书城童书纳尼亚传奇系列(套装共7册)
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第272章 历险如何告一段落(3)

“Well, exactly the same thing happened again. And I thought to myself, oh dear, how ever many skins have I got to take off ? For I was longing to bathe my leg. So I scratched away for the third time and gotoff a third skin, just like the two others, and stepped out of it. But as soon as I looked at myself in the water I knew it had been no good.

“Then the lion said-but I don’t know if it spoke- “You will have to let me undress you.” I was afraid of his claws, I can tell you, but I was pretty nearly desperate now. So I just lay flat down on my back to let him do it.

“The very first tear he made was so deep that I thought it had gone right into my heart. And when he began pulling the skin off, it hurt worse than anything I‘ve ever felt. The only thing that made me able to bear it was just the pleasure of feeling the stuff peel off. You know- if you’ve ever picked the scab off a sore place. It hurts like billy-oh but it is such fun to see it coming away.”

“I know exactly what you mean,” said Edmund.

“Well, he peeled the beastly stuff right off-just as I thought I‘d done it myself the other three times, only they hadn’t hurt-and there it was, lying on the grass: only ever so much thicker, and darker, and more knobbly-looking than the others had been. And there was I as smooth and soft as a peeled switch and smaller than I had been. Then he caught hold of me-I didn‘t like that much for I was very tender underneath now that I’d no skin on-and threw me into the water. It smarted like anything but only for a moment. After that it became perfectly delicious and as soon as I started swimming and splashing I found that all the pain had gone from my arm. And then I saw why. I‘d turned into a boy again. You’d think me simply phoney if I told you how I felt about my own arms. I know they‘ve no muscle and are pretty mouldy compared with Caspian’s, but I was so glad to see them.

“After a bit the lion took me out and dressed me-” “Dressed you? With his paws?”

“Well, I don‘t exactly remember that bit. But he did somehow or other: in new clothes-the same I’ve got on now, as a matter of fact. And then suddenly I was back here. Which is what makes me think it must have been a dream.”

“No. It wasn‘t a dream,” said Edmund. “Why not?”

“Well, there are the clothes, for one thing. And you have been- well, un-dragoned, for another.”

“What do you think it was, then?” asked Eustace. “I think you’ve seen Aslan,” said Edmund.

“Aslan!” said Eustace. “I‘ve heard that name mentioned several times since we joined the Dawn Treader. And I felt-I don’t know what-I hated it. But I was hating everything then. And by the way, I‘d like to apologize. I’m afraid I‘ve been pretty beastly.”

“That’s all right,” said Edmund. “Between ourselves, you haven‘t been as bad as I was on my first trip to Narnia. You were only an ass, but I was a traitor.”

“Well, don’t tell me about it, then,” said Eustace. “But who is Aslan? Do you know him?”

“Well-he knows me,” said Edmund. “He is the great Lion, the son of the Emperor-over-Sea, who saved me and saved Narnia. We‘ve all seen him. Lucy sees him most often. And it may be Aslan’s country we are sailing to.”

Neither said anything for a while. The last bright star had vanished and though they could not see the sunrise because of the mountains on their right, they knew it was going on because the sky above them and the bay before them turned the colour of roses. Then some bird of the parrot kind screamed in the wood behind them, and they heard movements among the trees, and finally a blast on Caspian‘s horn. The camp was astir.

Great was the rejoicing when Edmund and the restored Eustace walked into the breakfast circle round the camp fire. And now of course everyone heard the earlier part of his story. People wondered whether the other dragon had killed the Lord Octesian several years ago or whether Octesian himself had been the old dragon. The jewels with which Eustace had crammed his pockets in the cave had disappeared along with the clothes he had then been wearing: but no one, least of all Eustace himself, felt any desire to go back to that valley for more treasure.

In a few days now the Dawn Treader, remasted, re-painted, andwell stored, was ready to sail. Before they embarked Caspian caused to be cut on a smooth cliff facing the bay the words:

DRAGON ISLAND DISCOVERED BY CASPIAN X, KING OF NARNIA, ETC.

IN THE FOURTH YEAR OF HIS REIGN. HERE, AS WE SUPPOSE, THE LORD OCTESIANHAD HIS DEATH.

It would be nice, and fairly true, to say that “from that time forth Eustace was a different boy”. To be strictly accurate, he began to be a different boy. He had relapses. There were still many days when he could be very tiresome. But most of those I shall not notice. The cure had begun.

The Lord Octesian’s arm-ring had a curious fate. Eustace did not want it and offered it to Caspian, and Caspian offered it to Lucy. She did not care about having it. “Very well, then, catch as catch can,” said Caspian and flung it up in the air. This was when they were all standing looking at the inscription. Up went the ring, flashing in the sunlight, and caught, and hung, as neatly as a well-thrown quoit, on a little projection on the rock. No one could climb up to get it from below and no one could climb down to get it from above. And there, for all I know, it is hanging still and may hang till that world ends.

中文阅读

“看什么呀?”埃德蒙问道。“看金手镯上的纹章图案。”卡斯宾说。

“一把小锤子上面有一颗钻石,就像是一颗星星,”德利尼安说,“哎呀,我以前见过这个。”

“见过!”卡斯宾说道,“嗨,你当然见过。这是纳尼亚一个伟大家族的标志。这是欧克提宪大臣的臂环。”

“坏蛋,”雷匹奇普对龙说道,“是你把一个纳尼亚大臣给吞吃了吗?”龙拼命地摇头。

“或许,”露西说,“是欧克提宪大臣变成了龙——被施了魔法,你们知道的。”

“也不一定,”埃德蒙说,“所有的龙都收藏金子。我认为,比较靠谱的猜测是,欧克提宪走到这个岛屿就停止不前了。”

“你是欧克提宪大臣吗?”露西对着龙问道,看到它悲伤地摇了摇头,又问道,“我是说,你是一个被施了魔法的——人类吗?”

龙使劲儿地点头。接着有人问道——事后大家争论不休,到底是露西还是埃德蒙问的——“你不会是——不会碰巧是尤斯塔斯吧?”尤斯塔斯点着可怕的龙头,用尾巴砰砰拍打着海水,大家纷纷向后退去(一些水手发出惊叫声,我就不一一写下来了),以躲开他眼中流出的那些巨大而滚烫的泪珠。