諾貝爾文學經典:《寵兒》第1章Part 15

It was gone. Denver wandered through the silence to the stove. She ashed over the fire and pulledthe pan of biscuits from the oven. The jelly cupboard was on its back, its contents lying in a heapin the corner of the bottom shelf. She took out a jar, and, looking around for a plate, found half ofone by the door. These things she carried out to the porch steps, where she sat down.
The two of them had gone up there. Stepping lightly, easy-footed, they had climbed the whitestairs, leaving her down below. She pried the wire from the top of the jar and then the lid. Under it was cloth and under that a thin cake of wax. She removed it all and coaxed the jelly onto one halfof the half a plate. She took a biscuit and pulled off its black top. Smoke curled from the soft whiteinsides. She missed her brothers. Buglar and Howard would be twenty two and twenty-three now.
Although they had been polite to her during the quiet time and gave her the whole top of the bed,she remembered how it was before: the pleasure they had sitting clustered on the white stairs —she between the knees of Howard or Buglar — while they made up die-witch! stories with provenways of killing her dead. And Baby Suggs telling her things in the keeping room. She smelled likebark in the day and leaves at night, for Denver would not sleep in her old room after her brothersran away.
Now her mother was upstairs with the man who had gotten rid of the only other company she had.
Denver dipped a bit of bread into the jelly. Slowly, methodically, miserably she ate QUITE in hurry, but losing no time, Sethe and Paul D climbed the white stairs. Overwhelmedasmu(a) ch by the downright luck of finding her house and her in it as by the certaintyof giving her his sex, Paul D dropped twenty-five years from his recent memory. A stair stepbefore him was Baby Suggs' replacement, the new girl they dreamed of at night and fucked cowsfor at dawn while waiting for her to choose. Merely kissing the wrought iron on her back hadshook the house, had made it necessary for him to beat it to pieces. Now he would do more.
She led him to the top of the stairs, where light came straight from the sky because the second-story windows of that house had been placed in the pitched ceiling and not the walls. There weretwo rooms and she took him into one of them, hoping he wouldn't mind the fact that she was notprepared; that though she could remember desire, she had forgotten how it worked; the clutch andhelplessness that resided in the hands; how blindness was altered so that what leapt to the eye wereplaces to lie down, and all else — door knobs, straps, hooks, the sadness that crouched in corners,and the passing of time — was interference.
It was over before they could get their clothes off. Half-dressed and short of breath, they lay sideby side resentful of one another and the skylight above them. His dreaming of her had been toolong and too long ago. Her deprivation had been not having any dreams of her own at all. Nowthey were sorry and too shy to make talk.

它走了。丹芙穿過死寂，晃到爐邊。她用柴灰蓋住爐火，從烤箱裏抽出那鍋烤餅。盛果醬的碗櫥仰躺在地上，裏面的東西在底格的一角擠作一團。她拿出一個罐子，然後四處去尋盤子，只在門旁邊找到半個。她拿着這些東西，在門廊的台階上坐下。
他們兩個上去了。步履輕快、不慌不忙地，他們爬上了白樓梯，把她扔在下面。她撬開罐子的封口和蓋子。蓋子下邊是布，再下邊是薄薄的一層蠟。她一一揭掉，慢慢地把果醬倒在半拉盤子裏。她拿起一塊烤餅，揭掉黑黑的焦皮。又白又軟的餅裏冒出裊裊熱氣。
她思念哥哥們。巴格勒和霍華德現在該有二十二和二十三了。雖説在她聽不見聲音的那陣子他們待她很是彬彬有禮，還把整個上鋪讓給她，她記得的卻仍是那以前的光景：他們樂融融地團坐在白樓梯上———她夾在巴格勒或者霍華德的膝蓋中間———那時他們編了好多“殺巫婆!”故事，想出種種確鑿的方法來殺死巫婆。她還想起貝比·薩格斯在起居室對她講的事。奶奶白天聞起來像樹皮，晚上聞起來像樹葉———自打哥哥們出走以後，丹芙就不在自己原來的屋裏過夜了。
現在她的媽媽正和那個男人一起待在樓上，就是他，趕跑了她唯一的夥伴。

丹芙將一小塊麪包蘸進果醬。慢吞吞地，有條不紊地，悽苦不堪地，她吃掉了它。並不很急，但也不浪費一點時間，塞絲和保羅·D爬着白樓梯。能夠如此幸運地找到她的房子和當中的她，而且肯定要同她雲雨一番，保羅·D徹底昏了頭，把記憶中最近的二十五年丟個精光。前面一磴樓梯上就是那個頂替貝比·薩格斯的姑娘，那個他們夜裏夢想、黎明為之去操母牛、同時等待她挑選的新來的姑娘。單是親吻她後背上的鍛鐵，已經晃動了整座房子，已經逼着他把它打了個稀巴爛。現在他還要做得更多呢。
她把他領到樓梯的上面，那兒的光線從天空直射進來，因為二樓的窗户不是開在牆上，而是裝在傾斜的屋頂上。樓上一共有兩個房間，她帶他進了其中一間，心下希望他不會介意她還沒準備好———雖然她還能喚起慾望，卻已經忘了慾望是如何作用的：揮之不去，手中的緊迫與無力；意亂情迷之下，跳進眼簾的只有可以躺下的地方，而其餘的一切———門把手、皮帶、掛鈎、蜷在屋角的悲傷，以及時光的流逝———不過是干擾。
在他們把衣服脱光之前那事就都完了。胴體半裸，氣喘吁吁，他們並排躺着，相互怨恨，也怨恨上面的天光。他對她的魂牽夢縈已是太久太久以前的事了，而她壓根就被剝奪了夢想的權利。現在他們很難過，而且實在羞於彼此交談。