2 A Bad Sign

CHAPTER 2 A Bad Sign As the boys had said, my pap hadn't been seen for more than a year, and that was fine by me. I didn't want to see him ever again. He used to get angry with me and cuff me with the back of his hand, though I used to hide in the woods most of the time when he was around. Some people even said he had died, but I didn't believe them. I believed the old man would turn up again. But I wished he wouldn't.

正如孩子们所说，我爸爸已经一年多没露面了，这对我来说没什么。 我再也不想见到他了。 他过去常常生我的气，用手背把我铐起来，尽管他在的时候，我大部分时间都躲在树林里。 有些人甚至说他已经死了，但我不相信他们。 我相信那个老人会再次出现。 但我希望他不要这么做。

The boys and I played robbers now and then for about a month. Then I quit. All the boys did. We hadn't robbed anybody, only pretended. We used to hop out of the woods and go charging down on people in carts who were taking plants and animals to market. But we never robbed any of them. Tom called the hogs "gold treasure," and he called the turnips and stuff "jewelry," and we would go to the cave and talk about what we had done. I just couldn't see any profit in it. Three or four months passed and it was well into the winter now. I had been to school. I could spell and read and write a little, and could say the multiplication table up to six times seven is thirty-five. I didn't think I could get higher than that if I lived forever. At first I hated the school, but by and by I found I could stand it. Whenever I got too tired of it I played hooky. The trouble that would bring the next day cheered me up. I was getting sort of used to the widow's ways, too, and they

我和孩子们时不时地玩强盗游戏，玩了大约一个月。 然后我辞职了。所有的男孩都这么做了。 我们没有抢劫任何人，只是假装。 我们常常跳出树林，冲到那些推着马车把动植物运到市场的人身上。 但我们从未抢劫过他们中的任何一个。 汤姆称这些猪为“黄金宝藏”，他称芜菁和其他东西为“珠宝”，我们会去山洞里谈论我们所做的事情。 我只是看不出有什么好处。 三四个月过去了，现在已经是冬天了。 我去上学了。我能拼写、读、写一点，还能把乘法表说到6乘7等于35。 我觉得即使我永远活下去，也不会比这更高了。 起初我讨厌那所学校，但渐渐地我发现我能忍受了。 每当我厌倦了，我就逃学。 第二天会带来的麻烦使我振作起来。 我也开始习惯寡妇的生活方式了，他们

weren't so hard on me. Living in a house and sleeping in a bed were still a little uncomfortable. Before the cold weather came I would slip out and sleep in the woods sometimes, and that was restful for me. I liked the old ways best, but I was beginning to like the new ones a little bit, too. The widow said I was coming along and doing well. She said she wasn't ashamed of me. One morning I happened to knock over the salt shaker at breakfast, which was bad luck. It made me terribly nervous and worried. I felt so bad that I had to go for a walk to try and figure out how to keep off the bad luck. I knew something would happen. I went down to the front garden and climbed over a fence. There was an inch of new snow on the ground and I saw somebody's footprints. This person had come up from the quarry and stood around for a while. Then he went back around the garden fence. It was strange that he hadn't come in or knocked on the door after

你对我没那么苛刻。住在房子里，睡在床上还是有点不舒服。 在寒冷的天气来临之前，我有时会溜出去，在树林里睡觉，这对我来说是一种休息。 我最喜欢旧的方式，但我也开始有点喜欢新的方式了。 寡妇说，我来了，做得很好。 她说她不以我为耻。 一天早上吃早饭时，我不小心打翻了盐瓶，真是倒霉。 这让我非常紧张和担心。 我感觉很糟糕，我不得不出去走走，想办法摆脱坏运气。 我就知道会有事发生。 我走到前面的花园，爬过篱笆。 地上积了一英寸厚的新雪，我看到了有人的脚印。 这个人从采石场上来，站了一会儿。 然后他又绕着花园的篱笆走了回去。 奇怪的是，后来他既没有进来，也没有敲门

standing around like that. I was curious. I was going to follow the tracks, but then I bent down to look at them closer. There was a cross in the left boot-heel made with big nails, a sign to keep off the devil. It was something I recognized from my pap's shoes. I started running as fast as I could. I looked over my shoulder every now and then, but I didn't see anybody. I was at Judge Thatcher's as quickly as I could get there. He asked if I had come for some of the money he was keeping for me. "No, sir," I said. "I don't want it at all. I want you to take it. I want to give it to you—the six thousand and everything else." He looked surprised and couldn't seem to figure it out. "Please take it," I said. "And don't ask me anything. Then I won't have to tell any lies." It took some convincing. At last he made me sign a piece of paper. He said it would mean I

像那样站着。 我很好奇。我本来打算顺着脚印走的，但后来我弯下腰仔细看了看。 在左靴后跟上有一个用大钉子钉成的十字架，这是一个远离魔鬼的标志。 这是我从我爸爸的鞋子上认出来的。 我开始以最快的速度奔跑。 我不时地回头看，但没有看到任何人。 我以最快的速度赶到了撒切尔法官家。 他问我是不是来拿他为我保管的一些钱。 “不，先生，”我说。“我一点也不想要。 我要你拿去。我想把它给你——六千英镑和其他一切。” 他看起来很惊讶，似乎想不明白是怎么回事。 “请收下吧，”我说。“什么也别问我。 这样我就不用说谎了。” 我花了些时间说服他。最后他让我在一张纸上签名。 他说这意味着我

had given him all of my money and property. Then I left to find Miss Watson's slave, Jim, who had some magic items that were supposed to be able to tell the future. He knew all about good and bad luck. I told Jim that my pap was here again and that I had found his tracks in the snow. I wanted to know what he was going to do and how long he was going to stay. Jim took an old hairball that that had come from a bull, which he said was supposed to be magic. It was as big as a fist. Jim said it had a spirit inside. He shook it, listened to it, and dropped it on the floor. He did this again and again, and then he put his ear against it to listen. He said it wouldn't talk without money. I had an old fake quarter and asked if the hairball could tell the difference. Jim said it probably couldn't, so we cleaned up my quarter and put it underneath the hairball. He listened to it one more time and said it was ready to tell my fortune.

把我所有的钱和财产都给了他。 然后我离开去找沃森小姐的奴隶吉姆，他有一些据说能预知未来的魔法物品。 他对好运和厄运都了如指掌。 我告诉吉姆，我爸爸又来了，我在雪地里发现了他的脚印。 我想知道他要做什么，要待多久。 吉姆拿了一个公牛身上的旧毛球，他说那应该是有魔力的。 它和拳头一样大。吉姆说里面有鬼魂。 他摇了摇，听了听，然后把它扔在地板上。 他这样做了一遍又一遍，然后把耳朵贴在上面听。 他说没有钱是不会说话的。 我有一个旧的假硬币，问毛球能不能分辨出来。 吉姆说可能不会，所以我们清理了我的硬币，把它放在毛球下面。 他又听了一遍，说可以给我算命了。

"Your old father doesn't know yet what he's going to do," Jim said. "Sometimes he thinks he'll go away and then he thinks he'll stay. The best is to rest easy and let the old man make his own way. But you are all right. You're going to have great trouble in your life, and great joy. Sometimes you're going to get hurt and sometimes you're going to get sick, but every time you're going to get well again. You should keep away from water as much as you can. And don't take any risks." I left feeling a little better, but still mighty nervous. Well I didn't have to wait too long. When I lit my candle and went up to my room that night, there sat my pap! I shut the door and when I turned around, there he was. I used to be scared of him all the time, because of how badly he treated me. I guess I was a little scared right then, too. But after I got over the surprise of seeing him so suddenly, I realized I wasn't scared of him very

“你的老父亲还不知道他要做什么，”吉姆说。 “有时他觉得他会离开，然后又觉得他会留下来。 最好的办法是休息，让老人自己走自己的路。 但是你很好。你的生活将会有很大的麻烦，也会有很大的快乐。 有时你会受伤，有时你会生病，但每次你都会好起来的。 你应该尽可能地远离水。 不要冒任何风险。” 我离开时感觉好了一点，但仍然非常紧张。 我没等太久。 那天晚上，当我点燃蜡烛上楼回到我的房间时，我爸爸就坐在那里！我关上门，一转身，他就在那里。 我以前一直很怕他，因为他对我很不好。 我想我当时也有点害怕。 但当我从突然见到他的惊讶中恢复过来后，我意识到我并不是很怕他