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By now the stranger had been staring down at her for some time, however. And he was staring at her still. “I have the misfortune to suffer in my back, monsieur,” she confided to him finally, in her slow and classically enunciated French. “It is not a large back but the pain is disproportionate. You are a doctor, perhaps? An osteopath?”
那人已经盯着她看了好一阵子，现在还在直勾勾地看着她。“先生，我很倒霉，脊椎酸痛，”最后她还是用一种推心置腹的口吻开了口。她的法语说得很慢，发音清晰，标准。“脊椎不大，却痛得厉害。你是医生吧？没准是个正骨科医生？”
Then she wondered, looking up at him, whether he was ill, and her joke out of place. An oily gloss glistened on his jaw and neck, and there was an unseeing self-obsession about his pallid eyes. He seemed to see beyond her to some private trouble of his own. She was going to ask him this—You are perhaps in love, monsieur? Your wife is deceiving you?—and she was actually considering steering him into a café for a glass of water or a tisane when he abruptly swung away from her and looked behind him, then over her head up the street the other way. And it occurred to her that he really was afraid, not just traqué but frightened stiff; so perhaps he was not a policeman at all, but a thief—though the difference, she knew well, was often slight.
说完，她抬头看着他，心想他是不是病了，如果是，那么她的玩笑就开得不合时宜了。他的下巴和脖子闪着油光，双眼无神，好像专注于什么事，而对别的一切都视而不见。他好像不是在看她，而是在想自己的什么麻烦事。“先生，你大概在谈恋爱吧？你妻子背叛你了？”她正准备这样问他，甚至考虑将他拉进咖啡馆喝杯水或花草茶（用晒干的植物叶或花泡制的茶————译注），就在这时，他突然将目光从她身上移开，先是转过身扫了眼，又从她头上看过去，向街道的另一边张望了一下。她忽然感觉他好像很害怕，不只是担心有人抓他，而是对什么东西怕得要命。这样看来，他也许根本不是警察，而是小偷————尽管她很清楚这两者往往差别不大。
“Your name is Maria Andreyevna Ostrakova?” he asked her abruptly, as if the question scared him. “你叫玛丽亚·安德烈耶夫娜·奥斯特拉科娃？”他猝不及防地问了她一句，问话的口气仿佛这个问题倒把他自己吓到了。
He was speaking French but she knew that it was not his mother tongue any more than it was her own, and his correct pronunciation of her name, complete with patronymic, already alerted her to his origin. She recognised the slur at once and the shapes of the tongue that made it, and she identified too late, and with a considerable inward start, the type she had not been able to put her finger on.
他说的是法语，但她知道，和她一样，法语并不是他的母语。他能说出她的名字，而且发音准确，甚至连她父亲的名字都知道（苏联人的名字多分三段：名字，源于父亲的名字，姓。这里的安德烈耶夫娜就是源于父亲的名字，说明她父亲的名字是安德烈耶夫————译注），这让她对他的来路产生了警觉。她一下子认出了他的发音和口型，心里猛然一激灵，之前一直无法确定他是哪种类型的人物，现在她终于明白了，可惜已经太晚了。
“If it is, who on earth are you?” she asked him in reply, sticking out her jaw and scowling.
“就算是，你到底是谁？”她下巴向前突出，沉下脸反问他。
He had drawn a pace closer. The difference in their heights was immediately absurd. So was the degree to which the man’s features betrayed his unpleasing character. From her low position Ostrakova could read his weakness as clearly as his fear. His damp chin had set in a grimace, his mouth had twisted to make him look strong, but she knew he was only banishing an incurable cowardice. He is like a man steeling himself for a heroic act, she thought. Or a criminal one. He is a man cut off from all spontaneous acts, she thought.
他向她走近了一步。两人的身高差距更加明显了，简直一个是巨人，一个是侏儒。他不讨人喜欢的个性瞬间通过他的外貌暴露无遗。奥斯特拉科娃仰望着他，可以清楚读出内在的虚弱和恐惧。他汗湿的下巴扭曲变形，脸上露着狞笑，让自己显得很强大，但她看得出来，这只能用来掩饰他不可救药的怯懦本性。她想，他像是要壮一把胆，干一桩英雄壮举，要不就是什么犯罪的勾当。这人如果没有外力强制，什么事都做不来。
“You were born in Leningrad on May 8, 1927?” the stranger asked.
“你1927年5月8日出生在列宁格勒？”陌生人问。
Probably she said yes. Afterwards she was not sure. She saw his scared gaze lift and stare at the approaching bus. She saw an indecision near to panic seize him, and it occurred to her—which in the long run was an act of near clairvoyance—that he proposed to push her under it. He didn’t, but he did put his next question in Russian—and in the brutal accents of Moscow officialdom.
当时她很可能说是，但事后又不确定说了什么。公交车来了，她看见那人抬头盯着它，眼里满是惊恐，犹豫不决，几近惊慌失措。她忽然有种感觉————从后来发生的事情来看，简直是先知先觉————那人打算将她推到车轮底下去。他倒是没有这样做，但问了下一个问题，用的是俄语，带着莫斯科官僚那种粗暴无礼的口音。
“In 1956, were you granted permission to leave the Soviet Union for the purpose of nursing your sick husband, the traitor Ostrakov? Also for certain other purposes?”
"1956年，你获准离开苏联，是为了照顾你生病的丈夫，叛徒奥斯特拉科夫吗？还有其他目的吗？"
“Ostrakov was not a traitor,” she replied, cutting him off. “He was a patriot.” And by instinct she took up her shopping bag and clutched the handle very tight.
“奥斯特拉科夫不是叛徒，”她打断了他的话，“他是爱国的”。一边说一边不由自主地抓起购物袋，紧紧握住提把不放。
The stranger spoke straight over this contradiction, and very loudly, in order to defeat the clatter of the bus: “Ostrakova, I bring you greetings from your daughter Alexandra in Moscow, also from certain official quarters! I wish to speak to you concerning her! Do not board this car!”
陌生人不顾她的反驳，自顾自说下去，嗓门很大，以盖过汽车的哐啷哐啷声：“奥斯特拉科娃，我带来了你在莫斯科的女儿亚历山德拉对你的问候，还有某些官方人士对你的问候！我要跟你说说她的事！别上这辆车！”
The bus had pulled up. The conductor knew her and was holding his hand out for her bag. Lowering his voice, the stranger added one more terrible statement: “Alexandra has serious problems which require the assistance of a mother.”
公交车停了下来。售票员认识她，正要伸手接过她的袋子。这时，陌生人压低声音，又说了一句可怕的话：“亚历山德拉遇到了严重问题，需要她妈帮忙。”
The conductor was calling to her to get a move on. He spoke with pretended roughness, which was the way they joked. “Come on, mother! It’s too hot for love! Pass us your bag and let’s go!” cried the conductor.
售票员在催她上车。他假装很粗鲁，平时他们开玩笑就那样。“妈妈，走吧！大热天谈什么恋爱！把袋子递给我，我们走！”售票员大声喊道。
Inside the bus there was laughter; then someone shouted an insult—old woman, keeps the world waiting! She felt the stranger’s hand scrabbling inexpertly at her arm, like a clumsy suitor groping for the buttons. She pulled herself free. She tried to tell the conductor something but she couldn’t; she opened her mouth but she had forgotten how to speak. The best she could manage was to shake her head. The conductor yelled at her again, then waved his hands and shrugged. The insults multiplied—old woman, drunk as a whore at midday! Remaining where she was, Ostrakova watched the bus out of sight, waiting for her vision to clear and her heart to stop its crazy cavorting. Now it is I who need a glass of water, she thought. From the strong I can protect myself. God preserve me from the weak.
公交车里一片笑声，接着有人大声骂了一句：老太婆，凭啥让大家都等你！她感到陌生人乱抓一气，想拽住她的手臂，完全不像是专业人员所为，倒像一个笨拙的求婚者在摸索衣扣。她挣脱了。她竭力想告诉售票员什么，但说不出来；张开嘴，却忘了该说什么。除了摇头，什么也做不了。售票员又向她喊了一声，然后朝她挥挥手，又耸耸肩。辱骂的话说得更难听了：老娘们，中午这时候还醉得象个婊子！奥斯特拉科娃呆立着目送汽车远去，让模糊的视线一点点重新清晰起来，心脏逐渐停止疯狂的跳动。她心说：现在需要喝杯水的是我了。面对强敌，我能保护自己，上帝保守我远离虚弱。
She followed him to the café, limping heavily. In a forced-labour camp, exactly twenty-five years before, she had broken her leg in three places in a coal slip. On this August 4th—the date had not escaped her—under the extreme duress of the stranger’s message, the old sensation of being crippled came back to her.
她完全是一瘸一拐地跟着他进了一家咖啡馆。整整二十五年前，她在强制劳动营，由于煤层滑坡，腿断了三处。8月4日，这是她忘不了的日子。二十五年后的同一天，陌生人说的话像块巨石压在她心上，过去跛足的感觉好像又回来了。
The café was the last in the street, if not in all Paris, to lack both a juke-box and neon lighting—and to remain open in August—though there were bagatelle tables that bumped and flashed from dawn till night. For the rest, there was the usual mid-morning hubbub, of grand politics, and horses, and whatever else Parisians talked; there was the usual trio of prostitutes murmuring among themselves, and a sullen young waiter in a soiled shirt who led them to a table in a corner that was reserved with a grimy Campari sign. A moment of ludicrous banality followed. The stranger ordered two coffees, but the waiter protested that at midday one does not reserve the best table in the house merely in order to drink coffee; the patron had to pay the rent, monsieur! Since the stranger did not follow this flow of patois, Ostrakova had to translate it for him. The stranger blushed and ordered two ham omelettes with frites, and two Alsatian beers, all without consulting Ostrakova. Then he took himself to the men’s room to repair his courage—confident, presumably, she would not run away—and when he returned his face was dry and his ginger hair combed, but the stink of him, now they were indoors, reminded Ostrakova of Moscow subways, and Moscow trams, and Moscow interrogation rooms. More eloquently than anything he could ever have said to her, that short walk back from the men’s room to their table had convinced her of what she already feared. He was one of them. The suppressed swagger, the deliberate brutalisation of the features, the ponderous style in which he now squared his forearms on the table and with feigned reluctance helped himself to a piece of bread from the basket as if he were dipping a pen in ink—they revived her worst memories of living as a disgraced woman under the weight of Moscow’s malevolent bureaucracy.
这家咖啡馆即使不是全巴黎，至少也是这条街上最后一家既没有点唱机，也没有霓虹灯的咖啡馆，而且居然到了八月份还开着。店里的几张台球桌倒是从早到晚都有人在厮杀。除此之外，中午时分照例有一帮人在哇啦哇啦地谈政治大事啦，谈赛马啦，反正是些巴黎人爱说的事，还有常去的三个妓女在一起低声说话。一个年轻侍者，穿着脏兮兮的衬衫，绷着脸把他们带到角落里的一张桌子。桌上放了一张满是污垢的印有肯巴利酒（一种苦味的粉红色开胃酒————译注）图案的牌子，表明有人预订了。接下来的一幕既老套又荒唐可笑。陌生人要了两杯咖啡，侍者却不高兴地说，哪有人晌午时占了最好的位子却光点咖啡。老板可是要付房租的，先生！陌生人听不懂这一连串土话，奥斯特拉科娃只好给他翻译。陌生人脸有点红，锐气受挫，只好点了两份火腿煎蛋加薯条，还有两瓶阿尔萨斯啤酒。他要这些东西的时候，完全没有征求奥斯特拉科娃的意见。然后他去了洗手间重整旗鼓，恢复锐气，大概有把握她不会逃跑。回来的时候，他脸也干了，姜黄色的头发也梳好了，但因为在室内，身上的体臭味更浓了，令奥斯特拉科娃回想起莫斯科的地铁，莫斯科的有轨电车，以及莫斯科的审讯室。他在从洗手间到桌子短短一段路上的一举一动，比他前面说的一切都更有说服力，从而她确信先前担心的都是真的。他和他们是一伙的。他走路的姿态虽然有意克制，还是一副耻高气扬的样子；外貌则刻意显出残酷没人性的样子；这会他前臂铺在桌上，显得很笨重；他又故意装出不情愿拿的样子，伸手撮了块篮子里的面包（西餐以吃面包开场————译注），好像用钢笔蘸了下墨水————这一切都唤起了她的痛苦记忆：在莫斯科恶毒的官僚体系压迫下，一个女人家，过着屈辱的生活。
“So,” he said, and started eating the bread at the same time. He selected a crusty end. With hands like that he could have crushed it in a second, but instead he chose to prise ladylike flakes from it with his fat finger-ends, as if that were the official way of eating. While he nibbled, his eyebrows went up and he looked sorry for himself, me a stranger in this foreign land. “Do they know here that you have lived an immoral life in Russia?” he asked finally. “Maybe in a town full of whores they don’t care.”
“那么，”他一面说，一面开始吃面包。他从硬皮的一头开始吃。凭他一双大手，本可以一下子把面包捏个粉碎，他的吃法却像女人一样，用肥大的手指端将面包一小块一小块地撕下来吃，仿佛这就是面包的正式吃法。他小口小口地吃着，扬起眉毛，看上去有些自怨自艾：我就是一个异域的异客。“这里的人知道你在苏联的生活很不道德吗？”他终于说道，“也许在一个满是婊子的城市，他们也不在乎。”
Her answer lay ready on the tip of her tongue: My life in Russia was not immoral. It was your system which was immoral.
她的回答已到了嘴边：我在苏联的生活没有不道德。你们的体制才不道德。
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发表于 2023-12-3 08:25:01