I begin to lie each night at Barbara’s side, wakeful while she sleeps on; one time I put back the blanket to study the curve of her breast. Then I take to watching her as she bathes and dresses. Her legs — that I know from my uncle’s books should be smooth — are dark with hair; the place between them — which I know should be neat, and fair — darkest of all. That troubles me. Then at last, one day, she catches me gazing.
这番话他跟我说了好几次。我才不信他。我十三岁了。刚开始，那些书令我满心恐惧：因为那似乎是件可怕的事，小孩子正成长发育为成年男女，他们会按图索骥，有样儿学样儿——欲望萌发，私处发育，血气方刚，不惜冒险，一门心思只想着追求没完没了的肉体交合。我想象着我的嘴在亲吻中静默下来，想象着我两腿分开，想象着我被手指抚过，我的身体被穿刺…毕竟，正如我所说过的，我十三岁了。这恐惧令我心神不宁：我夜夜躺在芭芭拉身边，她呼呼大睡，而我开始彻夜难眠。有一回我掀开毯子，观察她胸部的曲线。我还在她洗澡或更衣时偷偷观察她。她的腿——我舅舅书上说应该是光滑的——黑而多毛；她的下身——我舅舅书上说应该是整洁而美好的——却是最黑的。这令我颇为困惑。最后，有一天，她发现我在看她。
“What are you looking at?” she says.
“你看什么呢？”她说道。
“From my uncle,” I say.
“从我舅舅那儿。”我说道。
She starts away from me as if in horror, lets her skirt fall, puts her hands before her breast. Her cheek flares crimson. “Oh!” she cries. “I never did! Where did you learn such words?”
她仿佛被吓了一大跳，从我身边跳开，双手护胸，结果裙子落到地上。她双颊通红。“噢！”她叫道。“，你从哪儿学到这些词？”
“Oh, you liar! Your uncle’s a gentleman. I’ll tell Mrs Stiles!”
“噢！你说谎！你舅舅是正人君子。我要告诉斯黛尔太太！”
“Speak like a devil, will you?” she says as she does it. “Like a slut and a filthy beast? Like your own trash mother? Will you? Will you?”
“还要说那些脏字吗？”她边塞边说道。“还要学荡妇和畜生说话吗？还要学你那个废物母亲吗？还要吗？还要吗？”
She does. I think Mrs Stiles will hit me; instead, like Barbara, she starts back. But then, she takes up a block of soap and, while Barbara holds me, she presses the soap into my mouth — presses it hard, then passes it back and forth across my lips and tongue.
她真这么做了。我以为斯黛尔太太要揍我了；谁料，斯黛尔太太跟芭芭拉一样也跳起来了。接下来，她拿了一块肥皂，让芭芭拉按住我，她往我嘴里塞肥皂——她力气好大，她用肥皂在我嘴里前前后后、上上下下地又搅又擦。
Then she lets me fall, and stands and wipes her hands convulsively upon her apron. She has Barbara keep to her own bed, from that night on; and she makes her keep the door between our rooms ajar, and put out a light.
然后她松开我，任我跌落在地，她站在那儿，双手难以抑制地颤抖着，在围裙上擦着手。那天晚上开始，她让芭芭拉回自己床上睡；让她把房门半开着，还放了盏灯。
“Thank God she wears gloves, at least,” I hear her say. “That may keep her from further mischief…”
“感谢上帝，她至少还戴着手套，”我听她说道。“戴着手套不至于让她错的太远…”
I wash my mouth, until my tongue grows cracked, and bleeds; I weep and weep; but still taste lavender. I think my lip must have poison in it, after all.
我漱口，洗嘴，一直洗到舌头破了流出血来；我一直哭啊哭；然而我嘴里还是有熏衣草味道。我甚至以为，我的嘴巴中了毒。
But soon, I do not care. My cunt grows dark as Barbara’s, I understand my uncle’s books to be filled with falsehoods, and I despise myself for having supposed them truths. My hot cheek cools, my colour dies, the heat quite fades from my limbs. The restlessness turns all to scorn. I become what I was bred to be. I become a librarian.
可很快，我就不在乎了。我私处发育得跟芭芭拉的一样黑，我明白我舅舅的书里充斥着不实之词，而我居然信以为真，我为此深深鄙视自己。我火烧般的面颊冷却下来，红晕消褪，心神不宁变成了轻蔑不屑。我变成我舅舅希望将我教养成的那个样子。我变成了一个图书管理员。
“We have it here, Uncle,” I will answer. — For within a year I know the place of every book upon his shelves. I know the plan of his great index — his Universal Bibliography of Priapus and Venus. For to Priapus and Venus he has devoted me, as other girls are apprenticed to the needle or the loom. I know his friends — those gentlemen who visit, and still hear me recite. I know them now for publishers, collectors, auctioneers — enthusiasts of his work. They send him books — more books each week — and letters: “‘Mr Lilly: on the Cleland. Grivet of Paris claims no knowledge of the lost, sodomitical matter. Shall I pursue?'”
“在这儿，舅舅。”我如是说。——不到一年时间，我就对他书架上每本书的位置了如指掌。我知道他想做索引目录的宏伟计划——他的《普瑞艾波斯和维纳斯书目大全》。他把我的青春献给普瑞艾波斯神和维纳斯神，正如别的姑娘把青春献给针头线脑。我认识了他的朋友们——那些前来拜访并聆听我诵读的绅士们。我现在知道他们都是出版商，藏书家，拍卖人——都是他的狂热支持者。他们给他捎来书籍——每周都有很多书——还有信件来往：“‘李先生：于克里兰德。《巴黎的黑短尾猴》一书中并无不为人知的鸡奸内容，我是否继续寻找此书？’”
“The Lustful Turk,” my uncle might say, looking up from his papers. “Where do we have it?”
“那本《淫荡的土耳其人》放在哪儿？”我舅舅会从他的纸堆里抬起头来问我。
“What think you, Maud?” he says. “– Well, never mind it now. We must leave the Cleland to languish, and hope for more in the spring. So, so. Let me see…”
“你怎么想？莫德？”他说道。“——好了，现在别管它了。我们得让克里兰德继续折腾下去，希望春天有好消息。那么，那么，让我想想…”
I say nothing. “Should you like it?”
我没作声。“想回房间吗？”
He divides the slips of paper upon his desk. “Now, The Festival of the Passions. Have we still the second volume, on loan from Hawtrey? You must copy it, Maud…”
他理理桌上的纸堆里的纸片儿。“现在，我们是不是只有从霍粹那儿借来的第二卷？你得把它抄下来，莫德…”
“I will,” I say.
“我会抄的，”我说道。
My uncle hears me read, his eyes creased hard behind their lenses.
我叔叔听见我读书，眼睛在镜片后面皱得很厉害。
You think me meek. How else should I answer? Once, early on, I forget myself, and yawn. My uncle studies me. He has taken his pen from his page, and slowly rolls its nib. “It appears you find your occupation dull,” he says at last. “Perhaps you would like to return to your room.”
你觉得我温顺，可我还能如何作答呢？早些时候，有一次，我一时忘形，打了个哈欠。我舅舅盯着我。他从书上拿起笔，慢慢转动着笔尖。最后他说道，“看来你觉得你的职责乏味无趣？或许你想回到你房间里去？”
“Perhaps, sir,” I say, after a moment.
停了片刻，我答道，“有点想，先生。”
“Perhaps. Very good. Put back your book then, and go. But, Maud –” This last, as I cross to the door. “Do you instruct Mrs Stiles to keep the fuel from your fire. You don’t suppose I shall pay, to keep you warm in idleness, hmm?”
“有点想，很好。那就把书放回去，去吧。不过，莫德——”当我朝房门走过去时，他扔出来一句。“告诉斯黛尔太太不要给火添煤了。你不会指望我付钱就是为了让你暖暖和和地什么都不做吧？嗯？”
I hesitate, then go. This is, again, in winter — it seems always winter there! I sit wrapped in my coat until made to dress for dinner. But at the table, when Mr Way brings the food to my plate, my uncle stops him. “No meat,” he says, laying a napkin across his lap, “for idle girls. Not in this house.”
我稍事犹豫，还是离开了。这回又是冬天。——那儿好像总是冬天！我裹着外套坐在房间里，一直等到换衣裳吃晚饭。然而当我坐到饭桌边，魏先生要往我盘中添菜时，我舅舅阻止了他。“在这所房子里，不做事的人没肉吃。”
Then Mr Way takes the platter away. Charles, his boy, looks sorry. I should like to strike him. Instead I must sit, twisting my hands into the fabric of my skirt, biting down my rage as I once swallowed tears, hearing the sliding of the meat upon my uncle’s ink-stained tongue, until I am dismissed.
于是魏先生把托盘端走了。他的手下查尔斯看上去一脸同情，我真想上去给他两下子。可我不能，我必须老老实实坐着，将心中的怒火一点一点吞下去，正如我曾吞下那些泪珠儿，耳朵里听着肉滑过我舅舅那被墨水染黑的舌头，直到他允许我离开。
Next day at eight o’clock, I return to my work; and am careful never to yawn again.
第二天早晨八点，我回去继续工作，当心留意着，再没打过哈欠。
I grow taller, in the months that follow. I become slender and more pale. I become handsome. I outgrow my skirts and gloves and slippers.– My uncle notes it, vaguely, and instructs Mrs Stiles to cut me new gowns to the pattern of the old. She does, and makes me sew them. I believe she must take a sort of malicious pleasure from the dressing of me to suit his fancy; then again, perhaps in her grief for her daughter she has forgotten that little girls are meant to turn out women. Anyway, I have been too long at Briar, and draw a comfort, now, from regularity. I have grown used to my gloves and my hard-boned gowns, and flinch at the first unloosening of the strings. Undressed, I seem to feel myself as naked and unsafe as one of my uncle’s lense-less eyes.
接下来的日子里，我长高了。我变苗条了，也更苍白了。我变漂亮了。我的裙子、手套和鞋都小了——我舅舅不动声色地注意到了，他命斯黛尔太太按旧样式给我做新袍子。她照办了，还让我缝那些袍子。遵照他的喜好来装扮我，我相信她定然从中获取了某种恶毒的快感；也许她沉浸在女儿的悲惨遭遇中，忘记了小姑娘会长成大姑娘。总之，我在布莱尔住的太久了，现在对清规戒律已处之泰然。我渐渐习惯了手套和硬邦邦的袍子，解下胸衣带子会令我畏缩起来。脱下衣裳，我就感觉自己象我舅舅摘下眼镜的眼睛一样，赤裸裸的，没有安全感。
Asleep, I am sometimes oppressed by dreams. Once I fall into a fever, and a surgeon sees me. He is a friend of my uncle’s and has heard me read. He fingers the soft flesh beneath my jaw, puts his thumbs to my cheeks, draws down my eye-lids. “Are you troubled,” he says, “with uncommon thoughts? Well, we must expect that. You are an uncommon girl.” He strokes my hand and prescribes me a medicine — a single drop to be taken in a cup of water — “for restlessness”. Barbara puts out the mixture, while Mrs Stiles looks on.
睡觉时，我会被梦。有一回我发烧了，医生来看我。他是我舅舅的朋友，听过我诵读文章。他拨弄着我柔嫩的下巴，大拇指按在我颧骨上，掀掀我的眼皮。“你是不是为一些不同寻常的想法而困惑？”他说道。“好了，我们应该想到这一点，你是个不同寻常的姑娘。”他摸摸我的手，给我开了个药方——一颗药丸，杯水送服——“可以安抚精神的。”芭芭拉把药混到水里，斯黛尔太太在旁边盯着。
Then Barbara leaves me, to be married, and I am given another maid. Her name is Agnes. She is small, and slight as a bird — one of those little, little birds that men bring down with nets. She has red hair and white skin marked with freckles, like paper foxed with damp. She is fifteen, innocent as butter. She thinks my uncle kind. She thinks me kind, at first. She reminds me of myself, as I once was. She reminds me of myself as I once was and ought still to be, and will never be again. I hate her for it. When she is clumsy, when she is slow, I hit her. That makes her clumsier. Then I hit her again. That makes her weep. Her face, behind her tears, keeps still its look of mine. I beat her the harder, the more I fancy the resemblance.
后来，芭芭拉离开了我，她结婚了，我又有了个新女仆。她名叫阿格尼斯。她很瘦小，象小鸟一样娇小——那种绅士们捉来关进笼子里的小小鸟。她一头红发，皮肤很白，上面还有雀斑，就仿佛长了潮斑的纸。她十五岁，如凝脂般纯净。她以为我舅舅是好人，刚开始她以为我也是好人。她让我想到我原先的样子。她让我想到原先的我，让我想起我应当是什么样的，我再也不会是那个我了。因此，我非常厌恶她。一旦她迟钝，一旦她动作慢了，我就打她。这令她更加笨拙。那我就再打她。我打得她哭哭啼啼。泪水之下，她还保持着那个曾经的我的模样。我出手越重，脑海里就越是浮现出那张相似的面孔。
I am as worldly as the grossest rakes of fiction; but have never, since I first came to my uncle’s house, been further than the walls of its park. I know everything. I know nothing. You must remember this, in what follows. You must remember what I cannot do, what I have not seen. I cannot, for example, sit a horse, or dance. I have never held a coin in order to spend it. I have never seen a play, a railway, a mountain, or a sea.
我无所不知，又一无所知。接下来的故事中，你得牢记这一点。你得牢记，什么事是我力所不及的，什么事是我闻所未闻的。比如说，我不会骑马，也不会跳舞。我从没拿着硬币去买过东西。我没看过戏，没见过铁路，没见过高山和大海。
So my life passes. You might suppose I would not know enough of ordinary things, to know it queer. But I read other books besides my uncle’s; and overhear the talk of servants, and catch their looks, and so, by that — by the curious and pitying glances of parlourmaids and grooms! — I see well enough the oddity I have become.
我的生活就是如此度过的。你也许会认为我会缺乏常识，我会觉得常识都很奇怪。可我也读过我舅舅的其他藏书；我听到很多仆人的议论，注意到他们的目光，于是，由此——由那些礼宾女仆和男仆好奇又怜悯的目光中！——我心知肚明，我变得有多古怪。
I like to walk beside the water, thinking of this. There is an ancient, overturned punt there, half rotted away — the holes in its hull a perpetual mockery, it seems to me, of my confinement; but I like to sit upon it, gazing at the rushes at the water’s edge. I remember the Bible story, of the child that was placed in a basket and was found by the daughter of a king. I should like to find a child. I should like it, not to keep it! — but to take its place in the basket and leave it at Briar to grow up to be me. I think often of the life I would have, in London; and of who might claim me.
我喜欢走在河边，想起这些事。河边有条古旧破败的船，都快烂掉了——船壳上的破洞，对于我，仿佛是在嘲笑我被束手束脚的景遇；不过我喜欢坐在船壳上，凝视着水边的芦苇丛。我记得《圣经》里的故事，一个婴儿裹在毯子里，被一个国王的女儿发现了。我也想发现一个婴儿，我会喜欢这个婴儿，但决不是要抚养他！——而是要代替他躺到毯子里，把他丢在布莱尔，让他长成我。我经常想到，如果我在伦敦会有怎样的生活，有谁会来认领我。
I have never seen London; and yet, I think I know it, too. I know it, from my uncle’s books. I know it lies upon a river — which is the same river, grown very much broader, that runs beyond his park.
我没去过伦敦；不过我觉得从我舅舅的书里我也了解了伦敦。我知道伦敦坐落在一条河边——就是从他花园外面流过的那条小河，流到下游河面变宽阔了。
I am seventeen when Richard Rivers comes to Briar with a plot and a promise and the story of a gullible girl who can be fooled into helping me do it.
理查德·瑞富斯来到布莱尔时，我时年十七。他带来一个计划，一个承诺，他说了个故事，有个轻信的女孩，她会上当受骗，好帮我逃出去。
But I am inside the cabinet, and long to get out…
然而我就是被关在这么一间密室里，渴望出去…
That is when I am still young, and given to fancies. When I am older I do not walk by the river so much as stand at the windows of the house and gaze at where I know the water flows. I stand at my own casement, for many hours at a time. And in the yellow paint that covers the glass of the windows of my uncle’s library I one day, with my finger-nail, make a small and perfect crescent, to which I afterwards occasionally lean and place my eye — like a curious wife at the keyhole of a cabinet of secrets.
那时我还小，喜欢胡思乱想。后来我年岁稍长，就不再到河边散步，而是站在窗边凝视着我知道有水流的地方。我站在自己房间的窗前，一站就是好几个小时。而且，有一天，在我舅舅书房那些个刷了黄油漆的窗户上，我用手指抠出一个小而弯的月牙儿，后来我偶尔会把眼睛凑到这个月牙儿上——仿佛一个好奇的妻子，在从秘室的钥匙孔里窥探着其中的秘密。
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