經典科幻文學:《宇宙盡頭的餐館》第3章1

Chapter 3
“Does anyone have a kettle?” Arthur asked as he walked on to the bridge, and instantly began to wonder why Trillian was yelling at the computer to talk to her, Ford was thumping it and Zaphod was kicking it, and also why there was a nasty yellow lump on the vision screen.
He put down the empty cup he was carrying and walked over to them.
“Hello?” he said.
At that moment Zaphod flung himself over to the polished marble surfaces that contained the instruments that controlled the conventional photon drive. They materialized beneath his hands and he flipped over to manual control. He pushed, he pulled, he pressed and he swore. The photon drive gave a sickly judder and cut out again.
“Something up?” said Arthur.
“Hey, didja hear that?” muttered Zaphod as he leapt now for the manual controls of the Infinite Improbability Drive, “the monkey spoke!”
The Improbability Drive gave two small whines and then also cut out.
“Pure history, man,” said Zaphod, kicking the Improbability Drive, “a talking monkey!”
“If you’re upset about something…” said Arthur.

第三章
“你們誰有水壺？”一走進艦橋，阿瑟張口便問，問完才大吃一驚：崔莉恩正對着電腦大喊大叫，要它和自己通話；福特重重地敲打着電腦；贊福德則乾脆用腳踹了起來。屏幕上顯示的是一個醜陋的黃色腫塊。
他放下手裏拿着的空杯子，朝他們走過去。
“喂？”他說。
就在這時，贊福德撲向拋光的大理石桌面，裏面隱藏着控制常規光子驅動器的儀器。這些儀器在他手下逐漸顯現出形態，他找到了手動操作的地方。向前推、向後拉、向下壓，同時嘴裏還詛咒着。光子驅動器微弱地顫動了一下，但馬上就停止了。
“發生什麼事了嗎？”阿瑟問。
“嘿，你們聽見了嗎？”贊福德咕噥着，現在他已經蹦到另外一邊，開始尋找無限非概率驅動器的手動操作裝置，“這隻猴子居然說話了！”
非概率驅動器發出兩聲哀號，然後同樣停止了。
“這可是真正的歷史事件，夥計，”贊福德說，一邊踹了非概率驅動器一腳，“一隻會說話的猴子！”
“如果你想找我的茬……”阿瑟說。