那些无法抗拒的名篇35:I Am Legend我是传奇(节选)
35 I Am Legend
35 我是传奇
On those cloudy days, Robert Neville was never sure when sunset came, and sometimes they were in the streets before he could get back.
在阴天，罗伯特·奈维尔判断日落的时间就不准了。有时在他赶回家之前，天就黑了。
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.
如果他仔细分析一下，或许能推测出日落的大概时间。但他已经习惯了根据天色来判断时间。一到阴天，这方法就不灵了，所以一到阴天，他就呆在自家附近。
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.
一个阴晦的下午，他正绕着房屋散步，嘴角叼着香烟，细丝状的烟雾在他身后缭绕上升。他仔细检查每扇窗户，看是否有木板松动。疯狂袭击过后，那些厚实的木板总会出现裂痕甚至被掀起一角，他只好换掉它们。一个讨厌的活儿。今天只有一块窗板松脱，真让人吃惊!他暗自想着。
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.
他检查后院的温室和贮水池，贮水池周围的桁架总是失去力度，接雨装置要么弯曲要么断裂。有时他们把石头扔过温室周围的高大围栏，石块偶尔会撕开上面的天棚，他不得不替换它们。
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.
今天温室和贮水池都没损坏。他进屋拿锤子和钉子。推开前门，他看到自己在破裂的镜子里的扭曲影像。镜子是他上个月钉在门上的。可没几天，镀银玻璃就开始剥落，由它们落吧，他想。他再也不往那地方放混蛋镜子了，不值，还不如放大蒜。大蒜总是管用。
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.
他缓慢地穿过昏暗寂静的客厅，左转进入狭窄的走廊，然后来到他的卧室。那房间曾经装饰得很漂亮，但那是过去。现在它只是个实用性房间，奈维尔的衣橱和床没占多大空间，于是他把房间一头改成了工作坊。
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.
一个长凳占据了几乎整面墙，在它的硬木表面放着重锯齿、车床、砂轮、锤子和老虎钳，在长凳上方的壁架上，散乱堆放着罗伯特·奈维尔常用的各种工具。
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.
他从长凳上拿起锤子，又从杂物箱里摸出了几个钉子。他来到屋外，把松动的木板钉好。剩余的钉子随手丢到了挨门的石堆里。
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.
他在门口草坪上站了一会，前后打量着西马伦大街。他是个高个儿男子，今年36岁，英德血统。他的长相一般，只有细长的嘴唇和湛蓝的眼睛还算有型。现在这双蓝眼睛正盯着他房子两边的一堆烧毁的房屋废墟。是他自己烧的，以防有人通过邻近的房屋跳上他的屋顶。
After a few minutes he took along, 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.
几分钟后，他伸了个懒腰，走回屋去。他把锤子丢在客厅沙发上，又点了支烟，开始喝上午茶。
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.
过后，他强迫自己进了厨房，在水槽里碾碎已经积累了5天的垃圾。他知道他应该烧掉纸餐具和炊具。应该掸去家具上的灰尘，应该清洗水槽，清洗浴缸和厕所。应该换洗他的床单枕套。但他讨厌做这些事。
For he was a man and he was alone and these things had no importance to him.
因为他是男人，而且独自生活，这些破事对他来说无关紧要。
It was almost noon.Robert Neville was in his hothouse collecting a basketful of garlic.
快到中午时，罗伯特·奈维尔在他的温室里收了满满一篮子大蒜。
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.
想当初，闻到这么重的大蒜味时，他肯定会恶心得想吐，胃里会持续地翻腾。可现在，这种味道弥漫了他的房间、衣服，有时他甚至觉得这味道已经渗透进了他的肉体和血液里。
He hardly noticed it at all.
这味道再也不能引起他的注意了。
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.
摘了足够多的大蒜后，他回到房间把它们全部倒在水槽里。他轻弹了下墙上的开关，灯光闪烁了一阵，才恢复正常光亮。他发出厌烦的嘶嘶声。一定是发电机的毛病。他又要找手册，又要检查线路。要是太难修理，又得去换新的。
Angrily he jerked a high-legged stool to the sink, got a knife,and sat down with an exhausted grunt.
他气愤地拎了个高脚凳放到水槽旁，拿了把小刀，带着疲惫的咕哝声坐下。
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.
首先，他把大蒜剥成月牙状的小蒜瓣。然后把每个粉色皮革般坚韧的蒜瓣切开，露出里面的蒜肉。空气中顿时充满浓郁的刺激性气味。当他实在忍受不了这味道时，便打开空调抽掉这浑浊的气体。
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.
他起身从壁架上抽出一个碎冰锥，在蒜片上打孔，然后把它们穿在金属丝上，直到他拥有25条项链为止。
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.
先前他把大蒜项链挂在窗户上，但是有人总是从远处扔石头，他不得不用废钢夹板盖住损坏的窗户。后来，他又扯掉夹板，钉上一排厚木板。房子弄得像一个阴沉的墓穴，但总比石头夹着冰雹般的玻璃碎片飞进屋来要强。在他安装了三台空调后，发现状况还不错。一个男人可以适应任何事情，如果他必须这么做的话。
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.
串好蒜瓣，他走出去将它们钉到窗板上，换下原来的旧项链，那些早已没了浓烈的气味。
He had to go through this process twice a week. Until he found something better, it was his first line of defense.
这事他每周都要做两次。在找到更好的方法以前，这是他最好的第一防线。
Defense? he often thought. For what?
防线?他经常想，防什么?
作者介绍：
理查德·马瑟森被誉为“20世纪最伟大的作家之一”，《我是传奇》小说问世以来，已经于1964和1971年两度被搬上荧屏。除了一些魔幻、科普、恐怖风格的小说，马瑟森还是一个多产的影视剧作家，他的很多小说都被改编成影视剧本，如《奇怪的收缩人》、《重返的时刻》等。
恐怖的生化战争席卷而来，人类为自己掘下了死亡的坟墓。世纪末日随即而来，人类快要灭绝了，唯一存活下来的是纽约一个才华横溢的病原体学者，罗伯特·奈维尔。这种通过空气传播的病毒快速地笼罩了整个城市。血液天生的免疫力使罗伯特成了仅存的人类。作为人类最后的希望，他用自己血液中的免疫系统，寻找逆转病毒的方法。他别无选择，因为他的时间不多了。
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