世紀文學經典:《百年孤獨》第2章Part 4

José Arcadio Buendía did not succeed in deciphering the dream of houses with mirror walls until the day he discovered ice. Then he thought he understood its deep meaning. He thought that in the near future they would be able to manufacture blocks of ice on a large scale from such a common material as water and with them build the new houses of the village. Macondo would no longer be a burning place, where the hinges and door knockers twisted with the heat, but would be changed into a wintry city. If he did not persevere in his attempts to build an ice factory, it was because at that time he was absolutely enthusiastic over the education of his sons, especially that of Aureliano, who from the first had revealed a strange intuition for alchemy. The laboratory had been dusted off. Reviewing Melquíades' notes, serene now, without the exaltation of novelty, in prolonged and patient sessions they tried to separate úrsula's gold from the debris that was stuck to the bottom of the pot. Young José Arcadio scarcely took part in the process. While his father was involved body and soul with his water pipe, the willful first-born, who had always been too big for his age, had become a monumental adolescent. His voice had changed. An incipient fuzz appeared on his upper lip. One night, as úrsula went into the room where he was undressing to go to bed, she felt a mingled sense of shame and pity: he was the first man that she had seen naked after her husband, and he was so well-equipped for life that he seemed abnormal. úrsula, pregnant for the third time, relived her newlywed terror.
Around that time a merry, foul-mouthed, provocative woman came to the house to help with the chorea, and she knew how to read the future in cards. úrsula spoke to her about her son. She thought that his disproportionate size was something as unnatural as her cousin's tail of a pig. The woman let out an expansive laugh that resounded through the house like a spray of broken glass. "Just the opposite," she said. "He'll be very lucky." In order to confirm her prediction she brought her cards to the house a few days later and locked herself up with José Arcadio in a granary off the kitchen. She calmly placed her cards on an old carpenter's bench. saying anything that came into her head, while the boy waited beside her, more bored than intrigued. Suddenly she reached out her hand and touched him. "Lordy!" she said, sincerely startled, and that was all she could say. José Arcadio felt his bones filling up with foam, a languid fear, and a terrible desire to weep. The woman made no insinuations. But José Arcadiokept looking for her all night long, for the smell of smoke that she had under her armpits and that had got caught under his skin. He wanted to be with her all the time, he wanted her to be his mother, for them never to leave the granary, and for her to say "Lordy!" to him. One day he could not stand it any more and. he went looking for her at her house: He made a formal visit, sitting uncomprehendingly in the living room without saying a word. At that moment he had no desire for her. He found her different, entirely foreign to the image that her smell brought on, as if she were someone else. He drank his coffee and left the house in depression. That night, during the frightful time of lying awake, he desired her again with a brutal anxiety, but he did not want her that time as she had been in the granary but as she had been that afternoon.
Days later the woman suddenly called him to her house, where she was alone with her mother, and she had him come into the bedroom with the pretext of showing him a deck of cards. Then she touched him with such freedom that he suffered a delusion after the initial shudder, and he felt more fear than pleasure. She asked him to come and see her that night. He agreed. in order to get away, knowing that he was incapable of going. But that night, in his burning bed, he understood that he had to go we her, even if he were not capable. He got dressed by feel, listening in the dark to his brother's calm breathing, the dry cough of his father in the next room, the asthma of the hens in the courtyard, the buzz of the mosquitoes, the beating of his heart, and the inordinate bustle of a world that he had not noticed until then, and he went out into the sleeping street. With all his heart he wanted the door to be barred and not just closed as she had promised him. But it was open. He pushed it with the tips of his fingersand the hinges yielded with a mournful and articulate moan that left a frozen echo inside of him. From the moment he entered, sideways and trying not to make a noise, he caught the smell. He was still in the hallway, where the woman's three brothers had their hammocks in positions that he could not see and that he could not determine in the darkness as he felt his way along the hall to push open the bedroom door and get his bearings there so as not to mistake the bed. He found it. He bumped against the ropes of the hammocks, which were lower than he had suspected, and a man who had been snoring until then turned in his sleep and said in a kind of delusion, "It was Wednesday." When he pushed open the bedroom door, he could not prevent it from scraping against the uneven floor. Suddenly, in the absolute darkness, he understood with a hopeless nostalgia that he was completely disoriented. Sleeping in the narrow room were the mother, another daughter with her husband and two children, and the woman, who may not have been there. He could have guided himself by the smell if the smell had not been all over the house, so devious and at the same time so definite, as it had always been on his skin. He did not move for a long time, wondering in fright how he had ever got to that abyss of abandonment, when a hand with all its fingers extended and feeling about in the darkness touched his face. He was not surprised, for without knowing, he had been expecting it. Then he gave himself over to that hand, and in a terrible state of exhaustion he let himself be led to a shapeless place where his clothes were taken off and he was heaved about like a sack of potatoes and thrown from one side to the other in a bottomless darkness in which his arms were useless, where it no longer smelled of woman but of ammonia, and where he tried to remember her face and found before him the face of úrsula, confusedly aware that he was doing something that for a very long time he had wanted to do but that he had imagined could really never be done,not knowing what he was doing because he did not know where his feet were or where his head was, or whose feet or whose head, and feeling that he could no longer resist the glacial rumbling of his kidneys and the air of his intestines, and fear, and the bewildered anxiety to flee and at the same time stay forever in that exasperated silence and that fearful solitude.
Her name was Pilar Ternera. She had been part of the exodus that ended with the founding of Macondo, dragged along by her family in order to separate her from the man who had raped her at fourteen and had continued to love her until she was twenty-two, but who never made up his mind to make the situation public because he was a man apart. He promised to follow her to the ends of the earth, but only later on, when he put his affairs in order, and she had become tired of waiting for him, always identifying him with the tall and short, blond and brunet men that her cards promised from land and sea within three days, three months, or three years. With her waiting she had lost the strength of her thighs, the firmness of her breasts, her habit of tenderness, but she kept the madness of her heart intact. Maddened by that prodigious plaything, José Arcadio followed her path every night through the labyrinth of the room. On a certain occasion he found the door barred, and he knocked several times, knowing that if hehad the boldness to knock the first time he would have had to knock until the last, and after an interminable wait she opened the door for him. During the day, lying down to dream, he would secretly enjoy the memories of the night before. But when she came into the house, merry, indifferent, chatty, he did not have to make any effort to hide his tension, because that woman, whose explosive laugh frightened off the doves, had nothing to do with the invisible power that taught him how to breathe from within and control his heartbeats, and that had permitted him to understand why man are afraid of death. He was so wrapped up in himself that he did not even understand the joy of everyone when his father and his brother aroused the household with the news that they had succeeded in penetrating the metallic debris and had separated úrsula's gold.
They had succeeded, as a matter of fact, after putting in complicated and persevering days at it. úrsula was happy, and she even gave thanks to God for the invention of alchemy, while the people of the village crushed into the laboratory, and they served them guava jelly on crackers to celebrate the wonder, and José Arcadio Buendía let them see the crucible with the recovered gold, as if he had just invented it. Showing it all around, he ended up in front of his older son, who during the past few days had barely put in an appearance in the laboratory. He put the dry and yellowish mass in front of his eyes and asked him: "What does it look like to you?"

José Arcadio answered sincerely:"Dog shit."

在看見冰塊之前，霍·阿·布恩蒂亞始終猜不破自己夢見的玻璃房子。後來，他以爲自己理解了這個夢境的深刻意義。他認爲，不久的將來，他們就能用水這樣的普通材料大規模地製作冰磚，來給全村建築新的房子。當時，馬孔多好象一個赤熱的火爐，門閂和窗子的鉸鏈都熱得變了形；用冰磚修蓋房子，馬孔多就會變成一座永遠涼爽的市鎮了。如果霍·阿·布恩蒂亞沒有堅持建立冰廠的打算，只是因爲他當時全神貫注地教育兩個兒子，特別是奧雷連諾，這孩子一開始就對鍊金術表現了罕見的才能。試驗室裏的工作又緊張起來。現在，父子倆已經沒有被新奇事物引起的那種激動心情，只是平平靜靜地反覆閱讀梅爾加德斯的筆記，持久而耐心地努力，試圖從粘在鍋底的一大塊東西里面把烏蘇娜的金子分離出來。大兒子霍·阿卡蒂奧幾乎不參加這個工作。當父親身心都沉湎於熔鐵爐旁的工作時，這個身材過早超過年歲的任性的頭生子，已經成了一個魁梧的青年。他的嗓音變粗了·臉頰和下巴都長出了茸毛。有一天晚上，他正在臥室裏脫衣睡覺，烏蘇娜走了進來，竟然產生了羞澀和憐恤的混合感覺，因爲除了丈夫，她看見赤身露體的第一個男人就是兒子，而且兒子生理上顯得反常，甚至使她嚇了一跳。已經懷着第三個孩子的烏蘇娜，重新感到了以前作新娘時的那種恐懼。
那時，有個女人常來布恩蒂亞家裏，幫助烏蘇娜做些家務。這個女人愉快、熱情、嘴尖，會用紙牌占卜。烏蘇娜跟這女人談了談自己的憂慮。她覺得孩子的發育是不勻稱的，就象她的親戚長了條豬尾巴。女人止不住地放聲大笑，笑聲響徹了整座屋子，彷彿水晶玻璃鈴鐺。“恰恰相反，”她說。“他會有福氣的。”“過了幾天，爲了證明自己的預言準確，她帶來一副紙牌，把自己和霍·阿卡蒂奧鎖在廚房旁邊的庫房裏。她不慌不忙地在一張舊的木工臺上擺開紙牌，口中唸唸有詞；這時，年輕人佇立一旁，與其說對這套把戲感到興趣，不如說覺得厭倦。忽然，占卜的女人伸手摸了他一下。“我的天！”她真正吃驚地叫了一聲，就再也說不出什麼話了。霍·阿卡蒂奧感到，他的骨頭變得象海綿一樣酥軟，感到睏乏和恐懼，好不容易纔忍住淚水。女人一點也沒有激勵他。可他整夜都在找她，整夜都覺到她腋下發出的氣味：這種氣味彷彿滲進了他的軀體。他希望時時刻刻跟她在一起，希望她成爲他的母親，希望他和她永遠也不走出庫房，希望她向他說：“我的天！”重新摸他，重新說：“我的天！”有一日，他再也忍受不了這種煩惱了，就到她的家裏去。這次訪問是禮節性的，也是莫名其妙的——在整個訪問中，霍·阿卡蒂奧一次也沒開口。此刻他不需要她了。他覺得，她完全不象她的氣味在他心中幻化的形象，彷彿這根本不是她。而是另一個人。他喝完咖啡，就十分沮喪地回家。夜裏，他翻來覆去睡不着覺，又感到極度的難受，可他此刻渴望的不是跟他一起在庫房裏的那個女人，而是下午坐在他面前的那個女人了。
過了幾天，女人忽然把霍·阿卡蒂奧帶到了她的家中，並且藉口教他一種紙牌戲法，從她跟母親坐在一起的房間裏，把他領進一間臥窄。在這兒，她那麼放肆地摸他，使得他渾身不住地戰慄，但他感到的是恐懼，而不是快樂。隨後，她叫他夜間再未。霍·阿卡蒂奧口頭答應，心裏卻希望儘快擺脫她，——他知道自己天不能來的。然而夜間，躺在熱烘烘的被窩裏，他覺得自己應當去她那兒，即使自己不能這麼幹。他在黑暗中摸着穿上衣服，聽到弟弟平靜的呼吸聲、隔壁房間裏父親的產咳聲、院子裏母雞的咯咯聲、蚊子的嗡嗡聲、自己的心臟跳動聲——世界上這些亂七八糟的聲音以前是不曾引起他的注意的，然後，他走到沉入夢鄉的街上。他滿心希望房門是門上的，而下只是掩上的（她曾這樣告訴過他）。擔它井沒有閂上。他用指尖一推房門，鉸鏈就清晰地發出悲鳴，這種悲鳴在他心中引起的是冰涼的迴響。他儘量不弄出響聲，側着身子走進房裏，馬上感覺到了那種氣味，霍·阿卡蒂奧還在第一個房間裏，女人的三個弟弟通常是懸起吊牀過夜的；這些吊牀在什麼地方，他並不知道，在黑暗中也辨別不清，因此，他只得摸索着走到臥室門前，把門推開，找準方向，免得弄錯牀鋪。他往前摸過去，立即撞上了一張吊牀的牀頭，這個吊牀低得出乎他的預料。一個正在乎靜地打鼾的人，夢中翻了個身，聲音有點悲觀他說了句夢話：“那是星期三。”當霍·阿卡蒂奧推開臥室門的時候，他無法制止房門擦過凹凸不平的地面。他處在一團漆黑中，既苦惱又慌亂，明白自己終於迷失了方向。睡在這個狹窄房間裏的，是母親、她的第二個女兒和丈夫、兩個孩子和另一個女人，這個女人顯然不是等他的。他可以憑氣味找到，然而到處都是氣味，那麼細微又那麼明顯的氣味，就象現在經常留在他身上的那種氣味。霍·阿卡蒂奧呆然不動地站了好久，驚駭地問了問自己，怎會陷入這個束手無策的境地，忽然有一隻伸開指頭的手在黑暗中摸索，碰到了他的面孔，他並不覺得奇怪，因爲他下意識地正在等着別人摸他。他把自己交給了這隻手，他在精疲力盡的狀態中讓它把他拉到看不見的牀鋪跟前；在這兒，有人脫掉了他的衣服，把他象一袋土豆似的舉了起來，在一片漆黑裏把他翻來覆去；在黑暗中，他的雙手無用了，這兒不再聞女人的氣味，只有阿莫尼亞的氣味，他力圖回憶她的面孔，他的眼前卻恍惚浮現出烏蘇娜的而孔；他模糊地覺得，他正在做他早就想做的事兒，盡倚他決不認爲他能做這種事兒，他自己並不知道這該怎麼做，並不知道雙手放在哪兒，雙腳放在哪兒，並不知道這是誰的腦袋、誰的腿；他覺得自己再也不能繼續下去了，他渴望逃走，又渴望永遠留在這種極度的寂靜中，留在這種可怕的孤獨中。
這個女人叫做皮拉·苔列娜。按照父母的意願，她參加過最終建立馬孔多村的長征。父母想讓自己的女兒跟一個男人分開，她十四歲時，那人就使她失去了貞操，她滿二十二歲時，他還繼續跟她生在一起，可是怎麼也拿不定使婚姻合法化的主意，因爲他不是她本村的人。他發誓說，他要跟隨她到夭涯海角，但要等他把自己的事情搞好以後；從那時起，她就一直等着他，已經失去了相見的希望，儘管紙牌經常向她預示，將有各式各樣的男人來找她，高的和矮的、金髮和黑髮的；有的從陸上來，有的從海上來，有的過三天來，有的過三月來，有的過三年來。等呀盼呀，她的大腿已經失去了勁頭，胸脯已經失去了彈性，她已疏遠了男人的愛撫，可是心裏還很狂熱。現在，霍·阿卡蒂奧對新穎而奇異的玩耍入了迷，每天夜裏都到迷宮式的房間裏來找她。有一回，他發現房門是閂上的，就篤篤地敲門；他以爲，他既有勇氣敲第一次，那就應當敲到底……等了許久，她才把門打開。白天，他因睡眠不足躺下了，還在暗暗回味昨夜的事。可是，皮拉·苔列娜來到布恩蒂亞家裏的時候，顯得高高興興、滿不在乎、笑語聯珠，霍·阿卡蒂奧不必費勁地掩飾自己的緊張，因爲這個女人響亮的笑聲能夠嚇跑在院子裏踱來踱去的鴿子，她跟那個具有無形力量的女人毫無共同之處，那個女人曾經教他如何屏住呼吸和控制心跳，幫助他了解男人爲什麼怕死。他全神貫注於自己的體會，甚至不瞭解周圍的人在高興什麼，這時，他的父親和弟弟說，他們終於透過金屬渣滓取出了烏蘇娜的金子，這個消息簡直震動了整座房子。
事實上，他們是經過多日堅持不懈的努力取得成功的。烏蘇娜挺高興，甚至感謝上帝發明了鍊金術，村裏的居民擠進試驗室，主人就拿抹上番石榴醬的烤餅招待他們，慶祝這個奇蹟的出現，而霍·阿·布恩蒂亞卻讓他們參觀一個坩堝，裏面放着復原的金子，他的神情彷彿表示這金子是他剛剛發明的，他從一個人走到另一個人跟前，最後來到大兒子身邊。大兒子最近幾乎不來試驗室了。布恩蒂亞把一塊微黃的乾硬東西拿到他的眼前，問道，“你看這象什麼？”
霍·阿卡蒂奧直耿耿地回答：“象狗屎。”