世紀文學經典:《百年孤獨》第13章Part9

It was necessary to borrow beds and hammocks from the neighbors, to set up nine shifts at the table, to fix hours for bathing, and to borrow forty stools so that the girls in blue uniforms with masculine buttons would not spend the whole day running from one place to another. The visit was a failure because the noisy schoolgirls would scarcely finish breakfast before they had to start taking turns for lunch and then for dinner, and for the whole week they were able to take only one walk through the plantations. At nightfall the nuns were exhausted, unable to move, give another order, and still the troop of tireless adolescents was in the courtyard singing school songs out of tune. One day they were on the point of trampling úrsula, who made an effort to be useful precisely where she was most in the way. On another day the nuns got all excited because Colonel Aureli-ano Buendía had urinated under the chestnut tree without being concerned that the schoolgirls were in the courtyard. Amaranta was on the point of causing panic because one of the nuns went into the kitchen as she was salting the soup and the only thing that occurred to her to say was to ask what those handfuls of white powder were.
"Arsenic," Amaranta answered.
The night of their arrival the students carried on in such a way, trying to go to the bathroom before they went to bed, that at one o'clock in the morning the last ones were still going in. Fernanda then bought seventy--two chamberpots but she only managed to change the nocturnal problem into a morning one, because from dawn on there was a long line of girls, each with her pot in her hand, waiting for her turn to wash it. Although some of them suffered fevers and several of them were infected by mosquito bites, most of them showed an unbreakable resistance as they faced the most troublesome difficulties, and even at the time of the greatest heat they would scamper through the garden. When they finally left, the flowers were destroyed, the furniture broken, and the walls covered with drawings and writing, but Fernanda pardoned them for all of the damage because of her relief at their leaving. She returned the borrowed beds and stools and kept the seventy-two chamberpots in Melquíades' room. The locked room, about which the spiritual life of the house revolved in former times, was known from that time on as the "chamberpot room." For Colonel Aureli-ano Buendía it was the most appropriate name, because while the rest of the family was still amazed by the fact that Melquíades' room was immune to dust and destruction, he saw it turned into a dunghill. In any case, it did not seem to bother him who was correct, and if he found out about the fate of the room it was because Fernanda kept passing by and disturbing his work for a whole afternoon as she put away the chamberpots.

這就不得不向鄰居借用木牀和吊鋪，讓大家分成九班輪流吃飯，規定沐浴的時間，而且借來了四十隻凳子，免得穿着藍制服和男靴的姑娘們整天在房子裏盪來盪去。應付她們實在困難：鬧喳喳的一羣剛剛吃完早飯又要給另一批人開午飯，然後是晚飯；整整一個星期，女學生們只到種植園去遊玩過一次。黑夜來臨，爲了把姑娘們趕上牀鋪，修女們累得精疲力盡，可是不管她們怎麼賣力，總有一羣不知疲倦的少女留在院子裏，調門不準地高唱校歌。有一次，姑娘們差點兒絆倒了烏蘇娜，因爲她總喜歡到她最能妨礙別人的地方去幫忙。另一次，由於奧雷連諾上校當着姑娘們的面在慄樹下小便，修女們竟嚷叫起來。阿瑪蘭塔呢，差點兒引起了驚慌：她正把鹽放在湯裏時，一個修女走進廚房，立即問她撒到鍋裏的白色粉未是什麼。
“砒霜。”
到達的第一夜，姑娘們累得要命，想在睡覺之前上一次廁所，——大約夜裏一點，其中最後幾個才輪流進去。於是菲蘭達買了七十二個便盆，但這隻把夜間的問題變成了早上的問題，因爲姑娘們天一亮就在廁所前面排了長長的隊伍，手裏都拿着便盆，等候輪到自己去洗便盆。儘管其中幾個姑娘感冒了，其他一些姑娘的皮膚被蚊子咬得起了皰，可是大多數人在困難面前表現了堅忍精神，甚至最熱的時刻也在花園裏蹦蹦跳跳。到客人們最終離開的時候，花叢被踩壞了，傢俱給毀了，牆上佈滿了畫兒和字兒，可是菲蘭達看見她們走了就高興，原諒她們造成的損害。她把牀和凳子送還了鄰居，而將七十二隻便盆堆在梅爾加德斯的房間裏。這個鎖着的房間——昔日全家精神生活的中心，現在成了聞名的“便盆間”了。照奧雷連諾上校看來，這個稱呼是最合適的，儘管梅爾加德斯的臥室沒有塵土，也沒遭到破壞，全家的人仍然對它感到驚訝，可是上校卻覺得它不過是一堆垃圾。無論如何，他似乎根本不管誰是對的：如果說他知道了這個房間的命運，那是因爲菲蘭達爲了收藏便盆整天在他旁邊跑來跑去，妨礙他工作。