世紀文學經典:《百年孤獨》第13章Part11

"What a rain!" úrsula said.
"October," he said.
When he said it he did not raise his eyes from the first little fish of the day because he was putting in the rubies for the eyes. Only when he finished it and put it with the others in the pail did he begin to drink the soup. Then, very slowly, he ate the Piece of meat roasted with onions, the white rice, and the slices of fried bananas all on the same plate together. His appetite did not change under either the best or the harshest of circumstances. After lunch he felt the drowsiness of inactivity. Because of a kind of scientific superstition he never worked, or read, or bathed, or made love until two hours of digestion had gone by, and it was such a deep-rooted belief that several times he held up military operations so as not to submit the troops to the risks of indigestion. So he lay down in the hammock, removing the wax from his ears with a penknife, and in a few minutes he was asleep. He dreamed that he was going into an empty house with white walls and that he was upset by the burden of being the first human being to enter it. In the dream he remembered that he had dreamed the same thing the night before and on many nights over the past years and he knew that the image would be erased from his memory when he awakened because that recurrent dream had the quality of not being remembered except within the dream itself. A moment later, indeed, when the barber knocked at the workshop door, Colonel Aureli-ano Buendía awoke with the impression that he had fallen asleep involuntarily for a few seconds and that he had not had time to dream anything.
"Not today." he told the barber. "We'll make it on Friday."
He had a three-day beard speckled with white hairs, but he did not think it necessary to shave because on Friday he was going to have his hair cut and it could all be done at the same time. The sticky sweat of the unwanted siesta aroused the scars of the sores in his armpits. The sky had cleared but the sun had not come out. Colonel Aureli-ano Buendía released a sonorous belch which brought back the acidity of the soup to his palate and which was like a command from his organism to throw his blanket over his shoulders and go to the toilet. He stayed there longer than was necessary, crouched over the dense fermentation that was coming out of the wooden box until habit told him that it was time to start work again. During the time he lingered he remembered again that it was Tuesday, and that José Arcadio Segun-do had not come to the workshop because it was payday on the banana company farms. That recollection, as all of those of the past few years, led him to think about the war without his realizing it. He remembered that Colonel Geri-neldo Márquez had once promised to get him a horse with a white star on its face and that he had never spoken about it again. Then he went on toward scattered episodes but he brought them back without any judgment because since he could not think about anything else, he had learned to think coldly so that inescapable memories would not touch any feeling. On his way back to the workshop, seeing that the air was beginning to dry out, he decided that it was a good time to take a bath, but Amaranta had got there ahead of him. So he started on the second little fish of the day. He was putting a hook on the tail when the sun came out with such strength that the light creaked like a fishing boat. The air, which had been washed by the three-day drizzle, was filled with flying ants. Then he came to the realization that he felt like urinating and he had been putting it off until he had finished fixing the little fish. He went out into the courtyard at ten minutes after four, when he heard the distant brass instruments, the beating of the bass drum and the shouting of the children, and for the first time since his youth he knowingly fell into a trap of nostalgia and relived that prodigious afternoon Of the gypsies when his father took him to see ice. Santa Sofía de la Piedad dropped what she was doing in the kitchen and ran to the door.
"It's the circus," she shouted.
Instead of going to the chestnut tree, Colonel Aureli-ano Buendía also went to the street door and mingled with the bystanders who, were watching the parade. He saw a woman dressed in gold sitting on the head of an elephant. He saw a sad dromedary. He saw a bear dressed like a Dutch girl keeping time to the music with a soup spoon and a pan. He saw the clowns doing cartwheels at the end of the parade and once more he saw the face of his miserable solitude when everything had passed by and there was nothing but the bright expanse of the street and the air full of flying ants with a few onlookers peering into the precipice of uncertainty. Then he went to the chestnut tree, thinking about the circus, and while he urinated he tried to keep on thinking about the circus, but he could no longer find the memory. He pulled his head in between his shoulders like a baby chick and remained motionless with his forehead against the trunk of the chestnut tree. The family did not find him until the following day at eleven o'clock in the morning when Santa Sofía de la Piedad went to throw out the garbage in back and her attention was attracted by the descending vultures.

“多大的雨呀！”烏蘇娜說。
“十月嘛，”他說。
說話的時候，他並沒有從這一矢做的第一條金魚上揚起視線，因他正在給它安裝紅寶石眼睛。剛剛做完這條金魚，他就把它和其他的金魚一起放在罐子裏，開始喝湯。然後，他慢慢地吃了一塊洋蔥嫩肉、白米飯和幾片炸香蕉，這些都是放在同一只盤子裏的。無論在最好的或者最壞的情況下，他的胃口總是相同的。午飯以後，他想休息一會兒。由於某種具有科學根據的迷信，用於消化的兩個小時還沒過去，他就決不工作、看書、沐浴或者談愛。這是一種根深蒂固的信念，爲了不讓自己的士兵消化不良，他曾幾次延遲開始軍事行動。他躺在吊牀上，用鉛筆刀從耳朵裏挖出耳垢，幾分鐘就睡着了。他做了個夢，彷彿走進一座白色牆壁的空房子，由於他是走進這座房子的第一個人，不禁感到毛骨悚然，他在夢中記起，前一夜，甚至最近幾年，他曾多次做過這樣的夢：而且明白，只要他一醒來，一切就會忘記，因爲他那週期性的夢境有一個特點：只能在夢中想起做過的夢。過了片刻，理髮師敲作坊的門時，奧雷連諾上校睜開眼來，覺得自己只打了幾秒鐘的瞌睡，還來不及夢見什麼哩。
“今天不必了，”他向理髮師說。“咱們星期五再見吧。”
他的鬍鬚已有三天沒颳了，跟白頭髮連接了起來。可他認爲不必刮臉，星期五反正要剪髮，可以同時刮臉和剪髮。在不太舒服的午睡之後，他渾身都是粘搭搭的汗，腋下的瘡疤也在發痛。雨停了，可是太陽仍然沒有露臉。奧雷連諾上校打了個響嗝，嘴裏感到了湯的酸味，這也好象是他的機體發出的命令，要他披上斗篷走進廁所。他在那兒逗留的時間，比需要的時間長久一些；他蹲在茅坑的木箱上，木箱裏發出強烈的發酵氣味，然後習慣告訴他應該開始工作了。他在廁所裏想起，今天是星期二，霍·阿卡蒂奧第二不來作坊，因爲星期二是香蕉公司的發薪日。就象最近幾年經常憶起往事一樣，這時他又不知不覺地想起了戰爭。他記得，格林列爾多。 馬克斯上校有一次答應給他弄一匹額上有顆白星的駿馬，但是這個朋友再也不提這件事了。然後，他開始反覆思量戰爭中的一件件事情，可是回憶過去並沒有在他心裏激起歡樂和悲哀，因爲他無法避免去想戰爭他就學會了平靜地想它，不動感情。返回作坊的時候，他發現空氣開始變得乾燥了，就決定洗澡，可是浴室已被阿瑪蘭塔佔據。於是，他着手做這一天的第二條金魚。他已給金魚裝上了尾巴，這時太陽突然鑽出雲層，強烈的陽光彷彿照得周圍的一切象舊漁船那樣軋軋發響。三天的雨水沖洗過的空氣中滿是飛蟻。這時上校覺得，他早就想去小便了，可是一直推遲到金魚做完。下午四點十分，他剛走到院子裏，便聽到了遠處傳來的銅管樂器聲、大鼓聲和孩子們的歡呼聲，他從青年時代以來第一次自覺地掉進了懷舊的羅網，重新想起了同吉卜賽人呆在一起的那個奇妙的下午；那時，他父親是帶他去參觀冰塊的。聖索菲婭·德拉佩德放下廚房裏的活兒，跑到門外。
“是雜技團！”她喊了一聲。
奧雷連諾上校沒去慄樹那兒，也走到門外，同一羣愛看熱鬧的人混在一起，他們正在觀望街上行進的隊伍。他看見大象背上一個穿着金色衣服的女人；看見一隻悒鬱的單峯駱駝；看見一隻裝扮成荷蘭姑娘的狗熊，它用匙子和盤子打着音樂拍子；看見正在隊伍後頭翻筋斗的幾個小丑。在一切都已過去之後，除了充滿陽光的、空曠的街道、飛蟻以及幾個仍然在茫然張望的觀衆，什麼也沒有了，上校又面對自己可憐的孤獨了。接着，什他一面想着雜技團，一面朝慄樹走去；小便的時候。他想繼續想一想雜技團，可是麼也記不起來。他象小雞似的縮着脖子，把腦門紮在樹幹上，就一動不動了。第二天早上十一點鐘，聖索菲虹·德拉佩德妻到後院去倒垃圾，發現幾隻禿鷹朝慄樹飛來，全家才知道出了事。