經典科幻文學:《宇宙盡頭的餐館》第34章1

Chapter 34
The sun came out and beamed cheerfully at them. A bird sang. A warm breeze wafted through the trees and lifted the heads of the flowers, carrying their scent away through the woods. An insect droned past on its way to do whatever it is that insects do in the late afternoon. The sound of voices lilted through the trees followed a moment later by two girls who stopped in surprise at the sight of Ford Prefect and Arthur Dent apparently lying on the ground in agony, but in fact rocking with noiseless laughter.
“No, don’t go,” called Ford Prefect between gasps, “we’ll be with you in a moment.”
“What’s the matter?” asked one of the girls. She was the taller and slimmer of the two. On Golgafrincham she had been a junior personnel officer, but hadn’t liked it much.
Ford pulled himself together.
“Excuse me,” he said, “hello. My friend and I were just contemplating the meaning of life. Frivolous exercise.”
“Oh it’s you,” said the girl, “you made a bit of a spectacle of yourself this afternoon. You were quite funny to begin with but you did bang on a bit.”
“Did I? Oh yes.”
“Yes, what was all that for?” asked the other girl, a shorter round-faced girl who had been an art director for a small advertising company on Golgafrincham. Whatever the privations of this world were, she went to sleep every night profoundly grateful for the fact that whatever she had to face in the morning it wouldn’t be a hundred almost identical photographs of moodily lit tubes of toothpaste.
“For? For nothing. Nothing’s for anything,” said Ford Prefect happily. “Come and join us. I’m Ford, this is Arthur. We were just about to do nothing at all for a while but it can wait.”
The girls looked at them doubtfully.
“I’m Agda,” said the tall one, “this is Mella.”
“Hello Agda, hello Mella,” said Ford.
“Do you talk at all?” said Mella to Arthur.
“Oh, eventually,” said Arthur with a smile, “but not as much as Ford.”
“Good.”
There was a slight pause.
“What did you mean,” asked Agda, “about only having two million years? I couldn’t make sense of what you were saying.”
“Oh that,” said Ford, “it doesn’t matter.”
“It’s just that the world gets demolished to make way for a hyperspace bypass,” said Arthur with a shrug, “but that’s two million years away, and anyway it’s just Vogons doing what Vogons do.”
“Vogons?” said Mella.
“Yes, you wouldn’t know them.”
“Where’d you get this idea from?”
“It really doesn’t matter. It’s just like a dream from the past, or the future.” Arthur smiled and looked away.
“Does it worry you that you don’t talk any kind of sense?” asked Agda.

第三十四章
太陽鑽了出來，照耀著他們。一隻鳥在歌唱，溫暖的微風輕拂過樹林，抬起花朵們的頭，把它們的芬芳播撒在林間。一隻昆蟲嗡嗡地行進在它的路上，去做昆蟲們在午後應該做的事情，林間跳躍著人聲，伴隨人聲而來的是兩個女孩，她們驚訝地停了下來。只見福特長官和阿瑟·鄧特躺在地上，初看似乎痛苦不堪，再看時，這兩人原來正笑得打滾。
“不，別走，”福特長官在喘氣的間歇喊道，“我們來和你們作伴。”
“出什麼事了？”其中一個女孩同道。她是個子較高、較苗條的那一個，在高爾伽弗林查姆上，她曾經是一個下級人事官員，但地並不喜歡那份工作，
福特控制住自己的情緒。
“請原諒，”他說，“你們好。我和我的朋友正在思考生命的意義。只是無關緊要的思維練習而已。”
“哦，是你啊，”女孩說，“你今天下午可箅出了風頭。剛開始時你挺滑稽的，不過後來卻發火了。”
“我發火了，噢，是的。”
“是啊，為什麼要發火呢”另一個女孩問。她個子矮點兒，臉圓圓的，在高爾伽弗林查姆上曾經是一家小廣告公司的藝術導演，無論現往這個世界有哪些匱乏，每天晚上睡覺時她都會深深地感謝命運——不管早上起來時她必須面對什麼問題，這些問題絕不會再是一百張幾乎一模一樣的牙膏廣告照片。
“為什麼，什麼也不為，”福特長官快樂地說，“來加入我們吧，我叫福特，這是阿瑟。我們正準備什麼也不做地待上一會兒。”
女孩們懷疑地看著他們。
“我叫阿姬達，”高的那個說，“這是梅託。”
“你好，阿姬達；你好，梅託。”福特說。
“你會說話嗎，”梅拉問阿瑟。
“哦，當然，”阿瑟笑著說，“不過沒有福特話多。”
“很好。”
一陣短暫的沉默。
“你是什麼意思，”阿姬達問，“說只有二百萬年了’我不明白你在說什麼。”
“噢，那個呀，”福特說，“別管它了。”
“意思是，這個世界將被毀滅，目的是給一條超空問通道騰地方。”阿瑟聳了聳肩，“不過那是二百萬年以後的事了，只是沃貢人在幹身為沃貢人必須乾的事而已。”
“沃貢人？”梅拉問。
“是的，你們不會知道他們的。”
“所有這些事情，你們足從哪兒知道的，”
“這無關緊要，真的，這就像來自過去的一場夢，或者來自未來。”阿瑟看著遠處，笑著說。
“你的話瘋瘋癲癲的，你不擔心嗎？”阿姬達問。