经典科幻文学:《宇宙尽头的餐馆》第30章2

The tallest of the men stood a little over five feet high, they all stooped forward slightly, had longish arms and lowish foreheads, and clear bright eyes with which they stared intently at the strangers.
Seeing that they carried no weapons and made no move towards them, Ford and Arthur relaxed slightly.
For a while the two groups simply stared at each other, neither side making any move. The natives seemed puzzled by the intruders, and whilst they showed no sign of aggression they were quite clearly not issuing any invitations.
For a full two minutes nothing continued to happen.
After two minutes Ford decided it was time something happened.
“Hello,” he said.
The women drew their children slightly closer to them.
The men made hardly any discernible move and yet their whole disposition made it clear that the greeting was not welcome – it was not resented in any great degree, it was just not welcome.
One of the men, who had been standing slightly forward of the rest of the group and who might therefore have been their leader, stepped forward. His face was quiet and calm, almost serene.
“Ugghhhuuggghhhrrrr uh uh ruh uurgh,” he said quietly.
This caught Arthur by surprise. He had grown so used to receiving an instantaneous and unconscious translation of everything he heard via the Babel Fish lodged in his ear that he had ceased to be aware of it, and he was only reminded of its presence now by the fact that it didn’t seem to be working. Vague shadows of meaning had flickered at the back of his mind, but there was nothing he could get any firm grasp on. He guessed, correctly as it happens, that these people had as yet evolved no more than the barest rudiments of language, and that the Babel Fish was therefore powerless to help. He glanced at Ford, who was infinitely more experienced in these matters.
“I think,” said Ford out of the corner of his mouth, “he’s asking us if we’d mind walking on round the edge of the village.”
A moment later, a gesture from the man-creature seemed to confirm this.
“Ruurgggghhhh urrgggh; urgh urgh (uh ruh) rruurruuh ug,” continued the man-creature.
“The general gist,” said Ford, “as far as I can make out, is that we are welcome to continue our journey in any way we like, but if we would walk round his village rather than through it it would make them all very happy.”
“So what do we do?”

他们中最高的一个男人也才刚刚超过五英尺。他们的身体都略微有些前倾，胳膊比较长，前额比较低，眼睛清晰而明亮，正专注地盯着面前这两个陌生人。
见他们没带武器，也没有朝自己逼过来，福特和阿瑟稍微放松了些。
有一段时间，双方就这么互相望着，都没有做出任何举动。土著们看来被闻人者给弄糊涂了。虽然这两个人并没有表现出要入侵的意思，但显然也是不受欢迎的。什么也没发生。
整整两分钟，还是什么也没发生。
叉过了两分钟，福特决定是该发生点儿什么的时候了。
“你们好。”他说。
女人把孩子往自己身边稍微拉近了点儿。
男人们虽然没有做出什么可以察觉的举动，但从他们的整体意向上看，很显然，这样的问候是不受欢迎的——倒也没有引起太大的愤怒，仅仅是不受欢迎而已。
其中一个男人站在整个人群稍微前面一点的地方，因此可能是他们的头领。他往前走了几步，脸上的表情平静而镇定，甚至可以安详。
“鸣哇呜哇呜哇，呜，呜，畦，呜畦。”他轻轻地说。
阿瑟吃了一惊。他的耳朵里寄居着巴别鱼，可以翻译一切语言，巴别鱼的翻译即时同步，甚至察觉不到这个翻译过程。阿瑟已经对此习以为常了，完全忽略了翻泽的存在。而现在，他注意到了巴别鱼的存在，因为它这次似乎失去了作用。意思的模糊阴影在他头脑的后部游移，但他却无法领会。他猜想，这些人可能还没有进化出哪怕是最初级的语言，所以巴别鱼也无能为力。他瞟了一眼福特，毕竟他对这种事情有经验得多。
“我想，”福特从嘴角挤出一句话，“他是在问我们是否介意绕着这个村子的边缘前进。”
过了一会儿，这个人的手势似乎证实了这一点。
“咕哈咕哈，呜哇；呜哇，呜哇，（呜，哇）咕哈咕哈，哈。”他继续说道。
“就我所能弄明白的，”福特说，“他的大概意思是，我们可以按照我们喜欢的任何方式继续我们的旅程，不过如果我们绕着村子走，而不是穿过它的话，这会让他们所有人都非常高兴。”
“那我们怎么办呢?”