33 Thirty-three

Thirty-three Far below them, in the City of New York, something like pandemonium was breaking out. A great round ball as big as a house had been sighted hovering high up in the sky over the very centre of Manhattan, and the cry had gone up that it was an enormous bomb sent over by another country to blow the whole city to smithereens. Air-raid sirens began wailing in every section. All radio and television programmes were interrupted with announcements that the population must go down into their cellars immediately. One million people walking in the streets on their way to work looked up into the sky and saw the monster hovering above them, and started running for the nearest subway entrance to take cover. Generals grabbed hold of telephones and shouted orders to everyone they could think of. The Mayor of New York called up the President of the United States down

在他们下面很远的地方，在纽约市，一场类似大混乱的场面正在爆发。 有人看见一个像房子一样大的大圆球在曼哈顿中心的高空盘旋，人们大声说这是另一个国家派来的一颗巨大的炸弹，要把整个城市炸成碎片。 每个区域都响起了空袭警报。 所有的广播和电视节目都被广播打断了，通知人们必须立即到地窖里去。 100万走在上班路上的人抬头望向天空，看到怪物在他们头顶盘旋，于是开始跑向最近的地铁入口寻找掩护。 将军们拿起电话，向他们能想到的每一个人大声命令。 纽约市长把美国总统叫了下来

in Washington, D.C., to ask him for help, and the President, who at that moment was having breakfast in his pyjamas, quickly pushed away his half-finished plate of Sugar Crisps and started pressing buttons right and left to summon his Admirals and his Generals. And all the way across the vast stretch of America, in all the fifty States from Alaska to Florida, from Pennsylvania to Hawaii, the alarm was sounded and the word went out that the biggest bomb in the history of the world was hovering over New York City, and that at any moment it might go off.

总统当时正穿着睡衣吃早餐，他迅速推开吃了一半的糖薯片，开始左右按按钮，召唤他的海军上将和将军们。 整个美国，从阿拉斯加到佛罗里达，从宾夕法尼亚到夏威夷的五十个州，警报都拉响了，世界历史上最大的炸弹正在纽约上空盘旋，随时可能爆炸。