一隻牽動全美網民的“蜘蛛俠”浣熊

At first, it looked so defeated: Its head buried between its front paws and its body curled up on a ledge 20 feet above a street in downtown St. Paul.

起初，它看上去悲觀失落，腦袋埋在前爪和身體之間，蜷縮在聖保羅市中心街頭一個20英尺高（約合6米）的窗沿上。

But this was a raccoon, after all — part of a deceptive and unpredictable family of nocturnal mammals whose panda-like looks lull humans into forgetting they can carry multiple diseases. Nonetheless, three maintenance workers shortly before noon on Tuesday thought they could rouse the raccoon from its stupor and offered it a ladder to climb down from the ledge.

但它畢竟是一隻浣熊，屬於一個充滿欺騙性而難以預測的夜行哺乳動物種類，它們熊貓般的外表騙住了人類，讓人忘了它們可能攜帶多種病菌。儘管如此，在週二中午之前不久，三個維修工覺得他們可以讓這隻浣熊從恍惚中清醒過來，還給它預備了一個從窗沿上爬下來的梯子。

It was the start of a mesmerizing escape — captivating people in Minnesota and then nationwide on Twitter.

一場引人入勝的逃生就這樣開始了——它打動了明尼蘇達州人，然後是全國的Twitter網民。

The raccoon, clearly not ready to give up and not a fan of ladders, jolted from the recess of the building, dug its long fingernails into the tan exterior and scurried over to another side. It started to climb and climb and climb.

這隻浣熊顯然還不準備放棄，而且也不大喜歡梯子，它從大廈凹進去的地方一躍而出，長長的指甲抓着大廈棕褐色的外牆，匆匆轉向另一側，開始不斷往上爬，爬啊爬。

Raccoons are skilled climbers with strong claws and will rapidly scurry up trees to escape danger. By rotating their hind feet, they can descend from trees headfirst, according to the book “Adirondack Mammals.”

浣熊極爲擅長攀登，它們的爪子很有力，能迅速爬上樹，逃離危險。《阿迪朗達克哺乳動物》(Adirondack Mammals)一書中寫道，它們還可以輪流擺動後足，頭朝下地從樹上爬下來。

The St. Paul raccoon scaled the two-story building with ease. But there was a bigger challenge ahead: the UBS Plaza, a 25-story office tower and St. Paul’s 15th-tallest building. Within minutes, the raccoon had ascended five stories.

聖保羅的這隻浣熊輕鬆爬上這座兩層建築。但是，前方還有一個更大的挑戰：瑞銀廣場大廈(UBS Plaza)，這座25層的辦公樓是聖保羅排名第15的高層建築。幾分鐘內，浣熊已經爬上了五層。

About 10 minutes later, the raccoon was pressed against the 12th floor, now a mere dark spot between two windows more than 100 feet above the street. Then the raccoon reached the 15th floor and then the 20th.

大約10分鐘後，浣熊的身體緊貼在12層的位置，成了街道上方100多英尺高（約合30米）的兩扇窗戶之間的一個黑點。然後，浣熊到達了15樓，然後是20樓。

While it’s normal for raccoons to climb 20 or 30 feet, scaling a large building is very unusual, said Russell L. Burke, a biology professor at Hofstra University.

雖然浣熊爬上二三十英尺的高度是正常的，但爬上大型建築物非常罕見，霍夫斯特拉大學(Hofstra University)生物學教授拉塞爾·L·伯克(Russell L. Burke)說。

Gawkers flooded the streets below UBS Plaza. Some brought binoculars. A girl clutched a raccoon stuffed animal. A marquee on Minnesota Public Radio’s building across the street flashed the breaking news: “St. Paul’s downtown raccoon reaches new heights.”

圍觀者涌向瑞銀廣場周圍的街道。有人還帶上了雙筒望遠鏡。一個女孩手裏抓着一隻浣熊毛絨動物。街對面明尼蘇達州公共廣播電臺大樓的電子屏上閃現出突發新聞：“聖保羅市中心的浣熊爬到新高度。”

Inside the tower, employees pressed their faces against the windows hoping to catch a glimpse of it. On the 23rd floor of UBS Plaza, Sheila Donnelly-Coyne, a partner at Paige J. Donnelly, a St. Paul law firm, huddled with her co-workers and started to chronicle the raccoon’s journey.

大廈內部，員工們把臉貼在窗戶上，希望能看它一眼。在瑞銀廣場23層，聖保羅律師事務所佩奇·J·唐納利(Paige J. Donnelly)的合夥人謝拉·唐納利-科因(Sheila Donnelly-Coyne)和同事們擠在一起，開始記錄這隻浣熊的旅程。

Their thoughts raced. Who will rescue it? Will it fall?

他們腦海裏轉過各種念頭。誰來救救它？它會掉下去嗎？

It showed up around 3 p.m. and started pacing on a thin window ledge outside Ms. Donnelly-Coyne’s office. “He just seemed sweet and cute and very mellow,” she said in an interview on Wednesday.

它在下午3點左右出現，在唐納利-科因的辦公室外一個窄窄的窗沿上踱步。“他又乖又甜又可愛，”她在週三接受採訪時說。

Breaking out a window or sending down window cleaners would have been too risky, Ms. Donnelly-Coyne said, so officials baited live traps with cat food and placed them on the roof. They hoped the smell would lure the animal up another two floors.

唐納利-科因說，打破窗戶或是讓窗戶清潔工去救它太冒險了，所以大廈管理人員把裝了貓糧的誘捕器放在屋頂上，希望這種氣味能引誘它爬完剩下兩層。

Ms. Donnelly-Coyne stayed in the office until 9 p.m., taking breaks from her work to check on the raccoon. When she left, she said, the animal was curled up sleeping. “All they could do was put enough stinky food up there to encourage him to go up the last two floors,” she said. “We were all kind of worried he might be too tired to do so but thankfully the little guy kept going.”

唐納利-科因一直呆在辦公室直到晚上9點，其間不時地放下手頭的工作去查看浣熊。她說，當她離開時，這頭動物蜷縮着身體睡着了。“他們能做的就是把大量散發氣味的食物放在那裏，鼓勵他再爬兩層，”她說。“我們都擔心他可能太累了，幸好這個小傢伙還在繼續前進。”

The raccoon awoke around 10:30 p.m. and apparently had a change of heart. It started to descend, down to the 18th floor and then the 17th, before stopping on another ledge.

晚上10點半左右，浣熊醒來了，它顯然改了主意，開始往下爬，一直爬到18樓，然後來到17樓，接着停在另一個窗沿上。

A photographer at Minnesota Public Radio zoomed in and saw the raccoon peering over the ledge. Maybe it saw the cheering crowd below. Maybe it thought the descent was too far. Either way, around 2 a.m. on Wednesday, it began another climb.

明尼蘇達州公共廣播電臺的一名攝影師拉近了鏡頭，看到浣熊正在窗沿上往下看。也許它看到了下面歡呼的人羣。也許它覺得往下爬太遠了。不管怎樣，週三凌晨兩點左右，它再次開始往上爬。

It surpassed the 18th floor and then 19th and kept going and going. Around 2:45 a.m., according to Mr. Nelson, it scaled the top and hopped onto the roof. It also found the cat food inside the trap.

它爬過了18樓，然後是19樓，接着繼續前進。根據納爾遜(Nelson)的說法，大約凌晨2點45分，它爬到了頂層，跳上屋頂，還發現了誘捕籠裏的貓食。

Wildlife Management Services, the company that set the traps, retrieved the raccoon on Wednesday morning, said Laurie Brickley, a spokeswoman for the city’s Department of Safety and Inspections.

聖保羅市安全和檢查部發言人勞麗·布里克利(Laurie Brickley)說，設置誘捕裝置的野生動物管理服務公司(Wildlife Management Services)於週三早上接回了浣熊。

The raccoon was a female about 2 years old, Ms. Brickley said. “She was a little skinny but in good shape,” she added.

布里克利說，這頭浣熊是雌性，大約兩歲左右。“她有點瘦，但狀況良好，”她補充說。

By the time the team reached the animal, it was “incredibly tired,” and had eaten all that was in the live trap and had drank a lot of water, Ms. Brickley said.

布里克利說，當團隊來到它身邊時，它“非常疲倦”，吃掉了誘捕籠中的所有東西，並且喝了很多水。

When asked where the raccoon had been released, Ms. Brickley declined to answer, saying only that it had been sent into the wild. “This raccoon needs peace and quiet right now,” she said.

當被問到浣熊被釋放的位置時，布里克利拒絕回答，只說它已被送到野外。 “這頭浣熊現在需要平靜安寧，”她說。