04 The Cave

The Cave The Giant ran on and on. But now a curious change took place in his way of running. He seemed suddenly to go into a higher gear. Faster and faster he went and soon he was travelling at such a speed that the landscape became blurred. The wind stung Sophie's cheeks. It made her eyes water. It whipped her head back and whistled in her ears. She could no longer feel the Giant's feet touching the ground. She had a weird sensation they were flying. It was impossible to tell whether they were over land or sea. This Giant had some sort of magic in his legs. The wind rushing against Sophie's face became so strong that she had to duck down again into the blanket to prevent her head from being blown away.

巨人不停地跑啊跑。 但是现在他跑步的方式发生了奇怪的变化。 他似乎突然加快了速度。 他越开越快，很快，他的速度快得连风景都变得模糊了。 风刺痛了苏菲的脸颊。 这使她热泪盈眶。它把她的头向后一甩，在她耳边呼啸。 她再也感觉不到巨人的脚碰到地面了。 她有一种奇怪的感觉，它们在飞。 无法分辨他们是在陆地上还是在海上。 这个巨人的腿上有某种魔力。 吹在索菲脸上的风变得如此猛烈，她不得不再次躲进毯子里，以免她的头被风吹走。

Was it really possible that they were crossing oceans? It certainly felt that way to Sophie. She crouched in the blanket and listened to the howling of the wind. It went on for what seemed like hours. Then all at once the wind stopped its howling. The pace began to slow down. Sophie could feel the Giant's feet pounding once again over the earth. She poked her head up out of the blanket to have a look. They were in a country of thick forests and rushing rivers. The Giant had definitely slowed down and was now running more normally, although normal was a silly word to use to describe a galloping giant. He leaped over a dozen rivers. He went rattling through a great forest, then down into a valley and up over a range of hills as bare as concrete, and soon he was galloping over a desolate wasteland that was not

他们真的有可能穿越大洋吗? 苏菲当然是这么想的。 她蜷缩在毯子里，听着风的呼啸。 这似乎持续了好几个小时。 突然，风停止了呼啸。 步伐开始放慢。 索菲能感觉到巨人的脚又一次在大地上跺来跺去。 她从毯子里探出头来看了看。 他们身处一个森林茂密、河流湍急的国家。 巨人确实放慢了速度，现在跑得更正常了，虽然用“正常”这个词来形容一个飞奔的巨人是愚蠢的。 他跳过了十几条河。 他嘎吱嘎吱地穿过一片大森林，然后下到一个山谷，再上到一排光秃秃的小山，很快他就驰过了一片荒凉的荒地

quite of this earth. The ground was flat and pale yellow. Great lumps of blue rock were scattered around, and dead trees stood everywhere like skeletons. The moon had long since disappeared and now the dawn was breaking. Sophie, still peering out from the blanket, saw suddenly ahead of her a great craggy mountain. The mountain was dark blue and all around it the sky was gushing and glistening with light. Bits of pale gold were flying among delicate frosty-white flakes of cloud, and over to one side the rim of the morning sun was coming up red as blood. Right beneath the mountain, the Giant stopped. He was puffing mightily. His great chest was heaving in and out. He paused to catch his breath. Directly in front of them, lying against the side of the mountain, Sophie could see a massive round stone. It was as big as a house. The Giant reached out and rolled the stone to one side as easily as if it had been a football, and now, where the stone had been, there appeared a vast black hole. The hole was so large the Giant didn't even have to duck his head as he went in. He strode into the

这是地球的一部分。地面平坦，呈淡黄色。 大块大块的蓝色岩石散落在周围，到处都是枯树，像骷髅一样。 月亮早已不见了，现在破晓了。 索菲还在从毯子里往外看，突然看见前面有一座陡峭的大山。 那座山是深蓝色的，四周的天空闪烁着光芒。 淡金色的碎片在精致的霜白色的云片中飞舞，另一边，晨曦的边缘像血一样红。 就在山下，巨人停了下来。 他喘着粗气。他那硕大的胸膛扑腾着。 他停下来喘口气。 就在他们的正前方，靠着山的一侧，索菲看见一块巨大的圆石头。 它和房子一样大。巨人伸出手，像踢足球一样轻松地把石头滚到一边，现在，石头原来所在的地方出现了一个巨大的黑洞。 洞太大了，巨人进去的时候甚至都不用低头。 他大步走进房间

black hole still carrying Sophie in one hand, the trumpet and the suitcase in the other. As soon as he was inside, he stopped and turned and rolled the great stone back into place so that the entrance to his secret cave was completely hidden from outside. Now that the entrance had been sealed up, there was not a glint of light inside the cave. All was black. Sophie felt herself being lowered to the ground. Then the Giant let go the blanket completely. His footsteps moved away. Sophie sat there in the dark, shivering with fear.

黑洞一只手仍然拎着苏菲，另一只手拿着小号和手提箱。 一进去，他就停下来，转过身来，把那块大石头滚回原处，这样他的秘密洞穴的入口就完全被外面隐藏起来了。 既然洞口已经封上了，山洞里一点亮光也没有。 一片漆黑。索菲觉得自己被吊到了地面上。 然后巨人完全放开了毯子。 他的脚步声移开了。索菲坐在黑暗中，吓得直哆嗦。

He is getting ready to eat me, she told herself. He will probably eat me raw, just as I am. Or perhaps he will boil me first. Or he will have me fried. He will drop me like a rasher of bacon into some gigantic frying-pan sizzling with fat. A blaze of light suddenly lit up the whole place. Sophie blinked and stared.

他要把我吃掉了，她对自己说。 他可能会生吃我，就像我一样。 或者他会先把我煮了。 否则他会把我炒了。他会把我像培根一样扔进油锅里滋滋作响。 一道亮光突然照亮了整个地方。 索菲眨了眨眼睛，盯着看。

She saw an enormous cavern with a high rocky roof. The walls on either side were lined with shelves, and on the shelves there stood row upon row of glass jars. There were jars everywhere. They were piled up in the corners. They filled every nook and cranny of the cave. In the middle of the floor there was a table twelve feet high and a chair to match. The Giant took off his black cloak and hung it against the wall. Sophie saw that under the cloak he was wearing a sort of collarless shirt and a dirty old leather waistcoat that didn't seem to have any buttons. His trousers were faded green and were far too short in the legs. On his bare feet he was wearing a pair of ridiculous sandals that for some reason had holes cut along each side, with a large hole at the end where his toes stuck out. Sophie, crouching on the floor of the cave in her nightie, gazed back at him through thick steel-rimmed glasses. She was trembling like a leaf in the wind, and a finger of ice was running up and down the length of her spine.

她看见一个巨大的洞穴，上面有高高的岩石。 两边的墙上都排列着架子，架子上放着一排又一排的玻璃瓶。 到处都是罐子。 它们堆在角落里。 他们填满了洞穴的每一个角落和缝隙。 在地板中央有一张12英尺高的桌子和一张与之相配的椅子。 巨人脱下他的黑斗篷，挂在墙上。 索菲看见他在斗篷下面穿了一件无领衬衫，一件又脏又旧的皮马甲，好像连一颗扣子都没有。 他的裤子已经褪了绿，裤腿也太短了。 他光着脚，穿着一双可笑的凉鞋，不知什么原因，两边都开了个洞，脚趾头露出来的地方还有一个大洞。 索菲穿着睡衣蹲在洞穴的地板上，透过厚厚的钢边眼镜回望着他。 她像风中的一片叶子一样颤抖着，一根指状的冰在她的脊椎上下流动。