It was given him--neither twine nor lanyard were seen again; but the next night an iron ball, closely netted, partly rolled from the pocket of the Lakeman's monkey jacket, as he was tucking the coat into his hammock for a pillow. Twenty-four hours after, his trick at the silent helm--nigh to the man who was apt to doze over the grave always ready dug to the seaman's hand--that fatal hour was then to come; and in the fore-ordaining soul of Steelkilt, the mate was already stark and stretched as a corpse, with his forehead crushed in.
他拿到他要的麻線——可是后來什么麻線、索帶都再也看不到了。隔天晚上,湖上人把上衣塞在吊鋪上當(dāng)枕頭的時候,他的上衣口袋里,卻半露出一只編扎得十分牢靠。像只鐵球似的東西來。二十四小時后,他就悄悄的在值掌舵的班——旁邊,正是那個注定要打盹打到這個水手時刻準(zhǔn)備為他挖掘的墳?zāi)估锶サ娜?mdash;—他的致命的時刻就要到來了;而在斯蒂爾基爾特的預(yù)先安排的心底里,這個大副應(yīng)是早已砸碎額頭,僵挺得像一具死尸了。
But, gentlemen, a fool saved the would-be murderer from the bloody deed he had planned. Yet complete revenge he had, and without being the avenger. For by a mysterious fatality, Heaven itself seemed to step in to take out of his hands into its own the damning thing he would have done.
不過,諸位先生,一個笨蛋卻把這個謀殺未遂犯從他所計劃周全的惡行中搭救出來了。他仍然把仇全報了,卻不是他親手干的。因為,由于一種神秘的天意,上天似乎親自出場干涉,把這個報仇者所要做的惡事,從他手里奪了過去,由上天自己親手來做。
It was just between daybreak and sunrise of the morning of the second day, when they were washing down the decks, that a stupid Teneriffe man, drawing water in the main-chains, all at once shouted out, There she rolls! there she rolls! Jesu, what a whale! It was Moby Dick.
第二天早晨,就在拂曉到日出之間,大家正在沖洗甲板的時候,那個在水里拉大鏈的騰涅立夫(騰涅立夫——非洲北部的加拿利群島中一個最大的島名。)笨蛋突然一下子高聲大叫起來,它在那兒翻動啦!它在翻動啦!天啊,多大的一條鯨呀!原來就是莫比-迪克。
Moby Dick! Cried Don Sebastian; St. Dominic! Sir sailor, but do whales have christenings? Whom call you Moby Dick?
莫比-迪克!塞瓦斯蒂安先生叫了出來;天呀!不過,水手先生,鯨也得命名嗎?你叫的莫比-迪克是誰呀?