讀點好英文:I Am Legend 我是傳奇

I Am Legend 我是傳奇

[美]理查德·馬瑟森（Richard Matheson）

恐怖的生化戰(zhàn)爭席卷而來，人類為自己掘下了死亡的墳墓。世紀末日隨即而來，人類快要滅絕了，唯一存活下來的是紐約一個才華橫溢的病原體學者羅伯特·奈維爾。這種通過空氣傳播的病毒快速地籠罩了整個城市。血液天生的免疫力使羅伯特成了僅存的人類。作為人類最后的希望，他憑借自己血液中的免疫系統(tǒng)，尋找逆轉病毒的方法。他別無選擇，因為他的時間不多了。

On those cloudy days, Robert Neville was never sure when sunset came, and sometimes they were in the streets before he could get back.

If he had been more analytical, he might have calculated the approximate time of their arrival;but he still used the lifetime habit of judging nightfall by the sky, and on cloudy days that method didn't work. That was why he chose to stay near the house on those days.

He walked around the house in the dull gray of afternoon, a cigarette dangling from the corner of his mouth, trailing threadlike smoke over his shoulder. He checked each window to see if any of the boards had been loosened.After violent attacks, the planks were often split or partially pried off, and he had to replace them completely;a job he hated.Today only one plank was loose.Isn't that amazing?he thought.

In the back yard he checked the hothouse and the water tank. Sometimes the structure around the tank might be weakened or its rain catchers bent or broken off.Sometimes they would lob rocks over the high fence around the hothouse, and occasionally they would tear through the overhead net and he'd have to replace panes.

Both the tank and the hothouse were undamaged today. He went to the house for a hammer and nails.As he pushed open the front door, he looked at the distorted reflection of himself in the cracked mirror he'd fastened to the door a month ago.In a few days, jagged pieces of the silver-backed glass would start to fall off.Let'em fall, he thought.It was the last damned mirror he'd put there;it wasn't worth it.He'd put garlic there instead.Garlic always worked.

He passed slowly through the dim silence of the living room, turned left into the small hallway, and left again into his bedroom. Once the room had been warmly decorated, but that was in another time.Now it was a room entirely functional, and since Neville's bed and bureau took up so little space, he had converted one side of the room into a shop.

A long bench covered almost an entire wall, on its hardwood top a heavy band saw;a wood lathe, an emery wheel, and a vise. Above it, on the wall, were haphazard racks of the tools that Robert Neville used.

He took a hammer from the bench and picked out a few nails from one of the disordered bins. Then he went back outside and nailed the plank fast to the shutter.The unused nails he threw into the rubble next door.

For a while he stood on the front lawn looking up and down the silent length of Cimarron Street. He was a tall man, thirty-six, born of English-German stock, his features undistinguished except for the long, determined mouth and the bright blue of his eyes, which moved now over the charred ruins of the houses on each side of his.He'd burned them down to prevent them from jumping on his roof from the adjacent ones.

After a few minutes he took a long, slow breath and went back into the house. He tossed the hammer on the living-room couch, then lit another cigarette and had his midmorning drink.

Later he forced himself into the kitchen to grind up the five-day accumulation of garbage in the sink. He knew he should burn up the paper plates and utensils too, and dust the furniture and wash out the sinks and the bathtub and toilet, and change the sheets and pillowcase on his bed;but he didn't feel like it.

For he was a man and he was alone and these things had no importance to him.

It was almost noon. Robert Neville was in his hothouse collecting a basketful of garlic.

In the beginning it had made him sick to smell garlic in such quantity his stomach had been in a state of constant turmoil. Now the smell was in his house and in his clothes, and sometimes he thought it was even in his flesh.

He hardly noticed it at all.

When he had enough bulbs, he went back to the house and dumped them on the drainboard of me sink. As he flicked the wall switch, the light flickered, then flared into normal brilliance.A disgusted hiss passed his clenched teeth.The generator was at it again.He'd have to get out that damned manual again and check the wiring.And, if it were too much trouble to repair, he'd have to install a new generator.

Angrily he jerked a high-legged stool to the sink, got a knife, and sat down with an exhausted grunt.

First, he separated the bulbs into the small, sickle-shaped cloves. Then he cut each pink, leathery clove in half, exposing the fleshy center buds.The air thickened with the musky, pungent odor.When it got too oppressive, he snapped on the air-conditioning unit and suction drew away the worst of it.

Now he reached over and took an icepick from its wall rack. He punched holes in each clove half, then strung them all together with wire until he had about twenty-five necklaces.

In the beginning he had hung these necklaces over the windows. But from a distance they'd thrown rocks until he'd been forced to cover the broken panes with plywood scraps.Finally one day he'd torn off the plywood and nailed up even rows of planks instead.It had made the house a gloomy sepulcher, but it was better than having rocks come flying into his rooms in a shower of splintered glass.And, once he had installed the three air-conditioning units, it wasn't too bad.A man could get used to anything if he had to.

When he was finished stringing the garlic cloves, he went outside and nailed them over the window boarding, taking down the old strings, which had lost most of their potent smell.

He had to go through this process twice a week. Until he found something better, it was his first line of defense.

Defense?he often thought. For what?

在陰天，羅伯特·奈維爾判斷日落的時間就不準了。有時在他趕回家之前，天就黑了。

如果他仔細分析一下，或許能推測出日落的大概時間。但他已經(jīng)習慣了根據(jù)天色來判斷時間。一到陰天，這方法就不靈了，所以一到陰天，他就待在自家附近。

一個陰晦的下午，他正繞著房屋散步，嘴角叼著香煙，細絲狀的煙霧在他身后繚繞上升。他仔細檢查每扇窗戶，看是否有木板松動。瘋狂襲擊過后，那些厚實的木板總會出現(xiàn)裂痕甚至被掀起一角，他只好換掉它們。一個討厭的活兒。今天只有一塊窗板松脫，真讓人吃驚！他暗自想著。

他檢查后院的溫室和貯水池，貯水池周圍的桁架總是失去力度，接雨裝置要么彎曲要么斷裂。有時他們把石頭扔過溫室周圍的高大圍欄，石塊偶爾會撕開上面的天棚，他不得不替換它們。

今天溫室和貯水池都沒損壞。他進屋拿錘子和釘子。推開前門，他看到自己在破裂的鏡子里的扭曲影像。鏡子是他上個月釘在門上的?？蓻]幾天，鍍銀玻璃就開始剝落，由它們落吧，他想。他再也不往那地方放渾蛋鏡子了，不值，還不如放大蒜。大蒜總是管用。

他緩慢地穿過昏暗寂靜的客廳，左轉進入狹窄的走廊，然后來到他的臥室。那房間曾經(jīng)裝飾得很漂亮，但那是過去?，F(xiàn)在它只是個實用性房間，奈維爾的衣櫥和床沒占多大空間，于是他把房間一頭改成了工作坊。

一個長凳占據(jù)了幾乎整面墻，在它的硬木表面放著重鋸齒、車床、砂輪、錘子和老虎鉗，在長凳上方的壁架上，散亂堆放著羅伯特·奈維爾常用的各種工具。

他從長凳上拿起錘子，又從雜物箱里摸出了幾枚釘子。他來到屋外，把松動的木板釘好。剩余的釘子隨手丟到了挨門的石堆里。

他在門口草坪上站了一會兒，前后打量著西馬倫大街。他是個高個兒男子，今年36歲，英德血統(tǒng)。他的長相一般，只有細長的嘴唇和湛藍的眼睛還算有型?，F(xiàn)在這雙藍眼睛正盯著他房子兩邊的一堆燒毀的房屋廢墟。是他自己燒的，以防有人通過鄰近的房屋跳上他的屋頂。

幾分鐘后，他伸了個懶腰，走回屋去。他把錘子丟在客廳沙發(fā)上，又點了支煙，開始喝上午茶。

過后，他強迫自己進了廚房，在水槽里碾碎已經(jīng)積累了五天的垃圾。他知道他應該燒掉紙餐具和炊具，應該撣去家具上的灰塵，應該清洗水槽、浴缸和廁所，應該換洗他的床單枕套。但他討厭做這些事。

因為他是男人，而且獨自生活，這些破事對他來說無關緊要。

快到中午時，羅伯特·奈維爾在他的溫室里收了滿滿一籃子大蒜。

想當初，聞到這么重的大蒜味時，他肯定會惡心得想吐，胃里會持續(xù)地翻騰?？涩F(xiàn)在，這種味道彌漫了他的房間、衣服，有時他甚至覺得這味道已經(jīng)滲透進了他的肉體和血液里。

這味道再也不能引起他的注意了。

摘了足夠多的大蒜后，他回到房間把它們全部倒在水槽里。他輕彈了下墻上的開關，燈光閃爍了一陣，才恢復正常光亮。他唇齒間發(fā)出厭煩的咝咝聲。一定是發(fā)電機的毛病。他又要找手冊，又要檢查線路。要是太難修理，又得去換新的。

他氣憤地拎了個高腳凳放到水槽旁，拿了把小刀，帶著疲憊的咕噥聲坐下。

首先，他把大蒜剝成月牙狀的小蒜瓣。然后把每個粉色皮革般堅韌的蒜瓣切開，露出里面的蒜肉。空氣中頓時充滿濃郁的刺激性氣味。當他實在忍受不了這味道時，便打開空調抽掉這混濁的氣體。

他起身從壁架上抽出一個碎冰錐，在蒜片上打孔，然后把它們穿在金屬絲上，直到他擁有25條項鏈為止。

先前他把大蒜項鏈掛在窗戶上，但是有人總是從遠處扔石頭，他不得不用廢鋼夾板蓋住損壞的窗戶。后來，他又扯掉夾板，釘上一排厚木板。房子弄得像一個陰沉的墓穴，但總比石頭夾著冰雹般的玻璃碎片飛進屋來要強。在他安裝了三臺空調后，發(fā)現(xiàn)狀況還不錯。一個男人可以適應任何事情，如果他必須這么做的話。

串好蒜瓣，他走出去將它們釘?shù)酱鞍迳?，換下原來的舊項鏈，那些早已沒了濃烈的氣味。

這事他每周都要做兩次。在找到更好的方法以前，這是他最好的第一防線。

防線？他經(jīng)常想，防什么？

Goals determine what you are going to be.

——Julius Erving

目標決定你將成為什么樣的人。

——歐文

實戰(zhàn)提升

作者介紹

理查德·馬瑟森被譽為“20世紀最偉大的作家之一”，《我是傳奇》小說問世以來，已經(jīng)于1964和1971年兩度被搬上熒屏。除了一些魔幻、科普、恐怖風格的小說，馬瑟森還是一個多產(chǎn)的影視劇作家，他的很多小說都被改編成影視劇本，如《奇怪的收縮人》《重返的時刻》等。

單詞注解

calculated[5kAlkjuleitid]adj.預先計劃的；可能的

structure[5strQktFE]n.結構；構造；組織

decorate[5dekEreit]v.裝飾，修飾

adjacent[E5dVeisEnt]adj.毗連的，鄰接的

accumulation[E7kju:mju5leiF（E）n]n.積累；積聚；堆積

pungent[5pQndVEnt]adj.辛辣的；尖刻的

sepulcher[5seplkE]n.墳墓，墓穴

名句大搜索

因為他是男人，而且獨自生活，這些破事對他來說無關緊要。

然后把每個粉色皮革般堅韌的蒜瓣切開，露出里面的蒜肉。

在找到更好的方法以前，這是他最好的第一防線。