经典科幻文学:《宇宙尽头的餐馆》第14章5

The waiter smiled a polite little waiter’s smile. He had almost exhausted his polite little waiter repertoire and would soon be slipping into his role of a rather tight lipped and sarcastic little waiter.
“Afterlife sir?” he said, “No sir.”
“And we’re not dead?” said Arthur.
The waiter tightened his lips.
“Aha, ha,” he said, “Sir is most evidently alive, otherwise I would not attempt to serve sir.”
In an extraordinary gesture which is pointless attempting to describe, Zaphod Beeblebrox slapped both his foreheads with two of his arms and one of his thighs with the other.
“Hey guys,” he said, “This is crazy. We finally did it. We finally got to where we were going. This is Milliways!”
“Yes sir,” said the waiter, laying on the patience with a trowel, “this is Milliways – the Restaurant at the End of the Universe.”
“End of what?” said Arthur.
“The Universe,” repeated the waiter, very clearly and unnecessarily distinctly.
“When did that end?” said Arthur.
“In just a few minutes, sir,” said the waiter. He took a deep breath. He didn’t need to do this since his body was supplied with the peculiar assortment of gases it required for survival from a small intravenous device strapped to his leg. There are times, however, when whatever your metabolism you have to take a deep breath.
“Now, if you would care to order drinks at last,” he said, “I will then show you to your table.”
Zaphod grinned two manic grins, sauntered over to the bar and bought most of it.

这个侍者已经快用尽他作为一个有礼貌的小个子侍者的全部本领了，马上就会进人他的另外一个角色，一个抿紧嘴唇挖苦人的小个子侍者。
“来世，先生，”他说，“不，先生。”
“我们没有死？”阿瑟又问。
这个侍者抿紧了嘴唇。
“啊哈，哈，”他说，“先生您显然还活着，否则我是不会试图为您提供服务的。”
赞福德用两只手臂拍打着自己的两个前额，同时用一条大腿拍打着另外一条。这种非凡姿势是不可能描述出来的：
“嘿，伙计们，”他说，“这太疯狂了。我们做到了。我们终于来到了我们要去的地方。这里是‘天尽头’！”
“是的，先生，”侍者啪嗒一声撂下他的耐性，“这里就是‘天尽头’——宇宙尽头餐馆。”
“什么的尽头？”阿瑟问。
“宇宙。”侍者又重复了一遍，非常清楚而且毫无必要地使用了强调语气。
“宇宙什么时候会到尽头，”阿瑟又问。
“过几分钟，先生。”侍者说。他深吸了一口气。其实他根本不需要这么做，因为他的身体是靠绑在他腿上的一个小型静脉注射装置中的几种特殊气体来维持生存的。不过，无论你的新陈代谢属于哪种类型，总有一些时候，你还是需要深吸一口气的。
“等你们几位最后拿定主意决定要饮料的时候，”他说，“我再给各位引座。”
赞福德的两张脸分别狂躁地咧嘴笑了笑，然后他从容地走到吧台前，把里面的大部分酒买了回来。