諾貝爾文學經典:《寵兒》第2章Part 3

Little rice, little bean,No meat in between.
Hard work ain't easy,Dry bread ain't greasy.
He was up now and singing as he mended things he had broken the day before. Some old pieces ofsong he'd learned on the prison farm or in the War afterward. Nothing like what they sang at SweetHome, where yearning fashioned every note.
The songs he knew from Georgia were flat-headed nails for pounding and pounding and pounding.
Lay my bead on the railroad line,Train come along, pacify my mind.
If I had my weight in lime,I'd whip my captain till he went stone blind.
five-cent nickel, Ten-cent dime,Busting rocks is busting time.
But they didn't fit, these songs. They were too loud, had too much power for the little house choreshe was engaged in — resetting table legs; glazing.
He couldn't go back to "Storm upon the Waters" that they sang under the trees of Sweet Home, sohe contented himself with mmmmmmmmm, throwing in a line if one occurred to him, and whatoccurred over and over was "Bare feet and chamomile sap,/ Took off my shoes; took off my hat."It was tempting to change the words (Gimme back my shoes; gimme back my hat), because hedidn't believe he could live with a woman — any woman — for over two out of three months. Thatwas about as long as he could abide one place. After Delaware and before that Alfred, Georgia,where he slept underground and crawled into sunlight for the sole purpose of breaking rock,walking off when he got ready was the only way he could convince himself that he would nolonger have to sleep, pee, eat or swing a sledge hammer in chains. But this was not a normalwoman in a normal house. As soon as he had stepped through the red light he knew that, comparedto 124, the rest of the world was bald. After Alfred he had shut down a generous portion of hishead, operating on the part that helped him walk, eat, sleep, sing. If he could do those things —with a little work and a little sex thrown in — he asked for no more, for more required him todwell on Halle's face and Sixo laughing. To recall trembling in a box built into the eful for the daylight spent doing mule work in a quarry because he did not tremble when hehad a hammer in his hands. The box had done what Sweet Home had not, what working like an assand living like a dog had not: drove him crazy so he would not lose his mind.
By the time he got to Ohio, then to Cincinnati, then to Halle Suggs' mother's house, he thought hehad seen and felt it all. Even now as he put back the window frame he had smashed, he could notaccount for the pleasure in his surprise at seeing Halle's wife alive, barefoot with uncovered hair— walking around the corner of the house with her shoes and stockings in her hands. The closedportion of his head opened like a greased lock.
"I was thinking of looking for work around here. What you think?"

一點米，一點豆，就是不給肉。
乾重活，累斷腿，麪包沒油水。
現在他起牀了，一邊修理前一天打壞的東西，一邊唱着歌。他在監獄農場和後來戰爭期間學的那幾首老歌。根本不像他們在“甜蜜之家”唱的，在“甜蜜之家”，熱望鑄成了每一個音符。
他從佐治亞學來的歌是平頭釘子，教人敲呀敲的只管敲。
我的頭枕在鐵道上，火車來碾平我的思想。
我要是變成石灰人，肯定抽瞎我的隊長。
五分錢鋼鏰，一毛錢銀角，砸石頭就是砸時光。
但是太不合時宜了，這些歌。對於他正在從事的那點家務活———重安桌子腿、裝修玻璃窗———來說，它們太響亮、太有勁了。
他已唱不出過去在“甜蜜之家”樹下唱的《水上暴風雨》了，所以他滿足於“呣，呣，呣”，想起一句就加進去一句，那一遍又一遍出現的總是：“光着腳丫，春黃菊，脫我的鞋，脫我的帽。”改詞很吸引人（還我的鞋，還我的帽），因爲他不相信自己能和一個女人———任何女人———在一起住太久，三個月裏不能超過兩個月。離開特拉華之後，他在一個地方大概只能逗留這麼長時間。再以前是佐治亞的阿爾弗雷德，在那裏，他睡在地下，只在砸石頭時才爬到陽光裏。只有準備好隨時走掉，才能使他相信，他不必再帶着鎖鏈睡覺、拉屎、吃飯和掄大錘了。然而這不是一個尋常房子裏的尋常女人。他剛一走過紅光就知道，比起124號，世界上其他地方都不過是童山禿嶺。逃離阿爾弗雷德後，他封閉了相當一部分頭腦，只使用幫他走路、吃飯、睡覺和唱歌的那部分。只要能做這幾件事———再加進一點工作和一點性交———他就別無所求，否則他就會耽溺於黑爾的面孔和西克索的大笑。就會憶起在地下囚籠裏的顫抖。即使在採石場的陽光下當牛做馬他也不勝感激，因爲一旦手握大錘他就不再哆嗦了。那牢籠起了“甜蜜之家”都沒起到的作用，起了驢一般勞動、狗一般生活都沒起到的作用：把他逼瘋，使他不至於自己瘋掉。
後來他去了俄亥俄，去了辛辛那提，直到站在黑爾·薩格斯的母親的房子前，他仍然覺得沒有什麼事情自己沒見過、沒感受過。然而，甚至現在，當他重新安裝被自己砸壞的窗框時，他也還是說不清見到黑爾的妻子時那種由衷的驚喜———她還活着，沒戴頭巾，赤着腳、手拿鞋襪從房子的拐角處走來。他頭腦的關閉部分像上了油的鎖一樣打開了。
“我想在附近找個差事。你說呢？”