简译短篇｜仙人掌
Comeandtakeme.请来把我带走。...
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The Cactus
仙人掌
仙人掌
作者：【美】欧·亨利
翻译／大星星 编辑／_23
导语
The most notable thing about Time is that it is so purely relative. A large amount of reminiscence is, by common consent, conceded to the drowning man; and it is not past belief that one may review an entire courtship while removing one's gloves.
而我们的主人公Trysdale就处在这样的状态中。在某处单身公寓里，Trysdale站在一张桌子旁边。桌子上，红色陶罐里长了一株奇特的绿色植物。这株植物是仙人掌的一种，有着细长如触手般的叶子，微风拂过，那不断摇摆的叶子就好像在向人招手。
That is what Trysdale was doing, standing by a table in his bachelor apartments. On the table stood a singular-looking green plant in a red earthen jar. The plant was one of the species of cacti, and was provided with long, tentacular leaves that perpetually swayed with the slightest breeze with a peculiar beckoning motion.
Trysdale的朋友，也是新娘的哥哥，正站在餐具柜旁，抱怨着自己竟一个人喝了这么多酒。他们两个都还穿着晚礼服，在黑暗之中，礼服上的胸针如星星般闪烁着。
Trysdale's friend, the brother of the bride, stood at a sideboard complaining at being allowed to drink alone. Both men were in evening dress. White favors like stars upon their coats shone through the gloom of the apartment.
当Trysdale慢慢地脱下手套时，几个小时前发生的事情在他的脑海里一闪而过。他甚至还能闻到教堂里的花朵散发的香味，还能听到宾客们低声而有涵养的交谈和衣摆碰触时发出的沙沙声，而一直在耳边盘旋的，是牧师拉长音调，宣布她将嫁给另一个男人。
As he slowly unbuttoned his gloves, there passed through Trysdale's mind a swift, scarifying retrospect of the last few hours. It seemed that in his nostrils was still the scent of the flowers that had been banked in odorous masses about the church, and in his ears the lowpitched hum of a thousand well-bred voices, the rustle of crisp garments, and, most insistently recurring, the drawling words of the minister irrevocably binding her to another.
他到底是怎样失去了她？这个念头压得他不能喘息，但这好像已成了他的一种思维习惯。在这残酷的现实的打压下，他猛然间意识到自己正被迫面对着之前从未面对过的东西——他那内心深处荒芜枯燥的自我。
From this last hopeless point of view he still strove, as if it had become a habit of his mind, to reach some conjecture as to why and how he had lost her. Shaken rudely by the uncompromising fact, he had suddenly found himself confronted by a thing he had never before faced --his own innermost, unmitigated, arid unbedecked self.
他看到，他那虚伪和自负的外壳，如今都已变成了愚蠢的碎布。他颤抖着想到，在他人看来，那外壳一定陈腐而可悲。
He saw all the garbs of pretence and egoism that he had worn now turn to rags of folly. He shuddered at the thought that to others, before now, the garments of his soul must have appeared sorry and threadbare.
虚伪和自负？正是它们撑起了他的外壳。而她始终是不为这两者所染的——但是为什么——当她缓步穿过侧廊，走向圣坛时，他感受到了强烈的悲哀。他努力说服自己，她之所以脸色苍白，是因为其他男人，而不是那个她要托付一生的人。但是，老天就连最微小的安慰也不愿施舍给他。因为，当那个男人执起她的手时，他看到了她眼中的憧憬和美好。他知道自己已经被遗忘了。曾几何时，她也是这样看着他，并且他能懂其中的爱意。而如今，支撑他自负感的最后一根柱子已经轰然倒塌。
Vanity and conceit? These were the joints in his armor. And how free from either she had always been--But why--As she had slowly moved up the aisle toward the altar he had felt an unworthy, sullen exultation that had served to support him. He had told himself that her paleness was from thoughts of another than the man to whom she was about to give herself. But even that poor consolation had been wrenched from him. For, when he saw that swift, limpid, upward look that she gave the man when he took her hand, he knew himself to be forgotten. Once that same look had been raised to him, and he had gauged its meaning. Indeed, his conceit had crumbled; its last prop was gone.
为什么就这样结束了？他们之间并没有过任何争吵，并没有——
Why had it ended thus? There had been no quarrel between them, nothing--
千遍万遍，他在脑中回忆着最后几天发生的剧变。
For the thousandth time he remarshalled in his mind the events of those last few days before the tide had so suddenly turned.
She had always insisted upon placing him upon a pedestal, and he had accepted her homage with royal grandeur. It had been a very sweet incense that she had burned before him; so modest (he told himself); so childlike and worshipful, and (he would once have sworn) so sincere. She had invested him with an almost supernatural number of high attributes and excellencies and talents, and he had absorbed the oblation as a desert drinks the rain that can coax from it no promise of blossom or fruit.
当Trysdale冷冷地摘下最后那只手套时，他终于想起了自己最大的愚蠢和自负之处。
As Trysdale grimly wrenched apart the seam of his last glove, the crowning instance of his fatuous and tardily mourned egoism came vividly back to him.
那是在某个晚上，他邀请她来他的房间，与她分享自己的伟大事迹。而现在，悲痛使他无法回忆起那天晚上她迷人的美丽——飘扬的头发，姣好的容貌，温柔的言语。这一切是让他喋喋不休地夸耀着自己的宏伟经历的强大动力。期间，她问道：“Carruthers船长说你的西班牙语说得非常好，为什么不告诉我？还有什么是你不知道的？”
The scene was the night when he had asked her to come up on his pedestal with him and share his greatness. He could not, now, for the pain of it, allow his mind to dwell upon the memory of her convincing beauty that night--the careless wave of her hair, the tenderness and virginal charm of her looks and words. But they had been enough, and they had brought him to speak. During their conversation she had said:"And Captain Carruthers tells me that you speak the Spanish language like a native. Why have you hidden this accomplishment from me? Is there anything you do not know?"
哈，Carruthers果然是个傻瓜。毫无疑问，将词典最后几页的老式西班牙谚语背会，然后在俱乐部里卖弄，这多少使Trysdale有些愧疚（虽然他经常干这种事）。而Carruthers，他的疯狂追捧者之一，却将自己这个值得怀疑的学识蓄意夸大了。
Now, Carruthers was an idiot. No doubt he (Trysdale) had been guilty (he sometimes did such things) of airing at the club some old, canting Castilian proverb dug from the hotchpotch at the back of dictionaries. Carruthers, who was one of his incontinent admirers, was the very man to have magnified this exhibition of doubtful erudition.
但是，哎呀！被她崇拜的感觉是如此美好，于是他便没有否认。他沉浸在她对自己卓越的西班牙语学识的赞美中，酥软下来的大脑也并没有感受到那根荆棘的存在——那根之后会狠狠刺伤他的荆棘。
But, alas! the incense of her admiration had been so sweet and flattering. He allowed the imputation to pass without denial. Without protest, he allowed her to twine about his brow this spurious bay of Spanish scholarship. He let it grace his conquering head, and, among its soft convolutions, he did not feel the prick of the thorn that was to pierce him later.
当他单膝下跪，向她求婚时，她是多么的开心，多么的害羞，就像只小鸟一样，激动得发抖。无论是当时还是现在，他都可以发誓，那时她眼里闪烁着毋庸置疑的应许。
How glad, how shy, how tremulous she was! How she fluttered like a snared bird when he laid his mightiness at her feet! He could have sworn, and he could swear now, that unmistakable consent was in her eyes, but, coyly, she would give him no direct answer.
不过她没有给他一个直接的答案。“我明天回复你。”她说。他如一个自信的胜利者，微笑着同意了。
"I will send you my answer tomorrow," she said; and he, the indulgent,confident victor, smilingly granted the delay.
The next day he waited, impatient, in his rooms for the word. At noon her groom came to the door and left the strange cactus in the red earthen jar. There was no note, no message, merely a tag upon the plant bearing a barbarous foreign or botanical name. He waited until night, but her answer did not come. His large pride and hurt vanity kept him from seeking her.
两天后的一个晚宴上，他们相遇了。简短的寒暄后，她紧张又期待地看着他，而他，则礼貌又冷酷地等待着她的解释。凭借女人特有的敏锐直觉，她似乎得到了某些暗示，然后开始变得心灰意冷，冷若冰霜。就是从那之后，他们逐渐疏远。
Two evenings later they met at a dinner. Their greetings were conventional, but she looked at him, breathless, wondering, eager. He was courteous, adamant, waiting her explanation. With womanly swiftness she took her cue from his manner, and turned to snow and ice. Thus, and wider from this on, they had drifted apart.
他错在哪里了？到底是谁的错？随着自负感逐渐消失，他开始思考这些问题，是不是——
Where was his fault? Who had been to blame? Humbled now, he sought the answer amid the ruins of his self-conceit. If--
朋友的声音突然打断了他的思绪：“我说，Trysdale，你到底怎么了？怎么看起来这么不开心，就好像结婚的是你似的，而你只不过是参加我妹妹的婚礼而已。瞧我，坐着一艘满是了大蒜气味和蟑螂的船，从南美洲赶了2000英里来参加这个婚礼，看看我肩上的担子多轻啊。我就只有这么一个妹妹，而现在她也出嫁了。走吧，我们喝酒去。”
The voice of the other man in the room, querulously intruding upon his thoughts, aroused him.“I say, Trysdale, what the deuce is the matter with you? You look unhappy as if you yourself had been married instead of having acted merely as an accomplice. Look at me, another accessory, come two thousand miles on a garlicky, cockroachy banana steamer all the way from South America to connive at the sacrifice--please to observe how lightly my guilt rests upon my shoulders. Only little sister I had, too, and now she's gone. Come now! take something to ease your conscience."
“谢了，但我现在不想喝。”Trysdale说。
"I don't drink just now, thanks," said Trysdale.
“你的白兰地，”朋友再次过来，走到他旁边，“可真难喝。有空到蓬塔雷东达找我，我可以带你试试老加西亚走私来的货，那可真是棒极了！哦，瞧啊，这可是我的老相识了。你从哪里弄来的这株仙人掌，Trysdale？”
"Your brandy," resumed the other, coming over and joining him, "is abominable. Run down to see me some time at Punta Redonda, and try some of our stuff that old Garcia smuggles in. It's worth the, trip. Hallo! here's an old acquaintance. Wherever did you rake up this cactus, Trysdale?"
“礼物而已，”Trysdale说道，“一朋友送的。知道是什么品种吗？”
"A present," said Trysdale, "from a friend. Know the species?"
“你算问对人了。这是一种热带品种，在蓬塔到处都是。上面的标签有名字。你会西班牙语吗？Trysdale。”
"Very well. It's a tropical concern. See hundreds of 'em around Punta every day. Here's the name on this tag tied to it. Know any Spanish, Trysdale?"
“不，不会，”Trysdale带着苦涩的微笑回答，“这是西班牙语？”
"No," said Trysdale, with the bitter wraith of a smile--"Is it Spanish?"
“对啊，当地人认为这种仙人掌的叶子在向人招手，便把它叫做‘Ventomarme’，英语的意思是‘请来把我带走’。”
"Yes. The natives imagine the leaves are reaching out and beckoning to you. They call it by this name--Ventomarme. Name means in English, 'Come and take me.'"
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