狄更斯雙語小說:《董貝父子》第55章Part3
'Ah Heaven, be quiet, cursed brigand!' to a horse who shook his bells 'What noise?'
'Behind. Is it not another carriage at a gallop? There! what's that?' Miscreant with a Pig's head, stand still!' to another horse, who bit another, who frightened the other two, who plunged and backed. 'There is nothing coming.'
'Nothing.'
'No, nothing but the day yonder.'
'You are right, I think. I hear nothing now, indeed. Go on!'
The entangled equipage, half hidden in the reeking cloud from the horses, goes on slowly at first, for the driver, checked unnecessarily in his progress, sulkily takes out a pocket-knife, and puts a new lash to his whip. Then 'Hallo, whoop! Hallo, hi!' Away once more, savagely.
And now the stars faded, and the day glimmered, and standing in the carriage, looking back, he could discern the track by which he had come, and see that there was no traveller within view, on all the heavy expanse. And soon it was broad day, and the sun began to shine on cornfields and vineyards; and solitary labourers, risen from little temporary huts by heaps of stones upon the road, were, here and there, at work repairing the highway, or eating bread. By and by, there were peasants going to their daily labour, or to market, or lounging at the doors of poor cottages, gazing idly at him as he passed. And then there was a postyard, ankle-deep in mud, with steaming dunghills and vast outhouses half ruined; and looking on this dainty prospect, an immense, old, shadeless, glaring, stone chateau, with half its windows blinded, and green damp crawling lazily over it, from the balustraded terrace to the taper tips of the extinguishers upon the turrets.
Gathered up moodily in a corner of the carriage, and only intent on going fast - except when he stood up, for a mile together, and looked back; which he would do whenever there was a piece of open country - he went on, still postponing thought indefinitely, and still always tormented with thinking to no purpose.
Shame, disappointment, and discomfiture gnawed at his heart; a constant apprehension of being overtaken, or met - for he was groundlessly afraid even of travellers, who came towards him by the way he was going - oppressed him heavily. The same intolerable awe and dread that had come upon him in the night, returned unweakened in the day. The monotonous ringing of the bells and tramping of the horses; the monotony of his anxiety, and useless rage; the monotonous wheel of fear, regret, and passion, he kept turning round and round; made the journey like a vision, in which nothing was quite real but his own torment.
It was a vision of long roads, that stretched away to an horizon, always receding and never gained; of ill-paved towns, up hill and down, where faces came to dark doors and ill-glazed windows, and where rows of mudbespattered cows and oxen were tied up for sale in the long narrow streets, butting and lowing, and receiving blows on their blunt heads from bludgeons that might have beaten them in; of bridges, crosses, churches, postyards, new horses being put in against their wills, and the horses of the last stage reeking, panting, and laying their drooping heads together dolefully at stable doors; of little cemeteries with black crosses settled sideways in the graves, and withered wreaths upon them dropping away; again of long, long roads, dragging themselves out, up hill and down, to the treacherous horizon.
“那？”
“啊，老天爺，安靜點，你這可惡的土匪！”他對一匹搖着鈴鐺的馬說道，”什麼？”
“後面。是不是另外一輛馬車正飛奔過來？那裏！那是什麼，聽到了嗎？”“你這長得跟豬頭一樣的惡棍！安安靜靜站着！”他對另一匹馬說道；這一匹馬咬了另一匹馬，那一匹馬又驚嚇了另外兩匹；它們向前猛衝過去，然後又倒退回來。“沒有什麼往這邊來。”
“沒有什麼嗎？”
“沒有什麼，只是天快亮了。”
“我想您說得不錯。真的，我現在什麼也沒聽到了。繼續趕路吧！”
在馬身上散發出的煙霧騰騰的熱氣之中半隱半現的馬車開始慢吞吞地前進；馬車伕因爲在前進道路中被不必要地阻留了好些時間，不高興地從衣袋中取出一把小刀，在鞭子上裝上一條新的皮條。然後”嗨！嗬！嗨！嘿！”，又一次狂野地飛跑起來。
這時星星暗淡，晨光熹微，他站在馬車中，回頭看，可以分辨出他所走過的道路，並注意到在遼闊的原野上看不見一個趕路的人。不久天大亮了，太陽照亮了麥田和葡萄園。從路旁石頭堆邊臨時性工棚裏出來的一個個工人正在這裏那裏修着公路或吃着麪包。不久農民們出來幹活或趕市集，或懶洋洋地靠在破舊的茅舍門邊，悠閒地注視着他從旁經過。然後他看到一個驛站，前面是深及踝骨的泥漿，四周是冒着熱氣的糞堆和很大的半毀壞的房屋；面對着這個優雅的景色的是一座巨大的、古老的石頭城堡，它沒有樹木遮蔭，發出耀眼的光，有一半窗子已遮上窗簾，綠色的黴懶散地在城堡上面蔓延，從圍了欄杆的陽臺一直擴展到塔樓上滅火器的錐形尖端。
他鬱鬱不樂地蜷縮在馬車的一個角落裏，一心只盼望着車子快快地跑；只有當週圍是一片空曠的田野的時候，他纔會站起來，站上整整一英里的路程，並往後看；--他就這樣往前趕着路，依舊把那些思想暫時擱置起來，往後推到將來一個不確定的時候，同時依舊常常被那些沒有目的的思想苦惱着。
羞恥、失望與失敗折磨着他的心。他不斷擔心被追趕上或被碰見（因爲他毫無根據地甚至連對面路上朝他走過來的行人都害怕），因此心情十分沉重。夜間，他感到難以忍受的畏懼和憂愁，到了白天它們又毫不減弱地重新返回。單調的鈴鐺聲和馬蹄聲，他那毫無變化的焦急和無益的憤怒，周而復始的害怕、懊悔與痛苦，這一切他覺得這次旅行像是個夢幻，在這夢幻中，除了他自己的痛苦外，沒有什麼是真實的。
這是一個夢幻，在這夢幻中有一條漫長的道路，它伸向一直不斷向後退、永遠也不能到達的地平線；在這夢幻中有路面鋪砌得很壞的城鎮，在丘陵上面和下面都有；人們從黑暗的門戶與沒有擦亮的窗子中露出臉來；身上濺滿污泥的母牛和公牛一行行地系在那裏等待出賣；它們相互用頭角頂撞着，哞哞地叫着；有時它們遲鈍的頭遭到大頭棒的敲打，那是可以把頭打破的；在這夢幻中，有橋樑、十字架、教堂、驛站；新的馬正很不願意地開始從事艱苦的勞役；最後一個驛站的馬身上冒着熱氣，嘴裏喘着氣，正低垂着頭，憂鬱地站在馬廄門邊；在這夢幻中，有小小的墓地，墳墓上的黑十字架東倒西歪，墳上枯萎的花圈愈來愈少了；然後在這夢幻中又是漫長的、漫長的道路，伸延到山上和山下，一直伸向變化莫測的地平線。
