21 The Hurtful Memories

The Hurtful Memories Ebenezer had never disliked an item of clothing so much. There was a time in the eighteenth century when he experienced strong feelings of disregard for a certain style of hat that happened to be in fashion, but that was nothing compared to the hatred he felt for the gold-buttoned shirt. The shirt made Ebenezer watch the television that the beast had hooked up to the memory book. Every time he tried to talk over the memories, the shirt would strangle him. Every time he tried to move his head away

埃比尼泽从来没有像现在这样不喜欢一件衣服。 在18世纪，有一段时间，他对碰巧流行的某种款式的帽子产生了强烈的反感，但这与他对金纽扣衬衫的厌恶相比，根本不算什么。 这件衬衫让埃比尼泽看了那只野兽挂在记忆书上的电视。 每次他想要谈论这些回忆时，衬衫就会把他勒死。 每次他想把头移开

from the screen, the shirt would grow tighter around his chest, or turn itchy on his skin. The book had run out of happy memories about the beast, so it was replaying ones it had already shown. The book showed the beast doing its mildly amusing impression of Queen Victoria, and the help that it had given to ensure that Ebenezer was the most fabulously dressed man in the first age of jazz and jazzy trousers. There were clips of the beast vomiting out bombproof shutters to protect the house during wartime, and sparkly boom boxes to make sure that the house wouldn't be le.. out during disco time. The book even showed up to the moment when the beast had vomited out the baby grand piano just a few weeks ago.

从屏幕上看，衬衫会在他的胸部变得更紧，或者在他的皮肤上变得发痒。 这本书已经没有了关于这头野兽的美好回忆，所以它正在重播它已经展示过的那些。 这本书展示了这头野兽对维多利亚女王的温和有趣的模仿，以及它在确保埃比尼泽成为第一个爵士乐时代穿着最华丽的人和爵士裤方面所提供的帮助。 有一些片段显示，这只野兽在战争期间吐出防爆百叶窗，以保护房子，还有闪闪发光的音响，以确保房子不会被炸毁。 在迪斯科时间外出。这本书甚至出现在几周前那只野兽吐出小三角钢琴的那一刻。

When Ebenezer had first seen these same memories just a couple of days ago, he had been secretly thrilled. Now the memories repulsed him. There's nothing like being kidnapped and tortured to make you go off someone. All Ebenezer could think of was getting himself and Bethany as far away from the beast as possible. His only chance of escape seemed to lie in the marks that Claudette's talons had left on the floor. The marks were words, and the words were: THEY'RE YOUR MEMORIES. USE THEM. At first, Ebenezer presumed that the message was just some cruel trick of the beast's, but the longer he looked at them, the more he thought it might have come from

当埃比尼泽几天前第一次看到这些相同的记忆时，他暗自感到兴奋。 现在，这些回忆使他感到厌恶。 没有什么比被绑架和折磨更能让你离开某人了。 埃比尼泽所能想到的就是让自己和伯大尼尽可能远离那只野兽。 他唯一的逃生机会似乎就在于克劳德特的爪子在地板上留下的痕迹。 标记是文字，文字是：它们是你的记忆。 使用它们。起初，埃比尼泽认为这个信息只是野兽残忍的恶作剧，但他看得越久，就越觉得它可能来自

Claudette—or, at least, whatever was still left of her in the beast. Ebenezer tried and tried to think about how he could possibly use his memories to escape, but he couldn't figure it out. He was terribly cross because he knew he wouldn't be able to live with himself if he didn't find a way to save Bethany. There was nothing he had ever wanted more in the world than to see her again. As Ebenezer thought about how much he missed Bethany, the portraits in the memory book began to change, and soon, the TV was filled with clips of her. But because the beast was no longer the subject, the memories were unflattering ones. The book showed Ebenezer picking up Bethany from the orphanage, when she had

克劳德特，或者，至少，她在那畜生身上所剩下的东西。 埃比尼泽试了又试，想怎样才能利用自己的记忆逃跑，但他就是想不出来。 他非常生气，因为他知道如果他找不到办法救宝芬妮，他就无法忍受自己的痛苦。 在这个世界上，他最渴望的就是能再见到她。 当埃比尼泽想到他是多么想念宝芬妮时，记忆册里的肖像开始发生变化，很快，电视上就满是她的片段。 但因为野兽不再是主题，记忆是不讨人喜欢的。 书里说埃比尼泽把宝芬妮从孤儿院接走了，当她

insulted his whistling, messed up his house, and demanded to be fed nothing but chocolate cake. Then it showed how Bethany had used this chocolate cake to doodle over all his favorite paintings in the house. There were lots of clips of Bethany calling him charming names like "nincompoop," "nitwit," and "gitface," and the book reminded him of his grumpy feelings whenever Bethany had tried to make him do something that got in the way of his easy life. In spite of the book's efforts, Ebenezer took far more joy from seeing Bethany at her worst than he had from seeing the beast at its loathsome best. It was strange, but the clips of Bethany seemed to have an effect on the shirt and the other items as well. They squirmed and wriggled—deeply uncomfortable at the

侮辱他的口哨，把他的房子弄得乱七八糟，只要求喂他巧克力蛋糕。 然后它展示了宝芬妮是如何用这块巧克力蛋糕在家里他最喜欢的画上涂鸦的。 书中有很多片段，都是贝瑟尼叫他一些迷人的名字，比如“笨蛋”、“笨蛋”和“笨蛋脸”。这本书让他想起，每当贝瑟尼试图让他做一些妨碍他轻松生活的事情时，他就会生气。 尽管这本书做了很多努力，但埃比尼泽看到伯大尼最糟糕的一面比看到野兽最令人厌恶的一面更让他高兴。 这很奇怪，但宝芬妮的片段似乎对衬衫和其他物品也有影响。 他们扭动着，扭动着——对这一切深感不安

sight of Ebenezer and Bethany's friendship. It was like how the memory book and shirt had reacted when Ebenezer had tried doing do-gooding—none of the beastly items seemed to enjoy being in the vicinity of anything good or pure. Ebenezer's eyes welled with tears when he looked at Bethany's face, but then the screen began to change again. He expected a transition to some new series of bad Bethany memories, but the beast appeared instead. The beast was speaking live from a dressing room in the theater, and it was looking straight down the lens of a camera it had vomited out for itself. Ebenezer saw that Claudette's beak was askew and that her body was battered and bruised. Feathers were

埃比尼泽和宝芬妮的友谊。 这就像埃比尼泽试图做好事时，记忆书和衬衫的反应一样——这些可恶的东西似乎都不喜欢靠近任何美好或纯洁的东西。 当埃比尼泽看着宝芬妮的脸时，他的眼睛里充满了泪水，但随后屏幕又开始改变。 他以为会过渡到新的一系列关于宝芬妮的坏记忆，但野兽却出现了。 这只野兽正在剧院的一间更衣室里直播，它正盯着自己吐出来的摄像机镜头。 埃比尼泽看到克劳德特的嘴歪了，她的身体伤痕累累。 羽毛是