It was awful, he cried, awful, awful!
太糟糕了，他怒吼着，糟糕，糟糕。
Still, the sun was hot. Still, one got over things. Still, life had a way of adding day to day. Still, he thought, yawning and beginning to take notice — Regent’s Park had changed very little since he was a boy, except for the squirrels — still, presumably there were compensations — when little Elise Mitchell, who had been picking up pebbles to add to the pebble collection which she and her brother were making on the nursery mantelpiece, plumped her handful down on the nurse’s knee and scudded off again full tilt into a lady’s legs. Peter Walsh laughed out.
然而，阳光依然炽热。然而，人们依然会忘却伤心的往事。然而，生活依然会日复一日地继续下去。然而，他想道，一边打着哈欠一边注意到——与他孩提时相比，摄政公园几乎没什么变化，只是现在多了些松鼠——然而，生活总会有些补偿的——这时小伊莉斯·米切尔，她刚才一直在捡鹅卵石，为了丰富她和哥哥摆在育儿室壁炉台上的卵石收藏，突然将一把卵石放在了保姆的膝盖上，然后飞奔而去，又一头撞在了一位女士的腿上。彼德·沃尔什不禁笑出声来。
That was comforting rather. She stood her upright, dusted her frock, kissed her.
这个意外着实让她觉得安慰。她把那个小姑娘扶起来，拍了拍她的外衣，亲了她一下。
But Lucrezia Warren Smith was saying to herself, It’s wicked; why should I suffer? she was asking, as she walked down the broad path. No; I can’t stand it any longer, she was saying, having left Septimus, who wasn’t Septimus any longer, to say hard, cruel, wicked things, to talk to himself, to talk to a dead man, on the seat over there; when the child ran full tilt into her, fell flat, and burst out crying.
可是，卢克蕾西娅·沃伦·史密斯此时正在自言自语：真是太恶劣了，凭什么我就该受罪呢？她问着自己，一边走下了那条大道。不，我不能再忍受下去了，她说着，眼下她已不在赛普提默斯身边了，他不再是那个她所认识的赛普提默斯了，你看他坐在那里的位子上，说着生硬、冷酷、恶毒的话，不是在喃喃自语，就是在和一个死人交谈。此时有个小孩一头撞在她身上，随即摔倒在地，哭了起来。
But for herself she had done nothing wrong; she had loved Septimus; she had been happy; she had had a beautiful home, and there her sisters lived still, making hats. Why should SHE suffer?
但对她自己来说，她并没有做错什么，她曾爱过赛普提默斯，她也曾经快乐过，她曾有一个美丽的家，她的姐妹们如今依旧住在那里，编织帽子。凭什么就该她遭罪呢？
The child ran straight back to its nurse, and Rezia saw her scolded, comforted, taken up by the nurse who put down her knitting, and the kind-looking man gave her his watch to blow open to comfort her — but why should SHE be exposed? Why not left in Milan? Why tortured? Why?
那个小孩子跑回到保姆那边，蕾西娅看着保姆放下手上的织物，把孩子抱了起来，责备着她，抚慰着她，而那个慈眉善目的男人把自己的表给了她，让她打开来玩——可为什么自己就该孤苦伶仃呢？为什么不留在米兰呢？为什么要备受煎熬？为什么？
Slightly waved by tears the broad path, the nurse, the man in grey, the perambulator, rose and fell before her eyes. To be rocked by this malignant torturer was her lot. But why? She was like a bird sheltering under the thin hollow of a leaf, who blinks at the sun when the leaf moves; starts at the crack of a dry twig. She was exposed; she was surrounded by the enormous trees, vast clouds of an indifferent world, exposed; tortured; and why should she suffer? Why?
泪水使得在她眼前时隐时现的大路、保姆、灰衣男子和婴儿车都微微晃动起来。她命里注定要受这个恶毒的虐待狂的折磨。可是为什么呢？她犹如一只鸟儿，躲在一片薄薄的树叶里，树叶拂动时，它朝着太阳眨眼；枯枝断裂时，它惊魂不定。她孤苦伶仃，被一个冷漠世界里的巨树和乌云团团包围，失去了庇护，备受折磨。而她为什么该受罪呢？为什么？
She frowned; she stamped her foot. She must go back again to Septimus since it was almost time for them to be going to Sir William Bradshaw. She must go back and tell him, go back to him sitting there on the green chair under the tree, talking to himself, or to that dead man Evans, whom she had only seen once for a moment in the shop. He had seemed a nice quiet man; a great friend of Septimus’s, and he had been killed in the War. But such things happen to every one. Every one has friends who were killed in the War. Every one gives up something when they marry. She had given up her home. She had come to live here, in this awful city. But Septimus let himself think about horrible things, as she could too, if she tried. He had grown stranger and stranger. He said people were talking behind the bedroom walls. Mrs. Filmer thought it odd. He saw things too — he had seen an old woman’s head in the middle of a fern. Yet he could be happy when he chose. They went to Hampton Court on top of a bus, and they were perfectly happy. All the little red and yellow flowers were out on the grass, like floating lamps he said, and talked and chattered and laughed, making up stories. Suddenly he said, “Now we will kill ourselves,” when they were standing by the river, and he looked at it with a look which she had seen in his eyes when a train went by, or an omnibus — a look as if something fascinated him; and she felt he was going from her and she caught him by the arm. But going home he was perfectly quiet — perfectly reasonable. He would argue with her about killing themselves; and explain how wicked people were; how he could see them making up lies as they passed in the street. He knew all their thoughts, he said; he knew everything. He knew the meaning of the world, he said.
她凝眉，她跺足。她必须再次回到赛普提默斯那里，因为他们去威廉·布莱德肖爵士那里的时间快到了。她必须返回去告诉他，必须回到他那里。他坐在树下的绿椅子上，自言自语，或者是在和死去的埃文斯交谈，她只在一家商店里和此人有过匆匆的一面之缘。他看上去是个沉默寡言的好人，是赛普提默斯的好朋友，在战场上牺牲了。可这样的事每个人都会遭遇到。每个人都有牺牲在战场上的好友。每个人在结婚时都必须放弃点什么。她放弃了自己的家。她来到这里，住在这个糟糕的城市里。可赛普提默斯放任自己想那些可怕的事，如果她想，她也可以这样呀。他变得越来越古怪了。他说有人在卧室的墙壁里面说话。菲尔默太太觉得他的话匪夷所思。他还会看见幻象——他在一株蕨草中看见了一个老妇人的脑袋。然而，只要他想，他还是能够得到快乐的。有次，他们坐在巴士顶层上去汉普顿宫[34]游玩，就玩得很带劲。草地上开满了小红花与小黄花，他说它们如漂浮的灯火，他喜笑颜开，说个不停，还编造了许多故事。可突然，他又说道：“让我们去自杀吧。”当时他们站在河岸边，他看着河水的眼神真是奇特，当一列火车或一辆巴士从他们身边开过时，她也曾看见过他眼里的这种神色——一种似乎被什么东西蛊惑住了的眼神。她感觉他正在离她而去，于是她抓住了他的胳膊。可回家途中他又变得沉默寡言——变得非常理智。他会和她讨论一起去自杀的事，还解释说人类是多么邪恶，当人们在街上和他擦肩而过时，他一眼就能看出他们都是喜欢说谎的人。他说他洞悉他们所有的想法，因为他了解一切。他还说他了解这个世界的意义。【注：[34]位于伦敦近郊泰晤士河滨的游览胜地，是亨利八世的宫殿。】
Was it that she had taken off her wedding ring? “My hand has grown so thin,” she said. “I have put it in my purse,” she told him.
是因为她摘掉了婚戒吗？“我的手变得这么瘦了，”她说。“我把戒指放在钱包里了，”她告诉他。
She was close to him now, could see him staring at the sky, muttering, clasping his hands. Yet Dr. Holmes said there was nothing the matter with him. What then had happened — why had he gone, then, why, when she sat by him, did he start, frown at her, move away, and point at her hand, take her hand, look at it terrified?
此时她离他很近了，可以看见他在瞪着天空，嘀嘀咕咕，两只手紧紧握在一起。然而霍姆斯医生说他没什么病。那么这到底是怎么一回事呢——那么，为什么，她明明就坐在他的身边，可为什么他会感觉如此遥远呢，为什么他会露出惊恐的神色，对她皱着眉头，挪开身体，先是指着她的手，然后又握住它，惊恐万状地瞧着它呢？
Then when they got back he could hardly walk. He lay on the sofa and made her hold his hand to prevent him from falling down, down, he cried, into the flames! and saw faces laughing at him, calling him horrible disgusting names, from the walls, and hands pointing round the screen. Yet they were quite alone. But he began to talk aloud, answering people, arguing, laughing, crying, getting very excited and making her write things down. Perfect nonsense it was; about death; about Miss Isabel Pole. She could stand it no longer. She would go back.
后来，他们回到家后，他几乎就不能走路了。他躺在沙发上，让她握紧他的手，别让他掉下去，掉下去，他高喊着，别让他掉进了底下的火海！他看见墙上有嘲笑他的鬼脸，那张脸在用各种恶毒龌龊的话骂他，纱窗上有无数只手在对他指指戳戳。然而房间里除了他们俩并没有别人。可他开始大声说话，回答着别人的问题，争论着，笑着，喊着，把自己弄得兴奋无比，还让她把他的话记下来。那纯粹就是胡言乱语，关于死亡，关于伊莎贝尔·波尔小姐。她再也受不了了，她要回家去。
He dropped her hand. Their marriage was over, he thought, with agony, with relief. The rope was cut; he mounted; he was free, as it was decreed that he, Septimus, the lord of men, should be free; alone (since his wife had thrown away her wedding ring; since she had left him), he, Septimus, was alone, called forth in advance of the mass of men to hear the truth, to learn the meaning, which now at last, after all the toils of civilisation — Greeks, Romans, Shakespeare, Darwin, and now himself — was to be given whole to…”To whom?” he asked aloud. “To the Prime Minister,” the voices which rustled above his head replied. The supreme secret must be told to the Cabinet; first that trees are alive; next there is no crime; next love, universal love, he muttered, gasping, trembling, painfully drawing out these profound truths which needed, so deep were they, so difficult, an immense effort to speak out, but the world was entirely changed by them for ever.
他甩掉她的手。他们的婚姻完结了，他想道，感觉既痛苦又宽慰。枷锁已然斩断，他翻身上马，他自由了，命里注定，他，赛普提默斯，人类的主人，应该得到自由。一个人（因为他的妻子已经扔掉了婚戒，因为她已经离开了他），他，赛普提默斯，孤身一人，在芸芸众生之前首先获得了感召，前去聆听真理，前去领悟意义，在经历了所有文明的苦役之后——希腊人、罗马人、莎士比亚、达尔文，现在轮到了他自己——现在，真理终于就要被完整地传给…“传给谁呢？”他大声发问。“传给首相大人。”他头顶上的一阵沙沙声回答道。这个最高机密必须向内阁汇报。首先，树木是有生命的；其次，罪恶是不存在的；再次，人间有爱，广博的爱。他喃喃低语，气喘吁吁，颤抖不已，痛苦地道出了这些深奥的真理，如此深刻，如此复杂，必须费尽心力才能将它阐明，但是这个世界也将因为它们而永远又彻底地改变。
Heaven was divinely merciful, infinitely benignant. It spared him, pardoned his weakness. But what was the scientific explanation (for one must be scientific above all things)? Why could he see through bodies, see into the future, when dogs will become men? It was the heat wave presumably, operating upon a brain made sensitive by eons of evolution. Scientifically speaking, the flesh was melted off the world. His body was macerated until only the nerve fibres were left. It was spread like a veil upon a rock.
上苍是神圣且慈悲的，充满无限的善意。它宽恕了他，原谅了他的软弱。但究竟该用怎样的科学来解释呢（因为人必须把科学看得高于一切）？为什么他能够看透人心，看见未来，看见狗变成了人呢？也许是因为这滚滚的热浪，使得历经无数岁月的进化而变得分外敏感的大脑产生了幻觉吧。用科学的语言来解释就是，肉体溶化了，超脱了凡尘。他的肉体不断销蚀，最后只剩下一把神经纤维。它横陈在那里，如岩石上的一片薄纱。
No crime; love; he repeated, fumbling for his card and pencil, when a Skye terrier snuffed his trousers and he started in an agony of fear. It was turning into a man! He could not watch it happen! It was horrible, terrible to see a dog become a man! At once the dog trotted away.
没有罪恶，只有爱，他反复说道，摸索着寻找他的卡片和铅笔。正在此时，一只斯凯猎犬[35]跑过来嗅他的裤脚管，他惊跳起来，害怕得要命。它正在变成一个人呢！他不能看着它发生！太可怕了，眼看着一条狗变成了人，实在太可怕了！那条狗即刻跑开了。【注：[35]一种原产于苏格兰西北部斯凯岛的小型猎犬，其身矮、体长、腿短、毛长且浓。】
He lay back in his chair, exhausted but upheld. He lay resting, waiting, before he again interpreted, with effort, with agony, to mankind. He lay very high, on the back of the world. The earth thrilled beneath him. Red flowers grew through his flesh; their stiff leaves rustled by his head. Music began clanging against the rocks up here. It is a motor horn down in the street, he muttered; but up here it cannoned from rock to rock, divided, met in shocks of sound which rose in smooth columns (that music should be visible was a discovery) and became an anthem, an anthem twined round now by a shepherd boy’s piping (That’s an old man playing a penny whistle by the public-house, he muttered) which, as the boy stood still came bubbling from his pipe, and then, as he climbed higher, made its exquisite plaint while the traffic passed beneath. This boy’s elegy is played among the traffic, thought Septimus. Now he withdraws up into the snows, and roses hang about him — the thick red roses which grow on my bedroom wall, he reminded himself. The music stopped. He has his penny, he reasoned it out, and has gone on to the next public-house.
他靠回到椅子上，筋疲力尽却又亢奋不已。他靠在那里休息着，等待着，直到再次恢复力气，去痛苦地向人类作出解释。他躺在高高的巅峰，躺在世界屋脊之上。大地在他脚下战栗。红花从他的肉体里长出来，僵硬的叶片在他的脑袋边簌簌作响。叮当的乐声响起，敲打着这里的岩石。那是远处街道上的汽车喇叭声，他嘟哝道。但在这儿，音乐在岩石间轰鸣，扩散开去，又在声波的震动中凝聚起来，光滑的音柱袅袅升腾（音乐也是看得见的，那可是个新发现），成为了一首赞歌，此时牧童的笛声也加入了进来（那其实是一个老头在酒吧门口吹着哨笛[36]，他嘟哝道），牧童静立在那里，乐声从笛子里涌出，之后，自己爬到了更高的地方，听到笛声变得哀婉动人，听到底下嘈杂的车流声。牧童的悲歌交织着车流的杂沓，赛普提默斯想道。此时，他退隐至雪山之巅，玫瑰高悬在他的四围——它是盛开在我卧室墙上的大朵的红玫瑰，他提醒自己说。乐声戛然而止。他如此推断，那老头定是讨到了钱，去下一家酒吧了。【注：[36]Pennywhistle，一种六音孔的玩具哨笛。】
But he himself remained high on his rock, like a drowned sailor on a rock. I leant over the edge of the boat and fell down, he thought. I went under the sea. I have been dead, and yet am now alive, but let me rest still; he begged (he was talking to himself again — it was awful, awful!); and as, before waking, the voices of birds and the sound of wheels chime and chatter in a queer harmony, grow louder and louder and the sleeper feels himself drawing to the shores of life, so he felt himself drawing towards life, the sun growing hotter, cries sounding louder, something tremendous about to happen.
可他自己依旧待在巍峨的岩石之上，如一个沉船的水手倚靠着岩石。我靠在船只的边沿上，后来掉进了水里，他寻思。我坠入了海底。我曾经死去，然而现在又复活了，让我静静地休息吧，他乞求道（他又开始喃喃自语——太可怕了，可怕）。正如，在苏醒之前，鸟语与车声互相交织成一首奇特的和奏曲，乐声越来越嘹亮，梦中人觉得自己被领到了生命的岸边，于是他感觉自己受到了生命的吸引，阳光愈发灼热，呼喊愈发响亮，某桩宏大的事件即将开场。
He had only to open his eyes; but a weight was on them; a fear. He strained; he pushed; he looked; he saw Regent’s Park before him. Long streamers of sunlight fawned at his feet. The trees waved, brandished. We welcome, the world seemed to say; we accept; we create. Beauty, the world seemed to say. And as if to prove it (scientifically) wherever he looked at the houses, at the railings, at the antelopes stretching over the palings, beauty sprang instantly. To watch a leaf quivering in the rush of air was an exquisite joy. Up in the sky swallows swooping, swerving, flinging themselves in and out, round and round, yet always with perfect control as if elastics held them; and the flies rising and falling; and the sun spotting now this leaf, now that, in mockery, dazzling it with soft gold in pure good temper; and now and again some chime (it might be a motor horn) tinkling divinely on the grass stalks — all of this, calm and reasonable as it was, made out of ordinary things as it was, was the truth now; beauty, that was the truth now. Beauty was everywhere.
他只得睁开眼睛，可眼皮上沉甸甸的，那是一种恐惧。他竭力挣扎，他冲破压力，他放眼瞭望，他看见了眼前的摄政公园。一长条一长条的阳光抚慰着他的双脚。树木摇来晃去，翩翩起舞。我们欢迎，我们接受，我们创造，世界仿佛在这么说着。真美啊，世界仿佛在这么说着。就好像是为了（科学地）证明美的无处不在，无论他看到的是房屋，是栏杆，还是跨越围栏的羚羊，美都会立即跃入他的眼帘。看着一片树叶在风中瑟瑟颤抖，他感到一种雅致的快乐。在高高的天上，燕子猛然俯冲，又急急旋转，尽情地飞来飞去，兜着圈子，却又总是处于完全的控制之中，就好像被一根橡皮筋牵住了一般；苍蝇也在飞上飞下；太阳戏弄般地时而照着这片树叶，时而又照着那片，以极为和善的脾气为树叶抹上一层柔美的金黄；不时有一些和谐的乐声（也许是汽车喇叭声），在一茎茎草梗上神奇地叮当作响——所有这一切，如此平静，如此合理，都是由平凡的事物得来，就是此刻的真理。美，就是此刻的真理。美，无处不在。
“For God’s sake don’t come!” Septimus cried out. For he could not look upon the dead.
“看在老天的份上，别过来！”赛普提默斯喊了起来。因为他不能正视死者。
But the branches parted. A man in grey was actually walking towards them. It was Evans! But no mud was on him; no wounds; he was not changed. I must tell the whole world, Septimus cried, raising his hand (as the dead man in the grey suit came nearer), raising his hand like some colossal figure who has lamented the fate of man for ages in the desert alone with his hands pressed to his forehead, furrows of despair on his cheeks, and now sees light on the desert’s edge which broadens and strikes the iron-black figure (and Septimus half rose from his chair), and with legions of men prostrate behind him he, the giant mourner, receives for one moment on his face the whole —
可是树枝分开了。一个灰衣男子正在向他们走来。是埃文斯！可他身上没有烂泥，没有伤口，他一点也没变。我必须告诉整个世界，赛普提默斯喊着，举起手来（穿着灰西服的死者正在向他靠近），像一个双手抱头，脸上密布着绝望沟壑的巨人一般举起手来，他曾独自在荒漠中长年累月为人类的命运哀叹，如今在荒漠的边缘看见了光明，那光明扩散开去，照亮了黑乎乎的鬼影（赛普提默斯从椅子上欠起身子），无数人匍匐在他的身后，而他，这个哀悼的巨人，一时在他的脸上呈现出容纳一切的神情…
The word “time” split its husk; poured its riches over him; and from his lips fell like shells, like shavings from a plane, without his making them, hard, white, imperishable words, and flew to attach themselves to their places in an ode to Time; an immortal ode to Time. He sang. Evans answered from behind the tree. The dead were in Thessaly, Evans sang, among the orchids. There they waited till the War was over, and now the dead, now Evans himself —
“时间”这个词撕开了它的外壳，将它那丰富的内在倾泻于他的全身，如贝壳一般从他的唇上坠落，如刨床里飞出的刨花，不用他费心去追求，严厉的、纯洁的、不朽的话语，飞去和一首光阴的颂歌融为一体，一首不朽的光阴颂。他放声歌唱。埃文斯在树木后面应和着他。死者在塞萨利[37]，埃文斯在兰花丛中唱道。他们等在那里，直到战争结束，而如今死者，如今埃文斯本人…【注：[37]希腊中东部一地区，位于品都斯山和爱琴海之间。】
“It is time,” said Rezia.
“时间到了，”蕾西娅说。
“The time, Septimus,” Rezia repeated. “What is the time?”
“时间，赛普提默斯，”蕾西娅重复说，“现在什么时间啦？”
“But I am so unhappy, Septimus,” said Rezia trying to make him sit down.
“可我是如此不幸，赛普提默斯，”蕾西娅说道，想要使他重新坐下。
The millions lamented; for ages they had sorrowed. He would turn round, he would tell them in a few moments, only a few moments more, of this relief, of this joy, of this astonishing revelation —
数百万人在悲悼中，他们已经痛苦了好几个世纪。他要转过身去，他要告诉他们，过一会儿，只要再过那么小小的一会儿，告诉他们这份安慰，这份快乐，这份惊人的启示…
“I will tell you the time,” said Septimus, very slowly, very drowsily, smiling mysteriously. As he sat smiling at the dead man in the grey suit the quarter struck — the quarter to twelve.
“我会告诉你时间的。”赛普提默斯说，说得很慢，有气无力的，还带着神秘的微笑。正当他坐在那里，朝着穿灰衣的死人微笑时，报时的钟声敲响了——十一点三刻。
He was talking, he was starting, this man must notice him. He was looking at them.
他自言自语地说着，瞪着某个人，此人一定注意到他了。那人看着他们。
And that is being young, Peter Walsh thought as he passed them. To be having an awful scene — the poor girl looked absolutely desperate — in the middle of the morning. But what was it about, he wondered, what had the young man in the overcoat been saying to her to make her look like that; what awful fix had they got themselves into, both to look so desperate as that on a fine summer morning? The amusing thing about coming back to England, after five years, was the way it made, anyhow the first days, things stand out as if one had never seen them before; lovers squabbling under a tree; the domestic family life of the parks. Never had he seen London look so enchanting — the softness of the distances; the richness; the greenness; the civilisation, after India, he thought, strolling across the grass.
他们很年轻，彼德·沃尔什走过他们身边时想道。真是糟糕的一幕——那个可怜的姑娘看上去绝望透顶——上午才刚过去一半呢。可究竟发生了什么呢，他寻思着，那个穿大衣的小伙子到底对那个姑娘说了些什么，使她的脸色那样难看；他们到底是陷进了怎样一个可怕的困境，会在这么清新的一个夏日之晨，把彼此都搞得如此绝望呢？回到英国的有趣之处在于，阔别了五年之后，这里变成这个样子了，总之在最初几天，一切在你眼中都显得像是从来也没见过似的：情人们在树荫下的吵嘴，公园里的天伦之乐。他从没见过伦敦像现在这样迷人——柔和的远景、丰饶的色彩、青翠的草地、高度的文明，对一个从印度归来的人来说，显得分外魅人，他一边沉思一边信步穿过了草坪。
Those five years –1918 to 1923– had been, he suspected, somehow very important. People looked different. Newspapers seemed different. Now for instance there was a man writing quite openly in one of the respectable weeklies about water-closets. That you couldn’t have done ten years ago — written quite openly about water- closets in a respectable weekly. And then this taking out a stick of rouge, or a powder-puff and making up in public. On board ship coming home there were lots of young men and girls — Betty and Bertie he remembered in particular — carrying on quite openly; the old mother sitting and watching them with her knitting, cool as a cucumber. The girl would stand still and powder her nose in front of every one. And they weren’t engaged; just having a good time; no feelings hurt on either side. As hard as nails she was — Betty What’shername –; but a thorough good sort. She would make a very good wife at thirty — she would marry when it suited her to marry; marry some rich man and live in a large house near Manchester.
那五年——从1918年到1923年——大概是最为关键的五年吧，他估计。人们看上去和以前不同了。报纸也看上去不同了。如今，比方说，有个人在一份有分量的周刊上公开发表了他对厕所的意见。十年前你是不可能那么做的——在一份有名的周刊上公然写什么厕所的事。还有就是在公共场合掏出一支口红，或一块粉扑打扮起来。在归乡的轮船上有许多年轻男女——他印象特别深刻的有贝蒂和伯迪——公开地打情骂俏，老母亲坐在一旁织着绒线，看在眼里却无动于衷。姑娘则静静地站在那里，在众目睽睽之下往鼻子上抹粉。而且他们也不兴订婚，只要开心就好，对哪一方都不会造成感情伤害。像她那么冷酷的人——贝蒂，是叫这个名字吧——，但也是个绝对的好人，到三十岁时，她会做个贤妻良母——等到时机合适她就会结婚的，嫁个阔老公，住在曼彻斯特附近的大房子里。
This susceptibility to impressions had been his undoing no doubt. Still at his age he had, like a boy or a girl even, these alternations of mood; good days, bad days, for no reason whatever, happiness from a pretty face, downright misery at the sight of a frump. After India of course one fell in love with every woman one met. There was a freshness about them; even the poorest dressed better than five years ago surely; and to his eye the fashions had never been so becoming; the long black cloaks; the slimness; the elegance; and then the delicious and apparently universal habit of paint. Every woman, even the most respectable, had roses blooming under glass; lips cut with a knife; curls of Indian ink; there was design, art, everywhere; a change of some sort had undoubtedly taken place. What did the young people think about? Peter Walsh asked himself.
毋庸置疑，风景能如此感染他正是他的致命弱点。已经到了他那样的年纪，却依旧像个小伙子似的，情绪反复无常，时而开心，时而沮丧，也不知道是什么原因，看见一张漂亮的脸蛋就会觉得幸福，看见一个邋遢女人又会一下子陷入苦恼的深渊。当然啰，在去过印度之后，你会爱上遇见的每一个女人。她们身上有一种清爽的感觉，即使是穿着最寒酸的，也明显要比五年前好看。在他眼里，时装从来也没有像现在那么得体适宜的，黑色的长披风，纤细的身材，高雅的姿态，还有那显然已成为普遍风尚的华美的彩妆。每个女人，甚至连最高贵的也不例外，都如温室中盛开的玫瑰，唇形犹如利刃，鬈发如墨，到处都是人为的艺术。某种变化毫无疑问地发生了。小伙子们对此会作何感想呢？彼德·沃尔什自问。
But of all that ancient lot, Clarissa’s friends — Whitbreads, Kinderleys, Cunninghams, Kinloch-Jones’s — Sally was probably the best. She tried to get hold of things by the right end anyhow. She saw through Hugh Whitbread anyhow — the admirable Hugh — when Clarissa and the rest were at his feet.
但在所有的老一辈中，在克拉丽莎的朋友中——惠特布莱德、金德莱、坎宁安、金洛克·琼斯——萨利大概算最好的。总之，她尽量公正地对待一切。在克拉丽莎和其他人仍对休·惠特布莱德崇拜得五体投地时——这个令人赞赏的休——她就已经看穿他了。
Who was it now who had done that? Peter Walsh asked himself, turning into the Broad Walk,– married a rich man and lived in a large house near Manchester? Somebody who had written him a long, gushing letter quite lately about “blue hydrangeas.” It was seeing blue hydrangeas that made her think of him and the old days — Sally Seton, of course! It was Sally Seton — the last person in the world one would have expected to marry a rich man and live in a large house near Manchester, the wild, the daring, the romantic Sally!
现在是谁已经达到了这个目的呢？彼德·沃尔什问着自己，转向了一条大路——谁已经嫁给了阔老公，住在曼彻斯特附近的大房子里呢？是某个最近给他写了封信的人，一封关于“蓝绣球花”的过分热情的长信。是看见了蓝绣球花才使她想起了他和往昔的岁月——萨利·西顿，当然啰！是萨利·西顿——世界那么大，你做梦都想不到偏偏是她嫁给了一个富翁，并且住进了曼彻斯特附近的一所大房子，这个狂野的、大胆的、浪漫的萨利！
“The Whitbreads?” he could hear her saying. “Who are the Whitbreads? Coal merchants. Respectable tradespeople.”
“惠特布莱德？”他仿佛听见她说，“谁是惠特布莱德？哦，是那个做煤炭生意的呀。可敬的生意人哪。”
Hugh she detested for some reason. He thought of nothing but his own appearance, she said. He ought to have been a Duke. He would be certain to marry one of the Royal Princesses. And of course Hugh had the most extraordinary, the most natural, the most sublime respect for the British aristocracy of any human being he had ever come across. Even Clarissa had to own that. Oh, but he was such a dear, so unselfish, gave up shooting to please his old mother — remembered his aunts’ birthdays, and so on.
出于某种理由，她讨厌休。除了自己的外表以外，他对什么都不上心，她说。他应该做个公爵才对。那他就一定会娶个皇家的公主啦。当然啰，在彼德遇见的所有人里，休是对英国的贵族制最充满敬仰的，非常的、自然的、崇高的敬仰啊。即便是克拉丽莎也不得不承认这一点。哦，可他又是多亲切的一个人，如此无私，为了取悦自己的母亲可以放弃去打猎——记得住他的姨妈们的生日，等等，等等。
Sally, to do her justice, saw through all that. One of the things he remembered best was an argument one Sunday morning at Bourton about women’s rights (that antediluvian topic), when Sally suddenly lost her temper, flared up, and told Hugh that he represented all that was most detestable in British middle-class life. She told him that she considered him responsible for the state of “those poor girls in Piccadilly”– Hugh, the perfect gentleman, poor Hugh!– never did a man look more horrified! She did it on purpose she said afterwards (for they used to get together in the vegetable garden and compare notes). “He’s read nothing, thought nothing, felt nothing,” he could hear her saying in that very emphatic voice which carried so much farther than she knew. The stable boys had more life in them than Hugh, she said. He was a perfect specimen of the public school type, she said. No country but England could have produced him. She was really spiteful, for some reason; had some grudge against him. Something had happened — he forgot what — in the smoking-room. He had insulted her — kissed her? Incredible! Nobody believed a word against Hugh of course. Who could? Kissing Sally in the smoking-room! If it had been some Honourable Edith or Lady Violet, perhaps; but not that ragamuffin Sally without a penny to her name, and a father or a mother gambling at Monte Carlo. For of all the people he had ever met Hugh was the greatest snob — the most obsequious — no, he didn’t cringe exactly. He was too much of a prig for that. A first-rate valet was the obvious comparison — somebody who walked behind carrying suit cases; could be trusted to send telegrams — indispensable to hostesses. And he’d found his job — married his Honourable Evelyn; got some little post at Court, looked after the King’s cellars, polished the Imperial shoe- buckles, went about in knee-breeches and lace ruffles. How remorseless life is! A little job at Court!
萨利，说句老实话，看透了所有这一切。彼德记得最清楚的是一场争论，发生在某个礼拜天早晨的伯尔顿，是关于女性权利的（这个话题自打开天辟地起就从没有断过）争论，萨利蓦然间生气了，怒火冲天的，说休代表的是最可憎的英国中产阶级。她告诉休，她认为他应该对那些“皮卡迪里街上可怜的站街女”的生活现状负责——休，这个完美的绅士，这个可怜的休！——脸上露出了没有一个男人会有的那种恐怖。她后来说她是故意那么做的（因为她和彼德常常在菜园子里碰头，还相互交流些看法）。“他什么书也不看，什么想法也没有，简直麻木不仁。”彼德能够听到她用强调的语气说着，这句话比她以为的要传播得远多了。马童们都比这个休看上去有生气，她说。他是公学制度制造出来的完美典范，她说。除了英国，没有一个国家会产生出这样的人。她真的是出口伤人，出于某种理由，她对他怀恨在心。曾经在吸烟室里发生了一桩事情——彼德忘记是什么事了。休好像侮辱了她——是吻了她吗？难以置信！当然没有人会相信关于休的坏话的。谁会呢？在吸烟室里吻萨利！如果是某个尊贵的伊迪斯小姐或维奥莱特女士，那倒还有可能，但不会是这个衣着寒碜的萨利，因为在她的名下分文没有，只有一对喜欢在蒙特卡罗豪赌的父母。在彼德遇见过的所有人中，休是最势利的一个——最会溜须拍马的一个——不，他也并非是个十足的阿谀奉承之徒。因为他的自尊心不容许他做得那么彻底。把他比作一流的贴身男仆还是比较贴切的——某个老是跟在主人后头拎行李箱的角色，你可以放心地叫他去发电报，他一定是女主人不可或缺的好帮手。他也找到了适合自己的事业——就是娶那个尊贵的伊芙林，就此在宫廷里谋到个小小的职位：看管国王的酒窖，把贵人们的鞋扣擦得锃亮，穿着长及膝盖的短裤和花饰繁复的上衣在皇宫里东跑西颠的。生活是多么残酷呀！宫廷里的一个小当差！
He had married this lady, the Honourable Evelyn, and they lived hereabouts, so he thought (looking at the pompous houses overlooking the Park), for he had lunched there once in a house which had, like all Hugh’s possessions, something that no other house could possibly have — linen cupboards it might have been. You had to go and look at them — you had to spend a great deal of time always admiring whatever it was — linen cupboards, pillow-cases, old oak furniture, pictures, which Hugh had picked up for an old song. But Mrs. Hugh sometimes gave the show away. She was one of those obscure mouse-like little women who admire big men. She was almost negligible. Then suddenly she would say something quite unexpected — something sharp. She had the relics of the grand manner perhaps. The steam coal was a little too strong for her — it made the atmosphere thick. And so there they lived, with their linen cupboards and their old masters and their pillow-cases fringed with real lace at the rate of five or ten thousand a year presumably, while he, who was two years older than Hugh, cadged for a job.
他娶了这位女士，这位尊贵的伊芙林，他们应该就住在这一带，彼德如是想道（看着那些能够俯瞰公园的豪宅），因为他曾经在那里的一家人家里用过午餐，那家人家也像休家一样，有一些别人家不可能有的摆设——也许是只放亚麻织品的柜子。你必须去看一下——你必须花上一点时间去不停地赞美一番——亚麻柜、枕头套、老橡木家具、图画，都是休从二手市场淘来的。但休太太有时也会露出马脚来。她是个不起眼的、如小老鼠般的女人，她崇拜高大的男人。她几乎无足轻重。然后在突然间她又会说出什么使人倍感意外的话——刺耳的话。她也许还保留着那么一丝贵族气派。煤炉的气味对她来说有些过于刺激了——它使空气变得污浊。因此他们住在那儿，和他们的亚麻柜，和古代大师的杰作，和蕾丝边的枕套生活在一起，过着年金收入大约在五千到一万镑的生活。而他呢，他还比休大两岁呢，却还在可怜巴巴地找工作。
At fifty-three he had to come and ask them to put him into some secretary’s office, to find him some usher’s job teaching little boys Latin, at the beck and call of some mandarin in an office, something that brought in five hundred a year; for if he married Daisy, even with his pension, they could never do on less. Whitbread could do it presumably; or Dalloway. He didn’t mind what he asked Dalloway. He was a thorough good sort; a bit limited; a bit thick in the head; yes; but a thorough good sort. Whatever he took up he did in the same matter-of-fact sensible way; without a touch of imagination, without a spark of brilliancy, but with the inexplicable niceness of his type. He ought to have been a country gentleman — he was wasted on politics. He was at his best out of doors, with horses and dogs — how good he was, for instance, when that great shaggy dog of Clarissa’s got caught in a trap and had its paw half torn off, and Clarissa turned faint and Dalloway did the whole thing; bandaged, made splints; told Clarissa not to be a fool. That was what she liked him for perhaps — that was what she needed. “Now, my dear, don’t be a fool. Hold this — fetch that,” all the time talking to the dog as if it were a human being.
他都五十三了，还不得不去求人家把他安置在某个秘书室里，帮他找份教小孩子拉丁文的助教工作，在办公室里对某个官僚老爷点头哈腰，干一份每年能带来五百块收入的差使。因为如果他娶了戴西，即使可以拿年金，钱也是无法维持他们的生活的。惠特布莱德也许会帮忙，或者是达洛维。他不介意去求达洛维。他是个大好人，虽然思想有点狭隘，脑子有点古板，这些都是事实，可他还是个十足的好人。无论做什么事，他都采取同样实事求是的、理智的方式；他没有丝毫的想象力，没有一点灵感的光辉，但有着他那种人特有的、怪异的认真劲。他应该做个乡绅——搞政治实在是浪费他的才华。他在户外时会表现出最佳状态，和他的马儿狗儿在一起——他真是个大好人，比如说，有次克拉丽莎的大长毛狗掉进了陷阱里，有只爪子眼看就要裂开来，克拉丽莎头晕得不知如何是好，是达洛维料理了一切：缠绷带，上夹板，叫克拉丽莎别犯傻。那也许就是她喜欢他的缘故——她需要的正是这种男人。“哦，亲爱的，别傻了。拿着这个——去把那个拿过来。”在整个过程中，他始终在和狗儿说话，好像它也是人似的。
That was one of the bonds between Sally and himself. There was a garden where they used to walk, a walled-in place, with rose-bushes and giant cauliflowers — he could remember Sally tearing off a rose, stopping to exclaim at the beauty of the cabbage leaves in the moonlight (it was extraordinary how vividly it all came back to him, things he hadn’t thought of for years,) while she implored him, half laughing of course, to carry off Clarissa, to save her from the Hughs and the Dalloways and all the other “perfect gentlemen” who would “stifle her soul” (she wrote reams of poetry in those days), make a mere hostess of her, encourage her worldliness. But one must do Clarissa justice. She wasn’t going to marry Hugh anyhow. She had a perfectly clear notion of what she wanted. Her emotions were all on the surface. Beneath, she was very shrewd — a far better judge of character than Sally, for instance, and with it all, purely feminine; with that extraordinary gift, that woman’s gift, of making a world of her own wherever she happened to be. She came into a room; she stood, as he had often seen her, in a doorway with lots of people round her. But it was Clarissa one remembered. Not that she was striking; not beautiful at all; there was nothing picturesque about her; she never said anything specially clever; there she was, however; there she was.
那就是彼德和萨利之间的一条纽带。有一个他们过去常常去散步的花园，花园被四面围墙圈起来，里面有玫瑰花丛和大棵的花椰菜——他还记得萨利曾摘下一朵玫瑰，驻足赞叹起月光下的甘蓝叶如此美丽（真是神奇，过去的一切还是那么栩栩如生，要知道他已经有多年没有想到过这些了），同时她还劝他，当然是半真半假地，趁早把克拉丽莎夺走，别让她落入休、达洛维以及诸如此类的“完美绅士”之手，因为他们会“枯萎她的灵魂”（那些日子里萨利写了许多诗歌），把她变成一个地道的家庭主妇，一个彻底的世俗之人。可是我们必须为克拉丽莎说句公道话。总之她并没有打算要嫁给休。她对自己的需求有非常明确的认识。她的感情都处于表面的状态。在内心里，她是个精明人——比如说，她比萨利能更好地判断一个人，而且完全靠女性的直觉。有如此出色的天赋，女性的天赋，那么你无论走到哪儿都能把世界掌握在你的手中。她走进房间，站住，像他过去常常看见的她的样子一般，门口有一帮人围在她身边。可别人记住的是克拉丽莎。不是因为她动人，她一点都不漂亮，也没什么独特之处，她从没说过什么特别机灵的话，但是，你就是忘不了她，忘不了她。
But how could she swallow all that stuff about poetry? How could she let him hold forth about Shakespeare? Seriously and solemnly Richard Dalloway got on his hind legs and said that no decent man ought to read Shakespeare’s sonnets because it was like listening at keyholes (besides the relationship was not one that he approved). No decent man ought to let his wife visit a deceased wife’s sister. Incredible! The only thing to do was to pelt him with sugared almonds — it was at dinner. But Clarissa sucked it all in; thought it so honest of him; so independent of him; Heaven knows if she didn’t think him the most original mind she’d ever met!
但她如何咽得下他关于诗歌的那一大套呢？她如何受得了听他对莎士比亚大放厥词？理查德·达洛维严肃认真地站在那里，说什么只要是体面人都不应该去读莎士比亚的十四行诗，因为那就像是在钥匙孔里偷听（除此之外，诗里描写的那种关系也不是他能认可的[38]）。还说只要是体面人就不应该让自己的老婆去拜访一个去世的已婚女人的姐妹。这说的哪是人话呀！唯一可行的方法就是拿起糖杏仁往他身上扔——那时正是晚餐时间。但克拉丽莎把这一切都咽下了肚去，还认为他是个无比诚实的人，一个有主见的人。天晓得，她是否认为他就是她遇见过的最具独立思想的人呢！【注：[38]莎士比亚的一部分十四行诗中有暧昧的双性恋情节，描写了主人公对一位“黑肤女郎”和一位“美男子”的爱恋。】
No, no, no! He was not in love with her any more! He only felt, after seeing her that morning, among her scissors and silks, making ready for the party, unable to get away from the thought of her; she kept coming back and back like a sleeper jolting against him in a railway carriage; which was not being in love, of course; it was thinking of her, criticising her, starting again, after thirty years, trying to explain her. The obvious thing to say of her was that she was worldly; cared too much for rank and society and getting on in the world — which was true in a sense; she had admitted it to him. (You could always get her to own up if you took the trouble; she was honest.) What she would say was that she hated frumps, fogies, failures, like himself presumably; thought people had no right to slouch about with their hands in their pockets; must do something, be something; and these great swells, these Duchesses, these hoary old Countesses one met in her drawing- room, unspeakably remote as he felt them to be from anything that mattered a straw, stood for something real to her. Lady Bexborough, she said once, held herself upright (so did Clarissa herself; she never lounged in any sense of the word; she was straight as a dart, a little rigid in fact). She said they had a kind of courage which the older she grew the more she respected. In all this there was a great deal of Dalloway, of course; a great deal of the public-spirited, British Empire, tariff-reform, governing-class spirit, which had grown on her, as it tends to do. With twice his wits, she had to see things through his eyes — one of the tragedies of married life. With a mind of her own, she must always be quoting Richard — as if one couldn’t know to a tittle what Richard thought by reading the Morning Post of a morning! These parties for example were all for him, or for her idea of him (to do Richard justice he would have been happier farming in Norfolk). She made her drawing-room a sort of meeting-place; she had a genius for it. Over and over again he had seen her take some raw youth, twist him, turn him, wake him up; set him going. Infinite numbers of dull people conglomerated round her of course. But odd unexpected people turned up; an artist sometimes; sometimes a writer; queer fish in that atmosphere. And behind it all was that network of visiting, leaving cards, being kind to people; running about with bunches of flowers, little presents; So-and-so was going to France — must have an air-cushion; a real drain on her strength; all that interminable traffic that women of her sort keep up; but she did it genuinely, from a natural instinct.
不，不，不！他不再爱她了！他只是感觉，在那天早上，在看见她拿着剪刀和丝线为派对做准备之后，无法控制自己不去想她，她的形象反反复复地回到他的脑海里，就像火车车厢里一个打瞌睡的人不断地往他身上靠。当然，这并不代表爱情，只是想着她，批评她，在三十年后，再次想要去理解她。说到她，很明显的一件事就是她是个世故之人，过分关心身份地位，一心想着要进入上流社会——从某种意义上说这是事实，她也对他承认过这点。（如果你不怕麻烦，你总能让她坦白的，她是个诚实的人。）她会说她讨厌邋遢鬼、保守派和失败者，也许就是像他那样的人吧。她认为人们没有权利两手插在口袋里闲来荡去，每个人都必须做些什么，必须取得成功。人们在她的客厅里遇见过的那些伟人，那些公爵夫人，那些满头白发的老伯爵夫人，他感觉这些人和他认为的仅有一丁点意义的事物都相差十万八千里，而对她来说，他们却代表着真实。贝克斯伯罗女士，她有次说过，把身体挺得笔直（克拉丽莎自己也这样，无论怎么说，她从来也不会倚着靠着什么，她就像一杆标枪般笔挺，实际上都有点僵硬了）。克拉丽莎说过她们身上有股子勇气，随着她年龄的增长，她越来越敬佩这种勇气。当然，所有这些看法中有很大一部分是来自达洛维的，诸如热心公益、大英帝国、税制改革、统治阶级精神，这些思想在她的内心里大量滋生着，也是趋势如此。虽说她的智慧高出达洛维一倍，但她不得不通过他的眼睛来观察事物——这正是婚姻生活的悲剧之一。她有自己的头脑，却老是喜欢引用理查德说的话——好像从你早晨读的《晨邮报》里，你还不能很好地了解理查德的想法似的！比如说，这些派对就完全是为了他，或者说是为了她理想中的他（替理查德说句公道话，如果能在诺福克[39]干农活，他一定会比现在快乐多了）。她把客厅变成了一个聚会的场所，干这种事她有天才。他一次又一次看见她把一个生涩的年轻人带进去，把他说得晕头转向直至昏死过去，然后再把他唤醒，扶他上路。当然，她身边总是围绕着数不清的无聊之人。但也会有古怪的不速之客大驾光临：有时是艺术家，有时是作家，在那种氛围里，他们简直就像一条条死鱼。而在这一切的背后，是一个互相拜访、交换名片、热情好客，捧着一束束鲜花和各种小礼物四处溜达的网络，比如某某人就要去法国了——就一定得送个气垫。这些事真的耗尽了她的体力，她这类女人必须要保持所有这些没完没了的交际，可她做得很真诚，因为那发自她自然的天性。【注：[39]英国东部北海之滨一历史悠久的地区。】
Oddly enough, she was one of the most thoroughgoing sceptics he had ever met, and possibly (this was a theory he used to make up to account for her, so transparent in some ways, so inscrutable in others), possibly she said to herself, As we are a doomed race, chained to a sinking ship (her favourite reading as a girl was Huxley and Tyndall, and they were fond of these nautical metaphors), as the whole thing is a bad joke, let us, at any rate, do our part; mitigate the sufferings of our fellow-prisoners (Huxley again); decorate the dungeon with flowers and air-cushions; be as decent as we possibly can. Those ruffians, the Gods, shan’t have it all their own way,– her notion being that the Gods, who never lost a chance of hurting, thwarting and spoiling human lives were seriously put out if, all the same, you behaved like a lady. That phase came directly after Sylvia’s death — that horrible affair. To see your own sister killed by a falling tree (all Justin Parry’s fault — all his carelessness) before your very eyes, a girl too on the verge of life, the most gifted of them, Clarissa always said, was enough to turn one bitter. Later she wasn’t so positive perhaps; she thought there were no Gods; no one was to blame; and so she evolved this atheist’s religion of doing good for the sake of goodness.
奇怪的是，她是他曾遇见过的无神论者中最彻底的一个，而也许（这是他过去创造出来用以解释她的一个理论，她这人从某些角度来说非常透明，从另一些角度来说又非常含混），也许她对自己说，既然我们是个濒危的种族，被绑在一艘即将沉没的船上（她姑娘时最喜爱的读物是赫胥黎[40]和廷德尔[41]的，他们俩都喜欢像这样用船舶打比方），既然世间的一切皆是一场糟糕的游戏，那么管它三七二十一，我们只要尽到自己的责任就好啦，减轻和我们在同一个牢笼里的伙伴们的痛苦吧（又是赫胥黎的笔法），用鲜花和气垫把地牢装点起来吧，让我们尽量活得体面些吧。那些无赖们，那些神祇们，可不能让他们随心所欲——她的看法是，那些神祇们，他们从来不会放弃任何伤害、破坏、毁灭人生的机会，但是只要你按淑女的标准来严格要求自己，那他们的威力就会大打折扣的。西尔维亚去世后，她立即产生了这一想法——那是个可怕的事故。亲眼看见自己的妹妹在你眼前被一棵倒下来的大树压死（都是贾斯廷·帕里的错——因为他太大意了），西尔维亚也是个即将步入人生的姑娘，是她们中最有天赋的一个，克拉丽莎总这么说，是足够使人认识到人生的悲惨的。后来，她也许对这个想法不那么肯定了，她认为不存在什么神祇，没人该为此负责，于是她形成了一种无神论的信仰，为做好事而做好事。【注：[40]托马斯·亨利·赫胥黎（1825~1895）：英国著名博物学家，达尔文进化论最杰出的代表。[41]约翰·廷德尔（1820~1893）：英国物理学家，因其关于气体的透明度和大气吸收辐射热量的著作而闻名。】
And of course she enjoyed life immensely. It was her nature to enjoy (though goodness only knows, she had her reserves; it was a mere sketch, he often felt, that even he, after all these years, could make of Clarissa). Anyhow there was no bitterness in her; none of that sense of moral virtue which is so repulsive in good women. She enjoyed practically everything. If you walked with her in Hyde Park now it was a bed of tulips, now a child in a perambulator, now some absurd little drama she made up on the spur of the moment. (Very likely, she would have talked to those lovers, if she had thought them unhappy.) She had a sense of comedy that was really exquisite, but she needed people, always people, to bring it out, with the inevitable result that she frittered her time away, lunching, dining, giving these incessant parties of hers, talking nonsense, sayings things she didn’t mean, blunting the edge of her mind, losing her discrimination. There she would sit at the head of the table taking infinite pains with some old buffer who might be useful to Dalloway — they knew the most appalling bores in Europe — or in came Elizabeth and everything must give way to HER. She was at a High School, at the inarticulate stage last time he was over, a round-eyed, pale-faced girl, with nothing of her mother in her, a silent stolid creature, who took it all as a matter of course, let her mother make a fuss of her, and then said “May I go now?” like a child of four; going off, Clarissa explained, with that mixture of amusement and pride which Dalloway himself seemed to rouse in her, to play hockey. And now Elizabeth was “out,” presumably; thought him an old fogy, laughed at her mother’s friends. Ah well, so be it. The compensation of growing old, Peter Walsh thought, coming out of Regent’s Park, and holding his hat in hand, was simply this; that the passions remain as strong as ever, but one has gained — at last!– the power which adds the supreme flavour to existence,– the power of taking hold of experience, of turning it round, slowly, in the light.
当然啰，她非常享受生活。活得开心是她的天性（尽管只有天知道，她也有保守的一面。他常常感觉，即使是和她交往了这么多年的他，也只能画出克拉丽莎的一点点轮廓）。总之，她的天性里没有抱怨，没有贤惠女人身上那种令人讨厌的仁义道德。她几乎能享受一切。如果你此时正与她散步在海德公园[42]，花坛里的郁金香、童车里的婴儿都会让她心情大好，在这种心情的刺激下，她会编造出可笑的小故事（如果她觉得那些情侣们不快乐，她很有可能会去和他们聊上几句安慰一下的）。她有一种极其细腻的喜剧感，可她需要别人，总是需要别人，去把它激发出来，这就造成了无法避免的后果，就是白白地浪费掉许多时间，午餐、晚餐，她的派对永不落幕，说着无聊的话，言不由衷的话，把自己的大脑弄得昏昏沉沉，丧失了敏锐的辨别力。她会坐在桌子的首席，跟某个也许对达洛维有用的老家伙苦苦纠缠——他们认识全欧洲所有最令人讨厌的角色——或者伊丽莎白正好走进来，那么一切都必须为她让路了。他最后一次去达洛维家的时候，伊丽莎白还是个高中生，正处在笨嘴拙舌的阶段，她是个眼睛圆圆的、脸色苍白的姑娘，跟她母亲没有半点相像的地方。她是一个沉默寡言、感觉迟钝的姑娘，把一切都认为是理所应当，任她母亲在她身上发泄一阵母爱之后，她会像个四岁的小孩子一般说道：“我现在可以走了吗？”她跑掉后，克拉丽莎解释说，伊丽莎白去打曲棍球了。脸上带着混合了快乐与骄傲的表情，这样的表情似乎是达洛维本人给她的影响。如今伊丽莎白想必已经“进入了社交界”，因而会嘲笑她母亲的朋友，会认为他是个老古董。那么好吧，就这样吧。彼德·沃尔什走出摄政公园，手里拿着帽子，就是简简单单的这个，心里想，人老后得到的报偿只有一点：热情依然保留得如以前一般强烈，不过你得到了——终于！——使生活增添无上滋味的力量——把握经验的力量，这力量使生活流畅地运转起来，慢慢地，在阳光下品味。【注：[42]伦敦最著名的皇家公园，位于市中心的威斯敏斯特教堂地区。】
A terrible confession it was (he put his hat on again), but now, at the age of fifty-three one scarcely needed people any more. Life itself, every moment of it, every drop of it, here, this instant, now, in the sun, in Regent’s Park, was enough. Too much indeed. A whole lifetime was too short to bring out, now that one had acquired the power, the full flavour; to extract every ounce of pleasure, every shade of meaning; which both were so much more solid than they used to be, so much less personal. It was impossible that he should ever suffer again as Clarissa had made him suffer. For hours at a time (pray God that one might say these things without being overheard!), for hours and days he never thought of Daisy.
这是糟糕的自白（他又戴好了帽子），可如今，在你五十三岁的时候，你几乎不再需要任何人了。生活本身，每分每秒，每一滴汁水，这里，此刻，现在，在阳光下，在摄政公园里，已然足够。实在已经太多了。整个一生都太短暂而无法去实现，现在你必须已经获得了力量，体验了所有的滋味，去享受每一盎司的欢娱，去寻找每一个躲在暗中的意义。如今这两者都比以前充实得太多太多，也比以前更公开化了。要他再次遭受以前克拉丽莎使他遭受过的痛苦已是不可能。已经一连几个小时了（感谢上帝，没人听见你说着这些话），一连几个小时，一连几天，他都没有想过戴西了。
Could it be that he was in love with her then, remembering the misery, the torture, the extraordinary passion of those days? It was a different thing altogether — a much pleasanter thing — the truth being, of course, that now SHE was in love with HIM. And that perhaps was the reason why, when the ship actually sailed, he felt an extraordinary relief, wanted nothing so much as to be alone; was annoyed to find all her little attentions — cigars, notes, a rug for the voyage — in his cabin. Every one if they were honest would say the same; one doesn’t want people after fifty; one doesn’t want to go on telling women they are pretty; that’s what most men of fifty would say, Peter Walsh thought, if they were honest.
那时他真的爱上克拉丽莎了吗？他想起那份悲惨，那份折磨，那些日子里超凡脱俗的感情。这整个都是不同的——比过去快乐多了——这就是真理，当然，现在是戴西爱上了他。也许这就是原因，在轮船启程的那一刻，他会感觉到无比轻松，什么也不需要，只要一个人待着就好。戴西对于小事也处处用心使他觉得烦恼——雪茄烟、笔记、为旅行准备的一张毯子——都在他的船舱里。只要是诚实的人都会这么说：年过半百就不需要伴侣了。你再也不想恭维任何女人，说什么她很漂亮。五十出头的男人多半都会这么认为的，彼德·沃尔什如是想，如果他们诚实的话。
But then these astonishing accesses of emotion — bursting into tears this morning, what was all that about? What could Clarissa have thought of him? thought him a fool presumably, not for the first time. It was jealousy that was at the bottom of it — jealousy which survives every other passion of mankind, Peter Walsh thought, holding his pocket-knife at arm’s length. She had been meeting Major Orde, Daisy said in her last letter; said it on purpose he knew; said it to make him jealous; he could see her wrinkling her forehead as she wrote, wondering what she could say to hurt him; and yet it made no difference; he was furious! All this pother of coming to England and seeing lawyers wasn’t to marry her, but to prevent her from marrying anybody else. That was what tortured him, that was what came over him when he saw Clarissa so calm, so cold, so intent on her dress or whatever it was; realising what she might have spared him, what she had reduced him to — a whimpering, snivelling old ass. But women, he thought, shutting his pocket- knife, don’t know what passion is. They don’t know the meaning of it to men. Clarissa was as cold as an icicle. There she would sit on the sofa by his side, let him take her hand, give him one kiss — Here he was at the crossing.
可那段没来由的情绪宣泄——今天早上突如其来的痛哭流涕，这算什么意思呢？克拉丽莎会怎么看他呢？也许会认为他是个傻瓜吧，这也不是头一回了。嫉妒就是那场发作的缘由——嫉妒总是凌驾于任何人类的感情之上，彼德·沃尔什想道，拿着小折刀的手高举起来。她常常去和奥德少校见面，戴西在最近的一封信里告诉他，他知道她是故意告诉他这个的，她这么说是为了引起他的嫉妒。他可以看见她皱着眉头写着这封信，绞尽脑汁寻思怎么说会让他感觉受伤。然而，这一切全然无效，他感到怒不可遏！回英国找律师，这一场折腾并不是为了娶她，而是为了不让别人娶她。那正是折磨他的原因所在，那就是在他看见克拉丽莎如此沉稳，如此冷漠，专心致志地在那里补她的裙子什么的的时候，他所感觉到的痛苦。想到她也许可以使他脱离苦海的，而她所做的却是使他变成这么一个——抽抽搭搭、眼泪鼻涕横流的老蠢货。可是女人们，他想着，合上了折刀，不懂感情为何物。她们不懂感情对男人意味着什么。克拉丽莎委实冷若冰霜。她会坐在沙发上，坐到他的旁边，让他握着她的手，给他一个吻——此时他走到了一个十字路口。
A sound interrupted him; a frail quivering sound, a voice bubbling up without direction, vigour, beginning or end, running weakly and shrilly and with an absence of all human meaning into
一个声音打搅了他，一个细微、颤抖的声音，一个如水泡般喷涌而出的声音，没有方向，没有力量，没有起点，也没有终点，虚弱又尖利地飘过，不包含任何人类能够理解的意义：
ee um fah um so foo swee too eem oo —
依恩法恩索，福史威图依姆乌——
Through all ages — when the pavement was grass, when it was swamp, through the age of tusk and mammoth, through the age of silent sunrise, the battered woman — for she wore a skirt — with her right hand exposed, her left clutching at her side, stood singing of love — love which has lasted a million years, she sang, love which prevails, and millions of years ago, her lover, who had been dead these centuries, had walked, she crooned, with her in May; but in the course of ages, long as summer days, and flaming, she remembered, with nothing but red asters, he had gone; death’s enormous sickle had swept those tremendous hills, and when at last she laid her hoary and immensely aged head on the earth, now become a mere cinder of ice, she implored the Gods to lay by her side a bunch of purple-heather, there on her high burial place which the last rays of the last sun caressed; for then the pageant of the universe would be over.
穿越了所有的年代——当人行道上荒草丛生，成为一片沼泽，穿越了象牙和猛犸的年代，穿越了太阳静静升起的年代，这个饱受摧残的女人——因为她穿着裙子——裸露着右手，左手贴在身旁，站在那里唱着一支恋曲——持续了一百万年的爱情，她歌唱，颠扑不破的爱情。数百万年之前，她的情人，他已经死了多少个世纪，曾经和她一起，在五月里散步，她低吟浅唱着。然而在岁月的进程中，在如夏日一般漫长的悠悠岁月中，在漫山遍野如火焰一般盛开着的，她记得，红色的紫苑花丛中，他倒下了。死神的那把大镰刀扫过巍峨的群山，到最后，她终于将她那颗花白的、无比苍老的头颅放倒在大地之上，而如今，大地已变成为一片残破的冰原。她祷告上帝在她身旁安放一束紫石楠，在她高高的坟茔之上，最后的一轮太阳将用它最后的一抹余晖抚慰它。到那时，宇宙的盛大表演也将告终。
the voice of no age or sex, the voice of an ancient spring spouting from the earth; which issued, just opposite Regent’s Park Tube station from a tall quivering shape, like a funnel, like a rusty pump, like a wind-beaten tree for ever barren of leaves which lets the wind run up and down its branches singing
这个声音，听不出年龄和性别，是一座古老的喷泉从大地上喷出的声音。它来自在摄政公园地铁站对过的一个颤抖着的高大身影，如一个漏斗，如一只生锈的水泵，如狂风吹落了最后一片树叶的枯木，只得听凭风儿在它的残枝间任意肆虐，唱出一首了无意义的歌：
ee um fah um so foo swee too eem oo
依恩法恩索，福史威图依姆乌——
and rocks and creaks and moans in the eternal breeze.
枯树在那永不停歇的狂风中，摇曳、嘎吱、呜咽。
Still remembering how once in some primeval May she had walked with her lover, this rusty pump, this battered old woman with one hand exposed for coppers the other clutching her side, would still be there in ten million years, remembering how once she had walked in May, where the sea flows now, with whom it did not matter — he was a man, oh yes, a man who had loved her. But the passage of ages had blurred the clarity of that ancient May day; the bright petalled flowers were hoar and silver frosted; and she no longer saw, when she implored him (as she did now quite clearly) “look in my eyes with thy sweet eyes intently,” she no longer saw brown eyes, black whiskers or sunburnt face but only a looming shape, a shadow shape, to which, with the bird-like freshness of the very aged she still twittered “give me your hand and let me press it gently” (Peter Walsh couldn’t help giving the poor creature a coin as he stepped into his taxi), “and if some one should see, what matter they?” she demanded; and her fist clutched at her side, and she smiled, pocketing her shilling, and all peering inquisitive eyes seemed blotted out, and the passing generations — the pavement was crowded with bustling middle-class people — vanished, like leaves, to be trodden under, to be soaked and steeped and made mould of by that eternal spring —
依旧记得在那遥远的古代，在五月的一天里，她曾经和她的情人并肩漫步，这个身心憔悴的老妇人，如一台生锈的水泵，伸出一只手乞讨铜板，另一只手贴在身旁，即使过了一千万年，她仍将站在这里，回想着曾经在五月里的那次散步，如今那里已成为波涛汹涌的一汪大海，不管当时陪她一起散步的那人是谁——他是一个男人，哦，是的，是个曾爱过她的男人。但是岁月的流淌模糊了那个古老五月的清晰记忆：那花瓣明艳的鲜花已然凋零，已然覆盖着一层银霜。她再也看不见，当她乞求他（正像她此时相当清晰地喊出的那样）“用你那甜蜜的眼神，专注地看着我的眼睛吧”，她再也看不见那双褐色的眼睛、浓黑的胡髭和晒黑了的脸庞，只看见一个隐约的身影，一个影子般的形象，她依然会用她那非常苍老却又如小鸟一般清新的嗓音，对着它婉婉地唱出：“把你的手给我，让我温柔地握住它吧。”（彼德·沃尔什忍不住给了这位可怜的老妇人一枚硬币，随后坐上了出租车。）“如果有人看见，又有什么关系呢？”她自问。她先是攥紧拳头贴在身侧，随即又微笑着把这一先令放进了口袋，所有那些凝视着的好奇目光都消失不见了，一代又一代人匆匆地——人行道上挤满了熙熙攘攘的中产阶级——消逝而去，如踩在脚下的落叶，被那个永恒的春天所浸润，所覆盖，直至融入一片沃土…
As the ancient song bubbled up opposite Regent’s Park Tube station still the earth seemed green and flowery; still, though it issued from so rude a mouth, a mere hole in the earth, muddy too, matted with root fibres and tangled grasses, still the old bubbling burbling song, soaking through the knotted roots of infinite ages, and skeletons and treasure, streamed away in rivulets over the pavement and all along the Marylebone Road, and down towards Euston, fertilising, leaving a damp stain.
当这首古老的歌从摄政公园地铁站的对面喷涌而出时，大地依然青翠，鲜花依然盛开。然而，尽管它来自如此粗俗的一张嘴，仿佛是从大地上的一个洞穴里传出来的，而且洞穴里满是泥泞，纠结着驳杂的树根和纷乱的杂草，这首潺潺流淌着的古老歌谣，浸透了无尽岁月里的交相缠绕的树根，浸透了累累白骨与硕硕宝藏，依旧如一条小溪般漫过了人行道，沿着马里勒伯恩街流去，接着又往下朝着尤斯顿街流去，滋润着大地，留下一片水渍。
Suppose it was a wet night? Suppose one’s father, or somebody who had known one in better days had happened to pass, and saw one standing there in the gutter? And where did she sleep at night?
倘若这是个下雨的夜晚呢？倘若她的父亲，或某个在她春风得意时认识过她的人，碰巧经过此地，看见她如此潦倒地站在这里，该如何是好呢？她要到哪里去过夜呢？
ee um fah um so foo swee too eem oo
依恩法恩索，福史威图依姆乌——
Cheerfully, almost gaily, the invincible thread of sound wound up into the air like the smoke from a cottage chimney, winding up clean beech trees and issuing in a tuft of blue smoke among the topmost leaves. “And if some one should see, what matter they?”
不屈不挠的、如游丝般的歌声，快乐地，几乎是兴高采烈地，娓娓地飘入了空中，如农舍烟囱里的缕缕炊烟，围绕着一尘不染的山毛榉树袅袅升起，又化作一股青烟飘荡在树端的绿叶间。“如果有人看见，又有什么关系呢？”
Oh poor old wretch!
哦，这个可怜、不幸的老阿婆！
“Poor old woman,” said Rezia Warren Smith, waiting to cross.
“可怜的老妇人，”蕾西娅·沃伦·史密斯说着，一边等待着穿过马路。
Since she was so unhappy, for weeks and weeks now, Rezia had given meanings to things that happened, almost felt sometimes that she must stop people in the street, if they looked good, kind people, just to say to them “I am unhappy”; and this old woman singing in the street “if some one should see, what matter they?” made her suddenly quite sure that everything was going to be right. They were going to Sir William Bradshaw; she thought his name sounded nice; he would cure Septimus at once. And then there was a brewer’s cart, and the grey horses had upright bristles of straw in their tails; there were newspaper placards. It was a silly, silly dream, being unhappy.
蕾西娅已经一连好几个星期都闷闷不乐了，所以她对发生在周围的一切都会触景生情，有时候她甚至感觉应该去叫住那些路人，如果他们看起来快乐而且和善的话，只是为了向他们诉说“我不快乐呀”。而这个在大街上唱着“如果有人看见，又有什么关系呢？”的老婆婆，突然间使她有了一份强烈的信心，一切都会好起来的。他们要去看威廉·布莱德肖爵士，她觉得他的名字很好听，他会立刻把赛普提默斯治好的。此时，有一辆啤酒厂的大车过来了，灰色马的尾巴上沾着根根直立的稻草梗。还有张贴着报纸的公告栏。如此忧郁的感觉，简直是一个蠢得无以复加的迷梦。
To look at, he might have been a clerk, but of the better sort; for he wore brown boots; his hands were educated; so, too, his profile — his angular, big-nosed, intelligent, sensitive profile; but not his lips altogether, for they were loose; and his eyes (as eyes tend to be), eyes merely; hazel, large; so that he was, on the whole, a border case, neither one thing nor the other, might end with a house at Purley and a motor car, or continue renting apartments in back streets all his life; one of those half- educated, self-educated men whose education is all learnt from books borrowed from public libraries, read in the evening after the day’s work, on the advice of well-known authors consulted by letter.
从外表看来，他也许是个小职员，但属于比较上层的那种，因为他穿着棕色的皮靴；他那双手显示出他是个有文化的人，他的侧影也给人同样的感觉——他那棱角分明的、大鼻子的、睿智的、敏感的侧影，但他的两片嘴唇却松松垮垮的，很不给力；还有他的眼睛（和常人一样）很普通，只是一双淡褐色的大眼睛而已。因此上从总体来说，他是个游走在边缘的人物：你无法将他归于任何一种族类，也许他最后会在珀利区拥有一座住宅和一辆汽车，也或许一辈子都只能在小街里巷租公寓住。他是那种靠自学获得了粗浅知识的人，他的修养全部来自从公共图书馆借阅来的书籍，遵照那些通过书信往来结识了的著名作家的建议，在工作之余每晚都挑灯夜读。
So they crossed, Mr. and Mrs. Septimus Warren Smith, and was there, after all, anything to draw attention to them, anything to make a passer-by suspect here is a young man who carries in him the greatest message in the world, and is, moreover, the happiest man in the world, and the most miserable? Perhaps they walked more slowly than other people, and there was something hesitating, trailing, in the man’s walk, but what more natural for a clerk, who has not been in the West End on a weekday at this hour for years, than to keep looking at the sky, looking at this, that and the other, as if Portland Place were a room he had come into when the family are away, the chandeliers being hung in holland bags, and the caretaker, as she lets in long shafts of dusty light upon deserted, queer-looking armchairs, lifting one corner of the long blinds, explains to the visitors what a wonderful place it is; how wonderful, but at the same time, he thinks, as he looks at chairs and tables, how strange.
于是，赛普提默斯·沃伦·史密斯夫妇穿过了马路，他们身上到底有什么地方能够吸引住别人的目光，能够使路人怀疑起这个年轻人怀揣着世间最为重要的消息，而且，更有甚者，能够使人想到他是这个世界上最幸福，同时也是最悲惨的人呢？也许是因为他们走得比别人慢一些，那个男人的步伐有些迟疑，拖拖拉拉的，可是对于一个小职员来说这不是再自然不过的事吗，他已经有好多年没有在工作日的这个时间来伦敦西区信步游荡了。如此说来，这么悠闲地望望天空，这里看看那里瞧瞧又有什么不对的呢？走在波特兰大街上，他仿佛走进了一间房间，房间里的住家都已离去，枝型吊灯悬挂在麻布袋子里，女管家拉起了长帷幔的一角，让一束束细长的、扑满尘土的阳光照在了怪模怪样的扶手椅上，椅子上空空如也。向游客们介绍这个地方有多么美妙，多么美妙，但同时，他看着这些桌子和椅子想道，又多么古怪。
London has swallowed up many millions of young men called Smith; thought nothing of fantastic Christian names like Septimus with which their parents have thought to distinguish them. Lodging off the Euston Road, there were experiences, again experiences, such as change a face in two years from a pink innocent oval to a face lean, contracted, hostile. But of all this what could the most observant of friends have said except what a gardener says when he opens the conservatory door in the morning and finds a new blossom on his plant:– It has flowered; flowered from vanity, ambition, idealism, passion, loneliness, courage, laziness, the usual seeds, which all muddled up (in a room off the Euston Road), made him shy, and stammering, made him anxious to improve himself, made him fall in love with Miss Isabel Pole, lecturing in the Waterloo Road upon Shakespeare.
伦敦曾经吞没了成千上万个名叫史密斯的年轻人，对于像赛普提默斯之类奇奇怪怪的教名全然不当一回事，而父母们给孩子起这样的名字原本是为了使他们显得与众不同。寄宿在尤斯顿大街附近的小巷，使他获得了各种各样的经验，比如说，两年之内他那张红润、天真的圆脸就变成了一张瘦削、干枯、敌视的脸。可是对于这一切，哪怕是一个最善于察言观色的朋友又能说些什么呢？最多也就像一个园丁在早晨打开了一座苗圃的门，发现他种的花又开出来一朵时所说的：开花了！它是由虚荣、野心、理想主义、热情、孤独、勇气、懒散这些平常的种子培育出来的花朵，这一切互相拥挤着（就在尤斯顿大街附近的一间斗室里），使他胆小懦弱，使他结结巴巴，使他渴望完善自己，使他爱上了伊莎贝尔·波尔小姐，她是个在滑铁卢大街讲授莎士比亚的老师。
As for the other experiences, the solitary ones, which people go through alone, in their bedrooms, in their offices, walking the fields and the streets of London, he had them; had left home, a mere boy, because of his mother; she lied; because he came down to tea for the fiftieth time with his hands unwashed; because he could see no future for a poet in Stroud; and so, making a confidant of his little sister, had gone to London leaving an absurd note behind him, such as great men have written, and the world has read later when the story of their struggles has become famous.
至于别的一些经历，那些孤独的经历，人们独自一人在卧室或办公室里打发时间的经历，独自在乡间或在伦敦街头散步的经历，他都已经有了。在他还只是个小孩子的时候，就因为与母亲不和而离家出走了，他母亲欺骗了他，因为他不知多少次手也不洗就下楼来喝茶，因为他看出一个诗人在斯特劳德[43]是没有前途的，于是，他动身去了伦敦，只告诉了一个和他特别要好的小妹妹，并留下了一封荒唐的短信，口气高傲得就像伟人们写的那种，等到他们的奋斗终于获得成功而成为名人之后，全世界的人才会来拜读他们留下的短信。【注：[43]英国中部偏西南的一个小城。】
Was he not like Keats? she asked; and reflected how she might give him a taste of Antony and Cleopatra and the rest; lent him books; wrote him scraps of letters; and lit in him such a fire as burns only once in a lifetime, without heat, flickering a red gold flame infinitely ethereal and insubstantial over Miss Pole; Antony and Cleopatra; and the Waterloo Road. He thought her beautiful, believed her impeccably wise; dreamed of her, wrote poems to her, which, ignoring the subject, she corrected in red ink; he saw her, one summer evening, walking in a green dress in a square. “It has flowered,” the gardener might have said, had he opened the door; had he come in, that is to say, any night about this time, and found him writing; found him tearing up his writing; found him finishing a masterpiece at three o’clock in the morning and running out to pace the streets, and visiting churches, and fasting one day, drinking another, devouring Shakespeare, Darwin, The History of Civilisation, and Bernard Shaw.
他难道不像济慈[44]吗？她寻思着，并考虑着如何使他对《安东尼和克利奥佩特拉》[45]及其他的莎士比亚作品感兴趣。她把书借给他看，给他写短信，使他心中燃起一生只有一回的烈火，没有热量的火焰，只有金红色的火苗，摇曳在波尔小姐的四周，如此极致的虚无缥缈，背景是《安东尼和克利奥佩特拉》，还有滑铁卢大街。他认为她是个美人，相信她的智慧完美无缺；他梦见她，给她写情诗，可她无视这些诗歌的主题，只顾着用红墨水给他改错；在一个夏夜里，他看见她穿着一条绿裙子漫步在广场上。“花开了。”园丁要是打开门也许会这么说的，也就是说，要是园丁走进来，在任何一个夜晚，在约莫同样的时刻，就准能看见他正在写作，看见他把写好的稿纸撕破，看见他在凌晨三点完成了一部巨著，冲出门去，在大街上踱步，在教堂里参观，今天节食，明日狂饮，贪婪地猛读莎士比亚、达尔文、《文明史》和萧伯纳。【注：[44]约翰·济慈（1795~1821）：英国杰出的浪漫派诗人，代表作有《夜莺颂》《希腊古瓮颂》《圣安妮节前夕》等。[45]莎士比亚晚期的悲剧代表作。】
Something was up, Mr. Brewer knew; Mr. Brewer, managing clerk at Sibleys and Arrowsmiths, auctioneers, valuers, land and estate agents; something was up, he thought, and, being paternal with his young men, and thinking very highly of Smith’s abilities, and prophesying that he would, in ten or fifteen years, succeed to the leather arm-chair in the inner room under the skylight with the deed-boxes round him, “if he keeps his health,” said Mr. Brewer, and that was the danger — he looked weakly; advised football, invited him to supper and was seeing his way to consider recommending a rise of salary, when something happened which threw out many of Mr. Brewer’s calculations, took away his ablest young fellows, and eventually, so prying and insidious were the fingers of the European War, smashed a plaster cast of Ceres, ploughed a hole in the geranium beds, and utterly ruined the cook’s nerves at Mr. Brewer’s establishment at Muswell Hill.
出什么事了，布鲁尔先生知道。布鲁尔先生，西布利和阿罗史密斯公司的总裁，那是家从事拍卖、估价和房地产的代理商。出什么事了，他想道，他像个慈父一般关心着这个年轻人，而且对史密斯的能力评价很高，甚至预言在十到十五年的时间里，他就会成功地坐上亮堂堂的经理室里的皮靠椅，周围都是存放着合同文件的保险箱。“只要他能够保持健康。”布鲁尔先生说，而那正是危险所在——他看上去很虚弱，于是他建议史密斯去踢踢足球，邀请他共进晚餐，并准备考虑推荐他加薪，然而就在此时发生了情况，布鲁尔先生的一系列计划都给打乱了，这个最为能干的小伙子离他而去了。欧战的魔爪终于伸了过来，多么阴险狠毒，它砸碎了谷物女神的石膏像，在天竺葵的花坛里炸出了一个大坑，还彻底吓疯了位于马斯威尔山的布鲁尔先生家的厨师。
Septimus was one of the first to volunteer. He went to France to save an England which consisted almost entirely of Shakespeare’s plays and Miss Isabel Pole in a green dress walking in a square. There in the trenches the change which Mr. Brewer desired when he advised football was produced instantly; he developed manliness; he was promoted; he drew the attention, indeed the affection of his officer, Evans by name. It was a case of two dogs playing on a hearth-rug; one worrying a paper screw, snarling, snapping, giving a pinch, now and then, at the old dog’s ear; the other lying somnolent, blinking at the fire, raising a paw, turning and growling good-temperedly. They had to be together, share with each other, fight with each other, quarrel with each other. But when Evans (Rezia who had only seen him once called him “a quiet man,” a sturdy red-haired man, undemonstrative in the company of women), when Evans was killed, just before the Armistice, in Italy, Septimus, far from showing any emotion or recognising that here was the end of a friendship, congratulated himself upon feeling very little and very reasonably. The War had taught him. It was sublime. He had gone through the whole show, friendship, European War, death, had won promotion, was still under thirty and was bound to survive. He was right there. The last shells missed him. He watched them explode with indifference. When peace came he was in Milan, billeted in the house of an innkeeper with a courtyard, flowers in tubs, little tables in the open, daughters making hats, and to Lucrezia, the younger daughter, he became engaged one evening when the panic was on him — that he could not feel.
赛普提默斯参加了头一批自愿兵。为了拯救英国他去了法国，因为在他心目中，莎士比亚戏剧和穿着绿裙子在广场上散步的伊莎贝尔·波尔小姐几乎就代表了整个英国。在战壕中，布鲁尔先生建议他踢足球时所想要看到的变化即刻就发生了：他变成了一个顶天立地的男子汉，得到了提拔，并且那个叫埃文斯的长官注意到了他，甚至还喜欢上了他。当时，他俩的情形活像在炉前地毯上嬉戏的两只狗，小狗在耍弄一只纸盒子，叫着，咬着，还不时地去蹭蹭老狗的耳朵；而那条老狗则昏昏沉沉地躺着，眨巴着睡眼望着炉火，伸出一只爪子，转过头去温和地叫两声。他们俩简直形影不离，分享着彼此的一切，也包括吵吵打打。可当埃文斯（蕾西娅只见过他一面，管他叫“一个文静的人”，他是个体格强壮的红发男子，身边有女人在场时常显得有些害羞），当埃文斯就在停战前夕在意大利牺牲时，赛普提默斯既没有显露出一丝一毫的感情，也似乎没有认识到这场友谊已经终结，反而为自己的无动于衷和富于理智而感到庆幸。战争教育了他。战争的场面如此壮观。他参与了整个这一场惊心动魄的表演，友谊、欧战、死亡，还赢得了晋升，他还不到三十，注定会活下去的。他的预感一点不错。最后的一阵炮火也没能击中他。他冷漠地看着炮弹在他身边爆炸。和平到来了，他当时正在米兰，被安顿在一个旅店老板的家里，那里有个庭院，花盆里开着鲜花，空地上有几张小巧的桌子，老板的女儿们在编着帽子。有天晚上，因为一阵恐慌的突然来袭——他发现自己失去了感觉——他便和老板的小女儿卢克蕾西娅订了婚。
For now that it was all over, truce signed, and the dead buried, he had, especially in the evening, these sudden thunder-claps of fear. He could not feel. As he opened the door of the room where the Italian girls sat making hats, he could see them; could hear them; they were rubbing wires among coloured beads in saucers; they were turning buckram shapes this way and that; the table was all strewn with feathers, spangles, silks, ribbons; scissors were rapping on the table; but something failed him; he could not feel. Still, scissors rapping, girls laughing, hats being made protected him; he was assured of safety; he had a refuge. But he could not sit there all night. There were moments of waking in the early morning. The bed was falling; he was falling. Oh for the scissors and the lamplight and the buckram shapes! He asked Lucrezia to marry him, the younger of the two, the gay, the frivolous, with those little artist’s fingers that she would hold up and say “It is all in them.” Silk, feathers, what not were alive to them.
现在一切都已结束，停战协定已经签好，死者也得到了安葬，而他却在突然间感受到了雷击般的恐怖，尤其是在晚上。他感觉麻木不仁。他打开意大利姑娘们坐在里面编帽子的房门，能够看见她们，也能够听见她们。浅盘里盛着彩珠，姑娘们在彩珠间搓着丝线。她们把粗麻布做的帽型转来转去，桌子上堆满了羽毛、亮片、丝线、缎带，剪刀敲着桌子，嘎嘎作响。可是他觉得失落，他丧失了感觉。不过，剪刀的咔嚓声，姑娘们的欢笑，做成了的帽子，这一切保护了他，他的安全得到了保障，他有了一个避风的港湾。可他不能彻夜坐在那里呀。有时天还未亮，他就醒了过来。床在塌下去，他在往下坠。哦，让剪刀、灯火和粗麻布做的帽型来救救他吧！他恳求卢克蕾西娅嫁给他，她是这对姐妹中年轻的那位，是个活泼又轻佻的姑娘，长着艺术家一般的纤纤玉指，她常常抬起手来说：“我的能耐全靠它们呢。”丝线、羽毛，在她的巧手之下，一切都富有了生命。
“Beautiful!” she would murmur, nudging Septimus, that he might see. But beauty was behind a pane of glass. Even taste (Rezia liked ices, chocolates, sweet things) had no relish to him. He put down his cup on the little marble table. He looked at people outside; happy they seemed, collecting in the middle of the street, shouting, laughing, squabbling over nothing. But he could not taste, he could not feel. In the tea-shop among the tables and the chattering waiters the appalling fear came over him — he could not feel. He could reason; he could read, Dante for example, quite easily (“Septimus, do put down your book,” said Rezia, gently shutting the Inferno), he could add up his bill; his brain was perfect; it must be the fault of the world then — that he could not feel.
“太美了！”她会喃喃自语着，用手肘捅捅赛普提默斯，好叫他也看见。但是，美和他之间隔着一层玻璃。即便是美食（蕾西娅喜欢冰淇淋、巧克力之类的甜食），到了他嘴里也会失去滋味。他放下了甜品杯，搁在大理石的小桌子上。他看着外面的人们，他们看上去很幸福，聚集在街道中央，不知道为了什么，在那里高声喧哗着，欢笑着，吵闹着。可他却吃什么都味同嚼蜡，感觉麻木。在茶馆店里，在桌椅和饶舌的侍者中间，一阵骇人的恐惧攫住了他的整个身心——他丧失了感觉的能力。他能够思考，也能够阅读，比如读但丁[46]的作品，而且读起来一点不吃力（“赛普提默斯，快点把书放下来。”蕾西娅说着，轻轻地阖上了《地狱篇》）；他能够算清账单，他的大脑一点没问题。那么，一定是这个世界的错了——是这个世界造成了他的麻木不仁。【注：[46]阿里盖利·但丁（1265~1321）：意大利著名诗人，代表作为长诗《神曲》，分为《地狱》《炼狱》和《天堂》三部。】
“It is the hat that matters most,” she would say, when they walked out together. Every hat that passed, she would examine; and the cloak and the dress and the way the woman held herself. Ill- dressing, over-dressing she stigmatised, not savagely, rather with impatient movements of the hands, like those of a painter who puts from him some obvious well-meant glaring imposture; and then, generously, but always critically, she would welcome a shopgirl who had turned her little bit of stuff gallantly, or praise, wholly, with enthusiastic and professional understanding, a French lady descending from her carriage, in chinchilla, robes, pearls.
“帽子是最要紧的。”他们一起在外面散步时，她会如此说道。从他们身边经过的每一顶帽子，她都要仔细观察，还有披风、裙子，以及女人们表现出来的风姿。她批评简陋的衣着，也反对过度装饰，但语气并不恶毒，只是挥挥手表示出不屑，就像一个画家把一幅华而不实的仿作推到了一边，尽管画这幅作品的人显然也没什么恶意。还有，她会对一个利用有限的行头把自己打扮得漂漂亮亮的女店员表示出宽容的赞许，尽管总带着挑剔的目光，或者对一位穿着灰鼠皮大衣、披着罩袍、戴着珍珠项链、正跨下马车的法国女士投去专业的目光，紧接着就是一番热情洋溢、毫无保留的赞美之辞。
It might be possible, Septimus thought, looking at England from the train window, as they left Newhaven; it might be possible that the world itself is without meaning.
也许，可能吧，在他们坐火车离开纽黑文时，赛普提默斯看着车窗外的英格兰，心里想道：也许，这世界本身可能就是毫无意义的。
At the office they advanced him to a post of considerable responsibility. They were proud of him; he had won crosses. “You have done your duty; it is up to us –” began Mr. Brewer; and could not finish, so pleasurable was his emotion. They took admirable lodgings off the Tottenham Court Road.
在办公室里，他们将他提拔到一个相当重要的职位上。他们为他骄傲，因为他曾获得过十字勋章。“你已经尽责了，现在该由我们…”布鲁尔先生说了起来，他如此激动，如此高兴，以至于说不出连贯的话了。赛普提默斯在托特纳姆庭院街附近租下了一套令人羡慕的公寓。
“The English are so silent,” Rezia said. She liked it, she said. She respected these Englishmen, and wanted to see London, and the English horses, and the tailor-made suits, and could remember hearing how wonderful the shops were, from an Aunt who had married and lived in Soho.
“英国人真是沉默寡言。”蕾西娅说。她喜欢这样子，她说。她尊敬这样的英国人，想要见识一下伦敦，还有英国的赛马，还有定制的西服，还记得听人说过那里的店铺有多可爱，是她的一个姨妈告诉她的，她姨妈婚后就住在索霍区[47]。【注：[47]伦敦市中心一地区，因其林立的饭店、剧院和夜总会而闻名。】
Here he opened Shakespeare once more. That boy’s business of the intoxication of language — Antony and Cleopatra — had shrivelled utterly. How Shakespeare loathed humanity — the putting on of clothes, the getting of children, the sordidity of the mouth and the belly! This was now revealed to Septimus; the message hidden in the beauty of words. The secret signal which one generation passes, under disguise, to the next is loathing, hatred, despair. Dante the same. Aeschylus (translated) the same. There Rezia sat at the table trimming hats. She trimmed hats for Mrs. Filmer’s friends; she trimmed hats by the hour. She looked pale, mysterious, like a lily, drowned, under water, he thought.
他在这里再次打开了莎士比亚的作品集。少年时对语言的痴迷——《安东尼和克利奥佩特拉》——已经彻底消失了。莎士比亚是多么厌恶人类啊——要穿衣服，要生孩子，还有欲壑难填的嘴巴和肚子！如今，赛普提默斯已经领会了真相，这个消息隐藏在华丽的辞藻背后。一代人传递给下一代人的秘密信号，经过了伪装，无非就是厌恶、仇恨和绝望。但丁如此。埃斯库罗斯[48]（根据他的译本判断）也如此。蕾西娅坐在那儿的桌前，修饰着帽子。她是在为菲尔默太太的朋友们修饰帽子，她连着好几个小时都在为帽子做装饰。她看上去苍白、神秘，如沉没于水底的一朵百合，他想道。【注：[48]埃斯库罗斯（公元前525~前456）：古希腊著名悲剧作家，代表作有《被俘的普罗米修斯》《阿伽门农》。】
“The English are so serious,” she would say, putting her arms round Septimus, her cheek against his.
“英国人实在太严肃了，”她会这么说着，一边用胳膊搂住赛普提默斯，还和他脸贴着脸。
Love between man and woman was repulsive to Shakespeare. The business of copulation was filth to him before the end. But, Rezia said, she must have children. They had been married five years.
莎士比亚是排斥男女之间的爱情的。他老早就说过性爱这档子事是肮脏的。可是，蕾西娅说，她一定要有孩子。他们结婚都已经五年了呀。
They went to the Tower together; to the Victoria and Albert Museum; stood in the crowd to see the King open Parliament. And there were the shops — hat shops, dress shops, shops with leather bags in the window, where she would stand staring. But she must have a boy.
他俩一起去参观了伦敦塔[49]，参观了维多利亚和艾尔伯特博物馆[50]，站在人群中观看了国王主持议会的开幕式。还有各色的店铺——帽店、服装店、橱窗里陈列着各种皮包的百货店，她会站在外面驻足细看。可她一定得有个孩子。【注：[49]伦敦市东面的皇家城堡，在历史上曾长期用作国家监狱。[50]伦敦市内博物馆，馆藏有不少英国的名画。名字来源于维多利亚女王及其丈夫艾尔伯特亲王。】
He watched her snip, shape, as one watches a bird hop, flit in the grass, without daring to move a finger. For the truth is (let her ignore it) that human beings have neither kindness, nor faith, nor charity beyond what serves to increase the pleasure of the moment. They hunt in packs. Their packs scour the desert and vanish screaming into the wilderness. They desert the fallen. They are plastered over with grimaces. There was Brewer at the office, with his waxed moustache, coral tie-pin, white slip, and pleasurable emotions — all coldness and clamminess within,– his geraniums ruined in the War — his cook’s nerves destroyed; or Amelia What’shername, handing round cups of tea punctually at five — a leering, sneering obscene little harpy; and the Toms and Berties in their starched shirt fronts oozing thick drops of vice. They never saw him drawing pictures of them naked at their antics in his notebook. In the street, vans roared past him; brutality blared out on placards; men were trapped in mines; women burnt alive; and once a maimed file of lunatics being exercised or displayed for the diversion of the populace (who laughed aloud), ambled and nodded and grinned past him, in the Tottenham Court Road, each half apologetically, yet triumphantly, inflicting his hopeless woe. And would HE go mad?
他看着她裁着，剪着，修出了形状，正如人们看着鸟儿在草地上一跳一跳，飞来飞去，连手指都不敢动一下。真相是这样的（让她忽视好了）：人类没有善心，没有信念，没有宽容，只知道追逐眼前的一时快活。他们拉帮结伙地去打猎。他们成群结队地去探索沙漠，尖叫着消失在荒原中。他们弃死者于不顾。他们龇牙咧嘴做着鬼脸。比如说办公室里的布鲁尔，小胡子上涂了蜡，珊瑚石的领带夹，白色紧身裤，一副兴高采烈的样子——但内心里唯有冷酷和焦虑——他的天竺葵在战争中毁了——他的厨师得了精神错乱；还有那个叫阿米莉娅什么的，总是在五点整把一杯杯茶点递到大家手上——这个眉眼淫邪、举止轻狂、下流龌龊的小娼妇；还有那些汤姆和伯蒂们，戴着浆洗得笔挺的衬领，浑身上下渗出一滴滴浓浓的罪恶。他们从未看见过他在笔记本上给他们画的肖像：赤身露体、丑态百出。大街上，货车从他身边呼啸而过，公告栏里张贴着触目惊心的一幕幕，男人被困在矿井下，女人被活活烧死。有一次，一队残疾的精神病人在托特纳姆庭院街上放风，也或许是通过这样的展示来娱乐大众（人们哄堂大笑），只见他们一个个笃悠悠地溜达着，点着头，咧着嘴，从他身边经过，看着他们那半带着歉意、半带着得意的样子，他的心头陡然升起一股无助的悲哀。他会不会也像他们那样发疯呢？
She must have a son like Septimus, she said. But nobody could be like Septimus; so gentle; so serious; so clever. Could she not read Shakespeare too? Was Shakespeare a difficult author? she asked.
她一定要有个像赛普提默斯的儿子，她说。可没人会像赛普提默斯的：没人能像他那么温柔，那么严肃，又那么聪慧。难道不能让她也读一下莎士比亚吗？莎士比亚是个难懂的作家吗？她问。
One cannot bring children into a world like this. One cannot perpetuate suffering, or increase the breed of these lustful animals, who have no lasting emotions, but only whims and vanities, eddying them now this way, now that.
不能把孩子带到这样一个世界上来呀。不能让受苦成为永恒，不能让这些淫荡的畜生繁衍昌盛，这些畜生没有持久的感情，只有一时的心血来潮和虚荣心，只会像墙头草一般一会儿倒向东一会儿倒向西。
His wife was crying, and he felt nothing; only each time she sobbed in this profound, this silent, this hopeless way, he descended another step into the pit.
他的妻子在流泪，他却没有任何感觉。只是每当她这么深沉地、静静地、绝望地流泪时，他就会感觉自己又在地狱里坠落了一层。
At last, with a melodramatic gesture which he assumed mechanically and with complete consciousness of its insincerity, he dropped his head on his hands. Now he had surrendered; now other people must help him. People must be sent for. He gave in.
最后，他的双手抱住了头，这个动作如此机械，一看就是个装模作样的夸张姿势，他自己也清楚地知道这个姿势毫无诚意。现在他已经认输，要由别人来拯救他。一定要派人过来，他已经屈服了。
Nothing could rouse him. Rezia put him to bed. She sent for a doctor — Mrs. Filmer’s Dr. Holmes. Dr. Holmes examined him. There was nothing whatever the matter, said Dr. Holmes. Oh, what a relief! What a kind man, what a good man! thought Rezia. When he felt like that he went to the Music Hall, said Dr. Holmes. He took a day off with his wife and played golf. Why not try two tabloids of bromide dissolved in a glass of water at bedtime? These old Bloomsbury houses, said Dr. Holmes, tapping the wall, are often full of very fine panelling, which the landlords have the folly to paper over. Only the other day, visiting a patient, Sir Somebody Something in Bedford Square —
什么也不能唤醒他。蕾西娅把他扶上床。她叫人去请医生——就是为菲尔默太太看病的霍姆斯大夫。霍姆斯大夫给他做了检查。他的身体没什么大问题，霍姆斯大夫说。哦，终于可以松口气了！多善良的人呀，真是个大好人！蕾西娅想。要是他像赛普提默斯那样感觉不舒服的话，他就会去听听音乐会，霍姆斯大夫说。他会和妻子一起休息一天，去打打高尔夫。为什么不在睡前试试用一杯热水服下两片溴化剂呢？这些布鲁姆斯伯里[52]区的老房子，霍姆斯大夫说着敲了敲墙壁，通常都有做工极好的护墙板，但愚蠢的房东会用墙纸把它们都遮起来。就在不久前，他去看了一个叫什么爵士的病人，就住在贝德福德广场[53]…【注：[52]伦敦市中心一地区，大英博物馆和伦敦大学的所在地。弗吉尼亚·伍尔夫自1904年起在此居住。[53]属于布卢姆斯伯里区，在大英博物馆附近。】
At tea Rezia told him that Mrs. Filmer’s daughter was expecting a baby. SHE could not grow old and have no children! She was very lonely, she was very unhappy! She cried for the first time since they were married. Far away he heard her sobbing; he heard it accurately, he noticed it distinctly; he compared it to a piston thumping. But he felt nothing.
茶点时间[51]，蕾西娅告诉他，菲尔默太太的女儿就快生了。她可不要到老还膝下无子呀！她如此寂寞，如此不幸！自从他们结婚以来，她还是头一次流了泪。他远远地听见了她的抽泣，他听得真真切切，也分明注意到了那是她的哭声，他将这哭声比作活塞的撞击声。可他就是没有任何感觉。【注：[51]英国人一般在下午四五点钟有吃茶点的习惯。】
Dr. Holmes came again. Large, fresh coloured, handsome, flicking his boots, looking in the glass, he brushed it all aside — headaches, sleeplessness, fears, dreams — nerve symptoms and nothing more, he said. If Dr. Holmes found himself even half a pound below eleven stone six, he asked his wife for another plate of porridge at breakfast. (Rezia would learn to cook porridge.) But, he continued, health is largely a matter in our own control. Throw yourself into outside interests; take up some hobby. He opened Shakespeare — Antony and Cleopatra; pushed Shakespeare aside. Some hobby, said Dr. Holmes, for did he not owe his own excellent health (and he worked as hard as any man in London) to the fact that he could always switch off from his patients on to old furniture? And what a very pretty comb, if he might say so, Mrs. Warren Smith was wearing!
霍姆斯大夫又来了。他身材高大，脸色红润，英俊潇洒。他掸掸靴子，照照镜子，把这些症状全不当回事——头痛、失眠、恐惧、多梦——不过是神经过敏罢了，别无其他，他说。如果霍姆斯大夫发现自己的体重低于一百六十磅，哪怕只轻了半磅，他就会在早餐时要求他妻子给他多来一份麦片粥（蕾西娅需要学会煮麦片粥）。不过，他接着说，健康主要是取决于自己的。要对外界事物培养起广泛的兴趣，要有些兴趣爱好。他打开莎士比亚的书——《安东尼和克利奥佩特拉》，随后又把它丢到一边。得有些兴趣爱好，霍姆斯大夫说，他自己是怎么获得如此良好的健康的呢（要知道，他工作起来的劲头不会输给任何一个伦敦男人），不正是因为他总是能够将注意力从病人身上转移到古董式家具上吗？如果不介意他这么冒昧地说一句，沃伦·史密斯太太头上的那把梳子可真美啊！
So there was no excuse; nothing whatever the matter, except the sin for which human nature had condemned him to death; that he did not feel. He had not cared when Evans was killed; that was worst; but all the other crimes raised their heads and shook their fingers and jeered and sneered over the rail of the bed in the early hours of the morning at the prostrate body which lay realising its degradation; how he had married his wife without loving her; had lied to her; seduced her; outraged Miss Isabel Pole, and was so pocked and marked with vice that women shuddered when they saw him in the street. The verdict of human nature on such a wretch was death.
因此，没有什么借口可找了，没什么大问题，只有那种罪恶感，人性已经为此判处了他死刑，罪名就是感觉麻木。埃文斯牺牲时，他毫不在乎，那是最卑劣的罪恶。但所有其他的罪恶都会在清晨抬起头来，在他的床栏杆边上朝着他躺在那里的身体指手画脚、冷嘲热讽。他躺在床上咀嚼着自己的堕落：他怎么能娶了一个自己不爱的女人，欺骗了她，引诱了她，并且他的行为令伊莎贝尔·波尔小姐义愤填膺。他的身上满是斑斑点点的罪恶标记，女人们在大街上和他擦肩而过时会禁不住颤抖。人性对他这样的卑鄙小人所做的判决就是死刑。
Human nature, in short, was on him — the repulsive brute, with the blood-red nostrils. Holmes was on him. Dr. Holmes came quite regularly every day. Once you stumble, Septimus wrote on the back of a postcard, human nature is on you. Holmes is on you. Their only chance was to escape, without letting Holmes know; to Italy — anywhere, anywhere, away from Dr. Holmes.
总之，人性已将他俘虏——这个鼻孔血红、令人厌恶的畜生。霍姆斯已将他俘虏。霍姆斯大夫每天都会相当准时地来看他。你一旦跌倒，赛普提默斯在一张明信片的背面写道，人性就会将你俘虏。霍姆斯就会将你俘虏。他俩唯一的机会就是逃跑，不能让霍姆斯知道，逃到意大利去——哪里都成，哪里都成，只要离霍姆斯大夫远远的。
“So you’re in a funk,” he said agreeably, sitting down by his patient’s side. He had actually talked of killing himself to his wife, quite a girl, a foreigner, wasn’t she? Didn’t that give her a very odd idea of English husbands? Didn’t one owe perhaps a duty to one’s wife? Wouldn’t it be better to do something instead of lying in bed? For he had had forty years’ experience behind him; and Septimus could take Dr. Holmes’s word for it — there was nothing whatever the matter with him. And next time Dr. Holmes came he hoped to find Smith out of bed and not making that charming little lady his wife anxious about him.
“看来你是吓坏了吧。”他和气地说道，在病人的旁边坐下。赛普提默斯真的对妻子说了他想自杀，她还只是个小姑娘，又是个外国人，不是吗？难道这不会使她以为英国丈夫都是些稀奇古怪的人吗？难道一个人不应该对他的妻子负一点小小的责任吗？干吗这样躺在床上呢，起来做点事情不更好吗？因为他已经有四十年的行医经验了，赛普提默斯应该相信他的话——他的身体没什么大问题。等到霍姆斯大夫下次来访的时候，他希望看见赛普提默斯已经下了床，不再使他那位娇小迷人的太太为他担惊受怕了。
When the damned fool came again, Septimus refused to see him. Did he indeed? said Dr. Holmes, smiling agreeably. Really he had to give that charming little lady, Mrs. Smith, a friendly push before he could get past her into her husband’s bedroom.
当这个该死的傻瓜再次来访时，赛普提默斯拒绝见他。他真的不想见我吗？霍姆斯大夫欣然微笑了。你瞧，他不得不友好地推开这位娇小迷人的史密斯太太，这才越过她走进了她丈夫的卧室。
So he was deserted. The whole world was clamouring: Kill yourself, kill yourself, for our sakes. But why should he kill himself for their sakes? Food was pleasant; the sun hot; and this killing oneself, how does one set about it, with a table knife, uglily, with floods of blood,– by sucking a gaspipe? He was too weak; he could scarcely raise his hand. Besides, now that he was quite alone, condemned, deserted, as those who are about to die are alone, there was a luxury in it, an isolation full of sublimity; a freedom which the attached can never know. Holmes had won of course; the brute with the red nostrils had won. But even Holmes himself could not touch this last relic straying on the edge of the world, this outcast, who gazed back at the inhabited regions, who lay, like a drowned sailor, on the shore of the world.
于是，他被流放了。整个世界都闹哄哄的：去自杀吧，去自杀吧，为了我们。可为什么他就该为了他们自杀呢？食物很美味，太阳很炽热。自杀的事，人们是怎么处理的呢，是用一把餐刀吗？这样太脏了，上面会沾满鲜血的——还是开煤气呢？他太虚弱了，几乎连手都举不起来了。而且，此刻他孑然一身，被诅咒，被抛弃，就像那些即将孤独地奔上黄泉路的人们，家里有一种奢侈的味道，一种充满了崇高意味的与世隔绝，一种人们从来都不了解的了无牵挂的自由。霍姆斯当然已经得胜了，那个红鼻子的畜生已经得胜了。但即使是霍姆斯本人也无法触动游荡在世界边缘的这个最后的遗迹，这个被驱逐的人，他回头望了望熙熙攘攘的居住区，像一个溺水的水手，倒在了一片世界的礁石上。
But Rezia could not understand him. Dr. Holmes was such a kind man. He was so interested in Septimus. He only wanted to help them, he said. He had four little children and he had asked her to tea, she told Septimus.
但蕾西娅无法理解他。霍姆斯大夫是个多善良的人呀。他对赛普提默斯很感兴趣。他只是想帮助他们，霍姆斯说。他有四个小孩，他邀请她去喝茶，她告诉赛普提默斯。
It was at that moment (Rezia gone shopping) that the great revelation took place. A voice spoke from behind the screen. Evans was speaking. The dead were with him.
正在那个时刻（蕾西娅去买东西了），伟大的启示来到了。纱窗背后传来了一个声音。是埃文斯在说话，死去的人和他在一起。
“Evans, Evans!” he cried.
“埃文斯，埃文斯！”他喊道。
She had had to buy the roses, Rezia said, from a poor man in the street. But they were almost dead already, she said, arranging the roses.
她一定要从大街上的那个穷人手里买下这些玫瑰花，蕾西娅说。可它们几乎已经都凋谢了，她说着，一边摆弄着玫瑰。
Mr. Smith was talking aloud to himself, Agnes the servant girl cried to Mrs. Filmer in the kitchen. “Evans, Evans,” he had said as she brought in the tray. She jumped, she did. She scuttled downstairs.
史密斯先生在大声地自言自语，女仆艾格尼斯在厨房里唤着菲尔默太太。“埃文斯！埃文斯！”她把托盘拿进去时他嘴里仍在念念有词。她惊跳了起来，真的。她没命地往楼下跑。
So there was a man outside; Evans presumably; and the roses, which Rezia said were half dead, had been picked by him in the fields of Greece. “Communication is health; communication is happiness, communication –” he muttered.
外面有一个人，大概是埃文斯；还有蕾西娅说的几乎凋零的玫瑰，是自己在希腊的田野里亲手摘的。“与人交流有益健康；与人交流是开心的事，交流…”他嘀嘀咕咕。
And Rezia came in, with her flowers, and walked across the room, and put the roses in a vase, upon which the sun struck directly, and it went laughing, leaping round the room.
蕾西娅进来了，手里捧着花，穿过了房间，把玫瑰插进花瓶，阳光直接照射在花瓶上，如灿烂的微笑，在室内跃动着。
“What are you saying, Septimus?” Rezia asked, wild with terror, for he was talking to himself.
“你在说什么呀，赛普提默斯？”蕾西娅惊恐不安地问，因为他又在自言自语。
“You brute! You brute!” cried Septimus, seeing human nature, that is Dr. Holmes, enter the room.
“你这个畜生！你这个畜生！”赛普提默斯叫着，看着人性，也就是霍姆斯大夫，走进了房间。
“Now what’s all this about?” said Dr. Holmes in the most amiable way in the world. “Talking nonsense to frighten your wife?” But he would give him something to make him sleep. And if they were rich people, said Dr. Holmes, looking ironically round the room, by all means let them go to Harley Street; if they had no confidence in him, said Dr. Holmes, looking not quite so kind.
“你现在又怎么啦？”霍姆斯大夫以最和蔼的态度说。“说这种没有意义的话，是存心要吓唬你老婆吗？”不过大夫会给他服点什么叫他睡觉的。而如果他们是有钱人，霍姆斯大夫说，嘲讽地四下里望了望这个房间，那不管怎样他们都可以去哈利街[54]的。如果他们不信任他的话，霍姆斯大夫说着，脸色已经不那么好看了。【注：[54]伦敦的一条街，是收费昂贵的私人诊所聚集地。】
She sent Agnes running for Dr. Holmes. Her husband, she said, was mad. He scarcely knew her.
她让艾格尼斯去叫霍姆斯大夫。她丈夫发疯了，她说。他几乎连她都不认得了。
It was precisely twelve o’clock; twelve by Big Ben; whose stroke was wafted over the northern part of London; blent with that of other clocks, mixed in a thin ethereal way with the clouds and wisps of smoke, and died up there among the seagulls — twelve o’clock struck as Clarissa Dalloway laid her green dress on her bed, and the Warren Smiths walked down Harley Street. Twelve was the hour of their appointment. Probably, Rezia thought, that was Sir William Bradshaw’s house with the grey motor car in front of it. The leaden circles dissolved in the air.
现在是十二点整，大本钟显示十二点，洪亮的钟声飘荡在伦敦北区的上空，又和别的钟声混合起来，与云彩和烟雾掺和在一起形成一种虚无缥缈的声音，消逝在海鸥的嘶嘶声中——正午的钟声敲响时，克拉丽莎·达洛维把她那条绿裙子放在床上，而沃伦·史密斯夫妇正走在哈利街上。十二点是他们的预约时间。也许，蕾西娅想，那幢前面停着辆灰色汽车的房子就是威廉·布莱德肖爵士的家吧。沉重的声浪消融在空中。
Indeed it was — Sir William Bradshaw’s motor car; low, powerful, grey with plain initials’ interlocked on the panel, as if the pomps of heraldry were incongruous, this man being the ghostly helper, the priest of science; and, as the motor car was grey, so to match its sober suavity, grey furs, silver grey rugs were heaped in it, to keep her ladyship warm while she waited. For often Sir William would travel sixty miles or more down into the country to visit the rich, the afflicted, who could afford the very large fee which Sir William very properly charged for his advice. Her ladyship waited with the rugs about her knees an hour or more, leaning back, thinking sometimes of the patient, sometimes, excusably, of the wall of gold, mounting minute by minute while she waited; the wall of gold that was mounting between them and all shifts and anxieties (she had borne them bravely; they had had their struggles) until she felt wedged on a calm ocean, where only spice winds blow; respected, admired, envied, with scarcely anything left to wish for, though she regretted her stoutness; large dinner-parties every Thursday night to the profession; an occasional bazaar to be opened; Royalty greeted; too little time, alas, with her husband, whose work grew and grew; a boy doing well at Eton; she would have liked a daughter too; interests she had, however, in plenty; child welfare; the after-care of the epileptic, and photography, so that if there was a church building, or a church decaying, she bribed the sexton, got the key and took photographs, which were scarcely to be distinguished from the work of professionals, while she waited.
确实是的——是威廉·布莱德肖爵士的汽车，低矮的车身，马力强劲，灰色的面板上镶嵌着他的姓名的缩写的简洁字体，仿佛作为一个科学的教士、一个神灵的助手，就不应该炫耀他那华丽的家族纹章。而且，因为车身是灰色的，为了配合它那冷静又柔和的外观，车子里面装饰有灰色的毛皮和银灰的毛毯，以便让他夫人在等待的时候也能暖暖和和的。因为威廉爵士常常要去六十英里之外，有时甚至要到更远的乡下，去拜访那些富贵的病人，他们是付得起威廉爵士因其正确建议而收取的合理的高昂费用的。他的夫人则膝盖上裹着毯子，在汽车里等上个把小时，背靠在后面，有时想着那些病人，有时则情有可原地想着一堵金墙，就在她等待的分分秒秒间，这堵金墙越垒越高了。这堵金墙在他们之间生长，在一切的世事变迁和忧虑渴望之间（她曾勇敢地承受过这些，他们曾一起为此奋斗过），直到她感觉自己已安稳地置身于一片风平浪静的海面上，在那里只有一阵阵的香风吹拂。她令人尊敬、羡慕、嫉妒，她几乎已经没有什么想要的东西了，尽管她对自己的肥胖表示遗憾。每周四晚上为专职医生们举办的大型派对；一场临时的义卖即将开幕，还有问候王室，哎呀，和她丈夫待在一起的时间越来越少啦，他的工作越来越忙。一个男孩在伊顿[55]读书，成绩还不错；她还希望有个女儿。不过，她还有许多爱好，比如儿童的福利啦，癫痫患者的术后护理啦，还有摄影，所以在她等她丈夫的时候，如果周围有个教堂，最好是座颓败的教堂，她就会贿赂教堂司事拿钥匙进去拍照，她拍的那些照片几乎和专业摄影师拍的不相上下。【注：[55]即伊顿公学：伊顿是伦敦附近泰晤士河边的一个市镇，镇内的伊顿公学是英格兰最大且最有名望的公立寄宿学校。】
Sir William himself was no longer young. He had worked very hard; he had won his position by sheer ability (being the son of a shopkeeper); loved his profession; made a fine figurehead at ceremonies and spoke well — all of which had by the time he was knighted given him a heavy look, a weary look (the stream of patients being so incessant, the responsibilities and privileges of his profession so onerous), which weariness, together with his grey hairs, increased the extraordinary distinction of his presence and gave him the reputation (of the utmost importance in dealing with nerve cases) not merely of lightning skill, and almost infallible accuracy in diagnosis but of sympathy; tact; understanding of the human soul. He could see the first moment they came into the room (the Warren Smiths they were called); he was certain directly he saw the man; it was a case of extreme gravity. It was a case of complete breakdown — complete physical and nervous breakdown, with every symptom in an advanced stage, he ascertained in two or three minutes (writing answers to questions, murmured discreetly, on a pink card).
威廉爵士自己也不年轻了。他曾非常努力地工作，完全靠自己的能力获得了这样的职位（他父亲只是个小店主）。他热爱自己的职业，在各类庆典中都是个出色的傀儡，有着一流的演讲口才——等到他被封为爵士时，这所有的因素使他显得脸色庄重，神情疲劳（病人如流水般不断涌来，他的职业所特有的职责与特权又是如此沉重）。他的疲惫神情，加上他的白发，增添了他那卓越的个人风采，也给了他名望（在处理精神疾病方面，这样的名望是最为重要的）。他除了有敏捷的技术，和在诊断上几乎无懈可击的准确性之外，他还有同情心、熟练的技法和对人类灵魂的理解力。他们俩刚一进门，他就明白了（他们是沃伦·史密斯夫妇），他几乎一眼就能看出这个男人，这是个相当严重的病例。这是精神完全崩溃的症状——肉体与精神都彻底崩溃了，每一种症状都显示出那男人已经到了晚期，他仔细考虑了两三分钟（把他们对这人谨慎的轻声提问所做的回答记录在一张粉红的卡片上）。
The patient repeated the word “war” interrogatively.
病人怀疑地重复了“战争”这个词。
Six weeks.
“六个星期。”
How long had Dr. Holmes been attending him?
“霍姆斯大夫给他看病有多久了？”
“The War?” the patient asked. The European War — that little shindy of schoolboys with gunpowder? Had he served with distinction? He really forgot. In the War itself he had failed.
“战争？”病人问道。欧洲大战——是小学生用火药制造出的那场小小的闹剧吗？他在战场上表现得很勇敢吗？他真的记不得了。他失败的原因正在于战争本身。
Prescribed a little bromide? Said there was nothing the matter? Ah yes (those general practitioners! thought Sir William. It took half his time to undo their blunders. Some were irreparable).
开的方子就是一些溴化剂吗？他说了没什么问题吗？啊，这就对了（这些什么病都看的开业医师！威廉爵士心想。他的一半时间都花在纠正这些人的错误上了。有些错误甚至是无法纠正的）。
He was attaching meanings to words of a symbolical kind. A serious symptom, to be noted on the card.
病人将词语的意义与象征联系在一起。是一个严重的病例，必须在卡片上记录下来。
“You served with great distinction in the War?”
“你在战争中有突出表现，对吗？”
“Yes, he served with the greatest distinction,” Rezia assured the doctor; “he was promoted.”
“是的，他在战争中表现得无比英勇，”蕾西娅自信地对医生说，“他还得到了晋升。”
“And they have the very highest opinion of you at your office?” Sir William murmured, glancing at Mr. Brewer’s very generously worded letter. “So that you have nothing to worry you, no financial anxiety, nothing?”
“在办公室里他们也给了你很高的评价吧？”威廉爵士嗫嚅道，一边瞄了一眼布鲁尔先生写的那封洋洋洒洒满是溢美之词的信。“那么，你没有什么好担忧的，没有经济问题，什么问题也没有，对吧？”
He had committed an appalling crime and been condemned to death by human nature.
他犯下了令人发指的大罪，人性判处他死刑。
“He has done nothing wrong whatever,” Rezia assured the doctor. If Mr. Smith would wait, said Sir William, he would speak to Mrs. Smith in the next room. Her husband was very seriously ill, Sir William said. Did he threaten to kill himself?
“他什么过错也没有。”蕾西娅向医生保证。如果史密斯先生不介意等一下的话，威廉爵士说，他想在隔壁房间和史密斯太太谈两句。她丈夫病得非常严重，威廉爵士说。他有威胁过要自杀吗？
Oh, he did, she cried. But he did not mean it, she said. Of course not. It was merely a question of rest, said Sir William; of rest, rest, rest; a long rest in bed. There was a delightful home down in the country where her husband would be perfectly looked after. Away from her? she asked. Unfortunately, yes; the people we care for most are not good for us when we are ill. But he was not mad, was he? Sir William said he never spoke of “madness”; he called it not having a sense of proportion. But her husband did not like doctors. He would refuse to go there. Shortly and kindly Sir William explained to her the state of the case. He had threatened to kill himself. There was no alternative. It was a question of law. He would lie in bed in a beautiful house in the country. The nurses were admirable. Sir William would visit him once a week. If Mrs. Warren Smith was quite sure she had no more questions to ask — he never hurried his patients — they would return to her husband. She had nothing more to ask — not of Sir William.
哦，他是说过，她大声说。可他不是真的想那样，她说。当然不是。这只是一个休息的问题，威廉爵士说：休息，休息，再休息，必须长期卧床休息。在乡下有一所很不错的疗养院，她丈夫能够在那里得到悉心照料。我们必须分开吗？她问。我很遗憾，是的。在我们生病的时候，那些我们最在乎的人反而是对我们没有好处的。可他并没有发疯，对吗？威廉爵士说自己从来不会用“发疯”这个字眼，他称之为平衡感的缺失。可她丈夫不喜欢医生，他会拒绝去那个地方的。威廉爵士和颜悦色地向她简单地解释了一下她丈夫的病情。他威胁过要自杀了。没有别的选择。这是个法律问题。他会住在乡下的一所美丽的疗养院里，躺在那里的病床上。那里的护士小姐都很可爱。威廉爵士会每周去看他一次。如果沃伦·史密斯太太确定没有别的问题要问的话——他从不催促他的病人——他们就回她丈夫那儿去吧。她没有更多的问题了——没有问题要问威廉爵士了。
“I have — I have,” he began, “committed a crime –“
“我曾…我曾经，”他说了起来，“犯了罪…”
So they returned to the most exalted of mankind; the criminal who faced his judges; the victim exposed on the heights; the fugitive; the drowned sailor; the poet of the immortal ode; the Lord who had gone from life to death; to Septimus Warren Smith, who sat in the arm-chair under the skylight staring at a photograph of Lady Bradshaw in Court dress, muttering messages about beauty.
于是，他们回到了赛普提默斯·沃伦·史密斯身旁，这个人类中最崇高的人，他是面对着法官的罪犯，被绑在高处示众的牺牲品，亡命之徒，落水的水手，唱着不朽颂歌的诗人，经历过出生入死的圣人。此时他正坐在天窗下的扶手椅上，两眼凝视着穿着宫廷礼服的布莱德肖夫人的一帧相片，嘴里呢喃着什么美的启示。
“We have had our little talk,” said Sir William.
“我们已经简单地聊过了。”威廉爵士说。
“He says you are very, very ill,” Rezia cried.
“他说你病得很重，很重。”蕾西娅大声说。
“One of Holmes’s homes?” sneered Septimus.
“霍姆斯大夫办的一家疗养院吗？”赛普提默斯讥讽地说。
The fellow made a distasteful impression. For there was in Sir William, whose father had been a tradesman, a natural respect for breeding and clothing, which shabbiness nettled; again, more profoundly, there was in Sir William, who had never had time for reading, a grudge, deeply buried, against cultivated people who came into his room and intimated that doctors, whose profession is a constant strain upon all the highest faculties, are not educated men.
这家伙给我的印象真是讨厌。因为在威廉爵士身上，他父亲是个做生意的，有一种对出身及衣着的本能的崇敬，衣衫褴褛的人会使他不快。而且，还有个更深的原因，那就是威廉爵士从没有时间看书，因此他对于那些走进他诊所的有教养之人有一种藏而不露的嫉恨，他们会暗示他并非是个受过良好教育的人，尽管这一职业要求最高的技能与不懈的努力。
“We have been arranging that you should go into a home,” said Sir William.
“我们商量着你该去一家疗养院。”威廉爵士说。
“One of MY homes, Mr. Warren Smith,” he said, “where we will teach you to rest.”
“是我开的一家疗养院，沃伦·史密斯先生，”他说，“在那里我们会教你如何放松的。”
And there was just one thing more.
最后只剩下一件事了。
“We all have our moments of depression,” said Sir William.
“我们谁都有过绝望的时候嘛。”威廉爵士说。
He was quite certain that when Mr. Warren Smith was well he was the last man in the world to frighten his wife. But he had talked of killing himself.
威廉爵士非常确信，等到沃伦·史密斯先生康复后，他会成为一个全世界最没有可能会去威胁自己妻子的人。不过他曾经扬言要自杀。
Once you fall, Septimus repeated to himself, human nature is on you. Holmes and Bradshaw are on you. They scour the desert. They fly screaming into the wilderness. The rack and the thumbscrew are applied. Human nature is remorseless.
一旦你失足跌倒，赛普提默斯对自己重复说，人性就会将你俘虏。霍姆斯和布莱德肖将你俘虏了。他们会去搜遍沙漠，他们会尖叫着冲入荒野，他们会使用拉肢刑架和拇指夹[56]。人性是残酷的。【注：[56]都是中世纪迫害异教徒的刑具。】
“Impulses came upon him sometimes?” Sir William asked, with his pencil on a pink card.
“他有时候会表现冲动吗？”威廉爵士问着，把一支铅笔放在了粉红的卡片上。
“Nobody lives for himself alone,” said Sir William, glancing at the photograph of his wife in Court dress.
“没有人只为自己活着。”威廉爵士说着，一边朝妻子穿着宫廷礼服的照片望了一眼。
That was his own affair, said Septimus.
那是我自己的事，赛普提默斯说。
“And you have a brilliant career before you,” said Sir William. There was Mr. Brewer’s letter on the table. “An exceptionally brilliant career.”
“而且，你未来还有光辉的前程呢。”威廉爵士说。桌子上放着布鲁尔先生的那封信。“你的前途无量哦。”
But if he confessed? If he communicated? Would they let him off then, his torturers?
可如果他坦白呢？如果他把一切都和盘托出呢？这些刽子手们，他们会放过他吗？
But what more did she want?
可她还能指望什么呢？
The upkeep of that motor car alone must cost him quite a lot, said Septimus, when they got out into the street.
在他们走出诊所来到大街上时，赛普提默斯说道，单单保养他这辆汽车就会要老大一笔开销呢。
But what was his crime? He could not remember it.
可他的罪名是什么呢？他记不得了。
“I — I –” Septimus stammered.
“我…我…”赛普提默斯支支吾吾。
“Try to think as little about yourself as possible,” said Sir William kindly. Really, he was not fit to be about.
“尽量少想你自己。”威廉爵士和气地说。真的，他这样的人可不适合四处溜达。
To his patients he gave three-quarters of an hour; and if in this exacting science which has to do with what, after all, we know nothing about — the nervous system, the human brain — a doctor loses his sense of proportion, as a doctor he fails. Health we must have; and health is proportion; so that when a man comes into your room and says he is Christ (a common delusion), and has a message, as they mostly have, and threatens, as they often do, to kill himself, you invoke proportion; order rest in bed; rest in solitude; silence and rest; rest without friends, without books, without messages; six months’ rest; until a man who went in weighing seven stone six comes out weighing twelve.
威廉爵士已经给了病人三刻钟的时间。如果在这门精确的科学中，毕竟，我们对其中的奥秘一无所知呀——神经系统，人类的大脑——一个医生丢失了他的平衡感，那么作为一个医生他就失败了。我们必须拥有健康，而健康正是平衡。因此，当一个病人走进你的诊所，并宣称自己就是基督（一个很常见的错觉），带来了一个信息，他们大都这么说的，而且威胁着，他们常常这样做，说要自杀，你就必须调动起平衡感了：你得命令他们上床休息，独自静养，安静、放松，彻底地休息，不见朋友，不看书，不通消息。静养六个月，直到入院时体重只有一百零六磅的人变为出院时的一百六十八磅。
“I — I –” he stammered.
“我…我…”赛普提默斯结结巴巴。
“Trust everything to me,” he said, and dismissed them.
“相信我，一切都交给我好了，”他说着，把他们打发走了。
Never, never had Rezia felt such agony in her life! She had asked for help and been deserted! He had failed them! Sir William Bradshaw was not a nice man.
蕾西娅这辈子从没感到过如此痛苦，从没！她恳求别人帮帮她，但却遭到了遗弃！他使他们的希望落了空！威廉·布莱德肖爵士不是一个好人。
Love, trees, there is no crime — what was his message?
爱，树木，罪恶并不存在——他带来了什么信息呢？
Was there anything else they wished to ask him? Sir William would make all arrangements (he murmured to Rezia) and he would let her know between five and six that evening he murmured.
你们还有什么想要问我吗？威廉爵士说，会把一切都安排妥当的（他低声对蕾西娅说），他会在今晚五六点钟通知她的，他低声说。
“Yes?” Sir William encouraged him. (But it was growing late.)
“什么？”威廉爵士鼓励他说下去（可时间已经不早了）。
He could not remember it.
他记不得了。
She clung to his arm. They had been deserted.
她紧紧扶着他的胳膊。他们就这样被人家打发了。
Proportion, divine proportion, Sir William’s goddess, was acquired by Sir William walking hospitals, catching salmon, begetting one son in Harley Street by Lady Bradshaw, who caught salmon herself and took photographs scarcely to be distinguished from the work of professionals. Worshipping proportion, Sir William not only prospered himself but made England prosper, secluded her lunatics, forbade childbirth, penalised despair, made it impossible for the unfit to propagate their views until they, too, shared his sense of proportion — his, if they were men, Lady Bradshaw’s if they were women (she embroidered, knitted, spent four nights out of seven at home with her son), so that not only did his colleagues respect him, his subordinates fear him, but the friends and relations of his patients felt for him the keenest gratitude for insisting that these prophetic Christs and Christesses, who prophesied the end of the world, or the advent of God, should drink milk in bed, as Sir William ordered; Sir William with his thirty years’ experience of these kinds of cases, and his infallible instinct, this is madness, this sense; in fact, his sense of proportion.
平衡，神圣的平衡，这个威廉爵士的女神，是在他巡视病房、垂钓鲑鱼，及布莱德肖夫人在哈利街产下儿子的时候获得的一种观念。布莱德肖夫人自己也喜欢钓鱼，而且她的摄影技术和专业人士简直不相上下。崇拜平衡的威廉爵士，不仅自己事业繁荣，而且也使得英国繁荣起来。他把女疯子隔离起来，禁止她们生育；他处罚绝望的人，使这些不合时宜者无法传播他们的观点，直到他们也获得他的平衡感——如果他们是男的，就属于他，而如果她们是女的，那就属于布莱德肖夫人（她刺绣、编织，每周有四个晚上陪儿子一起过）。这样不仅他的同事尊敬他，下属害怕他，就连病人的亲戚朋友也都深深地感激他，因为他坚持说这些善于预言的男女基督们，他们能预言世界末日或上帝的降临，应该躺在床上喝牛奶，威廉爵士就是这么命令的。威廉爵士以他治疗这类病例三十多年的经验，再加上他始终正确的直觉，判断出这种感觉就是疯狂。实际上，是他的平衡感替他做出的判断。
But Proportion has a sister, less smiling, more formidable, a Goddess even now engaged — in the heat and sands of India, the mud and swamp of Africa, the purlieus of London, wherever in short the climate or the devil tempts men to fall from the true belief which is her own — is even now engaged in dashing down shrines, smashing idols, and setting up in their place her own stern countenance. Conversion is her name and she feasts on the wills of the weakly, loving to impress, to impose, adoring her own features stamped on the face of the populace. At Hyde Park Corner on a tub she stands preaching; shrouds herself in white and walks penitentially disguised as brotherly love through factories and parliaments; offers help, but desires power; smites out of her way roughly the dissentient, or dissatisfied; bestows her blessing on those who, looking upward, catch submissively from her eyes the light of their own. This lady too (Rezia Warren Smith divined it) had her dwelling in Sir William’s heart, though concealed, as she mostly is, under some plausible disguise; some venerable name; love, duty, self sacrifice. How he would work — how toil to raise funds, propagate reforms, initiate institutions! But conversion, fastidious Goddess, loves blood better than brick, and feasts most subtly on the human will. For example, Lady Bradshaw. Fifteen years ago she had gone under. It was nothing you could put your finger on; there had been no scene, no snap; only the slow sinking, water-logged, of her will into his. Sweet was her smile, swift her submission; dinner in Harley Street, numbering eight or nine courses, feeding ten or fifteen guests of the professional classes, was smooth and urbane. Only as the evening wore on a very slight dulness, or uneasiness perhaps, a nervous twitch, fumble, stumble and confusion indicated, what it was really painful to believe — that the poor lady lied. Once, long ago, she had caught salmon freely: now, quick to minister to the craving which lit her husband’s eye so oilily for dominion, for power, she cramped, squeezed, pared, pruned, drew back, peeped through; so that without knowing precisely what made the evening disagreeable, and caused this pressure on the top of the head (which might well be imputed to the professional conversation, or the fatigue of a great doctor whose life, Lady Bradshaw said, “is not his own but his patients'”) disagreeable it was: so that guests, when the clock struck ten, breathed in the air of Harley Street even with rapture; which relief, however, was denied to his patients.
但平衡感有个姐妹，很少微笑，更加严厉，是个女神，即使现在也依旧致力于——在印度的炎热与黄沙中，在非洲的泥泞与沼泽中，在伦敦的贫民窟中，总之，只要是恶劣的气候和狡猾的魔鬼会引诱人们去背离真正信仰的地方，也就是她的真正信仰——冲破神殿，打碎偶像，并以她自己的严厉外表来取而代之。皈依就是她的名字，她凌驾在弱者的意志之上，她喜欢惹人注目、强加于人，欣赏刻在大众脸上的她自己的面容。在海德公园一角，她站在一只木桶上面讲道；裹着白衣，伪装成一个宣扬手足之情的人，如做着忏悔般地在工厂和国会里活动；提供帮助，但也觊觎权力；粗暴地打击那些持不同意见者、心怀不满者；把她的祝福送给那些抬头仰望着她的人，这些驯顺的人在她的眼睛里找到了光明。这位女神（蕾西娅·沃伦·史密斯猜出来了）在威廉爵士的心中也占有一个位置，尽管是隐秘的，在大部分的时间里，都在一种似是而非的伪装之下，以某种脆弱的名义：爱、职责、自我牺牲。他该怎么办呢——筹措资金、宣传改革、创办医院，这些都是多么累人的活呀！但是皈依，这个吹毛求疵的女神，比起砖瓦来，她更爱鲜血，而且以最微妙的方式享受着人类的意志。比如，布莱德肖夫人。十五年前她就已经屈服了。你根本找不出任何理由：没有吵闹，也没有呵斥，只有缓慢地下沉，沉入水中，直到她的意志转变为他的。她的微笑很甜美，她的屈服很迅速。哈利街的晚餐，有八九道菜，要招待十到十五个专业人士，总是办得从容不迫、礼数周全。只是在那天晚上，一丁点细微的疲倦，也或者是不安，紧张的抽搐、哆嗦、困惑、支支吾吾，表示出——要相信这一点实在是痛苦——这位可怜的女士在说谎。很久以前，她曾有过自由自在地钓鲑鱼的经历，而现在，为了及时满足她丈夫对支配和权力的狂热追求，这种欲望会使他的眼睛油光发亮，她麻木，挤退、修理、消灭了自我，退缩在后，偷偷张望。因此她弄不明白是什么造成了那天晚上的不愉快，还弄得大家都头昏脑涨的（很可能是因为那些专业性太强的话题，也或者是要做一个了不起的医生所导致的疲惫，因为他的生活，照布莱德肖夫人的说法，“是属于他的病人的，而不是他自己的”）。所以，当十点钟的钟声敲响，客人们终于可以呼吸到哈利大街上的新鲜空气时，真感到如释重负。然而，这种安慰，他的病人们是无福消受的。
There in the grey room, with the pictures on the wall, and the valuable furniture, under the ground glass skylight, they learnt the extent of their transgressions; huddled up in arm-chairs, they watched him go through, for their benefit, a curious exercise with the arms, which he shot out, brought sharply back to his hip, to prove (if the patient was obstinate) that Sir William was master of his own actions, which the patient was not. There some weakly broke down; sobbed, submitted; others, inspired by Heaven knows what intemperate madness, called Sir William to his face a damnable humbug; questioned, even more impiously, life itself. Why live? they demanded. Sir William replied that life was good. Certainly Lady Bradshaw in ostrich feathers hung over the mantelpiece, and as for his income it was quite twelve thousand a year. But to us, they protested, life has given no such bounty. He acquiesced. They lacked a sense of proportion. And perhaps, after all, there is no God? He shrugged his shoulders. In short, this living or not living is an affair of our own? But there they were mistaken. Sir William had a friend in Surrey where they taught, what Sir William frankly admitted was a difficult art — a sense of proportion. There were, moreover, family affection; honour; courage; and a brilliant career. All of these had in Sir William a resolute champion. If they failed him, he had to support police and the good of society, which, he remarked very quietly, would take care, down in Surrey, that these unsocial impulses, bred more than anything by the lack of good blood, were held in control. And then stole out from her hiding-place and mounted her throne that Goddess whose lust is to override opposition, to stamp indelibly in the sanctuaries of others the image of herself. Naked, defenceless, the exhausted, the friendless received the impress of Sir William’s will. He swooped; he devoured. He shut people up. It was this combination of decision and humanity that endeared Sir William so greatly to the relations of his victims.
在灰色的诊所里，墙上挂着相片，四周摆放着昂贵的家具，在磨砂玻璃的天窗下，病人们了解了自己的罪行有多么严重。他们蜷缩在扶手椅里，看着他为了他们的利益，挥舞着手臂做出一系列古怪的动作。他突然伸出手去，又猛地收回来放到屁股上，为了证明（如果病人们冥顽不灵的话）威廉爵士能够控制自己的举止，而病人们不行。于是，有些弱者崩溃了，哭了起来，向他投降；而另一些人，天知道受了什么疯狂的极度刺激，竟当众辱骂起来，骂威廉爵士是个该死的骗子；还有更为不敬的，竟然质问起生命本身来。人为什么要活着？他们问道。威廉爵士答复说因为生命是美好的。对于布莱德肖夫人来说那是当然的，因为她那戴着鸵鸟毛装饰的相片就挂在壁炉架上，还因为他的收入，每年差不多有一万两千镑呢。可对于我们，他们抗议说，生活可没有那么慷慨大方。威廉爵士默认了他们的说法。他们是一群缺乏平衡感的人呀。也许，世界上根本不存在上帝呢，他耸了耸肩。总之，活着还是不活，难道不是我们自己的事吗？可他们在这一点上恰恰弄错了。威廉爵士有个朋友在萨里[57]，他们在那里教授一门艺术，威廉爵士坦言那是一门复杂的艺术——教你如何获得平衡感的艺术。此外，还有家人间的亲情，荣誉，勇气，以及辉煌的事业。所有这一切都是威廉爵士坚决拥护的。如果这些都没能取得成功，那么他将不得不依赖于警察和社会的公正力量，他非常平静地说，这些力量会在萨里把那些主要由于出身卑微而引起的反社会冲动处理好，使其得到控制。然后，那位女神就会从她的藏身处悄悄地溜出来，登上她的宝座，她的欲望便是镇压住抵抗，将她的形象永不磨灭地树立在他人的神殿里。于是，这些赤身露体的、无力自卫的、筋疲力尽的、无依无靠的人，便只得接受了威廉爵士那钢铁般的意志。他猛扑过去，他狼吞虎咽，他把这些人统统关起来。正是这种决心与人道的组合，使得那些牺牲品的家属们还对威廉爵士感激涕零呢。【注：[57]英格兰东南一地区。】
Shredding and slicing, dividing and subdividing, the clocks of Harley Street nibbled at the June day, counselled submission, upheld authority, and pointed out in chorus the supreme advantages of a sense of proportion, until the mound of time was so far diminished that a commercial clock, suspended above a shop in Oxford Street, announced, genially and fraternally, as if it were a pleasure to Messrs. Rigby and Lowndes to give the information gratis, that it was half-past one.
哈利街的时钟在一点点地蚕食着这个六月里的一天，将它切碎捣烂，将它细细分割，仿佛在劝诱着服从，维护着权威，并异口同声地指出平衡感具有至高无上的价值，直到浩荡的钟声越行越远，只剩下牛津街上一家店铺门口高悬着的一口广告钟，还在那里温和又亲切地报时，好像里格比和朗兹商店很乐于为大家提供免费的信息，告诉大家现在是下午的一点半。
Looking up, it appeared that each letter of their names stood for one of the hours; subconsciously one was grateful to Rigby and Lowndes for giving one time ratified by Greenwich; and this gratitude (so Hugh Whitbread ruminated, dallying there in front of the shop window), naturally took the form later of buying off Rigby and Lowndes socks or shoes. So he ruminated. It was his habit. He did not go deeply. He brushed surfaces; the dead languages, the living, life in Constantinople, Paris, Rome; riding, shooting, tennis, it had been once. The malicious asserted that he now kept guard at Buckingham Palace, dressed in silk stockings and knee- breeches, over what nobody knew. But he did it extremely efficiently. He had been afloat on the cream of English society for fifty-five years. He had known Prime Ministers. His affections were understood to be deep. And if it were true that he had not taken part in any of the great movements of the time or held important office, one or two humble reforms stood to his credit; an improvement in public shelters was one; the protection of owls in Norfolk another; servant girls had reason to be grateful to him; and his name at the end of letters to the Times, asking for funds, appealing to the public to protect, to preserve, to clear up litter, to abate smoke, and stamp out immorality in parks, commanded respect.
抬头望去，只见店名里的每一个字母都代表着某个时辰。人们下意识地感谢里格比和朗兹商店能够把格林尼治标准时间告诉大家，而这份感谢（休·惠特布莱德在橱窗前流连，他如此想道）自然会引发人们日后去购买这家商店里的鞋袜。他这么琢磨着。他习惯如此。他想得并不深。他的思想如蜻蜓点水，一忽儿学陈腐的古文，一忽儿又搞当代语言，还马不停蹄地憧憬君士坦丁堡、巴黎、罗马的生活，以前还热衷过骑马、打猎、网球。有个家伙戏弄他说：现在他穿着长丝袜和短裤在白金汉宫做警卫，只有天知道他在守护着什么宝藏。不过，他干起这差使来确实很有效率。他已经为英国的上流社会服务了五十五个年头。他还认识好几任首相呢。据说他跟他们的交情还很深。如果说他确实没有参与过任何重大的时事，也从未身居过要职，那至少有一两次微不足道的改革还是应该归功于他的：改善收容所的居住条件是一件，保护诺福克郡的猫头鹰是另一件，女佣人们也有理由要感谢他。此外，他还多次给《泰晤士报》写信，要求人们捐助善款，呼吁公众保护环境、保护动物、清除垃圾、控制吸烟、禁止公园里的堕落行为，他还在信末署上真名，人们为此对他肃然起敬。
But Rezia Warren Smith cried, walking down Harley Street, that she did not like that man.
可是，沿着哈利街走去的蕾西娅·沃伦·史密斯却大声地喊出，她不喜欢那个家伙。
A magnificent figure he cut too, pausing for a moment (as the sound of the half hour died away) to look critically, magisterially, at socks and shoes; impeccable, substantial, as if he beheld the world from a certain eminence, and dressed to match; but realised the obligations which size, wealth, health, entail, and observed punctiliously even when not absolutely necessary, little courtesies, old-fashioned ceremonies which gave a quality to his manner, something to imitate, something to remember him by, for he would never lunch, for example, with Lady Bruton, whom he had known these twenty years, without bringing her in his outstretched hand a bunch of carnations and asking Miss Brush, Lady Bruton’s secretary, after her brother in South Africa, which, for some reason, Miss Brush, deficient though she was in every attribute of female charm, so much resented that she said “Thank you, he’s doing very well in South Africa,” when, for half a dozen years, he had been doing badly in Portsmouth.
此时，一点半的钟声渐渐消逝，他在橱窗前稍作逗留，以挑剔又庄重的目光注视着鞋袜，显示出一副气宇轩昂的派头。他的人格无懈可击，他的生活富裕充实，他高高在上俯瞰着卑微的人间，而他的衣着也正符合他那高贵的身份。但他也意识到他的地位、财富和健康所需承担的职责，因此即使是在并非绝对必要的场合，他也会表现得拘泥小节，礼数周全得简直无微不至，古雅的礼节使他的举止显得风度翩翩，这是值得人们去效仿去记住的。比如说，他和布鲁顿女士共进午餐时，他已经和她交往有二十年了，但从来也不会忘记带上一束康乃馨去双手奉上，并向布鲁顿女士的秘书布拉希小姐问好，同时还会顺带问候她那位在南非的兄弟。但不知道是什么原因，布拉希小姐总是非常讨厌他的这种献殷勤，尽管在她身上几乎找不出一丁点的女性魅力。于是她草草地回答他：“谢谢你，他在南非过得很好。”而事实是，过去的六年里她兄弟一直都住在朴次茅斯[58]，生活得还相当窘迫。【注：[58]英格兰南部一港市，与英吉利海峡相邻。】
Lady Bruton herself preferred Richard Dalloway, who arrived at the next moment. Indeed they met on the doorstep.
至于布鲁顿女士本人嘛，她更为欣赏理查德·达洛维，他是紧跟在惠特布莱德后头来到的。实际上，他们在门口就碰上了。
Lady Bruton preferred Richard Dalloway of course. He was made of much finer material. But she wouldn’t let them run down her poor dear Hugh. She could never forget his kindness — he had been really remarkably kind — she forgot precisely upon what occasion. But he had been — remarkably kind. Anyhow, the difference between one man and another does not amount to much. She had never seen the sense of cutting people up, as Clarissa Dalloway did — cutting them up and sticking them together again; not at any rate when one was sixty- two. She took Hugh’s carnations with her angular grim smile. There was nobody else coming, she said. She had got them there on false pretences, to help her out of a difficulty —
布鲁顿女士当然更欣赏理查德·达洛维啰。他的素质要比惠特布莱德好许多呢。然而，她也不会允许他们随意贬低她那位可怜的、亲爱的休。她永远都不会忘记他的善良——他真的是一位心地善良的大好人——她记不清自己是在什么具体的情况下感受到这一点的。但他确实是——一个心地善良的大好人。不管怎么说，两个男人间的区别也没什么重要的。她从来也不觉得像克拉丽莎·达洛维那样对别人品头论足有什么意思——她总喜欢把别人解剖得体无完肤，然后再缝合起来。至少在你到了六十二岁这把年纪时，不会觉得这么做有什么意思的。她接过休的康乃馨，棱角分明的脸上露出阴沉的笑容。没有别的客人了，她说。她是编了个借口把他们骗过来的，为了让他们帮她解决一个难题…
“But let us eat first,” she said.
“不过，咱们还是先吃饭吧。”她说。
And so there began a soundless and exquisite passing to and fro through swing doors of aproned white-capped maids, handmaidens not of necessity, but adepts in a mystery or grand deception practised by hostesses in Mayfair from one-thirty to two, when, with a wave of the hand, the traffic ceases, and there rises instead this profound illusion in the first place about the food — how it is not paid for; and then that the table spreads itself voluntarily with glass and silver, little mats, saucers of red fruit; films of brown cream mask turbot; in casseroles severed chickens swim; coloured, undomestic, the fire burns; and with the wine and the coffee (not paid for) rise jocund visions before musing eyes; gently speculative eyes; eyes to whom life appears musical, mysterious; eyes now kindled to observe genially the beauty of the red carnations which Lady Bruton (whose movements were always angular) had laid beside her plate, so that Hugh Whitbread, feeling at peace with the entire universe and at the same time completely sure of his standing, said, resting his fork,
于是，一队罩着围裙、戴着白帽的女仆悄无声息地接踵而来，她们在转门间优雅地来回穿梭，她们并非必不可少，但对于帮衬起梅费尔区[59]的主妇们在下午一点半到两点间设下一场神秘而豪华的骗局来说，她们各个都身手不凡。你瞧，在弹指间，穿梭的人流不见了，一种意味深长的、如梦似幻的氛围冉冉升起，首先呈上的是一盘盘美味佳肴——你分文不花就能享用哦。接着，餐桌上自动地摆满了玻璃杯和银餐具、小巧的垫子、印着鲜红的水果图案的碟子、涂了一层奶油的棕色的比目鱼片，汤盘里漂浮着鸡块。炉火熊熊，五彩缤纷，非一般家庭里所能见。美酒加咖啡（一样不用花钱），使客人们迷离的目光中浮现出愉悦的幻景，微微有些迷醉，在这样的目光中，生活仿佛变幻为一出神秘的音乐剧。此时，炙热的目光惬意地凝视着嫣红的康乃馨，美极了，那鲜花被布鲁顿女士搁在盘子边上（她的动作总显得不太自然）。此时的休·惠特布莱德，感受到了自己与整个宇宙的和谐相处，同时也对自己的地位更增添了十足的信心，因此他放下刀叉，说道：【注：[59]位于伦敦西区的高级住宅区。】
Lady Bruton raised the carnations, holding them rather stiffly with much the same attitude with which the General held the scroll in the picture behind her; she remained fixed, tranced. Which was she now, the General’s great-grand-daughter? great-great-grand- daughter? Richard Dalloway asked himself. Sir Roderick, Sir Miles, Sir Talbot — that was it. It was remarkable how in that family the likeness persisted in the women. She should have been a general of dragoons herself. And Richard would have served under her, cheerfully; he had the greatest respect for her; he cherished these romantic views about well-set-up old women of pedigree, and would have liked, in his good-humoured way, to bring some young hot-heads of his acquaintance to lunch with her; as if a type like hers could be bred of amiable tea-drinking enthusiasts! He knew her country. He knew her people. There was a vine, still bearing, which either Lovelace or Herrick — she never read a word poetry of herself, but so the story ran — had sat under. Better wait to put before them the question that bothered her (about making an appeal to the public; if so, in what terms and so on), better wait until they have had their coffee, Lady Bruton thought; and so laid the carnations down beside her plate.
布鲁顿女士拿起康乃馨，颇为僵硬地握在手里，其神态与挂在她背后的画像上拿着一幅卷轴的将军几乎如出一辙。她傻傻地看着花，一动也不动。此刻的她究竟像谁呢，是将军的曾孙女吗？想必是玄孙女吧？理查德·达洛维暗自寻思。罗德里克爵士，迈尔斯爵士，塔尔博特爵士——还真是像呢。这个家族的特征都保留在了女性身上，真是奇迹。她本人就具有当龙骑兵首领的素质。而理查德会很乐意在她手下效力的，他对她的敬意是至高无上的。他对于那些出身名门、血统高贵的老妇人怀着罗曼蒂克的想法，而且由于他性情温和，总喜欢带几个他认识的急性子的年轻人来和她共进午餐，好像她那种类型的人就是由性情温和且热衷于喝午茶的人培养出来的！他熟悉她的家乡。他熟悉她的家人。他知道她庄园里有一棵葡萄树，如今依然能结果，据说洛夫莱斯[60]或赫里克[61]——尽管她本人这辈子从未读过一行诗，但这传说还是流传了下来——曾在这棵树下乘过凉。最好等一下再向他们提出那个使她烦恼的问题吧（是否要向公众呼吁，该如何措辞之类），最好等到他们喝完咖啡再说，布鲁顿女士想道。接着，她又把那束康乃馨放回到盘子边上。【注：[60]理查德·洛夫莱斯（1618~1658）：英国骑士派诗人，代表作有抒情诗《致阿尔泰亚，在狱中》和《致卢卡斯塔，奔赴战场》。[61]罗伯特·赫里克（1591~1674）：英国骑士派诗人，以简洁而感性的诗风著称，代表作有抒情诗《混乱中的快乐》。】
Miss Brush resented this familiarity intensely. She thought him an underbred fellow. She made Lady Bruton laugh.
布拉希小姐对这个亲昵的说法极度反感。她认为他是个缺德少教的混账东西。她的想法不禁使布鲁顿女士开怀大笑起来。
“Wouldn’t they look charming against your lace?”
“要是用花衬着您的蕾丝边不是会更可爱吗？”
“How’s Clarissa?” she asked abruptly.
“克拉丽莎好吗？”她突兀地问。
Clarissa always said that Lady Bruton did not like her. Indeed, Lady Bruton had the reputation of being more interested in politics than people; of talking like a man; of having had a finger in some notorious intrigue of the eighties, which was now beginning to be mentioned in memoirs. Certainly there was an alcove in her drawing-room, and a table in that alcove, and a photograph upon that table of General Sir Talbot Moore, now deceased, who had written there (one evening in the eighties) in Lady Bruton’s presence, with her cognisance, perhaps advice, a telegram ordering the British troops to advance upon an historical occasion. (She kept the pen and told the story.) Thus, when she said in her offhand way “How’s Clarissa?” husbands had difficulty in persuading their wives and indeed, however devoted, were secretly doubtful themselves, of her interest in women who often got in their husbands’ way, prevented them from accepting posts abroad, and had to be taken to the seaside in the middle of the session to recover from influenza. Nevertheless her inquiry, “How’s Clarissa?” was known by women infallibly, to be a signal from a well-wisher, from an almost silent companion, whose utterances (half a dozen perhaps in the course of a lifetime) signified recognition of some feminine comradeship which went beneath masculine lunch parties and united Lady Bruton and Mrs. Dalloway, who seldom met, and appeared when they did meet indifferent and even hostile, in a singular bond.
克拉丽莎总是说布鲁顿女士不喜欢她。确实，大家都知道布鲁顿女士对政治比对人更感兴趣。她说话像个男子汉，曾在80年代的一桩臭名昭著的阴谋中插了一手，这件事至今在一些回忆录里还常有提及。她的客厅里肯定有个暗室，里面还有张桌子，上面放着一张将军塔尔博特·摩尔爵士的照片，将军如今已过世，他曾在那里当着布鲁顿女士的面起草了一份电报（在80年代的某个夜晚），电报的内容她是知晓的，也许还帮他出了点主意，那份电报是命令英国部队在某个历史性的时刻进军的（她保存了那支笔，并公开了那件事）。因此，在她唐突地问了一句“克拉丽莎好吗”之时，男人们很难使他们的妻子相信她会对女人感兴趣，毕竟，无论他们对布鲁顿女士多么忠心耿耿，他们自己都在偷偷地怀疑呢。女人们常常坏了丈夫的好事，不许他们去海外就职，议会开到一半却不得不带她们去海滨疗养，因为她们突然患上了流感。然而，女人们还是能够准确地把握住她那句“克拉丽莎好吗”的意义，它是来自一个祝福者、一个几乎沉默寡言的伴侣的信号，她所说的（一辈子里也许有那么五六次）代表她尊重那种女性间的友谊，它是款待男性的午餐会上的一股潜流，它把布鲁顿女士和达洛维夫人以奇特的方式联系在了一起，虽说这两人很少见面，而且见面时总显得冷冰冰的，有时甚至还表现出敌意。
“D’you know who’s in town?” said Lady Bruton suddenly bethinking her. “Our old friend, Peter Walsh.”
“你们知道谁来伦敦了吗？”布鲁顿女士突然想起来，“是我们的老朋友，彼德·沃尔什。”
They all smiled. Peter Walsh! And Mr. Dalloway was genuinely glad, Milly Brush thought; and Mr. Whitbread thought only of his chicken.
他们都笑了起来。彼德·沃尔什！达洛维先生是真的很开心，米莉·布拉希想，而惠特布莱德先生只关心他的鸡块。
Peter Walsh! All three, Lady Bruton, Hugh Whitbread, and Richard Dalloway, remembered the same thing — how passionately Peter had been in love; been rejected; gone to India; come a cropper; made a mess of things; and Richard Dalloway had a very great liking for the dear old fellow too. Milly Brush saw that; saw a depth in the brown of his eyes; saw him hesitate; consider; which interested her, as Mr. Dalloway always interested her, for what was he thinking, she wondered, about Peter Walsh?
彼德·沃尔什！他们仨，布鲁顿女士，休·惠特布莱德，还有理查德·达洛维，都想起了同一件事——彼德那时候是怎样痴情地坠入了爱河，然后遭到拒绝，去了印度，遭受打击，陷入窘境。理查德·达洛维竟然也非常喜欢这个亲爱的老家伙。米莉·布拉希从他棕色眼睛的深处看出来了，他在迟疑，权衡。她觉得观察他很有趣，达洛维先生总是让她觉得有趣，此时他在想什么呢，她思忖着，他是怎么看彼德·沃尔什的呢？
“I met Clarissa in the Park this morning,” said Hugh Whitbread, diving into the casserole, anxious to pay himself this little tribute, for he had only to come to London and he met everybody at once; but greedy, one of the greediest men she had ever known, Milly Brush thought, who observed men with unflinching rectitude, and was capable of everlasting devotion, to her own sex in particular, being knobbed, scraped, angular, and entirely without feminine charm.
“我今天早上在公园里碰到了克拉丽莎。”休·惠特布莱德说着，一面把脑袋埋在了汤盘里。他是急于要小小地表扬一下自己，因为只要他到伦敦来，他就会立刻碰上什么人的。不过他真是个贪吃的人，是她遇见过的最最贪吃的人，米莉·布拉希想道，她对男性的判断具有不可动摇的公正性，而且她的感情持久专一，尤其是对女性，尽管她本人的身材坑坑洼洼、有棱有角，像块搓板，完全缺乏女性的柔美。
“Yes; Peter Walsh has come back,” said Lady Bruton. It was vaguely flattering to them all. He had come back, battered, unsuccessful, to their secure shores. But to help him, they reflected, was impossible; there was some flaw in his character. Hugh Whitbread said one might of course mention his name to So-and-so. He wrinkled lugubriously, consequentially, at the thought of the letters he would write to the heads of Government offices about “my old friend, Peter Walsh,” and so on. But it wouldn’t lead to anything — not to anything permanent, because of his character.
“是的，彼德·沃尔什回来了。”布鲁顿女士说。这似乎使大家都觉得有那么一点骄傲。他回来了，历经了磨难，遭遇了失败，回到了他们的安全港湾。但要帮助他，他们沉思着，是不可能的，因为他的性格上有缺陷。休·惠特布莱德说我们当然可以在某某某面前提到他的名字。一想到他要给政府机关的头头脑脑们写信，写什么“我的老朋友，彼德·沃尔什”之类，他就会百分百地皱起眉头，露出一副可怜巴巴的模样。可这也无济于事——从长远角度来说，一切的努力都无济于事，因为彼德的性格有缺陷。
That Peter Walsh had been in love with Clarissa; that he would go back directly after lunch and find Clarissa; that he would tell her, in so many words, that he loved her. Yes, he would say that.
这个彼德·沃尔什曾经爱过克拉丽莎。达洛维吃完午饭会直接回去找克拉丽莎的，他会告诉她，用尽甜言蜜语告诉她，他有多么多么爱她。是啊，他一定会这么说的。
Milly Brush once might almost have fallen in love with these silences; and Mr. Dalloway was always so dependable; such a gentleman too. Now, being forty, Lady Bruton had only to nod, or turn her head a little abruptly, and Milly Brush took the signal, however deeply she might be sunk in these reflections of a detached spirit, of an uncorrupted soul whom life could not bamboozle, because life had not offered her a trinket of the slightest value; not a curl, smile, lip, cheek, nose; nothing whatever; Lady Bruton had only to nod, and Perkins was instructed to quicken the coffee.
米莉·布拉希几乎爱上了这样寂静的时刻，而达洛维先生又总是如此可靠，是个不折不扣的绅士。现在，到了四十岁的年龄，只要布鲁顿女士点点头，或者突然回一回头，米莉·布拉希都会立刻收到信号，无论她正处于怎样一种超然的出神状态，生活都无法欺骗她那出污泥而不染的灵魂，因为生活从没给过她任何哪怕只有一点点价值的东西：没有美丽的鬈发，没有迷人的微笑、嘴唇、面颊和鼻子，什么也没有。布鲁顿女士只要点一下头，她就会立刻指示帕金斯快点上咖啡。
“In trouble with some woman,” said Lady Bruton. They had all guessed that THAT was at the bottom of it.
“和什么女人惹了麻烦。”布鲁顿女士说。他们都猜到了，问题总是出在这个方面。
(They were waiting to bring the coffee until Mr. Whitbread had finished.)
（仆人们在等着惠特布莱德先生用完餐好上咖啡。）
Hugh was very slow, Lady Bruton thought. He was getting fat, she noticed. Richard always kept himself in the pink of condition. She was getting impatient; the whole of her being was setting positively, undeniably, domineeringly brushing aside all this unnecessary trifling (Peter Walsh and his affairs) upon that subject which engaged her attention, and not merely her attention, but that fibre which was the ramrod of her soul, that essential part of her without which Millicent Bruton would not have been Millicent Bruton; that project for emigrating young people of both sexes born of respectable parents and setting them up with a fair prospect of doing well in Canada. She exaggerated. She had perhaps lost her sense of proportion. Emigration was not to others the obvious remedy, the sublime conception. It was not to them (not to Hugh, or Richard, or even to devoted Miss Brush) the liberator of the pent egotism, which a strong martial woman, well nourished, well descended, of direct impulses, downright feelings, and little introspective power (broad and simple — why could not every one be broad and simple? she asked) feels rise within her, once youth is past, and must eject upon some object — it may be Emigration, it may be Emancipation; but whatever it be, this object round which the essence of her soul is daily secreted, becomes inevitably prismatic, lustrous, half looking-glass, half precious stone; now carefully hidden in case people should sneer at it; now proudly displayed. Emigration had become, in short, largely Lady Bruton.
休吃得太慢了，布鲁顿女士想。他发福了，她看得出来。理查德总是能把身体保持在最佳状态。她等得不耐烦了，她的整个身心都在断然地、无疑地、强势地把所有那些不值一提的琐事驱逐出去（彼德·沃尔什和他的事情），从而只关注那唯一的计划，这个计划不仅得到了她的关注，而且是一个监督她灵魂的细胞，是她身上最为本质的部分，没有了它，米利森特·布鲁顿就不成其为米利森特·布鲁顿了。这计划就是让那些出身良好的男女青年移民去加拿大，并帮助他们获得远大前程。她夸夸其谈了。她也许是失去了平衡感。在别人看来，移民并非是什么显而易见的救赎之道，也不能代表什么崇高的理想。对他们而言（对休、理查德，甚至对忠诚的布拉希小姐而言），移民并不能使封闭的自我获得释放，而这个强壮勇猛、营养良好、出身名门、直率冲动、感情外露、缺乏反省能力的女人（她爽朗而单纯——为什么不能全世界都是爽朗而单纯的人呢？她自问）觉得自我在她的内心里冉冉升起，青春一旦老去，自我就必须投入什么目标——也许是移民，也许是解放。无论是什么，她的灵魂都会分泌出每日的精华将这个目标围绕，使它势必成为一种晶莹剔透、光辉灿烂的东西，一半是明镜，一半是宝石，此时，它小心地躲藏着，以防被人耻笑，彼时，它又自豪地展示在世人的面前。简单说来，移民在很大程度上已成为布鲁顿女士本人。
“However,” said Lady Bruton, anxious to leave the subject, “we shall hear the whole story from Peter himself.”
“不管怎么说，”布鲁顿女士急于摆脱这个话题，说道，“我们应该听彼德亲口告诉我们整个事情。”
(The coffee was very slow in coming.)
（咖啡迟迟没有上。）
“The address?” murmured Hugh Whitbread; and there was at once a ripple in the grey tide of service which washed round Lady Bruton day in, day out, collecting, intercepting, enveloping her in a fine tissue which broke concussions, mitigated interruptions, and spread round the house in Brook Street a fine net where things lodged and were picked out accurately, instantly, by grey-haired Perkins, who had been with Lady Bruton these thirty years and now wrote down the address; handed it to Mr. Whitbread, who took out his pocket-book, raised his eyebrows, and slipping it in among documents of the highest importance, said that he would get Evelyn to ask him to lunch.
“地址呢？”休·惠特布莱德嘟哝道。这立刻在整日围着布鲁顿女士效劳的灰色潮水中激起了一阵涟漪，这些仆人们代她收信，代她拒客，将她裹在一层极细的薄膜中，以抵抗人世的风风雨雨，以缓解人间的纷纷扰扰，在布鲁克街的这幢房子里铺上了一张细网，已经为布鲁顿女士服务了三十年的花白头发的帕金斯，把一切都在这张网里归置得井井有条，以便在需要时能立刻拿取。此时，这位老仆把地址写了下来，把它递给了惠特布莱德先生，他拿出袖珍笔记簿，扬了扬眉，把它夹在最重要的文件中，说他会让伊芙林去请彼德来吃午饭的。
But she had to write. And one letter to the Times, she used to say to Miss Brush, cost her more than to organise an expedition to South Africa (which she had done in the war). After a morning’s battle beginning, tearing up, beginning again, she used to feel the futility of her own womanhood as she felt it on no other occasion, and would turn gratefully to the thought of Hugh Whitbread who possessed — no one could doubt it — the art of writing letters to the Times.
可她必须写信。给《泰晤士报》写一封信，她常对布拉希小姐这么说，要比组织一支远征南非的队伍还要费劲（在战时，她确实组织过）。在经过一上午写完了撕、撕完了写的苦斗之后，她常常会有一种身为女性的无用之感，这样的感觉她从未在别的场合体会过，随后她会满心佩服地想起休·惠特布莱德，因为他拥有——没人会怀疑这一点——给《泰晤士报》写信的才华。
A being so differently constituted from herself, with such a command of language; able to put things as editors like them put; had passions which one could not call simply greed. Lady Bruton often suspended judgement upon men in deference to the mysterious accord in which they, but no woman, stood to the laws of the universe; knew how to put things; knew what was said; so that if Richard advised her, and Hugh wrote for her, she was sure of being somehow right. So she let Hugh eat his soufflé; asked after poor Evelyn; waited until they were smoking, and then said,
一个和她天赋全然不同的人，把握语言的能力如此之强，措辞能写得投编辑所好，有那种你不能简单地称之为贪欲的热情。布鲁顿女士常常保留对男人的评价，那是为了对他们能够和宇宙的神秘法则和谐相处表示敬意，没有一个女人能做到这一点。他们知道如何写文章，也明白别人话里的意思。因此，如果理查德帮她出点子，休帮她写信，她相信一定能成的。于是，她让休吃完他的蛋奶酥[62]，还问候可怜的伊芙林，直等到他们抽烟的时候，她方才开口说道：【注：[62]一种以起泡蛋白为主烘烤出的法式甜点。】
And Miss Brush went out, came back; laid papers on the table; and Hugh produced his fountain pen; his silver fountain pen, which had done twenty years’ service, he said, unscrewing the cap. It was still in perfect order; he had shown it to the makers; there was no reason, they said, why it should ever wear out; which was somehow to Hugh’s credit, and to the credit of the sentiments which his pen expressed (so Richard Dalloway felt) as Hugh began carefully writing capital letters with rings round them in the margin, and thus marvellously reduced Lady Bruton’s tangles to sense, to grammar such as the editor of the Times, Lady Bruton felt, watching the marvellous transformation, must respect. Hugh was slow. Hugh was pertinacious. Richard said one must take risks. Hugh proposed modifications in deference to people’s feelings, which, he said rather tartly when Richard laughed, “had to be considered,” and read out “how, therefore, we are of opinion that the times are ripe… the superfluous youth of our ever-increasing population… what we owe to the dead…” which Richard thought all stuffing and bunkum, but no harm in it, of course, and Hugh went on drafting sentiments in alphabetical order of the highest nobility, brushing the cigar ash from his waistcoat, and summing up now and then the progress they had made until, finally, he read out the draft of a letter which Lady Bruton felt certain was a masterpiece. Could her own meaning sound like that?
布拉希小姐走了出去，然后又回来了，把信纸放在桌子上。休拿出了他的水笔，他那支银色的水笔，已经用了二十年，他说着，旋开了笔帽。它依然完好无损，他曾给制造商看过，他们说，为什么一定会磨损呢，没有道理呀。反正要归功于休，还要归功于他用这支笔表达出来的感情（理查德·达洛维这么觉得）。休小心翼翼地开始写起大写字母，还在空白处画上花环装饰，布鲁顿女士脑子里的那一团乱麻就这样被绝妙地梳理了一番，直梳理到文字干净、语法正确，布鲁顿女士看着这了不起的变化，心想《泰晤士报》的编辑大人一定会满意的。休写得很慢。休很固执。理查德说人就该冒冒险。休提议为了顾及别人的感受而做些修改，理查德不以为然，休相当严肃地指出“必须要考虑别人的感受”，同时念了起来：“因此，我们认为时机已经成熟…在我们不断递增的人口中，青年的数量是过剩的…我们对死者应尽的责任是…”，理查德认为这些都是华而不实的废话，不过放在这里当然也没什么坏处。休继续打草稿，将那些表现最为崇高的感情的词语按照字母顺序记下来，一面掸落背心上的烟灰，不时把他们取得的进展总结一下，直到最后，他读出了这封信的草稿，布鲁顿女士很肯定地认为这是一篇杰作。她的本意真的像他念给她听的那样吗？
“Milly, would you fetch the papers?”
“米莉，你去把信纸拿来好吗？”
Hugh could not guarantee that the editor would put it in; but he would be meeting somebody at luncheon.
休不能保证编辑会把这封信登出来，但他会在午餐会上跟某个要人谈一下的。
Whereupon Lady Bruton, who seldom did a graceful thing, stuffed all Hugh’s carnations into the front of her dress, and flinging her hands out called him “My Prime Minister!” What she would have done without them both she did not know. They rose. And Richard Dalloway strolled off as usual to have a look at the General’s portrait, because he meant, whenever he had a moment of leisure, to write a history of Lady Bruton’s family.
布鲁顿女士听他这么一说，她这人几乎从来也没什么优雅的举止，竟然把休带来的康乃馨全部塞进了胸口，张开两只臂膀，还冲他大叫，“我的首相大人！”她不知道如果没有了他俩该如何是好。他们起身。理查德·达洛维像往常一样溜达着去看一看将军的肖像画，因为他计划着，只要他稍有空闲，他就要为布鲁顿女士写一部家族史。
And Millicent Bruton was very proud of her family. But they could wait, they could wait, she said, looking at the picture; meaning that her family, of military men, administrators, admirals, had been men of action, who had done their duty; and Richard’s first duty was to his country, but it was a fine face, she said; and all the papers were ready for Richard down at Aldmixton whenever the time came; the Labour Government she meant. “Ah, the news from India!” she cried.
米利森特·布鲁顿也为她的家族感到无比自豪。不过他们可以等，他们可以等一下的，她看着肖像说道，意思是说她的家族，世代都出文官武将，海军上将，都是实干家，都已尽了职责，而理查德的第一职责是为国效劳，不过那只是面子问题，她说，一旦时机成熟，在奥尔德米克斯敦，所有的档案都保存得好好的，理查德随时可以参考引用。她所谓的时机成熟是指工党政府的下台。“看呵，从印度来的新闻哦！”她高喊着。
And then, as they stood in the hall taking yellow gloves from the bowl on the malachite table and Hugh was offering Miss Brush with quite unnecessary courtesy some discarded ticket or other compliment, which she loathed from the depths of her heart and blushed brick red, Richard turned to Lady Bruton, with his hat in his hand, and said,
接着，他们站在客厅里，从孔雀石桌子上放着的一只碟子里取出黄手套，此时，休多此一举地向布拉希小姐献殷勤，给了她一张没人要的票子什么的，她从心底里讨厌他，脸涨得通红。当时，理查德转身朝着布鲁顿女士，手上拿着帽子，说道：“你会来参加我们今晚的派对吧？”
“We shall see you at our party to-night?” whereupon Lady Bruton resumed the magnificence which letter-writing had shattered. She might come; or she might not come. Clarissa had wonderful energy. Parties terrified Lady Bruton. But then, she was getting old. So she intimated, standing at her doorway; handsome; very erect; while her chow stretched behind her, and Miss Brush disappeared into the background with her hands full of papers.
听了这话，布鲁顿女士即刻恢复了被写信破坏掉的高贵气派。她也许会去，也许不去。克拉丽莎真是精力过人。开派对简直让布鲁顿女士害怕。况且，她毕竟老了。她如此这般宣称，站在门口，形象高贵，身子笔挺。这时，她的狗儿在她身后伸懒腰，布拉希小姐双手捧满信纸消失在了背景中。
And Lady Bruton went ponderously, majestically, up to her room, lay, one arm extended, on the sofa. She sighed, she snored, not that she was asleep, only drowsy and heavy, drowsy and heavy, like a field of clover in the sunshine this hot June day, with the bees going round and about and the yellow butterflies. Always she went back to those fields down in Devonshire, where she had jumped the brooks on Patty, her pony, with Mortimer and Tom, her brothers. And there were the dogs; there were the rats; there were her father and mother on the lawn under the trees, with the tea-things out, and the beds of dahlias, the hollyhocks, the pampas grass; and they, little wretches, always up to some mischief! stealing back through the shrubbery, so as not to be seen, all bedraggled from some roguery. What old nurse used to say about her frocks!
布鲁顿女士挺着宏伟之躯、步履庄重地走上楼去，走进她的房间，躺在沙发上，一只胳膊耷拉下来。她叹着气，打着呼噜，不是说她睡着了，她只是累了，觉得身子很沉，又累又沉，如炎炎六月里太阳暴晒下的一方苜蓿地，许多蜜蜂在周围绕来绕去的，还有黄色的蝴蝶。她老是回想起德文郡周围的田野，在那里她曾骑着她的小马驹帕蒂跨越溪流，还有她的兄弟莫蒂默和汤姆。还有那里的狗儿、小老鼠。还有她的父母双亲，坐在树荫下的草坪上，面前放着茶点。还有大丽花、蜀葵、蒲苇的花坛。想当年，他们都是些小淘气，总是设法捣乱！偷偷地从灌木丛中爬出来，为了不被人发现，弄得满身是泥。老保姆以前是怎么说她的衣服来着！
Ah dear, she remembered — it was Wednesday in Brook Street. Those kind good fellows, Richard Dalloway, Hugh Whitbread, had gone this hot day through the streets whose growl came up to her lying on the sofa. Power was hers, position, income. She had lived in the forefront of her time. She had had good friends; known the ablest men of her day. Murmuring London flowed up to her, and her hand, lying on the sofa back, curled upon some imaginary baton such as her grandfathers might have held, holding which she seemed, drowsy and heavy, to be commanding battalions marching to Canada, and those good fellows walking across London, that territory of theirs, that little bit of carpet, Mayfair.
哦，天哪，她想起来——眼下是在布鲁克街的星期三。这些善良的好人，理查德·达洛维、休·惠特布莱德，就在这个大热天里走到了外面的街道上，大街上的喧嚣声飘到了躺在楼上沙发上的她的耳朵里。她有权力、地位、金钱。她曾生活在时代的风口浪尖。她有过知心朋友，结识过那个年代里最出色的男子。伦敦的嘈杂之声不断向她侵袭，而她那搁在沙发靠背上的手，似乎握着一根想象中的权杖，就像她的祖先们也许用过的那种。她看上去疲惫不堪、昏昏欲睡，却依稀记得自己在指挥着一支支军队向加拿大进军。而那两个大好人则走在伦敦的街头，向着属于他们的领地，向着那块如地毯般大小的弹丸之地，向着梅费尔区前进。
And they went further and further from her, being attached to her by a thin thread (since they had lunched with her) which would stretch and stretch, get thinner and thinner as they walked across London; as if one’s friends were attached to one’s body, after lunching with them, by a thin thread, which (as she dozed there) became hazy with the sound of bells, striking the hour or ringing to service, as a single spider’s thread is blotted with rain-drops, and, burdened, sags down. So she slept.
他们离她越来越远了，那条把她和他们联系在一起的细线（因为他们和她一起用了午餐），在他们穿越伦敦的时候，也会相应地变得越来越长，越来越细，就好像你和一个朋友吃了顿午饭后，这条细线把你和你朋友的身体联系在了一起。它在钟声里变得朦胧（她在那里打起盹来），那是报时的钟声，也或者是召唤人们去做礼拜的钟声，仿佛蜘蛛吐出的一根丝线，雨滴打在上面，丝线迫于压力而下垂。于是她睡着了。
And Richard Dalloway and Hugh Whitbread hesitated at the corner of Conduit Street at the very moment that Millicent Bruton, lying on the sofa, let the thread snap; snored. Contrary winds buffeted at the street corner. They looked in at a shop window; they did not wish to buy or to talk but to part, only with contrary winds buffeting the street corner, with some sort of lapse in the tides of the body, two forces meeting in a swirl, morning and afternoon, they paused. Some newspaper placard went up in the air, gallantly, like a kite at first, then paused, swooped, fluttered; and a lady’s veil hung. Yellow awnings trembled. The speed of the morning traffic slackened, and single carts rattled carelessly down half- empty streets. In Norfolk, of which Richard Dalloway was half thinking, a soft warm wind blew back the petals; confused the waters; ruffled the flowering grasses. Haymakers, who had pitched beneath hedges to sleep away the morning toil, parted curtains of green blades; moved trembling globes of cow parsley to see the sky; the blue, the steadfast, the blazing summer sky.
理查德·达洛维和休·惠特布莱德站在康迪特街的街角上踯躅不前，而与此同时，米利森特·布鲁顿躺在沙发上，听凭那根纽带折断，打着呼噜。街角上，两股相反方向的风在交战。他们站在商店橱窗前往里望，他们并不想买什么，也不想交谈，只想快些分手，只因为那两股风在街角交战，还有上午和下午的两股力量交织起来的漩涡，使得他们的身体起了一种退潮的感觉，所以他们停在那里稍事休息。有张报纸里的广告飞在空中，开始姿势优美得如风筝，然后停顿了一下，又颤颤巍巍地落了下来。一块女人的面纱挂在谁家的窗口。黄色的雨篷在颤动着。早晨的车流变得稀稀拉拉，空落落的街道上时而有一辆马车满不在乎地嘚嘚驶过。在诺福克，就是理查德·达洛维半真半假向往着的那个诺福克，一阵轻柔的风把花瓣儿吹得合拢来，在湖面上泛起了层层涟漪，芳草萋萋，如波浪般起伏。晒干草的农夫，忙活了一上午后躺在树篱下小睡了一会儿，此时他们拨开了重重叠叠的绿叶和那发颤的一簇簇欧芹，看着天空，那夏天里蔚蓝的、凝滞的、炽热的天空。
Aware that he was looking at a silver two-handled Jacobean mug, and that Hugh Whitbread admired condescendingly with airs of connoisseurship a Spanish necklace which he thought of asking the price of in case Evelyn might like it — still Richard was torpid; could not think or move. Life had thrown up this wreckage; shop windows full of coloured paste, and one stood stark with the lethargy of the old, stiff with the rigidity of the old, looking in. Evelyn Whitbread might like to buy this Spanish necklace — so she might. Yawn he must. Hugh was going into the shop.
瞧呀，理查德在看着一只詹姆斯一世时期的双柄银杯，而休·惠特布莱德则在以行家的眼光故作谦逊地打量着一条西班牙项链，他想伊芙林也许会喜欢，他应该进去问一下价钱。而理查德依然浑身乏力，既无法思考，也无法挪步。生活吐出了这些遗留下来的残骸，商店橱窗里满是彩色的人造石，人们呆呆地站在橱窗外，如迟钝的老人，如僵化的老人，朝里望着。伊芙林·惠特布莱德可能想买这条西班牙项链的——很有可能的。理查德非得打个呵欠不可。休往商店里走去。
“Right you are!” said Richard, following.
“你是对的！”理查德说着，跟了进去。
Goodness knows he didn’t want to go buying necklaces with Hugh. But there are tides in the body. Morning meets afternoon. Borne like a frail shallop on deep, deep floods, Lady Bruton’s great- grandfather and his memoir and his campaigns in North America were whelmed and sunk. And Millicent Bruton too. She went under. Richard didn’t care a straw what became of Emigration; about that letter, whether the editor put it in or not. The necklace hung stretched between Hugh’s admirable fingers. Let him give it to a girl, if he must buy jewels — any girl, any girl in the street. For the worthlessness of this life did strike Richard pretty forcibly — buying necklaces for Evelyn. If he’d had a boy he’d have said, Work, work. But he had his Elizabeth; he adored his Elizabeth.
天晓得，理查德本不想进去陪休买项链的。可身体里有了退潮的感觉。上午和下午交织起来的漩涡。如脆弱的一叶扁舟在深深的、深深的潮水中沉浮，布鲁顿女士的曾祖父、他的回忆录，以及他在北美的战役都湮没在水中，都沉入了水底。还有米利森特·布鲁顿。她也沉下去了。理查德对移民的前途问题毫不在意，对那封信也一样，他不在乎编辑会不会把它登出来。那条项链缠绕在休那优雅的手指间。就让他送给哪个姑娘好了，如果他一定要买首饰的话——随便哪个姑娘，随便哪个街头的姑娘。理查德强烈地感受到了这种生活的毫无意义——为伊芙林买项链。如果他有个儿子，他就会对他说：努力工作，工作。但他只有女儿伊丽莎白，他可疼爱这颗掌上明珠啦。
“I should like to see Mr. Dubonnet,” said Hugh in his curt worldly way. It appeared that this Dubonnet had the measurements of Mrs. Whitbread’s neck, or, more strangely still, knew her views upon Spanish jewellery and the extent of her possessions in that line (which Hugh could not remember). All of which seemed to Richard Dalloway awfully odd. For he never gave Clarissa presents, except a bracelet two or three years ago, which had not been a success. She never wore it. It pained him to remember that she never wore it. And as a single spider’s thread after wavering here and there attaches itself to the point of a leaf, so Richard’s mind, recovering from its lethargy, set now on his wife, Clarissa, whom Peter Walsh had loved so passionately; and Richard had had a sudden vision of her there at luncheon; of himself and Clarissa; of their life together; and he drew the tray of old jewels towards him, and taking up first this brooch then that ring, “How much is that?” he asked, but doubted his own taste. He wanted to open the drawing- room door and come in holding out something; a present for Clarissa. Only what? But Hugh was on his legs again. He was unspeakably pompous. Really, after dealing here for thirty-five years he was not going to be put off by a mere boy who did not know his business. For Dubonnet, it seemed, was out, and Hugh would not buy anything until Mr. Dubonnet chose to be in; at which the youth flushed and bowed his correct little bow. It was all perfectly correct. And yet Richard couldn’t have said that to save his life! Why these people stood that damned insolence he could not conceive. Hugh was becoming an intolerable ass. Richard Dalloway could not stand more than an hour of his society. And, flicking his bowler hat by way of farewell, Richard turned at the corner of Conduit Street eager, yes, very eager, to travel that spider’s thread of attachment between himself and Clarissa; he would go straight to her, in Westminster.
“我想见见杜博内先生。”休用老于世故的口吻简洁地说道。看来这个杜博内先生知道惠特布莱德太太的颈围尺寸，或者，虽说这看来愈发奇怪，还知道她喜爱西班牙首饰以及她拥有多少那种首饰（关于这个，休记不清了）。所有这一切在理查德·达洛维看来都十分奇怪。因为他从来不送克拉丽莎礼物，除了两三年前曾送给她一只手镯，而且还失败了。她从来不戴那玩意儿。一想到她从来也不戴，他就觉得心里难受。如一根蜘蛛丝在这儿那儿摇来荡去，之后又依附在了一片叶尖上，理查德的心思也从死气沉沉之中恢复了过来，把全副心思都集中在了他妻子克拉丽莎的身上，彼德·沃尔什曾如此热烈地爱过她呢。理查德骤然在眼前看见了她在午餐会上的情景：他自己和克拉丽莎在一起，他们生活在一起。于是，他把一盘旧首饰拿到自己面前，先拿起一枚胸针，再拿起一枚戒指看了下，“这个多少钱？”他问，但对自己的眼光表示怀疑。他想要打开客厅的门，手里拿着什么东西走进去——献给克拉丽莎的一份礼物。只是送什么好呢？可休又在那里走动了。他真是虚荣心强得没话说了。真的，他已和这家店打了三十五年的交道，才不会被一个对生意经一窍不通的毛孩子忽悠呢。杜博内先生好像是出去了，如果杜博内先生不在，休就不会买任何东西，那小伙子听到这句，脸刷地就红了，赶忙毕恭毕敬地朝他鞠了小小的一躬。一切都很完美，礼貌周到。然而即使要了理查德的命，他也不会那么说的！他想不通这些店员怎么能忍受这个该死的傲慢之徒。休成了个令人受不了的混蛋。理查德·达洛维和他在一起超过一小时就会受不了的。于是，理查德轻轻弹了下圆顶礼帽表示再见，转过了康迪特街的街角，急切地，是的，非常急切地，去追随那根将他和克拉丽莎联系在一起的蛛丝。他要径直奔向威斯敏斯特，奔到她的身旁。
But he wanted to come in holding something. Flowers? Yes, flowers, since he did not trust his taste in gold; any number of flowers, roses, orchids, to celebrate what was, reckoning things as you will, an event; this feeling about her when they spoke of Peter Walsh at luncheon; and they never spoke of it; not for years had they spoken of it; which, he thought, grasping his red and white roses together (a vast bunch in tissue paper), is the greatest mistake in the world. The time comes when it can’t be said; one’s too shy to say it, he thought, pocketing his sixpence or two of change, setting off with his great bunch held against his body to Westminster to say straight out in so many words (whatever she might think of him), holding out his flowers, “I love you.” Why not? Really it was a miracle thinking of the war, and thousands of poor chaps, with all their lives before them, shovelled together, already half forgotten; it was a miracle. Here he was walking across London to say to Clarissa in so many words that he loved her. Which one never does say, he thought. Partly one’s lazy; partly one’s shy. And Clarissa — it was difficult to think of her; except in starts, as at luncheon, when he saw her quite distinctly; their whole life. He stopped at the crossing; and repeated — being simple by nature, and undebauched, because he had tramped, and shot; being pertinacious and dogged, having championed the down- trodden and followed his instincts in the House of Commons; being preserved in his simplicity yet at the same time grown rather speechless, rather stiff — he repeated that it was a miracle that he should have married Clarissa; a miracle — his life had been a miracle, he thought; hesitating to cross. But it did make his blood boil to see little creatures of five or six crossing Piccadilly alone. The police ought to have stopped the traffic at once. He had no illusions about the London police. Indeed, he was collecting evidence of their malpractices; and those costermongers, not allowed to stand their barrows in the streets; and prostitutes, good Lord, the fault wasn’t in them, nor in young men either, but in our detestable social system and so forth; all of which he considered, could be seen considering, grey, dogged, dapper, clean, as he walked across the Park to tell his wife that he loved her.
可是，他想拿点什么进门。鲜花？对，鲜花，因为他不相信自己对首饰的品位。不论多少束花，玫瑰、兰花都可以的，来庆祝你认为值得庆祝的任何事。他们在午餐会上说起彼德·沃尔什时，他突然对她涌起了一股柔情。他们已经有多年不说感情的事了，他心想，这是世界上最严重的错误，手里捧着红白相间的玫瑰（用薄纱纸包裹着的一大把）。相处久了，这种事就没法说了，因为我们太害羞了，这种话说不出口呀，他想着，把一两个六便士的找头放进口袋，一大捧花紧紧贴在胸口，奔向威斯敏斯特，去直截了当对她说出心里话（不管她会怎么想），献上鲜花，还有说，“我爱你。”有什么不可以呢？想想战争，真是一个奇迹，成千上万个可怜的家伙，生活才刚刚开始，就一同被黄土掩埋了，而且大多已经淡出了人们的记忆。此时，他正在穿越伦敦城，去对克拉丽莎倾诉衷肠，去对她说他爱她。我们从来不会这么说的，他想。部分因为懒惰，部分因为羞涩。而克拉丽莎——要想起她来很不容易，除非在一些特别的场合，比如在午餐会上，他才会非常清晰地想起她来，想起他们的生活。他停在十字路口，反复说着——他生性天真，灵魂还没有被腐蚀，因为他奋斗过，坚持过；他执着坚定，支持弱势群体，在下议院会议中直陈己见；他保持了单纯的天性，但同时也变得沉默寡言、拘谨呆板——他反复说着，他能够娶到克拉丽莎，简直就是奇迹。一个奇迹——他的生活就是个奇迹，他沉思着，在十字路口踌躇不前。不过看着那些只有五六岁的小家伙独自穿过皮卡迪里街，他觉得火冒三丈。交警应该立刻把来往的车流拦下来。他对伦敦的交警不抱幻想。实际上，他是在收集警察渎职的证据，例如不许小摊贩把货车停在大街上，不许妓女拉客，天哪，错不在她们身上，也不在那些寻快活的小青年身上，而在我们这个面目可憎的社会制度，诸如此类。这些都是他脑子里考虑着的问题，你可以看出他在深思，你看他头发灰白，犟头倔脑，衣冠楚楚，干净整齐地穿过公园回家去，去告诉妻子他爱她。
For he would say it in so many words, when he came into the room. Because it is a thousand pities never to say what one feels, he thought, crossing the Green Park and observing with pleasure how in the shade of the trees whole families, poor families, were sprawling; children kicking up their legs; sucking milk; paper bags thrown about, which could easily be picked up (if people objected) by one of those fat gentlemen in livery; for he was of opinion that every park, and every square, during the summer months should be open to children (the grass of the park flushed and faded, lighting up the poor mothers of Westminster and their crawling babies, as if a yellow lamp were moved beneath). But what could be done for female vagrants like that poor creature, stretched on her elbow (as if she had flung herself on the earth, rid of all ties, to observe curiously, to speculate boldly, to consider the whys and the wherefores, impudent, loose-lipped, humorous), he did not know. Bearing his flowers like a weapon, Richard Dalloway approached her; intent he passed her; still there was time for a spark between them — she laughed at the sight of him, he smiled good-humouredly, considering the problem of the female vagrant; not that they would ever speak. But he would tell Clarissa that he loved her, in so many words. He had, once upon a time, been jealous of Peter Walsh; jealous of him and Clarissa. But she had often said to him that she had been right not to marry Peter Walsh; which, knowing Clarissa, was obviously true; she wanted support. Not that she was weak; but she wanted support.
等他走进房间，他要把心里话好好地倒一倒。因为不说出一个人的感受实在是一件遗憾备至的事情，他想着，穿过格林公园，一面快乐地看着在树荫下或躺或靠着的一家家人，大多是些穷人，小孩子在踢腿、吃奶，纸袋子散落一地，只要那些穿制服的胖绅士中哪一个去捡一下就可以了（如果人们对此不满的话）。因为在他看来，每个公园，每座广场，在夏季都应该对儿童们开放（公园的草地时明时暗，映照出威斯敏斯特的穷妈妈和在地上爬的小宝宝，仿佛有一盏黄灯在底下移动）。可是能够为那个可怜人模样的流浪女做些什么呢，她撑着肘躺在那里（仿佛是把自己送入了大地的怀抱，挣脱了所有的束缚，好奇地观察着，大胆地推测着，考虑着原因和理由，一副放肆滑稽的样子，说起话来没完没了），他不知道。理查德·达洛维拿着鲜花，像拿着一把枪，走近她，目不斜视地从她身边走过。虽然时间短暂，但他们间还是擦出了些火花——她看着他笑了起来，他也愉快地微笑着，考虑着流浪女的问题。当然，他们是永远不会彼此交谈的。可他会告诉克拉丽莎他爱她的，反反复复地告诉她。他曾经嫉妒过彼德·沃尔什，嫉妒他和克拉丽莎。不过她过去常常对他说，她没有嫁给彼德·沃尔什是做对了。了解克拉丽莎，就会明白这一点显然是对的，她需要有人可以依靠。不是说她是个弱者，可她确实需要依靠。
As for Buckingham Palace (like an old prima donna facing the audience all in white) you can’t deny it a certain dignity, he considered, nor despise what does, after all, stand to millions of people (a little crowd was waiting at the gate to see the King drive out) for a symbol, absurd though it is; a child with a box of bricks could have done better, he thought; looking at the memorial to Queen Victoria (whom he could remember in her horn spectacles driving through Kensington), its white mound, its billowing motherliness; but he liked being ruled by the descendant of Horsa; he liked continuity; and the sense of handing on the traditions of the past. It was a great age in which to have lived. Indeed, his own life was a miracle; let him make no mistake about it; here he was, in the prime of life, walking to his house in Westminster to tell Clarissa that he loved her. Happiness is this he thought.
至于说白金汉宫（就像一个人老珠黄的女歌手，穿着一袭白纱，面对着观众），你不能否认它也有相当的尊严，他琢磨着，也不能轻视它，毕竟，对于千百万人来说（一小群人在门口等着看国王的车队出来），它代表一个象征，尽管有点荒唐。小孩子用一盒积木也能搭得比它漂亮，他想，看着维多利亚女王纪念碑（他还记得她戴着玳瑁边眼镜乘车驶过肯辛顿），它那洁白的碑身，它那波涛汹涌的母性身材。不过他还是喜欢被霍萨[63]的后人统治，因为他喜欢历史的连贯性，以及把古老的传统世代相传下去的感觉。他生活在一个伟大的时代里。实际上，他自己的生活就是个奇迹，可别让他误解了自己的生活哟。他就在这里，正当壮年，在往威斯敏斯特的家里赶，去告诉克拉丽莎他爱她。这就是幸福，他想。【注：[63]霍萨和亨吉斯特，传说中的一对兄弟，是第一批定居英格兰的撒克逊部落的领袖。】
It is this, he said, as he entered Dean’s Yard. Big Ben was beginning to strike, first the warning, musical; then the hour, irrevocable. Lunch parties waste the entire afternoon, he thought, approaching his door.
这就是的，他说着，走进了教长广场。大本钟敲了起来，开始是提示音，音声悦耳，然后是报时声，势如破竹。午餐会把整个下午都浪费掉了，他兀自寻思，走到了他家门口。
But why should she invite all the dull women in London to her parties? Why should Mrs. Marsham interfere? And there was Elizabeth closeted all this time with Doris Kilman. Anything more nauseating she could not conceive. Prayer at this hour with that woman. And the sound of the bell flooded the room with its melancholy wave; which receded, and gathered itself together to fall once more, when she heard, distractingly, something fumbling, something scratching at the door. Who at this hour? Three, good Heavens! Three already! For with overpowering directness and dignity the clock struck three; and she heard nothing else; but the door handle slipped round and in came Richard! What a surprise! In came Richard, holding out flowers. She had failed him, once at Constantinople; and Lady Bruton, whose lunch parties were said to be extraordinarily amusing, had not asked her. He was holding out flowers — roses, red and white roses. (But he could not bring himself to say he loved her; not in so many words.)
可她为什么一定要邀请每一个乏味的伦敦女人来参加她的派对呢？为什么玛莎姆太太要来插一手呢？还有伊丽莎白，老是和多丽斯·基尔曼搅在一起。她想不出比这更恶心的事了。在这个时间里和那个女人一起祷告。钟声倾泻在房间里，如单调的海浪，它渐渐退去，又卷土重来，然后再次退却。她心不在焉地听着，门上起了一阵丁零当啷，什么东西在门口摸索着。在这个时间谁会来呢？三点，天哪！已经三点了！钟声响了三下，如此直接，如此震撼，如此庄重。她听不见别的任何声音了，但门把手在转动着，走进来的是理查德！多意外呀！理查德走了进来，手里捧着花。她曾经让他失望，在君士坦丁堡的时候。还有布鲁顿女士，据说她办的午餐会特别有意思，却没有邀请她。不过，他献上了花——玫瑰花，红玫瑰和白玫瑰。（可他无法鼓起勇气对她说出他爱她，无法对她尽情诉说。）
The sound of Big Ben flooded Clarissa’s drawing-room, where she sat, ever so annoyed, at her writing-table; worried; annoyed. It was perfectly true that she had not asked Ellie Henderson to her party; but she had done it on purpose. Now Mrs. Marsham wrote “she had told Ellie Henderson she would ask Clarissa — Ellie so much wanted to come.”
大本钟的钟声倾泻在克拉丽莎的客厅里，她坐在写字台前，心浮气躁，烦恼焦虑。那是不争的事实，她没有邀请埃莉·亨德森来参加她的派对，但她是故意如此的。而玛莎姆太太却给她写了这封信：“我已告诉埃莉·亨德森，我会去求克拉丽莎的——埃莉是多么想来参加呀。”
“Thinking of Bourton,” she said.
“他想念伯尔顿呢。”她说。
But how lovely, she said, taking his flowers. She understood; she understood without his speaking; his Clarissa. She put them in vases on the mantelpiece. How lovely they looked! she said. And was it amusing, she asked? Had Lady Bruton asked after her? Peter Walsh was back. Mrs. Marsham had written. Must she ask Ellie Henderson? That woman Kilman was upstairs.
不过那多可爱呀，她说，接过了他的鲜花。她明白，他不用说她也明白，毕竟她是他的克拉丽莎嘛。她把鲜花插进壁炉上的花瓶里。它们看上去多可爱呀！她说。午餐会有意思吗？她问。布鲁顿女士问候她了吗？彼德·沃尔什回国了。玛莎姆太太给她写了信。她一定要请埃莉·亨德森吗？那个女人，那个基尔曼，就在楼上呢。
“But let us sit down for five minutes,” said Richard.
“不过让我们先坐一会儿吧。”理查德说。
It all looked so empty. All the chairs were against the wall. What had they been doing? Oh, it was for the party; no, he had not forgotten, the party. Peter Walsh was back. Oh yes; she had had him. And he was going to get a divorce; and he was in love with some woman out there. And he hadn’t changed in the slightest. There she was, mending her dress…
客厅里的一切看上去都空荡荡的。所有的椅子都靠着墙。他们都做了些什么呀？哦，是在为派对做准备呢，不过，他没有忘记派对。彼德·沃尔什回来了。哦，没错儿，她已经见过他了。他正打算离婚，他爱上了那边的某个女人。而他也丝毫未变。她坐在那儿，补着她的裙子…
“Hugh was at lunch,” said Richard. She had met him too! Well, he was getting absolutely intolerable. Buying Evelyn necklaces; fatter than ever; an intolerable ass.
“休也去了午餐会。”理查德说。她也见过他了！好吧，他变得绝对让人无法忍受：要给伊芙林买项链，还比以前胖多了，简直是一头令人难以忍受的蠢驴。
“And it came over me ‘I might have married you,'” she said, thinking of Peter sitting there in his little bow-tie; with that knife, opening it, shutting it. “Just as he always was, you know.”
“我突然想到，‘我差点会嫁给你呢，’”她说，想起彼德戴着小领结坐在那儿，手里拿着那把刀，一会打开，一会合上。“他的样子一点没变，你知道的。”
“Kilman arrives just as we’ve done lunch,” she said. “Elizabeth turns pink. They shut themselves up. I suppose they’re praying.”
“我们刚吃完午饭基尔曼就到了，”她说，“伊丽莎白看见她就脸红了。她们把自己关在房间里。我想她们是在祷告吧。”
He had not said “I love you”; but he held her hand. Happiness is this, is this, he thought.
他依旧没有说“我爱你”，但他握着她的手。这就是幸福，这就是，他想。
Lord! He didn’t like it; but these things pass over if you let them.
天哪！他不喜欢这样，不过如果你睁一只眼闭一只眼，事情也就过去了。
“And our dear Miss Kilman?” he asked. Clarissa thought the roses absolutely lovely; first bunched together; now of their own accord starting apart.
“我们亲爱的基尔曼小姐呢？”他问。克拉丽莎觉得玫瑰花实在太可爱了，刚才还聚拢在一起，现在又自然地分开了。
“In a mackintosh with an umbrella,” said Clarissa.
“她还穿着雨衣拿着雨伞呢。”克拉丽莎说。
“But why should I ask all the dull women in London to my parties?” said Clarissa. And if Mrs. Marsham gave a party, did SHE invite her guests?
“可我为什么一定要邀请所有无聊的伦敦女人来我的派对呢？”克拉丽莎说。如果玛莎姆太太办派对，她会邀请克拉丽莎的朋友吗？
“Poor Ellie Henderson,” said Richard — it was a very odd thing how much Clarissa minded about her parties, he thought.
“可怜的埃莉·亨德森。”理查德说——真是桩怪事，克拉丽莎怎么会这么在乎她的派对呢，他想。
But Richard had no notion of the look of a room. However — what was he going to say?
可理查德对房间里的布置全无兴趣。究竟——他想要说什么呢？
They were talking about him at lunch, said Richard. (But he could not tell her he loved her. He held her hand. Happiness is this, he thought.) They had been writing a letter to the Times for Millicent Bruton. That was about all Hugh was fit for.
他们在午餐会上谈起他了，理查德说（但他无法对她说他爱她。他握住她的手。这就是幸福，他想）。他们替米莉森特·布鲁顿给《泰晤士报》写了封信。休的拿手好戏几乎也只有那个了。
“Armenians,” he said; or perhaps it was “Albanians.”
“是关于亚美尼亚人的。”他说，也或许他说的是“阿尔巴尼亚人”。
He must be off, he said, getting up. But he stood for a moment as if he were about to say something; and she wondered what? Why? There were the roses.
他必须走了，他说着，站起身来。可他站了一会儿，好像要准备说点什么。她奇怪他想说什么呢？为什么呢？她瞅着他带来的玫瑰花。
“Some Committee?” she asked, as he opened the door.
“委员会又要开会吗？”在他开门时，她问道。
And there is a dignity in people; a solitude; even between husband and wife a gulf; and that one must respect, thought Clarissa, watching him open the door; for one would not part with it oneself, or take it, against his will, from one’s husband, without losing one’s independence, one’s self-respect — something, after all, priceless.
人的身上总有一种尊严，一种孤独，甚至在夫妇之间，也有各自独立的生活，我们必须尊重它，克拉丽莎思忖着，一边看着他开门。因为我们自己也不愿放弃这种独立，也不愿违背丈夫的意愿去剥夺他自由的权利，如果我们剥夺了它，我们就必然会失去自己的独立和自尊——而这些东西，毕竟，是无价之宝。
If she worried about these parties he would not let her give them. Did she wish she had married Peter? But he must go.
如果她担心那些派对，他就不会让她举办了。她希望自己嫁给了彼德吗？可他必须走了。
“An hour’s complete rest after luncheon,” he said. And he went.
“午餐会之后该好好地休息一小时。”他说。他就这么走了。
He returned with a pillow and a quilt.
他拿着一只枕头和一条被子回来了。
How like him! He would go on saying “An hour’s complete rest after luncheon” to the end of time, because a doctor had ordered it once. It was like him to take what doctors said literally; part of his adorable, divine simplicity, which no one had to the same extent; which made him go and do the thing while she and Peter frittered their time away bickering. He was already halfway to the House of Commons, to his Armenians, his Albanians, having settled her on the sofa, looking at his roses. And people would say, “Clarissa Dalloway is spoilt.” She cared much more for her roses than for the Armenians. Hunted out of existence, maimed, frozen, the victims of cruelty and injustice (she had heard Richard say so over and over again)– no, she could feel nothing for the Albanians, or was it the Armenians? but she loved her roses (didn’t that help the Armenians?)– the only flowers she could bear to see cut. But Richard was already at the House of Commons; at his Committee, having settled all her difficulties. But no; alas, that was not true. He did not see the reasons against asking Ellie Henderson. She would do it, of course, as he wished it. Since he had brought the pillows, she would lie down… But — but — why did she suddenly feel, for no reason that she could discover, desperately unhappy? As a person who has dropped some grain of pearl or diamond into the grass and parts the tall blades very carefully, this way and that, and searches here and there vainly, and at last spies it there at the roots, so she went through one thing and another; no, it was not Sally Seton saying that Richard would never be in the Cabinet because he had a second-class brain (it came back to her); no, she did not mind that; nor was it to do with Elizabeth either and Doris Kilman; those were facts. It was a feeling, some unpleasant feeling, earlier in the day perhaps; something that Peter had said, combined with some depression of her own, in her bedroom, taking off her hat; and what Richard had said had added to it, but what had he said? There were his roses. Her parties! That was it! Her parties! Both of them criticised her very unfairly, laughed at her very unjustly, for her parties. That was it! That was it!
太有他的特色了！他会一再说“午餐会之后该好好地休息一小时”，直到世界末日，因为有个大夫曾对他这么说过。他这种人对医生说的话会不折不扣地执行，部分是因为他那可爱的、非凡的单纯，没有人能单纯到他那样的程度，这使得他去完成了他的那些事业，而她和彼德则把时间都浪费在了喋喋不休的争论中。理查德已经在去下议院的半路上了，要去讨论他的亚美尼亚人，或者是阿尔巴尼亚人，留下她坐在沙发上，看着他献上的玫瑰。而别人会说“克拉丽莎·达洛维被宠坏了”。比起亚美尼亚人来，她更关心她的玫瑰。尽管那些人到哪儿都被人驱逐，受尽了折磨，饥寒交迫，成为了残忍与不公的牺牲品（她不知道听理查德说过多少遍了）——然而，她对阿尔巴尼亚人什么感觉也没有，或者是亚美尼亚人吧？可她爱她的玫瑰（这难道对亚美尼亚人没有一点帮助吗？）——这是她能容忍看着别人把它从枝头摘下来的唯一一种花。可理查德大概已经到了下议院，在委员会里，已经解决了她所有的困难。可是不，唉，这不是真的。他不明白她不想请埃莉·亨德森的原因。她当然会照他希望的那样做。因为他已经拿来了枕头，她就躺下来吧…可是——可是——为什么她会突然间感觉，她实在找不出任何理由，会有如此刻骨铭心的痛苦？像一个在草地里丢失了一粒珍珠或钻石的人，如此这般小心翼翼地拨开高高的草丛，这里那里徒劳地寻找着，最后在草根处发现了它，她就这么将事情一桩桩一件件地梳理了一番。不，不是因为萨利·西顿说了理查德永远也进不了内阁，因为他有颗二流的脑袋（她想起了萨利说过的这句话），不，她对此并不介意；也不是因为伊丽莎白和多丽丝·基尔曼的缘故，那是明显的事实。这是一种感觉，一种不愉快的感觉，也许是因为今天早上，彼德说过的什么话，与她在卧室里脱掉帽子时感到的一丝沮丧交织在一起，而理查德说的话更增加了她的不快，可他说了什么呢？他的玫瑰还在这里。她的派对！就是它！她的派对！他们俩都非常不公地批评了她，非常刻薄地嘲笑她，因为她的派对。就是为了它！就是为了它！
“That’s what I do it for,” she said, speaking aloud, to life.
“就是为了这个我才举办派对的。”她说道，大声地对生活说道。
Since she was lying on the sofa, cloistered, exempt, the presence of this thing which she felt to be so obvious became physically existent; with robes of sound from the street, sunny, with hot breath, whispering, blowing out the blinds. But suppose Peter said to her, “Yes, yes, but your parties — what’s the sense of your parties?” all she could say was (and nobody could be expected to understand): They’re an offering; which sounded horribly vague. But who was Peter to make out that life was all plain sailing?– Peter always in love, always in love with the wrong woman? What’s your love? she might say to him. And she knew his answer; how it is the most important thing in the world and no woman possibly understood it. Very well. But could any man understand what she meant either? about life? She could not imagine Peter or Richard taking the trouble to give a party for no reason whatever.
由于她躺在沙发上，独自幽居，免除了责任，她如此明显地感觉到这理由成为了一种具体的存在。大街上嘈杂的声音是这个存在身穿的长袍，阳光明媚，它轻轻地吐出灼热的气息，拂动了百叶窗帘。不过假使彼德这么对她说：“是的，是的，可你的派对——你的派对有什么意义呢？”她能回答的只有（可别指望有人会明白她的意思）：它是一种奉献。听上去实在玄乎。可彼德凭什么以为生活都是一帆风顺的呢？——这个永远都在恋爱，永远都会爱上错误女人的彼德，他凭什么来批评她呢？你的爱又有多少意义呢？她也许可以这样问他。而且她也知道他的回答：爱是这个世界上最为重要的事，任何一个女人都不可能理解它。很好。可不也没有任何一个男人能理解她的意思吗？他们谁能理解生活的意义呢？她无法想象彼德或理查德会无缘无故去举办这麻烦得要命的派对。
Well, how was she going to defend herself? Now that she knew what it was, she felt perfectly happy. They thought, or Peter at any rate thought, that she enjoyed imposing herself; liked to have famous people about her; great names; was simply a snob in short. Well, Peter might think so. Richard merely thought it foolish of her to like excitement when she knew it was bad for her heart. It was childish, he thought. And both were quite wrong. What she liked was simply life.
好吧，她该怎样来为自己辩护呢？现在她明白了原因，感觉舒服多了。他们认为，或者说至少彼德认为，她喜欢强人所难，喜欢有名人簇拥在她的周围，还都是些大人物哩。总之，她就是个势利之人。好吧，彼德也许这么认为。理查德只是觉得她有点傻气，这么喜欢追求刺激，因为她自己也知道这样对她心脏不好。这样太孩子气了，他觉得。可他们俩都错了。她真正喜欢的只是生活。
All the same, that one day should follow another; Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday; that one should wake up in the morning; see the sky; walk in the park; meet Hugh Whitbread; then suddenly in came Peter; then these roses; it was enough. After that, how unbelievable death was!– that it must end; and no one in the whole world would know how she had loved it all; how, every instant…
然而，日子还是一天天地过下去，星期三、星期四、星期五、星期六；到了早上你必然会醒来；看看天空，在公园里散散步；碰到休·惠特布莱德，然后是彼德的突然来访，然后是这些玫瑰，这足够了。再然后呢，是死亡，多么令人难以置信呀！——一切都会完结，全世界没有一个人知道她有多么热爱这一切，多么热爱，这每时每刻…
But to go deeper, beneath what people said (and these judgements, how superficial, how fragmentary they are!) in her own mind now, what did it mean to her, this thing she called life? Oh, it was very queer. Here was So-and-so in South Kensington; some one up in Bayswater; and somebody else, say, in Mayfair. And she felt quite continuously a sense of their existence; and she felt what a waste; and she felt what a pity; and she felt if only they could be brought together; so she did it. And it was an offering; to combine, to create; but to whom?
但是挖掘得再深一点，在人们的冷嘲热讽之下（这些批评，多么肤浅，多么琐碎啊），在她自己的内心里，这个她称之为“生活”的东西，对她究竟意味着什么呢？哦，太奇怪了。某某人在南肯辛顿[64]，某某人在北贝思沃特[65]，还有别的人，比方说，在梅费尔[65]。她一直都能感受到这些人的存在，她感觉那是一种莫大的浪费，一种莫大的遗憾，要是能把那些人会聚起来该有多好呀！于是她这么做了。所以说它是一种奉献：为了联合，为了创造。可是要奉献给谁呢？【注：[63]霍萨和亨吉斯特，传说中的一对兄弟，是第一批定居英格兰的撒克逊部落的领袖。[64]伦敦的区名。[65]阿狄生（1672~1719）：英国著名散文家，与好友斯梯尔合办过期刊《闲谈者》和《旁观者》。】
An offering for the sake of offering, perhaps. Anyhow, it was her gift. Nothing else had she of the slightest importance; could not think, write, even play the piano. She muddled Armenians and Turks; loved success; hated discomfort; must be liked; talked oceans of nonsense: and to this day, ask her what the Equator was, and she did not know.
是为了奉献而奉献，也许吧。横竖，这都是她的天赋。除此之外她一无所长，不会思考，不会写作，甚至连弹钢琴都不会。她分不清亚美尼亚人和土耳其人，却又喜欢成功的感觉，讨厌生活的不便之处，一心想博得他人的好感，说起废话来滔滔不绝。直到今天，如果你问她赤道是什么，她还会无言以对。
She stood quite still and looked at her mother; but the door was ajar, and outside the door was Miss Kilman, as Clarissa knew; Miss Kilman in her mackintosh, listening to whatever they said.
她非常安静地站着，看着她的母亲。但门微微开着，基尔曼小姐在门外。克拉丽莎知道，穿着雨衣的基尔曼小姐，在专注地偷听她们的谈话。
Yes, Miss Kilman stood on the landing, and wore a mackintosh; but had her reasons. First, it was cheap; second, she was over forty; and did not, after all, dress to please. She was poor, moreover; degradingly poor. Otherwise she would not be taking jobs from people like the Dalloways; from rich people, who liked to be kind. Mr. Dalloway, to do him justice, had been kind. But Mrs. Dalloway had not. She had been merely condescending. She came from the most worthless of all classes — the rich, with a smattering of culture. They had expensive things everywhere; pictures, carpets, lots of servants. She considered that she had a perfect right to anything that the Dalloways did for her.
是的，基尔曼小姐站在楼梯口，穿着一件雨衣，但有她的道理。首先，它便宜；其次，她已经四十出头了。所以，她不用为了取悦别人而穿衣。而且，她没有钱，穷到了叮当响的地步。否则她不会接受像达洛维家的那种工作，他们是有钱人家，这样的人家喜欢和善待人。达洛维先生，说句公道话，是个和气的人。但达洛维太太不是。她仅仅是在屈尊俯就而已。她来自所有阶层中最无聊的一个阶层——有钱阶层，有点鸡零狗碎的文化知识。他们家里到处都是奢华之物：画像，地毯，仆役成群。基尔曼认为，自己完全有权利消受达洛维家为她提供的一切。
The door opened. Elizabeth knew that her mother was resting. She came in very quietly. She stood perfectly still. Was it that some Mongol had been wrecked on the coast of Norfolk (as Mrs. Hilbery said), had mixed with the Dalloway ladies, perhaps, a hundred years ago? For the Dalloways, in general, were fair-haired; blue-eyed; Elizabeth, on the contrary, was dark; had Chinese eyes in a pale face; an Oriental mystery; was gentle, considerate, still. As a child, she had had a perfect sense of humour; but now at seventeen, why, Clarissa could not in the least understand, she had become very serious; like a hyacinth, sheathed in glossy green, with buds just tinted, a hyacinth which has had no sun.
门开了。伊丽莎白知道母亲在休息。她轻手轻脚地走进来，一动不动地站在那里。是不是有哪个蒙古人遭遇了海难漂流到诺福克海岸（就像希尔伯里太太说的），后来就和达洛维家的女士们搅在了一起，也许是在一百年前吧？达洛维家的人，从总体上说，都是金发碧眼的，然而，伊丽莎白截然不同，头发是黑的，白净的脸上有一双中国人的眼睛，有一种东方的神秘感，性格温柔、体贴、文静。小时候，她具有一种十足的幽默感，可现在她十七岁了，克拉丽莎一点也弄不明白，她为何会变得那么严肃，如一朵风信子，包裹在亮绿的叶片中，只露出淡淡的花蕾，一朵照不到阳光的风信子。
She had been cheated. Yes, the word was no exaggeration, for surely a girl has a right to some kind of happiness? And she had never been happy, what with being so clumsy and so poor. And then, just as she might have had a chance at Miss Dolby’s school, the war came; and she had never been able to tell lies. Miss Dolby thought she would be happier with people who shared her views about the Germans. She had had to go. It was true that the family was of German origin; spelt the name Kiehlman in the eighteenth century; but her brother had been killed. They turned her out because she would not pretend that the Germans were all villains — when she had German friends, when the only happy days of her life had been spent in Germany! And after all, she could read history. She had had to take whatever she could get. Mr. Dalloway had come across her working for the Friends. He had allowed her (and that was really generous of him) to teach his daughter history. Also she did a little Extension lecturing and so on. Then Our Lord had come to her (and here she always bowed her head). She had seen the light two years and three months ago. Now she did not envy women like Clarissa Dalloway; she pitied them.
她被骗了。是的，这么说并没有夸张，因为一个姑娘当然有权利享受某种幸福吧？而她从来也没有幸福过，因为她人穷手又笨。还有，就在她在多尔比小姐的学校里可能有机会获得幸福时，战争爆发了，而且她从来也不肯说谎。多尔比小姐觉得，她还是和对德国人和她持同样观点的人待在一起好一些。因此，她不得不退了学。她家有德国血统，那是事实，十八世纪时，她家的姓拼作“Kiehlman”，但她的兄弟也是在战场上被德国人打死的呀。他们把她扫地出门，就因为她不愿意违心地承认德国人都是恶棍——她有德国朋友呀，她一生中仅有的幸福时光是在德国度过的呀！而且，她毕竟读过些历史。她不得不接受她能够找到的任何工作。达洛维先生是在她为公谊会工作期间认识她的。他同意了让她来教他女儿历史（他真是太慷慨了）。另外她也接些函授班之类的活。然后，我们的主对她显灵了（说到这儿，她总是一个劲地点头）。在两年零三个月之前，她看见了我主的光芒。从此，她再也不羡慕克拉丽莎·达洛维那样的女人了，现在她只觉得她们可怜。
Bitter and burning, Miss Kilman had turned into a church two years three months ago. She had heard the Rev. Edward Whittaker preach; the boys sing; had seen the solemn lights descend, and whether it was the music, or the voices (she herself when alone in the evening found comfort in a violin; but the sound was excruciating; she had no ear), the hot and turbulent feelings which boiled and surged in her had been assuaged as she sat there, and she had wept copiously, and gone to call on Mr. Whittaker at his private house in Kensington. It was the hand of God, he said. The Lord had shown her the way. So now, whenever the hot and painful feelings boiled within her, this hatred of Mrs. Dalloway, this grudge against the world, she thought of God. She thought of Mr. Whittaker. Rage was succeeded by calm. A sweet savour filled her veins, her lips parted, and, standing formidable upon the landing in her mackintosh, she looked with steady and sinister serenity at Mrs. Dalloway, who came out with her daughter.
两年零三个月之前，既伤心又愤怒的基尔曼小姐走进了一座教堂。她听了爱德华·惠特克牧师讲道，听了唱诗班的男孩子们唱的赞美诗，她见过了神圣的光芒降临人间，不知道是音乐还是歌声（她在夜里独自一人时也会用小提琴安慰自己，但拉出来的声音实在是一种折磨，她真是没有音乐细胞啊），使她内心里火热翻滚着的愤怒缓和了下来。她坐在那儿，泪如雨下，后来还去拜访了惠特克牧师在肯辛顿的私人住宅。是上帝之手的功劳，他说。上帝为她指明了方向。所以现在，每当她心里翻滚起如此灼热如此痛苦的感情，每当她感觉对达洛维夫人恨之入骨，对这个世界满怀抱怨，她就会想到上帝。她就会想到惠特克牧师。怒火就会被冷静所取代。一种甘甜的滋味浸润了她的血管，她的嘴唇张开了，威严地站在平台上，穿着雨衣，用沉稳又阴险的平静目光看着和女儿一起走出来的达洛维夫人。
She pitied and despised them from the bottom of her heart, as she stood on the soft carpet, looking at the old engraving of a little girl with a muff. With all this luxury going on, what hope was there for a better state of things? Instead of lying on a sofa — “My mother is resting,” Elizabeth had said — she should have been in a factory; behind a counter; Mrs. Dalloway and all the other fine ladies!
她打心底里可怜她们，也瞧不起她们。此刻，她站在柔软的地毯上，看着一幅画着个戴皮手笼的小姑娘的古旧版画。过着这么奢侈的生活，还能指望世道会变好吗？她不应该躺在沙发上——“我妈妈在休息，”伊丽莎白刚才这么说的——而应该在工厂里干活，或者去站柜台。达洛维太太和所有那些高贵的夫人们，都得工作！
Clarissa was really shocked. This a Christian — this woman! This woman had taken her daughter from her! She in touch with invisible presences! Heavy, ugly, commonplace, without kindness or grace, she know the meaning of life!
克拉丽莎真的很震惊。这个基督徒——这个女人！这个女人把她的女儿从她身边给夺走了！这个女人能与看不见的上帝心灵感应！这个笨重、丑陋、平庸、不厚道、不优雅的女人，但她却了解生活的意义！
But Miss Kilman did not hate Mrs. Dalloway. Turning her large gooseberry-coloured eyes upon Clarissa, observing her small pink face, her delicate body, her air of freshness and fashion, Miss Kilman felt, Fool! Simpleton! You who have known neither sorrow nor pleasure; who have trifled your life away! And there rose in her an overmastering desire to overcome her; to unmask her. If she could have felled her it would have eased her. But it was not the body; it was the soul and its mockery that she wished to subdue; make feel her mastery. If only she could make her weep; could ruin her; humiliate her; bring her to her knees crying, You are right! But this was God’s will, not Miss Kilman’s. It was to be a religious victory. So she glared; so she glowered.
可基尔曼小姐并不恨达洛维夫人。基尔曼小姐用她那醋栗色的大眼睛转向克拉丽莎，看着她那张粉红的小脸，修长的身体，清爽而时髦的样子，想道，愚蠢！傻瓜！你这个既不懂悲伤又不懂快乐的人，你这个把生命白白浪费掉的人！于是，她身上涌起一股想要征服达洛维夫人的强烈欲望，去揭穿克拉丽莎的假面具。如果她能够打败克拉丽莎，心里就会好受一点了。但她想要征服的不是克拉丽莎的身体，而是她的灵魂和伪装，要使克拉丽莎感觉到自己才是她的主宰。要是能让她哭，能毁了她，能羞辱她，能让她跪在自己的面前大叫：你是对的！该有多好呀。可这是上帝的意志，不是基尔曼小姐的。这将是一场宗教的胜利。于是她怒目而视，横眉冷对。
Elizabeth said she had forgotten her gloves. That was because Miss Kilman and her mother hated each other. She could not bear to see them together. She ran upstairs to find her gloves.
伊丽莎白说她忘记了戴手套，其实是借口，都是因为基尔曼小姐和她妈妈彼此讨厌。看见她俩在一起，她妈妈会觉得受不了。她跑上楼去找手套。
So they were going to the Stores. Odd it was, as Miss Kilman stood there (and stand she did, with the power and taciturnity of some prehistoric monster armoured for primeval warfare), how, second by second, the idea of her diminished, how hatred (which was for ideas, not people) crumbled, how she lost her malignity, her size, became second by second merely Miss Kilman, in a mackintosh, whom Heaven knows Clarissa would have liked to help.
那么，她们是要去商店啰。多奇怪呀，基尔曼小姐站在那儿（没错，她站在那儿，如身披铠甲准备投入野蛮战斗的史前怪物一般强劲而沉默），而克拉丽莎对她的反感在分分秒秒间减少，对她的敌意（那是对她的思想，而不是对她的人）也瓦解了，而基尔曼小姐的恶毒和强势，也在分分秒秒间消逝，还原为一个原本的基尔曼小姐，穿着雨衣的基尔曼小姐，天知道，克拉丽莎是愿意为她提供帮助的呀。
“You are taking Elizabeth to the Stores?” Mrs. Dalloway said.
“你要带伊丽莎白去商店吗？”达洛维夫人问。
Miss Kilman said she was. They stood there. Miss Kilman was not going to make herself agreeable. She had always earned her living. Her knowledge of modern history was thorough in the extreme. She did out of her meagre income set aside so much for causes she believed in; whereas this woman did nothing, believed nothing; brought up her daughter — but here was Elizabeth, rather out of breath, the beautiful girl.
基尔曼小姐说是的。她们站在那儿。基尔曼小姐并不打算讨人喜欢。她向来独立生活。她对现代史知识的了解可说是透彻到了极点。她真的为了信仰从自己菲薄的收入中拿出了很大的一部分，而这个女人却没有任何作为，也没有任何信仰，只是带大了女儿——瞧，伊丽莎白过来了，有点气喘吁吁的，这个漂亮姑娘。
At this dwindling of the monster, Clarissa laughed. Saying good- bye, she laughed.
看着这个怪物逐渐萎缩，克拉丽莎笑了起来。她笑着，和她们说再见。
Off they went together, Miss Kilman and Elizabeth, downstairs.
她们俩，基尔曼小姐和伊丽莎白，一起下楼去了。
Love and religion! thought Clarissa, going back into the drawing- room, tingling all over. How detestable, how detestable they are! For now that the body of Miss Kilman was not before her, it overwhelmed her — the idea. The cruelest things in the world, she thought, seeing them clumsy, hot, domineering, hypocritical, eavesdropping, jealous, infinitely cruel and unscrupulous, dressed in a mackintosh coat, on the landing; love and religion. Had she ever tried to convert any one herself? Did she not wish everybody merely to be themselves? And she watched out of the window the old lady opposite climbing upstairs. Let her climb upstairs if she wanted to; let her stop; then let her, as Clarissa had often seen her, gain her bedroom, part her curtains, and disappear again into the background. Somehow one respected that — that old woman looking out of the window, quite unconscious that she was being watched. There was something solemn in it — but love and religion would destroy that, whatever it was, the privacy of the soul. The odious Kilman would destroy it. Yet it was a sight that made her want to cry.
爱与信仰！克拉丽莎想着，走回到客厅里，感觉浑身刺痛。多可恶呀，这两者都那么可恶！虽说此时基尔曼小姐已不在她面前，但——这个想法——淹没了她。她们是这世上最冷酷的家伙，她想，看着她们笨拙、热烈、强势、伪善、偷听、嫉妒、极其冷酷、肆无忌惮的样子，穿着雨衣，站在平台上：爱与信仰的化身。她自己曾想过要改变别人的信仰吗？难道她不是希望大家都简简单单地保持自己的本色吗？她从窗口望见对面的老太太在爬楼梯。如果老太太愿意，就让她爬楼梯好了，让她停下来好了，然后，让她走进卧室，就像克拉丽莎常常看到的那样，拉开窗帘，然后又再次消失在背景中。无论如何，大家都尊重这样的举止——尊重这个看着窗外的老太太，她自己一点也没意识到有人正在看她。这里面有庄重的成分——但爱和宗教会毁了它，会毁了灵魂的隐私，诸如此类。可恶的基尔曼会毁了它。然而，这还是一幕使她想要落泪的场景。
But Elizabeth had already opened the front door; there was a van passing; she did not answer.
但伊丽莎白已经打开了前门，外面正好有辆货车驶过，她没有应声。
With a sudden impulse, with a violent anguish, for this woman was taking her daughter from her, Clarissa leant over the bannisters and cried out, “Remember the party! Remember our party tonight!”
在突然的一阵冲动中，在剧烈的愤怒中，因为这个女人从她身边夺走了她的女儿，克拉丽莎靠着栏杆喊道：“别忘了派对！别忘了我们今晚上的派对！”
How extraordinary it was, strange, yes, touching, to see the old lady (they had been neighbours ever so many years) move away from the window, as if she were attached to that sound, that string. Gigantic as it was, it had something to do with her. Down, down, into the midst of ordinary things the finger fell making the moment solemn. She was forced, so Clarissa imagined, by that sound, to move, to go — but where? Clarissa tried to follow her as she turned and disappeared, and could still just see her white cap moving at the back of the bedroom. She was still there moving about at the other end of the room. Why creeds and prayers and mackintoshes? when, thought Clarissa, that’s the miracle, that’s the mystery; that old lady, she meant, whom she could see going from chest of drawers to dressing-table. She could still see her. And the supreme mystery which Kilman might say she had solved, or Peter might say he had solved, but Clarissa didn’t believe either of them had the ghost of an idea of solving, was simply this: here was one room; there another. Did religion solve that, or love?
多么独特，多么奇异，是的，多感人，看着那个老太太（这么多年来她们一直都是邻居）的身影从窗口移开，仿佛她和那钟声、那旋律有着某种联系。钟声如此洪亮，却仿佛与她有关。指针不断坠落，坠落，直落到凡间万物之中，使得每一个时刻都庄重起来。钟声逼迫着那个老太太行动，起步走，克拉丽莎如此想象——可要去哪儿呢？克拉丽莎的目光想要盯住她，而她却转身走掉了，只能看见她的白帽子还在卧室后部移动。她依旧在房间的另一头忙活。为什么要有信条，要祈祷，要穿雨衣呢？哪里有奇迹，克拉丽莎暗自思忖，哪里就有神秘！那老太太，克拉丽莎是指，此时她看见老太太从五斗橱走到梳妆台那里。她依然看得见老太太。而那个基尔曼也许会说她自己已经参透了最高机密，彼德或许也会这么说的，但克拉丽莎不相信他们会有办法解开这神秘，其实神秘也不过如此：这里是自己的房间，那里是老太太的房间，无形地相通。难道宗教能解开这神秘吗，或者是爱，能解开吗？
Love destroyed too. Everything that was fine, everything that was true went. Take Peter Walsh now. There was a man, charming, clever, with ideas about everything. If you wanted to know about Pope, say, or Addison, or just to talk nonsense, what people were like, what things meant, Peter knew better than any one. It was Peter who had helped her; Peter who had lent her books. But look at the women he loved — vulgar, trivial, commonplace. Think of Peter in love — he came to see her after all these years, and what did he talk about? Himself. Horrible passion! she thought. Degrading passion! she thought, thinking of Kilman and her Elizabeth walking to the Army and Navy Stores.
爱也有毁灭的力量，会毁了一切优美的、真实的事物。比如说彼德·沃尔什吧。他是这样一个男人，迷人且聪明，对任何事都有自己的看法。比方说，如果你想知道教皇的事，或者阿狄生的事，或者只是想聊聊闲天，议论议论什么人，评价评价什么事，你就会发现彼德知道的比任何人都多。是彼德曾经帮助了她，还借书给她看。可瞧瞧他爱上的那些女人吧——庸俗、猥琐、普普通通。想想陷入爱河的彼德——经过这么多年后，他又来看她了，他说的那些是什么话哟？一个劲地谈他自己。恐怖的感情！她寻思着。可耻的感情！她思忖着，同时又想到了基尔曼和自己的伊丽莎白，此时正走在通往海陆军商店的路上呢。
Big Ben struck the half-hour.
大本钟正在半点报时。
Love — but here the other clock, the clock which always struck two minutes after Big Ben, came shuffling in with its lap full of odds and ends, which it dumped down as if Big Ben were all very well with his majesty laying down the law, so solemn, so just, but she must remember all sorts of little things besides — Mrs. Marsham, Ellie Henderson, glasses for ices — all sorts of little things came flooding and lapping and dancing in on the wake of that solemn stroke which lay flat like a bar of gold on the sea. Mrs. Marsham, Ellie Henderson, glasses for ices. She must telephone now at once.
爱——但此时另一只钟，它总是比大本钟慢两分钟敲响，怀里兜着杂七杂八之物，脚步踟蹰，姗姗来迟，然后把怀里的杂物倾倒出来，好像表示大本钟用它的权威制定出极其严肃公正的法律固然是好，但她也必须记住世上还有各种琐屑之物——如玛莎姆太太，埃莉·亨德森，放冰块的杯子之类——在如金条般平躺在海面上的庄严钟声过后，各种琐屑之物如潮水般涌来，蹦蹦跳跳地，如群魔乱舞。玛莎姆太太，埃莉·亨德森，放冰块的杯子。她现在必须马上打电话。
Volubly, troublously, the late clock sounded, coming in on the wake of Big Ben, with its lap full of trifles. Beaten up, broken up by the assault of carriages, the brutality of vans, the eager advance of myriads of angular men, of flaunting women, the domes and spires of offices and hospitals, the last relics of this lap full of odds and ends seemed to break, like the spray of an exhausted wave, upon the body of Miss Kilman standing still in the street for a moment to mutter “It is the flesh.”
喋喋不休，纷纷扰扰，迟到的钟声响起来，在大本钟之后响起来，怀里兜满了琐碎。马车的凌乱，货车的野蛮，无数生硬的男人和招摇的女人的急行军，写字楼和医院的穹顶与尖顶，击败了钟声，打碎了钟声，这只怀里兜满琐碎的钟发出了最后一声悲鸣，如一朵精疲力竭的浪花，飞溅在基尔曼小姐的身上，此时她一动不动地在大街上站了一会儿，嘴里呢喃着：“都是因为肉体。”
It was the flesh that she must control. Clarissa Dalloway had insulted her. That she expected. But she had not triumphed; she had not mastered the flesh. Ugly, clumsy, Clarissa Dalloway had laughed at her for being that; and had revived the fleshly desires, for she minded looking as she did beside Clarissa. Nor could she talk as she did. But why wish to resemble her? Why? She despised Mrs. Dalloway from the bottom of her heart. She was not serious. She was not good. Her life was a tissue of vanity and deceit. Yet Doris Kilman had been overcome. She had, as a matter of fact, very nearly burst into tears when Clarissa Dalloway laughed at her. “It is the flesh, it is the flesh,” she muttered (it being her habit to talk aloud) trying to subdue this turbulent and painful feeling as she walked down Victoria Street. She prayed to God. She could not help being ugly; she could not afford to buy pretty clothes. Clarissa Dalloway had laughed — but she would concentrate her mind upon something else until she had reached the pillar-box. At any rate she had got Elizabeth. But she would think of something else; she would think of Russia; until she reached the pillar-box.
她必须控制自己的肉体。克拉丽莎·达洛维侮辱了她。她对这事早有准备。但她并没有获胜，她没有控制住肉体。她丑陋、笨拙，克拉丽莎·达洛维为了这个嘲笑她，于是她的肉体欲望又被刺激了起来，因为她很在意自己站在克拉丽莎身旁时的样子。她也不能像克拉丽莎那样说起来头头是道。可她为什么想要去模仿那个女人呢？为什么？她从心底里蔑视达洛维夫人。克拉丽莎不严肃。她不好。她的生活是一连串的虚荣与欺骗。然而，多丽丝·基尔曼却被她战胜了。实际上，在克拉丽莎·达洛维嘲笑她时，她差一点就要哭出来了。“都是因为肉体。因为肉体，”她喃喃地说着（大声地自言自语已成了她的习惯），尽力想要压制住纷乱而痛苦的心情，沿着维多利亚大街走下去。她祷告上帝。人长得丑，她也没办法呀，而且，她没钱买漂亮衣服嘛。克拉丽莎·达洛维确实嘲笑了她——不过，在她走到邮筒前，她最好把心思集中到别的事情上去。她至少还拥有伊丽莎白。但她会想些别的事，比如想一想俄罗斯的问题。不知不觉间，她走到了邮筒前。
She had passed the pillar-box, and Elizabeth had turned into the cool brown tobacco department of the Army and Navy Stores while she was still muttering to herself what Mr. Whittaker had said about knowledge coming through suffering and the flesh. “The flesh,” she muttered.
她走过了邮筒，伊丽莎白拐进了海陆军商店的棕色烟草柜台，那里很是凉爽，而她还在自言自语，说什么惠特克先生说过觉悟来源于苦难，还有肉体的问题。“肉体。”她喃喃自语。
How nice it must be, she said, in the country, struggling, as Mr. Whittaker had told her, with that violent grudge against the world which had scorned her, sneered at her, cast her off, beginning with this indignity — the infliction of her unlovable body which people could not bear to see. Do her hair as she might, her forehead remained like an egg, bald, white. No clothes suited her. She might buy anything. And for a woman, of course, that meant never meeting the opposite sex. Never would she come first with any one. Sometimes lately it had seemed to her that, except for Elizabeth, her food was all that she lived for; her comforts; her dinner, her tea; her hot-water bottle at night. But one must fight; vanquish; have faith in God. Mr. Whittaker had said she was there for a purpose. But no one knew the agony! He said, pointing to the crucifix, that God knew. But why should she have to suffer when other women, like Clarissa Dalloway, escaped? Knowledge comes through suffering, said Mr. Whittaker.
要是能住在乡下就好了，她说，就像惠特克先生对她说的，在那里可以平复她对这个蔑视她、嘲笑她、抛弃她的世界的熊熊怒火，首先是这样一种侮辱——她必须承受一个惨不忍睹的丑陋身体。她可以做做头发，但她的前额永远只能像颗鸡蛋，光秃秃的，白乎乎的。没有衣服适合她。随便买什么都一样。作为一个女人，这当然意味着永远也别想接触异性。她从来不会主动与人亲近。近来她常常感觉，除了伊丽莎白之外，她的全部生活目的就是为了吃饭，为了舒适：晚饭，茶点，还有她晚上的热水袋。但人必须奋斗，必须征服，必须信仰上帝。惠特克先生说过，她活着是有目的的。可没人知道她的痛苦呀！但他却指着十字架说，上帝知道。可为什么一定要让她受苦受难呢，而别的女人，像克拉丽莎·达洛维那种人，就能幸免呢？觉悟来源于苦难，惠特克先生如是说。
Up they went. Elizabeth guided her this way and that; guided her in her abstraction as if she had been a great child, an unwieldy battleship. There were the petticoats, brown, decorous, striped, frivolous, solid, flimsy; and she chose, in her abstraction, portentously, and the girl serving thought her mad.
她们上楼去。伊丽莎白把她领到东领到西。基尔曼小姐心不在焉地跟在后头，如一个大孩子，如一艘笨重的军舰。到了衬裙柜台，棕色的、稳重的、条纹的、花哨的、厚实的、透明的，一条条裙子。于是，她心不在焉、神情异样地挑选起来，为她服务的那个姑娘还以为她是个疯子呢。
Elizabeth rather wondered, as they did up the parcel, what Miss Kilman was thinking. They must have their tea, said Miss Kilman, rousing, collecting herself. They had their tea.
伊丽莎白很想知道，在她们包裹货物的时候，基尔曼小姐在想什么。她们一定要用午茶，基尔曼小姐说，从恍惚中清醒过来，镇定下来。于是，她们用了午茶。
“Petticoats,” she said abruptly, and stalked straight on to the lift.
“衬裙柜台。”她骤然说道，接着径直阔步走向了电梯。
What department did she want? Elizabeth interrupted her.
她想去哪个柜台呢？伊丽莎白打断了她。
Elizabeth rather wondered whether Miss Kilman could be hungry. It was her way of eating, eating with intensity, then looking, again and again, at a plate of sugared cakes on the table next them; then, when a lady and a child sat down and the child took the cake, could Miss Kilman really mind it? Yes, Miss Kilman did mind it. She had wanted that cake — the pink one. The pleasure of eating was almost the only pure pleasure left her, and then to be baffled even in that!
伊丽莎白想，基尔曼小姐也许是饿了。瞧她的吃相，她心无旁骛地吃着，还一而再、再而三地朝邻桌上的一碟糖霜蛋糕瞄过去。然后，一位女士带着一个孩子在那个位子上坐下来，那孩子拿起了蛋糕，基尔曼小姐真会在意吗？是的，基尔曼小姐真的很在意。她想吃那块蛋糕——那块粉红色的蛋糕。口腹之乐几乎是她仅剩的一种纯粹的快乐，可即便是如此简单的快乐，想要消受也同样困难重重啊！
And her mother would come calling to say that a hamper had come from Bourton and would Miss Kilman like some flowers? To Miss Kilman she was always very, very nice, but Miss Kilman squashed the flowers all in a bunch, and hadn’t any small talk, and what interested Miss Kilman bored her mother, and Miss Kilman and she were terrible together; and Miss Kilman swelled and looked very plain. But then Miss Kilman was frightfully clever. Elizabeth had never thought about the poor. They lived with everything they wanted,– her mother had breakfast in bed every day; Lucy carried it up; and she liked old women because they were Duchesses, and being descended from some Lord. But Miss Kilman said (one of those Tuesday mornings when the lesson was over), “My grandfather kept an oil and colour shop in Kensington.” Miss Kilman made one feel so small.
她妈妈有时会过来告诉她说，从伯尔顿来了一大篮子鲜花，基尔曼小姐要不要拿一点呢？她一向对基尔曼小姐非常友好，可基尔曼小姐会一股脑儿把鲜花扎成一大束，而且也不会和她聊什么闲天。她妈妈觉得基尔曼小姐感兴趣的事都很无聊，所以基尔曼小姐和她妈妈在一起的时候总是非常别扭。基尔曼小姐高傲自大，但长相平平。可与此同时，基尔曼小姐又聪明绝顶。伊丽莎白此前从没有考虑过穷人的问题。因为她家应有尽有——她妈妈每天在床上吃早饭，照例由露西端上去。克拉丽莎还喜欢那些老妇人，因为她们都是什么公爵夫人，都是什么贵族的后代。可基尔曼小姐说（在某个上完课的星期二上午）：“我祖父在肯辛顿开过一家油彩商店。”基尔曼小姐总是让别人显得很渺小。
When people are happy, they have a reserve, she had told Elizabeth, upon which to draw, whereas she was like a wheel without a tyre (she was fond of such metaphors), jolted by every pebble, so she would say staying on after the lesson standing by the fire-place with her bag of books, her “satchel,” she called it, on a Tuesday morning, after the lesson was over. And she talked too about the war. After all, there were people who did not think the English invariably right. There were books. There were meetings. There were other points of view. Would Elizabeth like to come with her to listen to So-and-so (a most extraordinary looking old man)? Then Miss Kilman took her to some church in Kensington and they had tea with a clergyman. She had lent her books. Law, medicine, politics, all professions are open to women of your generation, said Miss Kilman. But for herself, her career was absolutely ruined and was it her fault? Good gracious, said Elizabeth, no.
当人们快乐时，他们总会有所保留，以备日后需要时提取，她曾对伊丽莎白这么说，而她却像一只没有车胎的轮子（她喜欢这样的隐喻），每次碰到小卵石都会蹦起来。星期二上午，上完课后，她会拿着一袋子书，她称之为“书包”，站在壁炉旁，待一会儿，说着这类话。而且，她也谈论战争。毕竟，也有人认为，英国人不是永远都正确的。有这样的书。有这样的集会。有持不同观点的人。伊丽莎白愿意和她一起去听某某人（那是一位相貌不凡的老人）的演讲吗？然后，基尔曼小姐带她去了肯辛顿的某座教堂，在那里和一位牧师一起用了茶点。基尔曼小姐还借给伊丽莎白许多书。法律、医学、政治，所有职业都对你们这一代女性开放，基尔曼小姐说。但对她自己来说，她的职业被彻底毁了，难道是她的错吗？老天爷呀，伊丽莎白说，当然不是。
But perhaps it was a little flat somehow, Elizabeth felt. And really she would like to go.
可不知为了什么，伊丽莎白也许感到有点无聊了。她真的想要走了。
Miss Kilman took another cup of tea. Elizabeth, with her oriental bearing, her inscrutable mystery, sat perfectly upright; no, she did not want anything more. She looked for her gloves — her white gloves. They were under the table. Ah, but she must not go! Miss Kilman could not let her go! this youth, that was so beautiful, this girl, whom she genuinely loved! Her large hand opened and shut on the table.
基尔曼小姐又喝了杯茶。伊丽莎白，带着她东方的姿态，和她那深不可测的神秘感，笔挺挺地坐着，她再也不需要别的茶点了。她寻找着她的手套——她的白手套。它们在桌子底下。啊，可她不能离开呢！基尔曼小姐不会让她走的！这么年轻，这么漂亮，基尔曼小姐真心地爱着这个姑娘！基尔曼小姐的那只大手在桌子上一张一合的。
Of course, then, Elizabeth would wait. But it was rather stuffy in here.
那么好，伊丽莎白当然会等她的。可这里相当憋闷。
“Are you going to the party to-night?” Miss Kilman said. Elizabeth supposed she was going; her mother wanted her to go. She must not let parties absorb her, Miss Kilman said, fingering the last two inches of a chocolate éclair.
“你今晚会去派对吗？”基尔曼小姐问。伊丽莎白说她会去的，她妈妈希望她能去。千万别让派对这种事迷住你整个的心灵，基尔曼小姐说，一边用手摸着最后两英寸的糖霜巧克力蛋糕。
She did not much like parties, Elizabeth said. Miss Kilman opened her mouth, slightly projected her chin, and swallowed down the last inches of the chocolate éclair, then wiped her fingers, and washed the tea round in her cup.
她不是很喜欢派对，伊丽莎白说。基尔曼小姐张开嘴，下巴微微向前突起，吞下了最后一点巧克力蛋糕，然后擦擦手指，搅动起杯子里的茶。
But said Miss Kilman, “I’ve not quite finished yet.”
可基尔曼小姐说：“我还没吃完呢。”
“I never go to parties,” said Miss Kilman, just to keep Elizabeth from going. “People don’t ask me to parties”– and she knew as she said it that it was this egotism that was her undoing; Mr. Whittaker had warned her; but she could not help it. She had suffered so horribly. “Why should they ask me?” she said. “I’m plain, I’m unhappy.” She knew it was idiotic. But it was all those people passing — people with parcels who despised her, who made her say it. However, she was Doris Kilman. She had her degree. She was a woman who had made her way in the world. Her knowledge of modern history was more than respectable.
“我从来不参加什么派对，”基尔曼小姐说，她这么说只是为了留住伊丽莎白，“没人邀请我参加派对”——她说的时候自己也知道，这种一切以自我为中心的想法正是她的缺点所在，惠特克先生曾提醒过她，但她没法改正。她吃过那么多苦呀。“别人为什么要邀请我呢？”她说，“我很普通，我不快乐。”她知道这么说很傻气。可都是因为路过这里的那些人——那些提着大包小包的人，他们瞧不起她，是他们使她说出这番话来的。无论如何，她都是多丽丝·基尔曼。她有学位。她是个在世界上孤身闯荡的女人。她对现代史的了解可谓叹为观止。
She was about to split asunder, she felt. The agony was so terrific. If she could grasp her, if she could clasp her, if she could make her hers absolutely and forever and then die; that was all she wanted. But to sit here, unable to think of anything to say; to see Elizabeth turning against her; to be felt repulsive even by her — it was too much; she could not stand it. The thick fingers curled inwards.
她就要崩溃了，她觉得。这痛苦实在太剧烈了。如果能抓住伊丽莎白，如果能抱住伊丽莎白，如果能使伊丽莎白完全归她所有，永远归她所有，那就死而无憾了！那就是她想要的一切。可坐在这里，脑子里空空如也，想不出说什么好。眼看着伊丽莎白开始对自己不满，甚至能感觉到她在排斥自己呢——真受够了！基尔曼小姐受不了了。她那粗壮的手指卷拢起来。
Like some dumb creature who has been brought up to a gate for an unknown purpose, and stands there longing to gallop away, Elizabeth Dalloway sat silent. Was Miss Kilman going to say anything more?
伊丽莎白·达洛维静静地坐着，如莫名其妙地被牵到门口的一头愚笨的牲口，一心只想着快点开溜。基尔曼小姐还要唠叨多久呢？
The great hand opened and shut.
那只大手一张一合。
“I don’t pity myself,” she said. “I pity”– she meant to say “your mother” but no, she could not, not to Elizabeth. “I pity other people,” she said, “more.”
“我不可怜自己，”她说，“我可怜”——她本来想说“你妈妈”，但不行，她不能那么说，不能当着伊丽莎白的面那么说。“我觉得，”她说，“别人比我更可怜。”
She had gone. Miss Kilman sat at the marble table among the éclairs, stricken once, twice, thrice by shocks of suffering. She had gone. Mrs. Dalloway had triumphed. Elizabeth had gone. Beauty had gone, youth had gone.
伊丽莎白走掉了。基尔曼小姐坐在大理石桌子前，面前摆着糖霜蛋糕，痛苦与震惊一而再、再而三地冲击着她。伊丽莎白走掉了。达洛维夫人旗开得胜。伊丽莎白走掉了。美丽走掉了，青春走掉了。
“Don’t quite forget me,” said Doris Kilman; her voice quivered. Right away to the end of the field the dumb creature galloped in terror.
“别把我忘个一干二净哟。”多丽丝·基尔曼说，嗓音都颤抖了。那头愚笨的牲口吓得立马撒腿就跑，直跑到田野的尽头。
Elizabeth turned her head. The waitress came. One had to pay at the desk, Elizabeth said, and went off, drawing out, so Miss Kilman felt, the very entrails in her body, stretching them as she crossed the room, and then, with a final twist, bowing her head very politely, she went.
伊丽莎白转过头去。女招待走过来。我到收银台去付账，伊丽莎白说着，走掉了，基尔曼小姐感觉，伊丽莎白的离去把自己身体里的五脏六腑都拉了出来，在伊丽莎白穿过大厅时，她感觉自己的内脏被越拉越长，最后，感觉又被拧了一下，那是因为伊丽莎白很有礼貌地向她点了点头，走掉了。
So she sat. She got up, blundered off among the little tables, rocking slightly from side to side, and somebody came after her with her petticoat, and she lost her way, and was hemmed in by trunks specially prepared for taking to India; next got among the accouchement sets, and baby linen; through all the commodities of the world, perishable and permanent, hams, drugs, flowers, stationery, variously smelling, now sweet, now sour she lurched; saw herself thus lurching with her hat askew, very red in the face, full length in a looking-glass; and at last came out into the street.
基尔曼小姐坐在那儿。她终于站起来，在小桌子间跌跌撞撞地朝前走，身体微微地摇摆着，有人拿着她掉下的衬裙追了出来，她迷路了，被为了去印度旅行特别准备的一只只衣箱挡住了去路；接着，又迷失在孕妇用品及婴儿内衣柜台之间；随后穿越了世界上的所有商品，从一次性的到经久耐用的，火腿、药品、鲜花、文具，各类商品，各种味道，她在时而香甜时而酸腐的柜台间蹒跚而行，在一面大镜子里看见了自己的模样，歪戴着帽子，满脸通红地踽踽而行；最后，终于走到了大街上。
The tower of Westminster Cathedral rose in front of her, the habitation of God. In the midst of the traffic, there was the habitation of God. Doggedly she set off with her parcel to that other sanctuary, the Abbey, where, raising her hands in a tent before her face, she sat beside those driven into shelter too; the variously assorted worshippers, now divested of social rank, almost of sex, as they raised their hands before their faces; but once they removed them, instantly reverent, middle class, English men and women, some of them desirous of seeing the wax works.
威斯敏斯特大教堂的尖塔耸立在她面前，那儿是上帝的宫殿。在繁忙的车流中，有上帝在此居住。她拿着包裹，坚定地向着那另一个圣殿出发，也就是那个修道院，她坐在那些同样来此寻求庇护的人们旁边，举起手在自己的面前做出个帐篷的形状。各色各样的朝拜者，都举起手放在自己的面前，社会地位的区别已不复存在，连性别的区别都几乎没有了，可一旦他们把手拿开，你就能立刻发现他们都是虔诚的中产阶级，是男男女女的英国人，他们中有些人还急着想去看蜡像呢。
But Mr. Fletcher had to go. He had to pass her, and being himself neat as a new pin, could not help being a little distressed by the poor lady’s disorder; her hair down; her parcel on the floor. She did not at once let him pass. But, as he stood gazing about him, at the white marbles, grey window panes, and accumulated treasures (for he was extremely proud of the Abbey), her largeness, robustness, and power as she sat there shifting her knees from time to time (it was so rough the approach to her God — so tough her desires) impressed him, as they had impressed Mrs. Dalloway (she could not get the thought of her out of her mind that afternoon), the Rev. Edward Whittaker, and Elizabeth too.
可弗莱彻先生必须要走了。他要出去就一定得打她那儿过，他自己是个干净得像一枚新别针的人，所以看见这个衣冠不整的穷女人不禁心生一缕惆怅。她披头散发的，地上还摆着她的包裹。她没有立即给他让路。于是，他只得站在那里环视周围，看着洁白的大理石，看着灰色的玻璃窗，看着堆积如山的珍宝（因为他对这个大教堂特别骄傲），她的高大，她的强壮，她的力量，她坐在那里不时移动两只膝盖（对她而言，想要接近上帝实在是不容易——而她的欲望又那么强烈），给了他很深的印象，就像它们也曾给了达洛维夫人（那个下午，她就是无法把达洛维夫人赶出自己的大脑）、爱德华·惠特克牧师和伊丽莎白很深的印象。
But Miss Kilman held her tent before her face. Now she was deserted; now rejoined. New worshippers came in from the street to replace the strollers, and still, as people gazed round and shuffled past the tomb of the Unknown Warrior, still she barred her eyes with her fingers and tried in this double darkness, for the light in the Abbey was bodiless, to aspire above the vanities, the desires, the commodities, to rid herself both of hatred and of love. Her hands twitched. She seemed to struggle. Yet to others God was accessible and the path to Him smooth. Mr. Fletcher, retired, of the Treasury, Mrs. Gorham, widow of the famous K. C., approached Him simply, and having done their praying, leant back, enjoyed the music (the organ pealed sweetly), and saw Miss Kilman at the end of the row, praying, praying, and, being still on the threshold of their underworld, thought of her sympathetically as a soul haunting the same territory; a soul cut out of immaterial substance; not a woman, a soul.
可基尔曼小姐依旧在面前保持着帐篷的手势。她周围的人来了又去，去了又来。新的朝拜者从大街上进来，取代了之前的闲杂人等，在人们环视四周拖着步子走过无名英雄墓时，她依旧用手指挡住眼睛，在这双重的黑暗中，因为修道院里的灯光如鬼魅般迷离，渴望着超越虚荣、欲望、商品，渴望着脱离爱与恨的世界。她的手抽搐着，似乎是在做着挣扎。然而对别人来说，上帝是可以亲近的，通往上帝之路是平坦的。从财政部退下来的弗莱彻先生，著名王室顾问的遗孀戈勒姆夫人，都简简单单地亲近了上帝，他们做完了祷告，把身子往后一靠，欣赏起了音乐（管风琴奏出甜美的乐声），同时也看见了坐在边上的基尔曼小姐，祷告着，祷告着，他们自己也依旧挣扎在地狱的大门口，所以满怀同情地把她视为是和他们徘徊在同一个世界里的灵魂，一个虚无缥缈的灵魂，不是一个女人，而是一个灵魂。
Buses swooped, settled, were off — garish caravans, glistening with red and yellow varnish. But which should she get on to? She had no preferences. Of course, she would not push her way. She inclined to be passive. It was expression she needed, but her eyes were fine, Chinese, oriental, and, as her mother said, with such nice shoulders and holding herself so straight, she was always charming to look at; and lately, in the evening especially, when she was interested, for she never seemed excited, she looked almost beautiful, very stately, very serene. What could she be thinking? Every man fell in love with her, and she was really awfully bored. For it was beginning. Her mother could see that — the compliments were beginning. That she did not care more about it — for instance for her clothes — sometimes worried Clarissa, but perhaps it was as well with all those puppies and guinea pigs about having distemper, and it gave her a charm. And now there was this odd friendship with Miss Kilman. Well, thought Clarissa about three o’clock in the morning, reading Baron Marbot for she could not sleep, it proves she has a heart.
巴士飞快地开过来，停了下，又开走了——一辆辆五颜六色的巴士，漆着红漆或黄漆，闪闪发光。可她该上哪一辆呢？反正都无所谓。当然，她不会去推别人。她是个听其自然的人。她表情冷漠，可她的眼睛是东方的、中国的、美丽的，还有，就像她妈妈说的，她的肩膀长得很好看，而且她一直保持着笔挺的身姿，使她看上去总是那么动人。近来，尤其是在晚上，在她兴致勃勃的时候，她从来不会表现得过于激动，她看上去几乎可说是美丽的，非常端庄，非常娴静。她会在想些什么呢？每个男人都会爱上她，而她觉得实在无聊透了。因为她的人生才刚刚开始嘛。她妈妈看得出来——人们开始恭维伊丽莎白。对此她并不怎么在意——比方说不在意她的穿着——这有时会让克拉丽莎担心，不过，有这些像狂犬病发作一般的傻小子们围着她汪汪叫不也挺好嘛，这使她平添了一份魅力。至于她和基尔曼小姐那种古怪的友谊嘛，算了吧，克拉丽莎在凌晨三点时想道，一边还在读着马尔博男爵的书，因为她睡不着，那至少证明了克拉丽莎是个内心丰富的人。
And Elizabeth waited in Victoria Street for an omnibus. It was so nice to be out of doors. She thought perhaps she need not go home just yet. It was so nice to be out in the air. So she would get on to an omnibus. And already, even as she stood there, in her very well cut clothes, it was beginning… People were beginning to compare her to poplar trees, early dawn, hyacinths, fawns, running water, and garden lilies; and it made her life a burden to her, for she so much preferred being left alone to do what she liked in the country, but they would compare her to lilies, and she had to go to parties, and London was so dreary compared with being alone in the country with her father and the dogs.
伊丽莎白在维多利亚大街等巴士。待在外头真是太好了。她想，现在她也许还不必回家。待在大自然里真是畅快极了。好啊，她就要坐上巴士了。而且人们已经，即使在她站在那里的时候，人们就已经…已经开始把她比作杨树、晨曦、风信子、小鹿、流水和花园里的百合。周围的人群使她觉得是一种负担，因为她非常愿意孤身留在乡下，做她想做的事，不过人们会把她比作百合，而她也不得不去参加派对，要是能和她的父亲以及她的狗一起待在乡下该有多好呀，伦敦实在是太无聊了。
Suddenly Elizabeth stepped forward and most competently boarded the omnibus, in front of everybody. She took a seat on top. The impetuous creature — a pirate — started forward, sprang away; she had to hold the rail to steady herself, for a pirate it was, reckless, unscrupulous, bearing down ruthlessly, circumventing dangerously, boldly snatching a passenger, or ignoring a passenger, squeezing eel-like and arrogant in between, and then rushing insolently all sails spread up Whitehall. And did Elizabeth give one thought to poor Miss Kilman who loved her without jealousy, to whom she had been a fawn in the open, a moon in a glade? She was delighted to be free. The fresh air was so delicious. It had been so stuffy in the Army and Navy Stores. And now it was like riding, to be rushing up Whitehall; and to each movement of the omnibus the beautiful body in the fawn-coloured coat responded freely like a rider, like the figure-head of a ship, for the breeze slightly disarrayed her; the heat gave her cheeks the pallor of white painted wood; and her fine eyes, having no eyes to meet, gazed ahead, blank, bright, with the staring incredible innocence of sculpture.
伊丽莎白突然走上前，赶在众人之前，腿脚麻利地上了公共汽车。她在顶层找了个位子。这个冲动的生灵——如一艘海盗船——猛然起步，飞驰而去，她不得不抓住扶手以保持平衡，因为它是一艘海盗船嘛，你看它横冲直撞、肆无忌惮，冷酷地把其他车辆甩在后面，危险地超车，大大咧咧地拉上一个乘客，或者无视某个候车人，夹在车流中，如傲慢的鳗鱼一般扭来扭去，随后扬帆破浪沿着白厅街而去。那么，伊丽莎白是否真的在意可怜的基尔曼小姐呢？基尔曼小姐心无嫉恨地爱着她，在她的心目中，伊丽莎白就是那原野里的一只梅花鹿，树林里的一片月光。但伊丽莎白却因为终于摆脱了羁绊，觉得很开心。新鲜空气多么清新舒畅呀。海陆军商店里的空气简直要闷死人。现在感觉像是在骑马了，沿着白厅街一路狂奔。在公共汽车的每一次抽搐中，穿着淡褐色大衣的美丽身躯都会像个骑士般灵活应对。她的秀发和衣衫在微风中轻轻地飘扬着，如船头的雕像柱；炎热使她的面颊如白漆的木材一般苍白；她那美丽的眼睛，由于周围没有旁人可看，便茫然地望着前方，明亮得有如一尊雕像，有着令人难以置信的专注与天真。
It was always talking about her own sufferings that made Miss Kilman so difficult. And was she right? If it was being on committees and giving up hours and hours every day (she hardly ever saw him in London) that helped the poor, her father did that, goodness knows,– if that was what Miss Kilman meant about being a Christian; but it was so difficult to say. Oh, she would like to go a little further. Another penny was it to the Strand? Here was another penny then. She would go up the Strand.
由于基尔曼小姐总是喜欢倾诉自己的苦难，所以别人都觉得她难以相处。基尔曼这样做对吗？如果每天都在救助穷人的委员会里浪费掉无数个小时，天晓得，伊丽莎白的父亲就是那样的（她在伦敦几乎就见不到他）——如果那就是基尔曼小姐所谓的基督徒的意思，但这也很难说。哦，她想走得再远一点。去滨河大道还要一个便士吗？那好，给你一便士。她就是要去滨河大道。
She liked people who were ill. And every profession is open to the women of your generation, said Miss Kilman. So she might be a doctor. She might be a farmer. Animals are often ill. She might own a thousand acres and have people under her. She would go and see them in their cottages. This was Somerset House. One might be a very good farmer — and that, strangely enough though Miss Kilman had her share in it, was almost entirely due to Somerset House. It looked so splendid, so serious, that great grey building. And she liked the feeling of people working. She liked those churches, like shapes of grey paper, breasting the stream of the Strand. It was quite different here from Westminster, she thought, getting off at Chancery Lane. It was so serious; it was so busy. In short, she would like to have a profession. She would become a doctor, a farmer, possibly go into Parliament, if she found it necessary, all because of the Strand.
她喜欢照料病人。任何职业都对你们这一代女性开放的，基尔曼小姐这么说过。那么，她也许可以做个医生。她也许可以去种田。牲口常常生病的。她也许可以拥有一千英亩地，底下还有帮手。她会去他们住的小屋看他们。到萨默塞特大厦了。也许可以做个很好的农夫——还有，说来奇怪，尽管这个想法来源于基尔曼小姐，但萨默塞特大厦的影响才是真正的关键。那幢灰色的、宏伟的建筑，看上去多么华丽，多么肃穆。人们在里面工作呢，她喜欢这样的感觉。她喜欢那些教堂，如灰色的纸做的模型，面对着滨河大道上的滚滚车流。这里与威斯敏斯特截然不同，她想着，一面在法院巷下了车。这里多么严肃，多么忙碌。总之，她想要有一份职业。她想做医生，做农妇，可能的话，也想进议会做议员，如果她觉得有必要，她这么想都是因为置身在这条滨河大道上。
The feet of those people busy about their activities, hands putting stone to stone, minds eternally occupied not with trivial chatterings (comparing women to poplars — which was rather exciting, of course, but very silly), but with thoughts of ships, of business, of law, of administration, and with it all so stately (she was in the Temple), gay (there was the river), pious (there was the Church), made her quite determined, whatever her mother might say, to become either a farmer or a doctor. But she was, of course, rather lazy.
人们的脚在忙着走路，手在忙着堆石块，占据着他们的心灵的不是那些琐碎的话语（把女人比作白杨什么的——当然，那相当有趣，可也很傻），而是船只、生意、法律、管理，一切都显得那么庄重（她走进了法学会），那么快乐（这里可以看见河流），那么虔诚（这里也有教堂），使她坚定了决心，不管她妈妈会怎么说，她就是要做个农妇或医生。不过，当然啰，她也很懒。
And it was much better to say nothing about it. It seemed so silly. It was the sort of thing that did sometimes happen, when one was alone — buildings without architects’ names, crowds of people coming back from the city having more power than single clergymen in Kensington, than any of the books Miss Kilman had lent her, to stimulate what lay slumbrous, clumsy, and shy on the mind’s sandy floor to break surface, as a child suddenly stretches its arms; it was just that, perhaps, a sigh, a stretch of the arms, an impulse, a revelation, which has its effects for ever, and then down again it went to the sandy floor. She must go home. She must dress for dinner. But what was the time?– where was a clock?
对于这些打算，还是什么也别说比较好。听上去傻傻的。在你一个人的时候，时常会这样突发奇想的——那些没有镌刻建筑师名字的大厦，从市中心回来的人流，要比肯辛顿的一个牧师，比基尔曼小姐借给她的任何一本书，都更有力量，更能刺激起在心灵的沙床上昏睡、蠢笨、害羞的东西去冲破表层，宛如一个孩子骤然伸出手臂。就是那样，也许，一声叹息，手臂伸一下，一阵冲动，一个启示，都具有永恒的影响，然后又平复下去，沉入了心灵的沙床。她必须要回家了。她必须穿戴好去用晚餐。可现在是几点呢？——哪里有钟呢？
She looked up Fleet Street. She walked just a little way towards St. Paul’s, shyly, like some one penetrating on tiptoe, exploring a strange house by night with a candle, on edge lest the owner should suddenly fling wide his bedroom door and ask her business, nor did she dare wander off into queer alleys, tempting bye-streets, any more than in a strange house open doors which might be bedroom doors, or sitting-room doors, or lead straight to the larder. For no Dalloways came down the Strand daily; she was a pioneer, a stray, venturing, trusting.
她抬头望向舰队街，羞答答地朝着圣保罗大教堂迈了几步，仿佛一个蹑手蹑脚潜行的人，拿着一支蜡烛，在夜间探索一间陌生的房屋，提心吊胆地生怕主人突然推开卧室门，问她有何贵干。她也不敢去那怪异诱人的小街里巷闲逛，正如不敢在一幢陌生的房子里随便打开一扇门，那也许是卧室的门，也许是客厅的门，也或者是直接通往厨房的门。因为，达洛维家的人从来不会天天来滨河大道的，她是一个开拓者，一个流浪女，一个冒险家，一个相信别人的人。
In many ways, her mother felt, she was extremely immature, like a child still, attached to dolls, to old slippers; a perfect baby; and that was charming. But then, of course, there was in the Dalloway family the tradition of public service. Abbesses, principals, head mistresses, dignitaries, in the republic of women — without being brilliant, any of them, they were that. She penetrated a little further in the direction of St. Paul’s. She liked the geniality, sisterhood, motherhood, brotherhood of this uproar. It seemed to her good. The noise was tremendous; and suddenly there were trumpets (the unemployed) blaring, rattling about in the uproar; military music; as if people were marching; yet had they been dying — had some woman breathed her last and whoever was watching, opening the window of the room where she had just brought off that act of supreme dignity, looked down on Fleet Street, that uproar, that military music would have come triumphing up to him, consolatory, indifferent.
在许多方面，她母亲认为，她都极不成熟，还像个孩子，离不开洋娃娃，喜欢旧拖鞋，简直是个十足的小孩子，可那不是也很可爱嘛。不过，当然啰，达洛维家是有献身公益事业的传统的。在她家的女性成员中，就出过修道院院长、大学校长、中小学校长，以及各类达官显贵——虽说她们中没有一个才华过人的，但毕竟都是地位显赫的人。她往圣保罗方向又走了几步。她喜欢在这片喧哗中透露出来的兄弟姐妹以及母女之间的亲情。她感觉非常和谐。可是，嘈杂声也非常刺耳，突然间，又有洪亮的喇叭声传来（是失业者的游行队伍），与喧嚣声混杂一片，奏的是军乐，他们似乎在行军。然而，要是他们已奄奄一息呢——要是某个女人吐出了生命里的最后一口气，而那个看护着她的人，打开了她刚刚在里面完成了庄严使命的房间的窗户，俯视着舰队街，那喧哗和军乐声就会一股脑飞入他的耳中，既给他以抚慰，又显得冷漠超然。
A puff of wind (in spite of the heat, there was quite a wind) blew a thin black veil over the sun and over the Strand. The faces faded; the omnibuses suddenly lost their glow. For although the clouds were of mountainous white so that one could fancy hacking hard chips off with a hatchet, with broad golden slopes, lawns of celestial pleasure gardens, on their flanks, and had all the appearance of settled habitations assembled for the conference of gods above the world, there was a perpetual movement among them. Signs were interchanged, when, as if to fulfil some scheme arranged already, now a summit dwindled, now a whole block of pyramidal size which had kept its station inalterably advanced into the midst or gravely led the procession to fresh anchorage. Fixed though they seemed at their posts, at rest in perfect unanimity, nothing could be fresher, freer, more sensitive superficially than the snow-white or gold-kindled surface; to change, to go, to dismantle the solemn assemblage was immediately possible; and in spite of the grave fixity, the accumulated robustness and solidity, now they struck light to the earth, now darkness.
一阵风（尽管天气炎热，风倒是不小）吹来一片薄薄的乌云，盘旋在滨河大道的上空，遮挡住太阳。人们的面容模糊起来，公共汽车也在突然间失去了光彩。云团如青山般洁净，你甚至能想象用一把斧头切下它那粗糙的硬边，一片辽阔的金色山坡随即绵延开来，呈现出天国乐园里的一方青草地，看上去正像居住在空中的诸神聚集在那里开会，但它们都在做着永恒的变幻呢。种种迹象互相交织着，好像是为了要实现某个早已安排好的计划，时而一座山峰萎缩下去，时而一整块原先待在原地不动的金字塔形云团挤进了别的云团中，或庄重地将一朵朵流云带入一个崭新的停泊地。尽管它们似乎岿然不动，休憩在完美的和谐中，可没有任何东西比这雪白的或金灿灿的云层更为清新、自由，更在外表上显露出敏感。变化着，移动着，庄严的聚会解散了，一切都在瞬息间实现。尽管云团稳重地凝聚在那里，堆积在一起，坚固厚实，但太阳时而还是会透过缝隙把光明投向大地，过后则又是一片灰暗。
It was not conscious. There was no recognition in it of one fortune, or fate, and for that very reason even to those dazed with watching for the last shivers of consciousness on the faces of the dying, consoling. Forgetfulness in people might wound, their ingratitude corrode, but this voice, pouring endlessly, year in year out, would take whatever it might be; this vow; this van; this life; this procession, would wrap them all about and carry them on, as in the rough stream of a glacier the ice holds a splinter of bone, a blue petal, some oak trees, and rolls them on.
这样的感觉是无意识的。从中并没有对运气和命运的认识，也正因如此，即使对那些因注视着弥留者脸上那最后一丝表情而木然了的人们来说，它也是一种安慰。人们的健忘也许会造成伤害，人们的忘恩负义也许会造成荒凉，可这个声音，无止境地奔流着，年复一年，卷走了所有的一切——这份誓言，这辆货车，这种生活，这支前行的队伍。噪声会把一切都收集起来，领着它们一路向前，如疯狂奔流着的冰川，冰块里裹挟着一根碎骨，一片蓝色的花瓣，几棵橡树，滚滚而去。
But it was later than she thought. Her mother would not like her to be wandering off alone like this. She turned back down the Strand.
可天色已晚，比她想的更晚了。她母亲不会希望看到她像这样一个人闲荡的。她沿着滨河大道返回去。
Going and coming, beckoning, signalling, so the light and shadow which now made the wall grey, now the bananas bright yellow, now made the Strand grey, now made the omnibuses bright yellow, seemed to Septimus Warren Smith lying on the sofa in the sitting-room; watching the watery gold glow and fade with the astonishing sensibility of some live creature on the roses, on the wall-paper. Outside the trees dragged their leaves like nets through the depths of the air; the sound of water was in the room and through the waves came the voices of birds singing. Every power poured its treasures on his head, and his hand lay there on the back of the sofa, as he had seen his hand lie when he was bathing, floating, on the top of the waves, while far away on shore he heard dogs barking and barking far away. Fear no more, says the heart in the body; fear no more.
光与影就这样来来去去地，如召唤，如示意，忽而把墙壁抹得灰暗，忽而把香蕉映得金黄，忽而把滨河大道抹得灰暗，忽而把公共汽车映得金黄，塞普提默斯·沃伦·史密斯躺在客厅的沙发上看着这一切，看着墙纸上的玫瑰沐浴在一片如水的金光中，隐隐约约的，像具有生命的鲜花似的，表现出令人愕然的敏锐。户外的树木举着如网的树叶伸向天边，室内传来流水的声音，鸟鸣声穿越海浪而来。所有力量都将它们的珍宝灌注到他的头顶，他的手放在沙发靠背上，就好像他在游泳时看见自己的手漂浮在海浪之上，他听见遥远的海岸上传来声声犬吠，遥远的犬吠声。别再害怕，他那躲藏在肉体里的心灵说道，别再害怕。
Calmly and competently, Elizabeth Dalloway mounted the Westminster omnibus.
伊丽莎白·达洛维，冷静又敏捷地，登上了去威斯敏斯特的巴士。
He was not afraid. At every moment Nature signified by some laughing hint like that gold spot which went round the wall — there, there, there — her determination to show, by brandishing her plumes, shaking her tresses, flinging her mantle this way and that, beautifully, always beautifully, and standing close up to breathe through her hollowed hands Shakespeare’s words, her meaning.
他不怕。每时每刻，大自然都微笑着给予暗示，如围绕着墙壁的金色光点——那儿，那儿，那儿——她的决心要表现出来，通过舞动她的羽毛，摆动她的发丝，甩动她的披风，如此这般，优雅无比，永远都那么优雅，站在他的面前，从她那虚握的双手间，用莎士比亚一般的语言，传达出她的意思。
Rezia, sitting at the table twisting a hat in her hands, watched him; saw him smiling. He was happy then. But she could not bear to see him smiling. It was not marriage; it was not being one’s husband to look strange like that, always to be starting, laughing, sitting hour after hour silent, or clutching her and telling her to write. The table drawer was full of those writings; about war; about Shakespeare; about great discoveries; how there is no death. Lately he had become excited suddenly for no reason (and both Dr. Holmes and Sir William Bradshaw said excitement was the worst thing for him), and waved his hands and cried out that he knew the truth! He knew everything! That man, his friend who was killed, Evans, had come, he said. He was singing behind the screen. She wrote it down just as he spoke it. Some things were very beautiful; others sheer nonsense. And he was always stopping in the middle, changing his mind; wanting to add something; hearing something new; listening with his hand up.
蕾西娅，坐在桌前，手里拧着帽子，凝视着他，看见了他的微笑。看来他此时很幸福。可看见他微笑，她觉得受不了。婚姻不该是这样的：自己的丈夫不该看上去像个陌生人，总是一惊一乍的，总是发出狂笑，或者默默无语地一连枯坐上好几个小时，或者缠住她让她记录下他的话语。桌子抽屉里满是他让她写的东西：关于战争，关于莎士比亚，关于伟大的发现，还有，关于死亡是如何之虚无。近来，他会没来由地突然兴奋起来（霍姆斯大夫和威廉·布莱德肖爵士都说过，兴奋对他是再糟糕没有的事了），挥舞着双手大喊大叫什么他发现了真理！他知道了一切！那个人，他那个战死沙场的朋友，埃文斯，来了，他说。埃文斯正在屏风后头唱歌呢。她把他说的话记录下来。有的话说得很美，有的则纯属无稽之谈。他总是在话说到一半的时候突然打住，因为他的想法瞬息万变，想要增加点什么新的内容，或者听见了什么新的声音，他会举起手聆听。
But she heard nothing.
可她却什么也没有听见。
And once they found the girl who did the room reading one of these papers in fits of laughter. It was a dreadful pity. For that made Septimus cry out about human cruelty — how they tear each other to pieces. The fallen, he said, they tear to pieces. “Holmes is on us,” he would say, and he would invent stories about Holmes; Holmes eating porridge; Holmes reading Shakespeare — making himself roar with laughter or rage, for Dr. Holmes seemed to stand for something horrible to him. “Human nature,” he called him. Then there were the visions. He was drowned, he used to say, and lying on a cliff with the gulls screaming over him. He would look over the edge of the sofa down into the sea. Or he was hearing music. Really it was only a barrel organ or some man crying in the street. But “Lovely!” he used to cry, and the tears would run down his cheeks, which was to her the most dreadful thing of all, to see a man like Septimus, who had fought, who was brave, crying. And he would lie listening until suddenly he would cry that he was falling down, down into the flames! Actually she would look for flames, it was so vivid. But there was nothing. They were alone in the room. It was a dream, she would tell him and so quiet him at last, but sometimes she was frightened too. She sighed as she sat sewing.
有次，他们发现打扫房屋的女仆读着其中的一张纸片，发出了一阵狂笑。这实在太作孽了。为此塞普提默斯高呼人性的冷酷——人们是如何互相撕扯，直至把对方撕成碎片。对于那些跌倒的人，他说，人们会把他们撕碎。“霍姆斯总和我们作对，”他会这么说，还会编造出许多关于霍姆斯的故事：霍姆斯在喝粥，霍姆斯在读莎士比亚——结果总是把自己弄得狂笑不已或暴跳如雷，因为在他看来，霍姆斯大夫代表着什么可怕的东西。“人性”，他这么称呼他。他还会看到一些景象。他溺水了，他常常这么说，躺在一块礁石上，海鸥在他头顶上嘶鸣。他会从沙发边上往底下看，一直看到大海。他会听见音乐声。其实那不过是管风琴声，或是某个人在大街上喊叫。可他却会大叫“多美呀！”泪水随即从他的脸颊上滑落，对她来说这是最糟糕的事，看着像塞普提默斯那样的人，这个曾经的战士，曾经的勇士，却在那里流泪。而他会一直躺在那里倾听，最后会突然大叫起来：他在往下坠落，不停坠落，落到熊熊烈火里去了！他说得那么生动，以至于她会真的去看看是不是哪里烧着了。可什么也没有发生。房间里只有他们两个。是一场梦，她会这么对他说，最后终于把他安抚下来，可有时她自己也会害怕。她坐在那里缝着帽子，发出了一声叹息。
“What is the name of Mrs. Filmer’s married daughter?” he asked.
“菲尔默太太那个结了婚的女儿叫什么名字来着？”他问。
“Mrs. Peters,” said Rezia. She was afraid it was too small, she said, holding it before her. Mrs. Peters was a big woman; but she did not like her. It was only because Mrs. Filmer had been so good to them. “She gave me grapes this morning,” she said — that Rezia wanted to do something to show that they were grateful. She had come into the room the other evening and found Mrs. Peters, who thought they were out, playing the gramophone.
“彼德斯太太。”蕾西娅说。她怕帽子做得太小了，她说，将它拿到自己的面前。彼德斯太太是个高大的女人，可蕾西娅不喜欢她。只是为了菲尔默太太向来都待他们不错。“她今天早上还给了我葡萄。”她说——因此，蕾西娅想做点什么来表示感谢。不过有天晚上，她走进房间时，却发现彼德斯太太在放唱机，她还以为他们外出了呢。
Her sigh was tender and enchanting, like the wind outside a wood in the evening. Now she put down her scissors; now she turned to take something from the table. A little stir, a little crinkling, a little tapping built up something on the table there, where she sat sewing. Through his eyelashes he could see her blurred outline; her little black body; her face and hands; her turning movements at the table, as she took up a reel, or looked (she was apt to lose things) for her silk. She was making a hat for Mrs. Filmer’s married daughter, whose name was — he had forgotten her name.
她的叹息声温柔缠绵，如晚间树林外的微风。此时，她放下了手上的剪刀，转身去取桌子上的什么东西。在她坐在那里缝纫的桌子上，起了一阵微微的骚动，在微微的窸窣声中，在轻轻的拍打之后，什么东西就做成了。透过他的睫毛，他看见了她那隐约的身影，她那黝黑娇小的身影，她的手和她的脸，她在桌前转身的动作，拿起一个线轴，或是寻找她的丝线（她总是丢三落四的）。她在为菲尔默太太已婚的女儿做一顶帽子，她的名字叫——他忘了她叫什么。
“She is a woman with a spiteful tongue,” said Rezia.
“她是个长舌妇。”蕾西娅说。
He began, very cautiously, to open his eyes, to see whether a gramophone was really there. But real things — real things were too exciting. He must be cautious. He would not go mad. First he looked at the fashion papers on the lower shelf, then, gradually at the gramophone with the green trumpet. Nothing could be more exact. And so, gathering courage, he looked at the sideboard; the plate of bananas; the engraving of Queen Victoria and the Prince Consort; at the mantelpiece, with the jar of roses. None of these things moved. All were still; all were real.
他小心翼翼地睁开眼睛，看看房间里是否真有一台唱机。千真万确——真实的东西太令人激动了。他一定要小心。他可不能发疯。他先是看了看放在下层书架里的时装广告，接着，眼睛一点点移向了装着绿喇叭的唱机。没有什么比它更真实了。于是，他鼓起勇气，看向餐具柜、盛着香蕉的果盘、维多利亚女王和她丈夫的雕版画，再看看壁炉架，架子上放着玫瑰花瓶。所有的一切都静止不动。一切都静止着，一切都是真实的。
“Was it true?” he asked. She was playing the gramophone? Yes; she had told him about it at the time; she had found Mrs. Peters playing the gramophone.
“是真的吗？”他问，“她放了唱机吗？”她说，是的。她当时就告诉过他这件事，她发现彼德斯太太在放唱机。
“What does Mr. Peters do?” Septimus asked.
“彼德斯先生是做什么的？”塞普提默斯问。
“Just now!” She said that with her Italian accent. She said that herself. He shaded his eyes so that he might see only a little of her face at a time, first the chin, then the nose, then the forehead, in case it were deformed, or had some terrible mark on it. But no, there she was, perfectly natural, sewing, with the pursed lips that women have, the set, the melancholy expression, when sewing. But there was nothing terrible about it, he assured himself, looking a second time, a third time at her face, her hands, for what was frightening or disgusting in her as she sat there in broad daylight, sewing? Mrs. Peters had a spiteful tongue. Mr. Peters was in Hull. Why then rage and prophesy? Why fly scourged and outcast? Why be made to tremble and sob by the clouds? Why seek truths and deliver messages when Rezia sat sticking pins into the front of her dress, and Mr. Peters was in Hull? Miracles, revelations, agonies, loneliness, falling through the sea, down, down into the flames, all were burnt out, for he had a sense, as he watched Rezia trimming the straw hat for Mrs. Peters, of a coverlet of flowers.
“就现在！”她带着意大利口音说道。是她亲口说的。他半遮住自己的眼睛，为了一点点地看清她的脸，先是下巴，接着是鼻子，再是前额，生怕她的脸变了形，或者长了些可怕的痘痘。可是不然，她就在那儿，一点没变。她缝着帽子，非常自然，撅着嘴唇，露出女人们在做针线活时特有的那种执着而忧郁的表情。可这也没什么可怕的呀，他定下心来，又一次看过去，再一次看过去，看着她的脸，她的手，她在明亮的阳光下坐在那儿缝帽子，这有什么可怕或讨厌的呢？彼德斯太太有一条毒舌。彼德斯先生在赫尔。那又为什么要怒气冲冲地瞎猜想呢？为什么要受苦受难流离失所呢？为什么看着云团会颤抖哭泣呢？蕾西娅坐在那儿在连衣裙的前襟上穿针引线，彼德斯先生在赫尔，为什么他偏要去寻找真理传递消息呢？奇迹、启示、痛苦、孤独，坠落到大海里，不停地坠落，坠落到火焰中，一切都烟消云散了，因为此时他只有一种感觉，看着蕾西娅缝制的彼德斯太太的草帽，他感觉那是条绣花的床罩。
“Ah,” said Rezia, trying to remember. She thought Mrs. Filmer had said that he travelled for some company. “Just now he is in Hull,” she said.
“呃，”蕾西娅说，她在尽力回忆，她想起，菲尔默太太说过他是某家公司的旅行推销员，“他现在人在赫尔[66]，”她说。【注：[66]英格兰东北部一港口城市。】
He took it out of her hands. He said it was an organ grinder’s monkey’s hat.
他从她手里接过帽子。他说那是给街头艺人耍的猴子戴的帽子。
“It’s too small for Mrs. Peters,” said Septimus.
“这顶帽子对彼德斯太太来说太小了。”塞普提默斯说。
How it rejoiced her that! Not for weeks had they laughed like this together, poking fun privately like married people. What she meant was that if Mrs. Filmer had come in, or Mrs. Peters or anybody they would not have understood what she and Septimus were laughing at.
这句话给了她多大的快乐哟！他们已经有好几个星期没有像这样大笑过了，没有像小夫妻那样在私底下拿别人打趣了。她的意思是，如果菲尔默太太或彼德斯太太或随便什么人上这儿来，她们都不会明白她和塞普提默斯在笑什么的。
For the first time for days he was speaking as he used to do! Of course it was — absurdly small, she said. But Mrs. Peters had chosen it.
几天来这还是头一次，他像过去那样说话了！它当然是——小得离谱了，她说。但那是彼德斯太太自个儿选的。
“There,” she said, pinning a rose to one side of the hat. Never had she felt so happy! Never in her life!
“瞧。”她说，把一朵玫瑰钉在帽子的一侧。她从没觉得这么幸福过！一辈子都没有过！
But that was still more ridiculous, Septimus said. Now the poor woman looked like a pig at a fair. (Nobody ever made her laugh as Septimus did.)
可那看上去更荒唐了，塞普提默斯说。那样的话，这个可怜的女人看上去就会像集市上的一头猪了（从没有人能像塞普提默斯那样让她开怀大笑的）。
What had she got in her work-box? She had ribbons and beads, tassels, artificial flowers. She tumbled them out on the table. He began putting odd colours together — for though he had no fingers, could not even do up a parcel, he had a wonderful eye, and often he was right, sometimes absurd, of course, but sometimes wonderfully right.
她的针线盒里有些什么东西呢？她有缎带、珠子、流苏、假花。她把这些统统倒在桌子上。他把古里古怪的颜色掺和在一起——尽管他笨手笨脚，甚至连打个包裹都无能为力，但他有很好的眼光，他的选择常常是对的，虽说有时会很荒唐，当然啰，但有时却可说是精彩绝伦。
So she sewed. When she sewed, he thought, she made a sound like a kettle on the hob; bubbling, murmuring, always busy, her strong little pointed fingers pinching and poking; her needle flashing straight. The sun might go in and out, on the tassels, on the wall-paper, but he would wait, he thought, stretching out his feet, looking at his ringed sock at the end of the sofa; he would wait in this warm place, this pocket of still air, which one comes on at the edge of a wood sometimes in the evening, when, because of a fall in the ground, or some arrangement of the trees (one must be scientific above all, scientific), warmth lingers, and the air buffets the cheek like the wing of a bird.
于是，她缝了起来。在她缝的时候，她制造出一种如放在铁架上的水壶一般的声响，扑扑声，滋滋声。总是那么繁忙，她那细小却有力的指尖在不停地捏着戳着，她手里的针在闪闪发光。太阳也许若隐若现的，照在流苏上，照在墙纸上，可他会等的，他想着，伸长了两条腿，看着沙发另一头环形花纹的短袜。他会在这个温暖的地方等下去，在这个连空气都停止了流动的世外桃源：有时候在黄昏的林边你会遇见这样的情景，因为地势的凹陷，或者是树木的排列（一定要讲科学，科学高于一切），致使暖意逗留不去，清风拂面，如鸟儿的翅膀。
“There it is,” said Rezia, twirling Mrs. Peters’ hat on the tips of her fingers. “That’ll do for the moment. Later…” her sentence bubbled away drip, drip, drip, like a contented tap left running.
“成啦，”蕾西娅说着，把彼德斯太太的帽子放在指尖上旋转起来，“暂时就算可以了。以后嘛…”她的话语如水泡般破裂了，滴答，滴答，如一只满心欢喜的、关不住的水龙头。
“She shall have a beautiful hat!” he murmured, taking up this and that, Rezia kneeling by his side, looking over his shoulder. Now it was finished — that is to say the design; she must stitch it together. But she must be very, very careful, he said, to keep it just as he had made it.
“她该有顶美丽的帽子！”他嘟哝道，拿起这个那个，蕾西娅蹲在他旁边，从他的肩头望过去。现在搞定了——也就是说设计完成了，她得把这些缝在一起。可她必须非常非常小心，他说，要保持好他弄出来的样子。
“But I must look so queer!” she cried, running over to the glass and looking first this side then that. Then she snatched it off again, for there was a tap at the door. Could it be Sir William Bradshaw? Had he sent already?
“可我一定会看上去很怪的！”她叫着，跑到镜子前面，一会儿看看这边，一会儿看看那边。接着，她又猛地把帽子摘下来，因为门上传来一阵敲门声。会是威廉·布莱德肖爵士吗？他已经来接他们了吗？
“Just look at it,” he said.
“你就看一下吧。”他说。
Yes, it would always make her happy to see that hat. He had become himself then, he had laughed then. They had been alone together. Always she would like that hat.
是的，看着那顶帽子，她永远都会感觉幸福的。现在他又做回他自己了，瞧，他又能笑了。他们俩又守在一起了。她会永远喜欢那顶帽子的。
He told her to try it on.
他让她试戴一下。
What always happened, then happened — what happened every night of their lives. The small girl sucked her thumb at the door; Rezia went down on her knees; Rezia cooed and kissed; Rezia got a bag of sweets out of the table drawer. For so it always happened. First one thing, then another. So she built it up, first one thing and then another. Dancing, skipping, round and round the room they went. He took the paper. Surrey was all out, he read. There was a heat wave. Rezia repeated: Surrey was all out. There was a heat wave, making it part of the game she was playing with Mrs. Filmer’s grandchild, both of them laughing, chattering at the same time, at their game. He was very tired. He was very happy. He would sleep. He shut his eyes. But directly he saw nothing the sounds of the game became fainter and stranger and sounded like the cries of people seeking and not finding, and passing further and further away. They had lost him!
每天都会发生的事，此时发生了——他们生活中的每个夜晚，都会发生这件事。小姑娘在门口吮着大拇指，蕾西娅蹲下身去，去哄她，吻她，再从桌子抽屉里拿出了一包糖果。这样的事每天都会发生。先是一件事，接着会引起另一件事。于是她把一件件事串联起来，先是一件事，接着是另一件事。跳着，蹦着，她们绕着房间一圈圈地舞着。他拿起报纸。萨里都成了一座空城，他读道，那里热浪滚滚。蕾西娅重复说，萨里都成了一座空城，那里热浪滚滚，这成为她和菲尔默太太的外孙女在玩着的游戏的一部分，她们俩都笑了起来，同时还在那里叽里呱啦地做游戏。他感觉累了。他非常开心。他要睡了。他闭上了眼睛。可等他一闭上眼睛，游戏的声音也立刻模糊起来，听上去那么陌生，仿佛有人在寻找着什么，但总也找不到，随即发出了一声呼喊，声音越来越遥远了。她们找不到他了！
It was wonderful. Never had he done anything which made him feel so proud. It was so real, it was so substantial, Mrs. Peters’ hat.
太好了。他从未做过什么使自己如此骄傲的事情。多现实呀，多实在呀，彼德斯太太的帽子。
No! it was only the small girl with the evening paper.
不是他！只是那个送晚报的小姑娘。
“Evans!” he cried. There was no answer. A mouse had squeaked, or a curtain rustled. Those were the voices of the dead. The screen, the coalscuttle, the sideboard remained to him. Let him then face the screen, the coal-scuttle and the sideboard… but Rezia burst into the room chattering.
“埃文斯！”他喊道。没有声音回答他。一只老鼠在窣窣潜行，还有一幅窗帘在沙沙作响。那就是死人的声音。只有屏风、煤桶和餐具柜还留在这里陪着他。那就让他面对屏风、煤桶和餐具柜吧…可是，蕾西娅突然嚷嚷着闯了进来。
He started up in terror. What did he see? The plate of bananas on the sideboard. Nobody was there (Rezia had taken the child to its mother. It was bedtime). That was it: to be alone forever. That was the doom pronounced in Milan when he came into the room and saw them cutting out buckram shapes with their scissors; to be alone forever.
他惊恐地惊跳起来。他看见什么了呢？盛着香蕉的果盘在餐具柜里。没人在那儿（蕾西娅带孩子去找妈妈了，已到了上床时间），就是这么回事：永远都是孤零零的一个。那是早在米兰就注定了的，他当时走进房间，看见她们在用剪刀剪麻布的帽样时，就已经命里注定，他永远都是孤零零的一个。
He was alone with the sideboard and the bananas. He was alone, exposed on this bleak eminence, stretched out — but not on a hill- top; not on a crag; on Mrs. Filmer’s sitting-room sofa. As for the visions, the faces, the voices of the dead, where were they? There was a screen in front of him, with black bulrushes and blue swallows. Where he had once seen mountains, where he had seen faces, where he had seen beauty, there was a screen.
他独自一人，只有餐具柜和香蕉陪着他。他独自一人，裸露在这个荒凉的高原上，平躺着身体——但不是在山顶上，也不是在悬崖上，而是在菲尔默太太客厅里的沙发上。至于那些景象，那些人的脸，那些死者的声音，他们都去哪里了呢？一张屏风在他的面前，上面画着黑色的香蒲和蓝色的燕子。他曾经看到的高山呢，他曾经看到的人脸呢，他曾经看到的美丽呢，只剩下了一张屏风。
“Ah, damn!” she cried (it was a joke of theirs, her swearing), the needle had broken. Hat, child, Brighton, needle. She built it up; first one thing, then another, she built it up, sewing.
“啊，该死！”她喊道（说骂人话是他们间的一种玩笑方式），因为针断了。帽子，孩子，布莱顿，针。她把这些串联起来：先是这事，再是那事，她把它们串起来，缝起来。
Some letter had come. Everybody’s plans were changed. Mrs. Filmer would not be able to go to Brighton after all. There was no time to let Mrs. Williams know, and really Rezia thought it very, very annoying, when she caught sight of the hat and thought… perhaps… she… might just make a little… Her voice died out in contented melody.
来了一封信。大家的计划都改变了。菲尔默太太毕竟是去不了布莱顿了。没时间通知威廉斯太太了，蕾西娅觉得那真的非常非常烦人，她看着那顶帽子想道，也许…她…也许可以做点小小的…她那心满意足的声音渐渐微弱了下去。
She wanted him to say whether by moving the rose she had improved the hat. She sat on the end of the sofa.
她想要他告诉她，她这么移了移玫瑰花，帽子看上去是不是更漂亮了。她坐在沙发边上。
They were perfectly happy now, she said, suddenly, putting the hat down. For she could say anything to him now. She could say whatever came into her head. That was almost the first thing she had felt about him, that night in the café when he had come in with his English friends. He had come in, rather shyly, looking round him, and his hat had fallen when he hung it up. That she could remember. She knew he was English, though not one of the large Englishmen her sister admired, for he was always thin; but he had a beautiful fresh colour; and with his big nose, his bright eyes, his way of sitting a little hunched made her think, she had often told him, of a young hawk, that first evening she saw him, when they were playing dominoes, and he had come in — of a young hawk; but with her he was always very gentle. She had never seen him wild or drunk, only suffering sometimes through this terrible war, but even so, when she came in, he would put it all away. Anything, anything in the whole world, any little bother with her work, anything that struck her to say she would tell him, and he understood at once. Her own family even were not the same. Being older than she was and being so clever — how serious he was, wanting her to read Shakespeare before she could even read a child’s story in English!– being so much more experienced, he could help her. And she too could help him.
他们现在真是无比幸福啊，她说着，突然放下了帽子，因为现在可以随便对他说什么了。她可以把脑子里一闪而过的念头告诉他。那几乎就是初次相逢时他给她的第一感觉，就在那天晚上，他和他的英国朋友走进了咖啡厅。他走进来，相当害羞，看了看四周，把帽子挂起来，可帽子又掉了下来。她都记得。她知道他是个英国人，尽管不是她的小姐妹爱慕的那种人高马大的英国人，他向来都很瘦，但他有一种很漂亮很清爽的气色。他的大鼻子，亮眼睛，有点驼背的坐姿，使她觉得，她过去常这么对他说，他像头年轻的雄鹰。那天晚上看到他时，她们正在玩多米诺骨牌，他走了进来——像头年轻的雄鹰，不过和她在一起时，他总是那么温文尔雅。她从没见过他轻狂或醉酒的样子，只是偶尔会因这场糟糕的战争表露出痛苦，但即便如此，只要她来到他的身边，他就会把那些情绪统统赶跑。任何事，这世界上的任何事，哪怕是她工作时碰到的一点点小麻烦，无论想到什么事，她都想告诉他，而且他都会立刻就明白。甚至连她的家人也做不到这么了解她。他比她大几岁，人又那么聪明——还那么严肃，想让她读莎士比亚，而那时她连英语的儿童书都还看不懂呢！——他的经验如此丰富多彩，他可以帮助她的。而她，也可以帮助他呀。
She held her hands to her head, waiting for him to say did he like the hat or not, and as she sat there, waiting, looking down, he could feel her mind, like a bird, falling from branch to branch, and always alighting, quite rightly; he could follow her mind, as she sat there in one of those loose lax poses that came to her naturally and, if he should say anything, at once she smiled, like a bird alighting with all its claws firm upon the bough.
她把手放在头上，等着他来告诉她他是否喜欢这顶帽子。她坐在那儿，等着，眼睛看着下面，他能够感觉到她的心思，像鸟儿在一根根枝丫间飞来飞去，又总能稳稳地落在枝头。他可以跟随她的思路，她坐在那儿，姿势轻松自然，只要他开口说话，她都会立刻笑起来，像一只落在枝头的鸟儿，爪子紧紧地攀住了枝条。
“It is because you talked of killing yourself,” said Rezia. (Mercifully, she could now say anything to Septimus.)
“那是因为你说你要自杀呀。”蕾西娅说（老天有眼，她现在总算什么都能对塞普提默斯说了）。
But this hat now. And then (it was getting late) Sir William Bradshaw.
不过，眼下先对付这顶帽子。接下来（天色越来越暗了），还要对付那个威廉·布莱德肖爵士。
But he remembered Bradshaw said, “The people we are most fond of are not good for us when we are ill.” Bradshaw said, he must be taught to rest. Bradshaw said they must be separated.
可他记得布莱德肖说过：“在我们生病时，我们最在乎的人反倒对我们没有好处。”布莱德肖是这么说的，还说他必须要学会休息。布莱德肖还说过，他俩必须要分开。
“Must,” “must,” why “must”? What power had Bradshaw over him? “What right has Bradshaw to say ‘must’ to me?” he demanded.
“必须”，“必须”，干吗老说“必须”？布莱德肖到底有什么权利可以来这样控制他？“布莱德肖有什么权利对我说‘必须怎么怎么的’呢？”他问。
So he was in their power! Holmes and Bradshaw were on him! The brute with the red nostrils was snuffing into every secret place! “Must” it could say! Where were his papers? the things he had written?
看来他是落入了他们的魔掌！霍姆斯和布莱德肖把他控制住了。这个红鼻子的畜生把鼻子伸进了每一个隐秘的角落！它有权说“必须！”他的纸片在哪里？他写过的那些东西呢？
She brought him his papers, the things he had written, things she had written for him. She tumbled them out on to the sofa. They looked at them together. Diagrams, designs, little men and women brandishing sticks for arms, with wings — were they?– on their backs; circles traced round shillings and sixpences — the suns and stars; zigzagging precipices with mountaineers ascending roped together, exactly like knives and forks; sea pieces with little faces laughing out of what might perhaps be waves: the map of the world. Burn them! he cried. Now for his writings; how the dead sing behind rhododendron bushes; odes to Time; conversations with Shakespeare; Evans, Evans, Evans — his messages from the dead; do not cut down trees; tell the Prime Minister. Universal love: the meaning of the world. Burn them! he cried.
她把他的纸片拿过来，他写过的那些东西，其实是她代他写下来的。她把纸片倒在沙发上。他们俩一起看着那些纸片。图表，设计图，小男人和小女人挥舞着用枝条代替的手臂，身上还长着翅膀——对吗？——在他们的背后；依照一先令和六便士的硬币描下来的大大小小的圆圈——代表日月星辰；曲曲弯弯的悬崖峭壁，登山者绑在一根绳上往上攀登，简直就像刀叉；有几张画着海景，在看上去像是波浪的东西上面有几张小脸在大笑：这些就是世界地图。烧了它们！他大喊大叫。现在来看看他写的东西：死人是如何在杜鹃花丛的后面唱歌的；献给时代的颂歌；与莎士比亚的对话；埃文斯，埃文斯，埃文斯——埃文斯从死神王国带来的消息；不要砍伐树木；要告诉首相大人。普天下的大爱，乃是这个世界的意义所在。烧了它们！他大喊大叫。
But Rezia laid her hands on them. Some were very beautiful, she thought. She would tie them up (for she had no envelope) with a piece of silk.
但蕾西娅把手压在了它们上面。有些话说得很美呢，她想。她会用一根丝线把它们捆起来的（因为她没有信封）。
Even if they took him, she said, she would go with him. They could not separate them against their wills, she said.
即使他们把他带走，她说，她也会跟他一起去的。他们不能违背他俩的意愿硬把他们拆散的，她又说。
Shuffling the edges straight, she did up the papers, and tied the parcel almost without looking, sitting beside him, he thought, as if all her petals were about her. She was a flowering tree; and through her branches looked out the face of a lawgiver, who had reached a sanctuary where she feared no one; not Holmes; not Bradshaw; a miracle, a triumph, the last and greatest. Staggering he saw her mount the appalling staircase, laden with Holmes and Bradshaw, men who never weighed less than eleven stone six, who sent their wives to Court, men who made ten thousand a year and talked of proportion; who different in their verdicts (for Holmes said one thing, Bradshaw another), yet judges they were; who mixed the vision and the sideboard; saw nothing clear, yet ruled, yet inflicted. “Must” they said. Over them she triumphed.
她把纸边对齐了，整理好这批文稿，几乎没看一眼就把它们打好了包。坐在她的身旁，他想，就好像她身上的每一片花瓣都在开放。她是一棵开花的树，透过花枝，她看见了一张立法者的脸。她已经来到了一所圣殿，她不用再害怕任何人了，不用怕霍姆斯，也不用怕布莱德肖。最后的，最伟大的，一个奇迹，一场胜利。他看见她步履蹒跚地爬上了让人害怕的楼梯，霍姆斯和布莱德肖如两座大山压在她的心头，这两个体重从来不低于一百六十磅的家伙，这两个把自己的老婆送入了宫廷，一年能赚一万，开口闭口都是要保持平衡之类的家伙。他们俩的意见不一（如果霍姆斯说可以，那布莱德肖一定说不行），但他们都是法官。他们把幻想和餐具柜混为一谈，对什么都看不清，但他们是统治者，也是迫害者。他们说“必须。”可她终于战胜了他们。
“There!” she said. The papers were tied up. No one should get at them. She would put them away.
“好了！”她说。文稿包好了。不会落入旁人之手了。她会把它们藏起来的。
And, she said, nothing should separate them. She sat down beside him and called him by the name of that hawk or crow which being malicious and a great destroyer of crops was precisely like him. No one could separate them, she said.
没有，她说，没有任何东西能拆散他们。她在他的身旁坐下，她把那个家伙叫作老鹰或乌鸦，因为那家伙和这些禽兽一样恶毒，老是糟蹋我们的食粮。没人能拆散他们，她说。
“No. I will not allow you to see my husband,” she said.
“不。我不允许你去见我的丈夫。”她说。
Septimus could hear her talking to Holmes on the staircase.
塞普提默斯可以听见她和霍姆斯在楼梯上的说话声。
Then she got up to go into the bedroom to pack their things, but hearing voices downstairs and thinking that Dr. Holmes had perhaps called, ran down to prevent him coming up.
然后，她站起来走进了卧室，准备整理他们的行李，但听见楼下传来人声，想到也许是霍姆斯大夫来拜访了，急忙跑下楼去阻拦。
“My dear lady, allow me…” Holmes said, putting her aside (Holmes was a powerfully built man).
“我亲爱的夫人，请允许我…”霍姆斯说着，把她推开去了（霍姆斯是个体格壮硕的男人）。
He could see her, like a little hen, with her wings spread barring his passage. But Holmes persevered.
他看见她像只小母鸡似的，张开了翅膀不让霍姆斯过去。可霍姆斯坚决不让步。
Holmes was coming upstairs. Holmes would burst open the door. Holmes would say “In a funk, eh?” Holmes would get him. But no; not Holmes; not Bradshaw. Getting up rather unsteadily, hopping indeed from foot to foot, he considered Mrs. Filmer’s nice clean bread knife with “Bread” carved on the handle. Ah, but one mustn’t spoil that. The gas fire? But it was too late now. Holmes was coming. Razors he might have got, but Rezia, who always did that sort of thing, had packed them. There remained only the window, the large Bloomsbury-lodging house window, the tiresome, the troublesome, and rather melodramatic business of opening the window and throwing himself out. It was their idea of tragedy, not his or Rezia’s (for she was with him). Holmes and Bradshaw like that sort of thing. (He sat on the sill.) But he would wait till the very last moment. He did not want to die. Life was good. The sun hot. Only human beings — what did THEY want? Coming down the staircase opposite an old man stopped and stared at him. Holmes was at the door. “I’ll give it you!” he cried, and flung himself vigorously, violently down on to Mrs. Filmer’s area railings.
霍姆斯正在上楼来。霍姆斯会猛地推开房门。霍姆斯会说“吓坏了吧，嗯？”霍姆斯会抓住他。可是不！霍姆斯休想，布莱德肖也休想抓住他。他哆哆嗦嗦地站起来，简直是在轮流做着单脚跳，想到了菲尔默太太那把刀柄上刻着“面包”字样的干净漂亮的切面包刀。啊，可是不该糟蹋那东西。开煤气点火？可现在太迟了。霍姆斯上来了。也许可以用剃刀，但蕾西娅把它们都包起来了，她总是爱收拾东西。只剩下窗户一条路了，布卢姆斯伯里公寓房的大窗户，打开窗户跳下去，那是桩无聊、讨厌，还有点闹剧味道的事。他们认为这就是悲剧，但他和蕾西娅不会那么想（因为她是站在他这一边的）。霍姆斯和布莱德肖喜欢那种事（他坐在窗台上）。不过，他会等到最后那一刻的。他不想死。生命是美好的。阳光又多么温暖。只是人类——他们到底要什么？从对面楼梯上下来的老人停下脚步，瞧着他。霍姆斯到了门口。“你给我看好了！”他大喊着，奋力跳了下去，重重地跌落在菲尔默太太家的围栏上。
“My dear lady, I have come as a friend,” Holmes was saying.
“我亲爱的夫人，我是好意而来呀。”霍姆斯这么说着。
It seemed to her as she drank the sweet stuff that she was opening long windows, stepping out into some garden. But where? The clock was striking — one, two, three: how sensible the sound was; compared with all this thumping and whispering; like Septimus himself. She was falling asleep. But the clock went on striking, four, five, six and Mrs. Filmer waving her apron (they wouldn’t bring the body in here, would they?) seemed part of that garden; or a flag. She had once seen a flag slowly rippling out from a mast when she stayed with her aunt at Venice. Men killed in battle were thus saluted, and Septimus had been through the War. Of her memories, most were happy.
她喝着那甜滋滋的东西，仿佛觉得自己打开了落地窗，走进了一座花园。可是在哪里呢？钟声响起来——一、二、三：钟声多么理智，比这些嘈杂和窃窃私语声理智多了，就像塞普提默斯本人。她觉得迷迷糊糊的。可钟声依旧在那里响着，四、五、六，摇晃着围裙的菲尔默太太（他们不会把尸体搬到这里来的，对吧？）似乎成了花园里的一个景物，或者说成了一面旗帜。蕾西娅和姑妈住在威尼斯时，曾见过一面旗帜在桅杆上悠悠地飘扬。人们就是那样对战死沙场者表示敬意的，而塞普提默斯也经历了战争。在她的记忆中，大多数都是幸福的。
“The coward!” cried Dr. Holmes, bursting the door open. Rezia ran to the window, she saw; she understood. Dr. Holmes and Mrs. Filmer collided with each other. Mrs. Filmer flapped her apron and made her hide her eyes in the bedroom. There was a great deal of running up and down stairs. Dr. Holmes came in — white as a sheet, shaking all over, with a glass in his hand. She must be brave and drink something, he said (What was it? Something sweet), for her husband was horribly mangled, would not recover consciousness, she must not see him, must be spared as much as possible, would have the inquest to go through, poor young woman. Who could have foretold it? A sudden impulse, no one was in the least to blame (he told Mrs. Filmer). And why the devil he did it, Dr. Holmes could not conceive.
“懦夫！”霍姆斯大夫喊着，一面把门撞开。蕾西娅冲向窗口，她看见了，她一下子明白了。霍姆斯大夫和菲尔默太太撞了个正着。菲尔默太太舞动着围裙，让蕾西娅回到卧室去，别看这惨状。楼梯上不断有人在跑上跑下。霍姆斯大夫进来了——面色苍白如纸，浑身一个劲地哆嗦，手里拿着一个杯子。你一定要勇敢，喝一点吧，他说（是什么？甜的东西），因为她丈夫摔得都不成人样了，不可能恢复意识了，她不能去看她丈夫，要尽量让她好过一点，接下来还要经受一番盘问呢，可怜的小女人。谁会想到发生这种事呢？一个突然的冲动，谁也不能怪呀（他对菲尔默太太说）。赛普提默斯为何要做下这件该死的事，霍姆斯大夫百思不得其解。
“Let her sleep,” said Dr. Holmes, feeling her pulse. She saw the large outline of his body standing dark against the window. So that was Dr. Holmes.
“让她睡吧。”霍姆斯大夫说着，给蕾西娅把了把脉。她看见他站在窗口的黑糊糊的大致轮廓。原来他就是霍姆斯大夫。
“He is dead,” she said, smiling at the poor old woman who guarded her with her honest light-blue eyes fixed on the door. (They wouldn’t bring him in here, would they?) But Mrs. Filmer pooh- poohed. Oh no, oh no! They were carrying him away now. Ought she not to be told? Married people ought to be together, Mrs. Filmer thought. But they must do as the doctor said.
“他死了。”她说着，对那位可怜的老妇人露出了微笑，老妇人淡蓝的眼睛忠诚地盯住门口，保卫着她（他们不会把他抬到这里来的，对吗）。可菲尔默太太对这个想法不屑一顾。哦，不，哦，不！他们马上就会把他抬走的。不该先通知蕾西娅吗？结了婚的人应该待在一起的，菲尔默太太想。可他们必须按大夫的吩咐办。
She put on her hat, and ran through cornfields — where could it have been?– on to some hill, somewhere near the sea, for there were ships, gulls, butterflies; they sat on a cliff. In London too, there they sat, and, half dreaming, came to her through the bedroom door, rain falling, whisperings, stirrings among dry corn, the caress of the sea, as it seemed to her, hollowing them in its arched shell and murmuring to her laid on shore, strewn she felt, like flying flowers over some tomb.
她戴上帽子，跑过了一片玉米地——那会是在哪儿呢？——跑上了一座山，在大海附近的一座山，因为那儿有船只，鸥鸟，蝴蝶。他们坐在巉岩上。在伦敦，他们也是像这样坐着，在半梦半醒间，透过卧室门溜进她耳朵里的，是下雨声，人们的窃窃私语，干枯的玉米秆发出的沙沙声，大海的轻抚，她这么觉得，拱起的海浪将他们围住，然后再放到海岸上，对着她呢喃低语，她觉得自己飞舞在天上，如坟墓上的飞花。
One of the triumphs of civilisation, Peter Walsh thought. It is one of the triumphs of civilisation, as the light high bell of the ambulance sounded. Swiftly, cleanly the ambulance sped to the hospital, having picked up instantly, humanely, some poor devil; some one hit on the head, struck down by disease, knocked over perhaps a minute or so ago at one of these crossings, as might happen to oneself. That was civilisation. It struck him coming back from the East — the efficiency, the organisation, the communal spirit of London. Every cart or carriage of its own accord drew aside to let the ambulance pass. Perhaps it was morbid; or was it not touching rather, the respect which they showed this ambulance with its victim inside — busy men hurrying home yet instantly bethinking them as it passed of some wife; or presumably how easily it might have been them there, stretched on a shelf with a doctor and a nurse… Ah, but thinking became morbid, sentimental, directly one began conjuring up doctors, dead bodies; a little glow of pleasure, a sort of lust too over the visual impression warned one not to go on with that sort of thing any more — fatal to art, fatal to friendship. True. And yet, thought Peter Walsh, as the ambulance turned the corner though the light high bell could be heard down the next street and still farther as it crossed the Tottenham Court Road, chiming constantly, it is the privilege of loneliness; in privacy one may do as one chooses. One might weep if no one saw. It had been his undoing — this susceptibility — in Anglo-Indian society; not weeping at the right time, or laughing either. I have that in me, he thought standing by the pillar-box, which could now dissolve in tears. Why, Heaven knows. Beauty of some sort probably, and the weight of the day, which beginning with that visit to Clarissa had exhausted him with its heat, its intensity, and the drip, drip, of one impression after another down into that cellar where they stood, deep, dark, and no one would ever know. Partly for that reason, its secrecy, complete and inviolable, he had found life like an unknown garden, full of turns and corners, surprising, yes; really it took one’s breath away, these moments; there coming to him by the pillar-box opposite the British Museum one of them, a moment, in which things came together; this ambulance; and life and death. It was as if he were sucked up to some very high roof by that rush of emotion and the rest of him, like a white shell-sprinkled beach, left bare. It had been his undoing in Anglo-Indian society — this susceptibility.
文明的一次胜利，彼德·沃尔什想。这是文明的一次胜利，当他听见清脆、尖利的救护车铃声传来时。救护车富有人道精神地迅速载上某个可怜的家伙，迅疾地、利落地向医院飞驰而去：可能是脑袋受伤，也可能是突发疾病，也可能是就在一两分钟前在某个路口被车撞了，这种事也可能发生在自己身上的。这就是文明。从东方回来后，文明给了他很深的印象——伦敦的效率、组织、互助精神。每一辆货车和马车都主动闪到一边，给救护车让路。也许这有点变态，但人们对救护车里的牺牲者所表现出来的尊敬，难道不也令人感动吗——忙碌的人们匆匆往家里赶，但同时也不由地想到会不会是自己的妻子在那车子里面，或者想到他们自己也很有可能变成车子里的那个倒霉蛋，四仰八叉地躺在担架上，医生护士陪在旁边…唉，只要脑子里一出现医生、尸体之类的东西，人们的思绪就会变得多么扭曲，多么伤感啊。由这种视觉刺激出来的快乐的灵光一现，或者说一种欲望，告诫人们从今往后别再去想那些事——对艺术，对友谊，它都是致命的。然而，彼德·沃尔什想，救护车转过街角进入另一条街，尽管依然能听见清脆尖利的铃声，它沿着托特纳姆法院街继续往前，铃声一直闹着，那是孤独的特权，在私下里，一个人会按自己的选择行事。如果没人看见，你也许会流泪。正是他的极度敏感，造成了他在印度的英国人圈子里四处碰壁。他总是不合时宜地哭，或不合时宜地笑。我身上有那毛病，他站在邮筒前想道，此刻就能感动得眼泪汪汪。怎么会这样，真是天晓得。也许是一种美，还有白天的重负，它开始于对克拉丽莎的拜访，炎热与紧张把他折磨得筋疲力尽，各种印象接踵而来，一滴滴地流进了他的内心深处，那里又深又暗，一个永远都没人了解的地方。也许是因为它吧，它既神秘又完整，它不容侵犯，他发现生命是一座神秘的花园，花园里曲径通幽，隐秘的角落星罗棋布，充满了神奇。真的，这样的时刻，可以教人屏住呼吸。他站在大英博物馆对面的邮筒前，感受着这样一个时刻，刹那间，各种事物都聚拢到一起，这辆救护车，生命和死亡。他仿佛被喷薄的激情推上了一个高高的屋顶，而他的那具躯壳，则如一片散布着零星贝壳的洁白海滩，空空如也。这造成了他在印度的英国人圈子里兜不开——他那极度的敏感。
Clarissa once, going on top of an omnibus with him somewhere, Clarissa superficially at least, so easily moved, now in despair, now in the best of spirits, all aquiver in those days and such good company, spotting queer little scenes, names, people from the top of a bus, for they used to explore London and bring back bags full of treasures from the Caledonian market — Clarissa had a theory in those days — they had heaps of theories, always theories, as young people have. It was to explain the feeling they had of dissatisfaction; not knowing people; not being known. For how could they know each other? You met every day; then not for six months, or years. It was unsatisfactory, they agreed, how little one knew people. But she said, sitting on the bus going up Shaftesbury Avenue, she felt herself everywhere; not “here, here, here”; and she tapped the back of the seat; but everywhere. She waved her hand, going up Shaftesbury Avenue. She was all that. So that to know her, or any one, one must seek out the people who completed them; even the places. Odd affinities she had with people she had never spoken to, some woman in the street, some man behind a counter — even trees, or barns. It ended in a transcendental theory which, with her horror of death, allowed her to believe, or say that she believed (for all her scepticism), that since our apparitions, the part of us which appears, are so momentary compared with the other, the unseen part of us, which spreads wide, the unseen might survive, be recovered somehow attached to this person or that, or even haunting certain places after death… perhaps — perhaps.
克拉丽莎曾经，在某地和他同乘一辆巴士的顶层，那时的克拉丽莎真的很情绪化，很容易受感动，一会儿觉得绝望，一会儿又兴高采烈，激动起来会浑身发抖，是个多有趣的伙伴呀。从巴士顶层她能看见各种稀奇古怪的小事、名称和人物，他们俩过去常常一起在伦敦街头游荡，从苏格兰市场买回大袋大袋的宝贝。克拉丽莎在那时有一个理论——他们有无数的理论，开口闭口都是理论，当时的小青年都这样。这就解释了为什么他们会有不满的情绪——不了解别人，别人也不了解他们。而他们又是怎样彼此了解的呢？他们天天见面，然后是半年不见，再然后是多年不见。这样的状况是不能让人满意的，他们都这么认为，我们对别人的了解是多么有限呀。可她说，坐在巴士上沿着夏夫茨伯里大道而去，她觉得自己无处不在，她不是在“这儿，这儿，这儿”（她轻扣着座位的靠背），而是在任何地方。她挥挥手，沿着夏夫茨伯里大道而去。她就是这个样子的。所以，要了解她，或了解任何人，我们必须要找出帮助她完善了自我的那个人，甚至是那个地方。她和从未交流过的人之间有一种奇特的引力，街上的某个女人，柜台里的某个男人——甚至和树木，和谷仓。最后总结为先验论[67]，她对死亡的恐惧，使她相信，或者说她宣称自己相信（因为她满脑袋的怀疑论），由于我们的灵魂，我们所表露出来的部分，与别的部分（未表露出来的部分）比较起来是那样的一种瞬间存在，而那未表露出来的部分会伸展到极广阔处，它也许能生存下来，能附着在这个那个人身上而恢复过来，甚至死后也能在某些地方流连…也许吧——也许。【注：[67]德国哲学家康德（1724~1804）倡导的一种理论，该理论强调主观直觉的重要性，排斥理性与实践，以下的描述即反映了这种玄虚的观点。】
Looking back over that long friendship of almost thirty years her theory worked to this extent. Brief, broken, often painful as their actual meetings had been what with his absences and interruptions (this morning, for instance, in came Elizabeth, like a long-legged colt, handsome, dumb, just as he was beginning to talk to Clarissa) the effect of them on his life was immeasurable. There was a mystery about it. You were given a sharp, acute, uncomfortable grain — the actual meeting; horribly painful as often as not; yet in absence, in the most unlikely places, it would flower out, open, shed its scent, let you touch, taste, look about you, get the whole feel of it and understanding, after years of lying lost. Thus she had come to him; on board ship; in the Himalayas; suggested by the oddest things (so Sally Seton, generous, enthusiastic goose! thought of HIM when she saw blue hydrangeas). She had influenced him more than any person he had ever known. And always in this way coming before him without his wishing it, cool, lady-like, critical; or ravishing, romantic, recalling some field or English harvest. He saw her most often in the country, not in London. One scene after another at Bourton…
回顾一下这几乎长达三十年的友谊，她的理论是多么奏效啊。由于他常常缺席和各种因素的干扰（比如今天早上，就在他正准备好好和克拉丽莎谈一谈时，伊丽莎白突然闯进来，像匹长腿的马驹，年轻漂亮，笨嘴拙舌），而他们实际的会面又往往短暂仓促，有时甚至是痛苦的，这对他的生活造成了无法估量的影响。这里面有一种神秘感。这实际的会面，就像是别人给你的一粒坚硬、粗糙、感觉不舒服的稻谷，常常使你感觉痛苦得要命。然而在别离的日子里，在最没有可能的地方，在多年的杳无音信之后，它会盛开出来，吐露着芬芳，开放出花朵，让你抚摸，让你玩味，环顾一下四周，你就能得到对它的完整感受及理解。他就是那样想起她来的：乘在渡船上，在喜马拉雅山上，最离谱的事情都能勾起他的回忆（萨利·西顿，这个热情大方的傻姑娘，也是如此！看见蓝色的绣球花，她就会想起他来）。她对他的影响是他认识的任何人都不及的。她总是骤然来到他的面前，完全出乎他的预料，冷冰冰的，像个贵妇，开口就喜欢批评人；或者风情万种，罗曼蒂克，令人联想起英国的田野和丰收的季节。他常常在乡下看见她，而不是在伦敦。在伯尔顿的一幕幕…
He had reached his hotel. He crossed the hall, with its mounds of reddish chairs and sofas, its spike-leaved, withered-looking plants. He got his key off the hook. The young lady handed him some letters. He went upstairs — he saw her most often at Bourton, in the late summer, when he stayed there for a week, or fortnight even, as people did in those days. First on top of some hill there she would stand, hands clapped to her hair, her cloak blowing out, pointing, crying to them — she saw the Severn beneath. Or in a wood, making the kettle boil — very ineffective with her fingers; the smoke curtseying, blowing in their faces; her little pink face showing through; begging water from an old woman in a cottage, who came to the door to watch them go. They walked always; the others drove. She was bored driving, disliked all animals, except that dog. They tramped miles along roads. She would break off to get her bearings, pilot him back across country; and all the time they argued, discussed poetry, discussed people, discussed politics (she was a Radical then); never noticing a thing except when she stopped, cried out at a view or a tree, and made him look with her; and so on again, through stubble fields, she walking ahead, with a flower for her aunt, never tired of walking for all her delicacy; to drop down on Bourton in the dusk. Then, after dinner, old Breitkopf would open the piano and sing without any voice, and they would lie sunk in arm-chairs, trying not to laugh, but always breaking down and laughing, laughing — laughing at nothing. Breitkopf was supposed not to see. And then in the morning, flirting up and down like a wagtail in front of the house…
他回到了旅馆。他穿过大堂，看见那里摆着许多红椅子和红沙发，还有叶子细长、看上去干巴巴的植物。他从钩子上取下钥匙。那位年轻的侍女递给他几封信。他上楼去——夏末时节，他常在伯尔顿逗留一个礼拜，有时甚至是两个礼拜，当时人们都喜欢去那里避暑，他在那里经常见到她。起初是她站在哪座山的山顶上，双手轻轻地按住头发，她的披肩在随风摇摆，手指着下面，对他们大喊着——她看见塞文河了。或是在一座森林里，在煮开水——她那纤纤玉指实在是不适合劳动啊。烟雾缥缈，在他们脸上缭绕，透过青烟可以看见她那张粉红的小脸；他们问村子里的老婆婆要水喝，老婆婆来到门前欢送他们。他们总是步行，而别人大都开车出行。她讨厌开车，她不喜欢任何动物，除了那条狗。他们沿着大路一走就是好几英里。她会停下来辨认方向，然后带着他穿过田野走回去。他们一路上总是不停地争论，谈论诗歌，谈论别人，谈论政治（那时她是个激进分子）。他们从来不注意周围的景物，除非她停下来对着风景或一棵树诗兴大发，还让他陪她一起欣赏。然后他们继续上路，穿过矮矮的树林，她走在前头，拿着准备献给她姑妈的一朵花，她个子那么纤细，却对步行情有独钟；在薄暮时分，他们回到了伯尔顿。然后，晚饭后，老布莱德科普夫会打开钢琴，荒腔走板地唱起来，而他们会窝在扶手沙发里，尽力屏住笑，但最后总还是会笑出来，一笑起来就没法收拾了——没来由的大笑。布莱德科普夫想必什么也不会看见的。然后到了早上，他们又会像鹡鸰鸟一般闹哄哄地在房子前面打情骂俏…
Oh it was a letter from her! This blue envelope; that was her hand. And he would have to read it. Here was another of those meetings, bound to be painful! To read her letter needed the devil of an effort. “How heavenly it was to see him. She must tell him that.” That was all.
哦，那是她来的一封信！这个蓝色的信封，是她的笔迹。他一定要看一看。肯定又要约他会面，注定是痛苦的！读她的来信还真需要魔鬼般的力量。“见到你多好呀，我必须把这告诉你。”就这点内容。
But it upset him. It annoyed him. He wished she hadn’t written it. Coming on top of his thoughts, it was like a nudge in the ribs. Why couldn’t she let him be? After all, she had married Dalloway, and lived with him in perfect happiness all these years.
可这封信使他沮丧，使他烦恼。他希望她没有写它。在他心绪不宁时来这么一封信，犹如在他的肋骨上戳了一记。她为什么不能让他消停呢？毕竟，她已经嫁给了达洛维，而且这么多年来一直和达洛维生活在至高的幸福中。
These hotels are not consoling places. Far from it. Any number of people had hung up their hats on those pegs. Even the flies, if you thought of it, had settled on other people’s noses. As for the cleanliness which hit him in the face, it wasn’t cleanliness, so much as bareness, frigidity; a thing that had to be. Some arid matron made her rounds at dawn sniffing, peering, causing blue- nosed maids to scour, for all the world as if the next visitor were a joint of meat to be served on a perfectly clean platter. For sleep, one bed; for sitting in, one armchair; for cleaning one’s teeth and shaving one’s chin, one tumbler, one looking-glass. Books, letters, dressing-gown, slipped about on the impersonality of the horsehair like incongruous impertinences. And it was Clarissa’s letter that made him see all this. “Heavenly to see you. She must say so!” He folded the paper; pushed it away; nothing would induce him to read it again!
这种旅馆不是让人舒服的地方。远远不是。不知道有多少人曾将帽子挂在这些钩子上面。就连这里的苍蝇，如果你想到的话，也曾经叮在别人的鼻子上。至于说那让他觉得如受打击一般的洁净，它也不是真正的洁净，而是荒凉与冷漠，事情肯定如此啰。因为，呆板的老板娘每天早晨都要做巡视，这里嗅嗅那里瞅瞅，让鼻子冻紫了的女仆擦这个洗那个，整个儿好像下一位客人是摆在一只干净非常的盘子里端上来的一块肉。一张床，用于睡觉；一张扶手椅，用于落座；一只大玻璃杯，一面镜子，用于刷牙刮胡子。书籍，信件，晨衣，散落在冷漠超然的马毛毯子上，显得很是粗鲁，极不协调。是克拉丽莎的信让他注意到了这一切。“见到你多好呀，我必须把这告诉你！”他叠起信纸，放到一边，无论如何他都不会再读第二遍了！
To get that letter to him by six o’clock she must have sat down and written it directly he left her; stamped it; sent somebody to the post. It was, as people say, very like her. She was upset by his visit. She had felt a great deal; had for a moment, when she kissed his hand, regretted, envied him even, remembered possibly (for he saw her look it) something he had said — how they would change the world if she married him perhaps; whereas, it was this; it was middle age; it was mediocrity; then forced herself with her indomitable vitality to put all that aside, there being in her a thread of life which for toughness, endurance, power to overcome obstacles, and carry her triumphantly through he had never known the like of. Yes; but there would come a reaction directly he left the room. She would be frightfully sorry for him; she would think what in the world she could do to give him pleasure (short always of the one thing) and he could see her with the tears running down her cheeks going to her writing-table and dashing off that one line which he was to find greeting him…”Heavenly to see you!” And she meant it.
为了让他在六点钟收到这封信，她一定是在他离开后立即就坐下来写了，贴上邮票，派人去寄掉。如大家说的，她就是这么个人。他的来访给她带来了烦恼。她有了许多感触，有那么一会儿，在她吻他手的时候，她感到遗憾，甚至是嫉妒，也可能（她的表情让他这么觉得）是想起了他说过的什么话——如果她嫁给他，也许他们能大大地改变这个世界。然而，现实并非如此，现实是她已人到中年，依旧一事无成。接着，她用那不屈不挠的力量强迫自己丢开一切，那是在她体内代表着坚韧和毅力的一条生命线，使她克服障碍，获得胜利，他以前从没在任何人身上看见过这种力量。这简直令人难以置信。不过，他一走出那个房间，她就会有某种反应。她会为他觉得遗憾之至，并且会考虑她究竟能做些什么来使他快乐（这是他向来缺乏的东西），他能看见她泪流满面地跑到书桌前，匆匆地写下那一行安慰他的话…“见到你多好呀！”这是她的心里话。
Peter Walsh had now unlaced his boots.
此时，彼德·沃尔什解开了鞋带。
But it would not have been a success, their marriage. The other thing, after all, came so much more naturally.
可他们即使结了婚，也不会成功的。还是另一回事，她嫁给达洛维的那回事，毕竟要自然得多。
It was odd; it was true; lots of people felt it. Peter Walsh, who had done just respectably, filled the usual posts adequately, was liked, but thought a little cranky, gave himself airs — it was odd that HE should have had, especially now that his hair was grey, a contented look; a look of having reserves. It was this that made him attractive to women who liked the sense that he was not altogether manly. There was something unusual about him, or something behind him. It might be that he was bookish — never came to see you without taking up the book on the table (he was now reading, with his bootlaces trailing on the floor); or that he was a gentleman, which showed itself in the way he knocked the ashes out of his pipe, and in his manners of course to women. For it was very charming and quite ridiculous how easily some girl without a grain of sense could twist him round her finger. But at her own risk. That is to say, though he might be ever so easy, and indeed with his gaiety and good-breeding fascinating to be with, it was only up to a point. She said something — no, no; he saw through that. He wouldn’t stand that — no, no. Then he could shout and rock and hold his sides together over some joke with men. He was the best judge of cooking in India. He was a man. But not the sort of man one had to respect — which was a mercy; not like Major Simmons, for instance; not in the least like that, Daisy thought, when, in spite of her two small children, she used to compare them.
多奇怪呀，真的，许多人都这么觉得。彼德·沃尔什，到目前为止所做的事情还算体面，对一般的职务也还能胜任，大家也都喜欢他，不过，大家都认为他有点古怪，喜欢摆谱——奇怪的是他居然会有一种心满意足的表情，尤其是如今他的头发都已灰白，脸上还挂着一副矜持的表情。正是这一点使他在女人眼里很有魅力，她们觉得他并非是十足的大男子主义。他身上，或身后，有什么与众不同之处。也许因为他是个书呆子——他来看你时，从来不会忘记拿起你家桌子上的书看一看（他此时正在阅读，鞋带拖在地板上）；或者因为他是个绅士，那是从他倒烟斗灰的动作里看出来的，当然在他对待女性的态度中也能看出来。这多可爱，又多荒唐呀，没有一点头脑的姑娘都能轻而易举地把他玩弄于股掌之间。不过，这姑娘也有自己的风险。也就是说，尽管他也许向来都很随和，而且确实生性乐观教养良好，跟他在一起令人心旷神怡，但那只是在一定程度上而言。那次，她都说了些什么呀——算了，算了，他看出来了。他受不了那个——算了，算了。随后，他就会和那帮男人为了某个笑话而大喊大叫、摇来晃去、捧腹大笑。他是印度最好的烹饪鉴赏师。他是个男人。但不是那种你一定要尊重他的男人——天可怜见的，比如说，不像西蒙斯少校，一点都不像，戴西想，尽管她有了两个小孩，她还是常常拿他俩做比较。
He pulled off his boots. He emptied his pockets. Out came with his pocket-knife a snapshot of Daisy on the verandah; Daisy all in white, with a fox-terrier on her knee; very charming, very dark; the best he had ever seen of her. It did come, after all so naturally; so much more naturally than Clarissa. No fuss. No bother. No finicking and fidgeting. All plain sailing. And the dark, adorably pretty girl on the verandah exclaimed (he could hear her). Of course, of course she would give him everything! she cried (she had no sense of discretion) everything he wanted! she cried, running to meet him, whoever might be looking. And she was only twenty-four. And she had two children. Well, well!
他脱掉靴子。他掏空口袋。和小折刀一起翻出来的还有一张戴西在阳台上的快照——穿得一身洁白的戴西，膝头趴着一只猎狐犬，非常可爱，黝黑的肤色，他从没见她这么漂亮过。毕竟，一切都显得那么自然，比克拉丽莎要自然得多了。没有吵嘴。没有烦恼。没有吹毛求疵，没有心烦意乱。一切都顺顺利利。那个阳台上的皮肤黝黑、可爱迷人的漂亮姑娘在欢呼着（他能听见）。当然，当然，她会把一切都献给他的！她高喊（她没有谨言慎行的习惯），要给他向往的一切！她高喊着，奔入他的怀抱，全然不顾旁人的目光。她只有二十四岁嘛，已经有了两个孩子。啧，啧！
Well indeed he had got himself into a mess at his age. And it came over him when he woke in the night pretty forcibly. Suppose they did marry? For him it would be all very well, but what about her? Mrs. Burgess, a good sort and no chatterbox, in whom he had confided, thought this absence of his in England, ostensibly to see lawyers might serve to make Daisy reconsider, think what it meant. It was a question of her position, Mrs. Burgess said; the social barrier; giving up her children. She’d be a widow with a past one of these days, draggling about in the suburbs, or more likely, indiscriminate (you know, she said, what such women get like, with too much paint). But Peter Walsh pooh-poohed all that. He didn’t mean to die yet. Anyhow she must settle for herself; judge for herself, he thought, padding about the room in his socks, smoothing out his dress-shirt, for he might go to Clarissa’s party, or he might go to one of the Halls, or he might settle in and read an absorbing book written by a man he used to know at Oxford. And if he did retire, that’s what he’d do — write books. He would go to Oxford and poke about in the Bodleian. Vainly the dark, adorably pretty girl ran to the end of the terrace; vainly waved her hand; vainly cried she didn’t care a straw what people said. There he was, the man she thought the world of, the perfect gentleman, the fascinating, the distinguished (and his age made not the least difference to her), padding about a room in an hotel in Bloomsbury, shaving, washing, continuing, as he took up cans, put down razors, to poke about in the Bodleian, and get at the truth about one or two little matters that interested him. And he would have a chat with whoever it might be, and so come to disregard more and more precise hours for lunch, and miss engagements, and when Daisy asked him, as she would, for a kiss, a scene, fail to come up to the scratch (though he was genuinely devoted to her)– in short it might be happier, as Mrs. Burgess said, that she should forget him, or merely remember him as he was in August 1922, like a figure standing at the cross roads at dusk, which grows more and more remote as the dog-cart spins away, carrying her securely fastened to the back seat, though her arms are outstretched, and as she sees the figure dwindle and disappear still she cries out how she would do anything in the world, anything, anything, anything…
都到了这把年纪，他还真把自己投入了一个混乱的局面。他半夜醒来时，这个想法会猛然袭上他的心头。假设他们结婚了呢？对他来说，一切都会很好的，但对她呢？他曾对伯吉斯太太吐露心事，她是个好人，不爱嚼舌头，她认为他这次回英国，表面上是见律师，但实际上也有助于让戴西重新思考，思考一下婚姻的意义。这是她的地位问题，伯吉斯太太说，还有社会风俗的障碍，还要放弃孩子，等等。在不远的将来，她会成为一个往事不堪回首的寡妇，在郊区混日子，也许更有甚者，成为一个人尽可夫之妇（你知道，她说，这种浓妆艳抹的女人最后会变成什么样子）。但是彼德·沃尔什不相信她说的这一切。他还没打算死呢。总之，戴西必须自己拿主意，自己做判断，他想着，穿着短袜在房间里踱来踱去，用手抚平礼服衬衫，因为他也许会去参加克拉丽莎的派对，或者去哪个音乐厅，或者待在房间里，看一本他以前在牛津认识的某个人写的引人入胜的书。如果哪天他真的退休了，那就是他要做的——写作。他会去牛津大学，在博德利恩[68]里面到处转转。那个黝黑可爱的漂亮姑娘跑到阳台尽头，挥舞着她的手，高喊着自己一点不在乎别人说什么。可是这一切是多么徒劳。他在那儿，这个她认为是整个世界的男人，这个完美的绅士，这个迷人又卓越的男人（他的年龄对她来说一点影响都没有），在布卢姆斯伯里的旅馆房间里踱着步子，刮胡子，梳洗一番，提起水罐，放下剃刀，然后继续想着要到博德利恩去转转，去查查他感兴趣的一两件小事的真相。无论跟谁他都会聊上那么几句，也因此越来越无视午餐的确切时间，错过约会，当戴西要他吻她或好好地亲热一番时，她常这么要求他，他的表现总是不尽如人意（尽管他是真心爱她的）——总之，照伯吉斯太太的说法，她应该忘了他，那样也许会更幸福些，或者只记住1922年8月里的他。那时的他就像薄暮时分站在十字路口的一个影子，当双轮马车稳稳地载着坐在后座里的她渐行渐远时，这个影子也越来越遥远，尽管她伸出了手臂，却还是无奈地看着影子越来越小，渐渐消失，但她依旧在那里高喊着她愿意为他做这个世界上的任何事，任何事，任何事，任何事…【注：[68]牛津大学里的图书馆。】
He never knew what people thought. It became more and more difficult for him to concentrate. He became absorbed; he became busied with his own concerns; now surly, now gay; dependent on women, absent-minded, moody, less and less able (so he thought as he shaved) to understand why Clarissa couldn’t simply find them a lodging and be nice to Daisy; introduce her. And then he could just — just do what? just haunt and hover (he was at the moment actually engaged in sorting out various keys, papers), swoop and taste, be alone, in short, sufficient to himself; and yet nobody of course was more dependent upon others (he buttoned his waistcoat); it had been his undoing. He could not keep out of smoking-rooms, liked colonels, liked golf, liked bridge, and above all women’s society, and the fineness of their companionship, and their faithfulness and audacity and greatness in loving which though it had its drawbacks seemed to him (and the dark, adorably pretty face was on top of the envelopes) so wholly admirable, so splendid a flower to grow on the crest of human life, and yet he could not come up to the scratch, being always apt to see round things (Clarissa had sapped something in him permanently), and to tire very easily of mute devotion and to want variety in love, though it would make him furious if Daisy loved anybody else, furious! for he was jealous, uncontrollably jealous by temperament. He suffered tortures! But where was his knife; his watch; his seals, his note- case, and Clarissa’s letter which he would not read again but liked to think of, and Daisy’s photograph? And now for dinner.
他从来不知道别人在想些什么。要他集中精力变得越来越困难了。他变得心无旁骛，只为自己的事奔忙；一会儿忧郁，一会儿开心；依赖女性，心不在焉，喜怒无常，越来越无法理解（那是他一边刮胡子一边想到的）为什么克拉丽莎不能简简单单地给他们找个住处，不能对戴西友好些呢，为什么不把她介绍给朋友们呢。那样他就可以做——做什么呢？就可以徘徊逗留（他此刻正在致力于将各类钥匙和文件分门别类），悠然地体验人生，一个人，总之，自给自足的。然而，其他人当然没有像他那么依赖别人的（他把马甲纽扣扣上），那是他的致命弱点。他控制不住自己不去吸烟室，他喜欢上校，喜欢高尔夫，喜欢桥牌，最喜欢的是有女人陪伴，她们那细腻的友情，她们对爱情的忠贞、无畏与伟大，尽管她也有缺陷，但他却觉得（那张黝黑、可爱的漂亮脸蛋此时正在一摞信封上面）她无比可爱，如开放在人类生活之巅的一朵绚烂的鲜花。然而他的表现不尽如人意，因为他总是能够把事物看穿（克拉丽莎的打击使他永远都缓不过来），而且特别容易对沉默的感情感到疲倦，渴望丰富多彩的爱，虽说要是戴西爱上了别人他一定会暴跳如雷的，暴跳如雷！因为他生性嫉妒，生性控制不了自己的嫉妒心。他受尽了折磨！可他的刀在哪儿呢？还有他的表、图章、皮夹子，还有那封他不会再读却又愿意常常想起的克拉丽莎的来信，还有戴西的相片，都在哪儿呢？现在是晚饭时间了。
They were eating.
人们正在吃饭呢。
It was not that he said anything, for being solitary he could only address himself to the waiter; it was his way of looking at the menu, of pointing his forefinger to a particular wine, of hitching himself up to the table, of addressing himself seriously, not gluttonously to dinner, that won him their respect; which, having to remain unexpressed for the greater part of the meal, flared up at the table where the Morrises sat when Mr. Walsh was heard to say at the end of the meal, “Bartlett pears.” Why he should have spoken so moderately yet firmly, with the air of a disciplinarian well within his rights which are founded upon justice, neither young Charles Morris, nor old Charles, neither Miss Elaine nor Mrs. Morris knew. But when he said, “Bartlett pears,” sitting alone at his table, they felt that he counted on their support in some lawful demand; was champion of a cause which immediately became their own, so that their eyes met his eyes sympathetically, and when they all reached the smoking-room simultaneously, a little talk between them became inevitable.
他没有说什么，因为孤零零一个人，他只得跟侍者搭话。他看着菜单的神情，食指指向一种特别的葡萄酒，在桌子前拉直裤线，严肃地自言自语，而不是贪婪地狼吞虎咽——所有这一切赢得了别人的尊重，不过，这份尊重，在晚饭的大部分时间里并没有表现出来，直到临近尾声时，沃尔什先生说了句“来点巴特莱特梨吧”，这句话在莫里斯一家人的餐桌上炸响了。他怎么能说得那么温和又坚定，说得像是个在公正的基础上行使着自己权利的立法人，不论是小查尔斯·莫里斯还是老查尔斯，不论是伊莱恩小姐还是莫里斯太太都不知道。不过当他独自坐在桌边说出“巴特莱特梨”时，他们感觉他是在要求他的合法权利，是在召唤着他们的支持，仿佛他是某项事业的捍卫者，而那事业也立刻成为了他们自己的事业，于是他们用同情的目光打量着他。随后他们又一起去了吸烟室，而此时他们之间的交谈已是不可避免的事了。
Sitting at little tables round vases, dressed or not dressed, with their shawls and bags laid beside them, with their air of false composure, for they were not used to so many courses at dinner, and confidence, for they were able to pay for it, and strain, for they had been running about London all day shopping, sightseeing; and their natural curiosity, for they looked round and up as the nice- looking gentleman in horn-rimmed spectacles came in, and their good nature, for they would have been glad to do any little service, such as lend a time-table or impart useful information, and their desire, pulsing in them, tugging at them subterraneously, somehow to establish connections if it were only a birthplace (Liverpool, for example) in common or friends of the same name; with their furtive glances, odd silences, and sudden withdrawals into family jocularity and isolation; there they sat eating dinner when Mr. Walsh came in and took his seat at a little table by the curtain.
人们坐在围绕在放着花瓶的小桌前，有的穿着礼服，有的穿着便服，披巾和提包摆在身旁，摆出一副故作镇定的样子，其实他们还不习惯一顿晚饭上来那么多道菜，然而，他们自信付得起这顿饭钱；同时，他们因一整天都在伦敦观光购物而觉得疲惫；还有他们那天生的好奇心，因为这个戴着玳瑁边眼镜、相貌堂堂的绅士进来时，他们都回头望着他；还有他们那善良的天性，因为他们都乐意为别人提供一些小小的帮助，诸如给别人一张时刻表啦，告诉别人什么有用的信息啦；还有他们的欲望，在他们的心里搏动着，悄悄地牵引着他们，无论如何都要建立起某种联系，哪怕只是出生地（比如说，利物浦）相同，或者认识某个共同的朋友也好呀。他们偷眼瞄着别人，保持古怪的沉默，然后又突然融入到家庭成员间的玩笑中，从而与旁人保持开距离。就在他们坐在那里吃晚饭时，沃尔什先生走了进来，在窗帘旁边的一张小桌子前坐了下来。
It was not very profound — only to the effect that London was crowded; had changed in thirty years; that Mr. Morris preferred Liverpool; that Mrs. Morris had been to the Westminster flower- show, and that they had all seen the Prince of Wales. Yet, thought Peter Walsh, no family in the world can compare with the Morrises; none whatever; and their relations to each other are perfect, and they don’t care a hang for the upper classes, and they like what they like, and Elaine is training for the family business, and the boy has won a scholarship at Leeds, and the old lady (who is about his own age) has three more children at home; and they have two motor cars, but Mr. Morris still mends the boots on Sunday: it is superb, it is absolutely superb, thought Peter Walsh, swaying a little backwards and forwards with his liqueur glass in his hand among the hairy red chairs and ash-trays, feeling very well pleased with himself, for the Morrises liked him. Yes, they liked a man who said, “Bartlett pears.” They liked him, he felt.
他们之间并没有什么深刻的话题——无非是讲讲伦敦的人口密集啦，三十年来发生的巨变啦，莫里斯先生更喜欢利物浦，莫里斯太太去看了威斯敏斯特花展，还有，他们全家都见到了威尔士王子，等等。然而，彼德·沃尔什觉得，世界上没有哪个家庭能和莫里斯一家相比，哪儿也没有。而他们一家相互间的关系也很完美，他们对上流社会全不在意，他们的喜好不受他人的影响，伊莱恩正在学习管理家族企业，她儿子获得了利兹[69]大学的奖学金，老夫人（和他年龄差不多）在家里还另有三个孩子。他们有两辆汽车，但莫里斯先生依旧在礼拜天修自己的鞋，太绝了，实在太绝了，彼德·沃尔什觉得，手里拿着酒杯，身体在毛茸茸的椅子和烟灰缸之间前后摇摆，对自己非常满意，因为莫里斯一家都喜欢他嘛。没错儿，他们喜欢一个会说什么“巴特莱特梨”的男人。他们喜欢他，他这么觉得。【注：[69]英格兰北部一城市。】
He would go to Clarissa’s party. (The Morrises moved off; but they would meet again.) He would go to Clarissa’s party, because he wanted to ask Richard what they were doing in India — the conservative duffers. And what’s being acted? And music… Oh yes, and mere gossip.
他要去参加克拉丽莎的派对（莫里斯一家告辞了，但他们还会再见面的）。他要去参加克拉丽莎的派对，因为他想去问问理查德：他们将对印度采取怎样的政策——这帮保守的傻瓜。眼下伦敦会有些什么表演呢？有什么音乐会呢…哦，对了，都是些飞短流长罢了。
Since it was a very hot night and the paper boys went by with placards proclaiming in huge red letters that there was a heat- wave, wicker chairs were placed on the hotel steps and there, sipping, smoking, detached gentlemen sat. Peter Walsh sat there. One might fancy that day, the London day, was just beginning. Like a woman who had slipped off her print dress and white apron to array herself in blue and pearls, the day changed, put off stuff, took gauze, changed to evening, and with the same sigh of exhilaration that a woman breathes, tumbling petticoats on the floor, it too shed dust, heat, colour; the traffic thinned; motor cars, tinkling, darting, succeeded the lumber of vans; and here and there among the thick foliage of the squares an intense light hung. I resign, the evening seemed to say, as it paled and faded above the battlements and prominences, moulded, pointed, of hotel, flat, and block of shops, I fade, she was beginning, I disappear, but London would have none of it, and rushed her bayonets into the sky, pinioned her, constrained her to partnership in her revelry.
这是个极其炎热的夜晚，报童背着用巨大的红色字体写着“热浪来袭”的布告牌走过，旅馆台阶上摆好了几张藤椅，绅士们悠然自得地坐在那里吸烟喝酒。彼德·沃尔什也坐在那儿。你也许会想象白昼，伦敦的白昼，就这么开始了。就像一个脱去了花裙子和白围兜，准备用蓝色的衣装和珍珠项链来装扮自己的女人，白昼已发生变化，褪去了光华，戴上了薄薄的面纱，就此进入了黄昏，发出一声快乐的叹息，宛如女人将衬裙丢在地上时发出的声音，弃绝了尘埃、暑热和色彩。车流稀疏了，汽车，取代了隆隆的货车，叮当作响，疾驶而过。在广场的四处，在茂盛的树木间，竖着明亮的路灯。我退场了，黄昏似乎在这么说着，在旅馆、公寓和成排的商店或方或圆或凸或尖的房顶上；暮色渐渐苍白、褪色，我要隐退了，她这么说着，我要走了。但伦敦就是不答应，硬是将一把刺刀伸向天空，绑住她，强迫她留下来加入这夜的狂欢。
For this is the truth about our soul, he thought, our self, who fish-like inhabits deep seas and plies among obscurities threading her way between the boles of giant weeds, over sun-flickered spaces and on and on into gloom, cold, deep, inscrutable; suddenly she shoots to the surface and sports on the wind-wrinkled waves; that is, has a positive need to brush, scrape, kindle herself, gossiping. What did the Government mean — Richard Dalloway would know — to do about India?
因为这就是我们灵魂的真相，他想道，我们的自我，如居住在深海中的鱼儿，在昏晦中前进，在连绵的大海藻间闯出一条路来，穿过阳光闪烁的海域，不停地前进，直到进入一个阴沉、寒凉、深邃、神秘的境地。突然之间，鱼儿又蹿出海面，在微风吹皱的浪尖上嬉戏。也就是说，我们有一种积极的需求，我们需要互相挤擦着过活，我们需要点燃自己的激情，我们需要八卦新闻。政府有什么打算呢——理查德·达洛维一定知道——政府准备拿印度怎么办？
For the great revolution of Mr. Willett’s summer time had taken place since Peter Walsh’s last visit to England. The prolonged evening was new to him. It was inspiriting, rather. For as the young people went by with their despatch-boxes, awfully glad to be free, proud too, dumbly, of stepping this famous pavement, joy of a kind, cheap, tinselly, if you like, but all the same rapture, flushed their faces. They dressed well too; pink stockings; pretty shoes. They would now have two hours at the pictures. It sharpened, it refined them, the yellow-blue evening light; and on the leaves in the square shone lurid, livid — they looked as if dipped in sea water — the foliage of a submerged city. He was astonished by the beauty; it was encouraging too, for where the returned Anglo-Indian sat by rights (he knew crowds of them) in the Oriental Club biliously summing up the ruin of the world, here was he, as young as ever; envying young people their summer time and the rest of it, and more than suspecting from the words of a girl, from a housemaid’s laughter — intangible things you couldn’t lay your hands on — that shift in the whole pyramidal accumulation which in his youth had seemed immovable. On top of them it had pressed; weighed them down, the women especially, like those flowers Clarissa’s Aunt Helena used to press between sheets of grey blotting-paper with Littré’s dictionary on top, sitting under the lamp after dinner. She was dead now. He had heard of her, from Clarissa, losing the sight of one eye. It seemed so fitting — one of nature’s masterpieces — that old Miss Parry should turn to glass. She would die like some bird in a frost gripping her perch. She belonged to a different age, but being so entire, so complete, would always stand up on the horizon, stone-white, eminent, like a lighthouse marking some past stage on this adventurous, long, long voyage, this interminable (he felt for a copper to buy a paper and read about Surrey and Yorkshire — he had held out that copper millions of times. Surrey was all out once more)– this interminable life. But cricket was no mere game. Cricket was important. He could never help reading about cricket. He read the scores in the stop press first, then how it was a hot day; then about a murder case. Having done things millions of times enriched them, though it might be said to take the surface off. The past enriched, and experience, and having cared for one or two people, and so having acquired the power which the young lack, of cutting short, doing what one likes, not caring a rap what people say and coming and going without any very great expectations (he left his paper on the table and moved off), which however (and he looked for his hat and coat) was not altogether true of him, not to-night, for here he was starting to go to a party, at his age, with the belief upon him that he was about to have an experience. But what?
自从彼德·沃尔什上次回英国以来，威利特先生的伟大革命——夏令时，就已经开始了。延长的黄昏对他是桩新鲜事。还相当振奋人心呢。小伙子们拿着公文箱走过去，因获得了自由而欣喜若狂，还傻乎乎地觉得骄傲，为能走在这条著名的人行道上而感到无比快乐，也许是庸俗，是华而不实的虚荣心，如果你想那么说也行，但那欢天喜地的心情，依然在他们的脸上映出了红晕。他们穿得也很考究，淡红的长袜和挺括的皮鞋。他们现在要去电影院消遣两个小时。黄中透蓝的暮色使他们的轮廓分明起来，也使他们显得更为优雅。暮色把广场上的树叶映得一片苍黄青灰——它们看上去仿佛是浸在海水中一般——一座沉没在海底的城市里的树叶。这样的美令他惊骇，也令他鼓舞，因为那些从印度回来的英国人会心安理得地坐在东方俱乐部里（他认识不少这样的人），怒气冲冲地总结着世界的腐败，而他还在这里，还和以前一样年轻。尽管如此，他依然嫉妒年轻人的夏日时光以及别的一切，还从一个姑娘的话语中，从一个女仆的笑声中——这些都是你无法掌握的无形之物——怀疑起在青年时代里觉得不可动摇地堆积起来的那座金字塔型的社会发生了变化。它曾经压在他们的头顶上，把他们压垮，尤其是女性，就像克拉丽莎的海伦娜姑妈的花，她在晚饭后常常坐在台灯下，把它们夹在灰色吸墨纸之间，上面再压上一本利特雷词典。她现在已经过世了。他从克拉丽莎那里听说，她一只眼睛失明了。似乎很合适——简直是大自然的一大杰作——那个老帕里小姐居然会有个玻璃球眼珠。她会像在风雪中紧紧攀住树枝的一只鸟儿那般死去的。她属于另一个世纪，但她是如此完美，如此统一，她永远都会站立在地平线上，如石头一般洁白刚毅，如一座灯塔，在这个充满危险的、无比漫长的旅途上，在这个没有尽头的（他掏出一枚铜板买了份报纸，看一看萨里和约克郡的板球赛——他已经千百万次掏出过铜板了。萨里又一次出局了）——在这个没有尽头的生活中，标志出一段已然逝去的往昔。但板球不仅仅是一种体育运动。板球是很重要的。他总忍不住想看看板球赛的消息。他先看看报纸付印时临时插进去的最新比分，然后再看天气到底有多热，然后再看一桩谋杀案的报道。同一件事做了千百万次会使这事变得意义丰富，尽管也可以说会使之黯然乏味。过去变得丰富，还积累下经验，曾经在乎过那么一两个人，于是具有了年轻人缺乏的力量，化复杂为简单，做自己想做的，不在乎别人的风言风语，凡事不抱太大期望（他把报纸留在桌上跑掉了），不过他也并非完全如此（他去拿自己的帽子和大衣），至少今晚不是，因为他此刻正准备去参加派对，在他这样的年龄，还满怀期待地以为会有什么事情即将发生在自己身上。但会发生什么呢？
Beauty anyhow. Not the crude beauty of the eye. It was not beauty pure and simple — Bedford Place leading into Russell Square. It was straightness and emptiness of course; the symmetry of a corridor; but it was also windows lit up, a piano, a gramophone sounding; a sense of pleasure-making hidden, but now and again emerging when, through the uncurtained window, the window left open, one saw parties sitting over tables, young people slowly circling, conversations between men and women, maids idly looking out (a strange comment theirs, when work was done), stockings drying on top ledges, a parrot, a few plants. Absorbing, mysterious, of infinite richness, this life. And in the large square where the cabs shot and swerved so quick, there were loitering couples, dallying, embracing, shrunk up under the shower of a tree; that was moving; so silent, so absorbed, that one passed, discreetly, timidly, as if in the presence of some sacred ceremony to interrupt which would have been impious. That was interesting. And so on into the flare and glare.
总之，是美感。不是眼睛里生涩的美，也不是简单纯粹的美——从贝德福德街到拉塞尔广场。当然，这一段路笔直而空阔，有对称的走廊，但也有灯火闪耀的窗户，一架钢琴，一架放着音乐的唱机。你会感觉到人们在偷偷地寻欢作乐，但时不时也会显露出来，透过拉开帷幔的窗户，窗门打开着，你可以看见一群人围桌而坐，年轻人在翩翩起舞，男人和女人在交谈，女仆懒散地看着窗外（那是她们表示工作已经完成的奇特方式）。长袜晾在顶层壁架上，一只鹦鹉，几株花草。引人入胜，神秘莫测，无限广阔，是这样的生活。在这个宽阔的广场上，出租车呼啸而过，猛然打弯，情侣们在闲荡，躲在树荫下甜言蜜语、卿卿我我，真是感人，如此静谧，如此专注，人们小心翼翼地、不好意思地从他们身边走过，仿佛在出席某种神圣的仪式，任何打搅都是一种亵渎的行为。这真有意思。他继续前行，走入一个灯火辉煌的世界。
Was everybody dining out, then? Doors were being opened here by a footman to let issue a high-stepping old dame, in buckled shoes, with three purple ostrich feathers in her hair. Doors were being opened for ladies wrapped like mummies in shawls with bright flowers on them, ladies with bare heads. And in respectable quarters with stucco pillars through small front gardens lightly swathed with combs in their hair (having run up to see the children), women came; men waited for them, with their coats blowing open, and the motor started. Everybody was going out. What with these doors being opened, and the descent and the start, it seemed as if the whole of London were embarking in little boats moored to the bank, tossing on the waters, as if the whole place were floating off in carnival. And Whitehall was skated over, silver beaten as it was, skated over by spiders, and there was a sense of midges round the arc lamps; it was so hot that people stood about talking. And here in Westminster was a retired Judge, presumably, sitting four square at his house door dressed all in white. An Anglo-Indian presumably.
那么，大家都出去吃饭了吗？有个男仆打开了这里的一扇门，出来一位走路大刀阔斧的老妇人，穿着搭襻鞋，头发上插着三根紫色的鸵鸟毛。另外几扇门也打开了，出来几位头戴鲜花、身裹披巾如木乃伊般的女士，还有没戴头饰的女士。在有着装饰立柱的高档住宅区里，女人们头上插着梳子（她们刚才跑上楼去看了下小孩）穿过门前稍稍修饰过的小花园而来；男人们在等着她们，微风吹开了他们的轻大衣，汽车已经发动好了。大家都要出门。大门一扇扇打开了，人们走下台阶出发，于是乎整个伦敦都出动了，人们仿佛在登上停泊在岸边的一只只小船，小船随着波浪颠簸，仿佛整个地方都在摇摆着过狂欢节呢。白厅如一张银箔，弧光灯闪过，如覆上了道道蛛丝，似乎有一群蚊子在围着弧光灯飞舞。天气这么热，大家站在那里交谈。而在这里的威斯敏斯特，有一个退休的法官，披一件白袍，端端正正地坐在家门口，也许还是个英印混血儿呢。
His light overcoat blew open, he stepped with indescribable idiosyncrasy, lent a little forward, tripped, with his hands behind his back and his eyes still a little hawklike; he tripped through London, towards Westminster, observing.
微风吹开了他的轻便大衣，他走起路来有一种无法形容的特质，身子微微前倾，磕磕绊绊的，手放在背后，眼睛有点像老鹰似的。他摇摇晃晃地穿过伦敦，朝威斯敏斯特走去，一边观察着。
The cold stream of visual impressions failed him now as if the eye were a cup that overflowed and let the rest run down its china walls unrecorded. The brain must wake now. The body must contract now, entering the house, the lighted house, where the door stood open, where the motor cars were standing, and bright women descending: the soul must brave itself to endure. He opened the big blade of his pocket-knife.
此时，他已招架不住那视觉印象的寒流，眼睛就如同一只满溢的杯子，任凭所有的一切沿着杯子的瓷壁流下，不留任何痕迹。此时，大脑必须保持清醒。身体必须保持紧绷，走进这所房子，这所灯火通明的房子，门大敞着，汽车停在门前，明艳照人的女士们走下车来：灵魂必须鼓起勇气，来应对这一切。他打开那把折刀的刀片。
And here a shindy of brawling women, drunken women; here only a policeman and looming houses, high houses, domed houses, churches, parliaments, and the hoot of a steamer on the river, a hollow misty cry. But it was her street, this, Clarissa’s; cabs were rushing round the corner, like water round the piers of a bridge, drawn together, it seemed to him because they bore people going to her party, Clarissa’s party.
在这儿，有一群吵吵闹闹、叽叽喳喳的女人，喝醉酒的女人；在那儿，只有一个警察，还有朦胧的房屋，巍峨的大厦，穹顶的房子，教堂，国会，河上传来的一艘汽船的呜呜声，一声空洞而神秘的呼号。可这里是她的街道，这条街，是克拉丽莎的居所。出租车沿着街角疾驶，如冲击着桥墩的水流，它们会集在这里，他这么想，是为了要载上人们去参加她的派对，克拉丽莎的派对。
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