經典科幻文學:《宇宙盡頭的餐館》第14章3
“Nice chandeliers though,” said Trillian.
They looked about themselves in bemusement.
“It’s not so much an afterlife,” said Arthur, “more a sort of apres vie.”
The chandeliers were in fact a little on the flashy side and the low vaulted ceiling from which they hung would not, in an ideal Universe, have been painted in that particular shade of deep turquoise, and even if it had been it wouldn’t have been highlighted by concealed moodlighting. This is not, however, an ideal Universe, as was further evidenced by the eye-crossing patterns of the inlaid marble floor, and the way in which the fronting for the eighty-yard long marble-topped bar had been made. The fronting for the eighty-yard long marble-topped bar had been made by stitching together nearly twenty thousand Antarean Mosaic Lizard skins, despite the fact that the twenty thousand lizards concerned had needed them to keep their insides in.
A few smartly dressed creatures were lounging casually at the bar or relaxing in the richly coloured body-hugging seats that were deployed here and there about the bar area. A young Vl’Hurg officer and his green steaming young lady passed through the large smoked glass doors at the far end of the bar into the dazzling light of the main body of the Restaurant beyond.
Behind Arthur was a large curtained bay window. He pulled aside the corner of the curtain and looked out at a landscape which under normal circumstances would have given Arthur the creeping horrors. These were not, however, normal circumstances, for the thing that froze his blood and made his skin try to crawl up his back and off the top of his head was the sky. The sky was…
An attendant flunkey politely drew the curtain back into place.
“All in good time, sir,” he said.
Zaphod’s eyes flashed.
“Hey, hang about you dead guys,” he said, “I think we’re missing some ultra-important thing here you know. Something somebody said and we missed it.”
Arthur was profoundly relieved to turn his attention from what he had just seen.
He said, “I said it was a sort of apres…”
“Yeah, and don’t you wish you hadn’t?” said Zaphod, “Ford?”
“I said it was odd.”
“Yeah, shrewd but dull, perhaps it was…”
“而且有華麗的吊燈。”崔莉恩説。
他們迷惑地看着四周。
“不大像來世，”阿瑟説，“倒更像一場招待宴會。”
實際上，這些吊燈顯得有點兒俗豔，掛在低矮的拱形天花板上。如果在一個完美的宇宙中，這種天花板是不會描繪上這樣特別的深綠松石色陰影的；即使這樣做了，也不會又用隱蔽射燈打出的高光加以突出。然而，這並不是一個完美的宇宙，這一點又得到了進一步證明：大理石地板上鑲嵌着的交叉眼腈圖案，以及足有八十碼長的大理石面吧枱前部的設計風格。這個足有八十碼長的大理石面吧枱前部由差不多兩萬塊來自心宿二的蜥蜴皮鑲嵌縫製而成，儘管這兩萬只蜥蜴是那麼需要這些皮來覆蓋自己的軀體。
穿着時髦的傢伙在吧枱前隨意閒逛，或者放鬆地坐在酒吧區內隨處放置的顏色豔麗、能把身體完全裹住的座位上。一個年輕的維爾哈格星官員和他年輕而叉興致勃勃的綠色女伴穿過吧枱遠端那些巨大的黑玻璃門，走進光彩奪目的餐館主體部分。
阿瑟身後是一扇被窗簾遮住的巨大凸窗。他撩起窗簾的一個角，看到的是一片荒涼陰沉的景象：灰暗、坑坑窪窪、滿目悽慘。要是在普通環境裏，這樣的景象會讓阿瑟不寒而慄。然而，這裏不是普通環境。在這裏是另一種東西使他血液凍結，使他後背直起雞皮疙瘩，好像皮膚想從後背爬上頭頂，再從頭頂掙脱，徹底離開他。是這裏的天空……
一個服務生走過來，禮貌地把窗簾放回遠處。
“一切都很好，先生。”他説。
贊福德的眼光閃動了一下。
“嘿，等一等，死了的夥計們。”他説，“嗯，我想我們忽略了到這地方以來最重要的一句話，非常重要。某個人説了某句話，而我們忽略了。”
阿瑟總算可以不理會剛才見到的那番景象了，他如釋重負。
他説：“我倒是説過，這像是一場宴會。”
“是的…難道你不希望自己壓根兒沒説過這句話嗎？”贊福德説，“福特？”
“我説過這裏很古怪。”
“是的，説得極其正確，般其無意義。也許這裏是……”
