世纪文学经典:《百年孤独》第18章Part7

Almost a year after his return home, having sold the silver candlesticks and the heraldic chamberpot—which at the moment of truth turned out to have only a little gold plating on the crest—in order to eat, the only distraction of Jos?Arcadio was to pick up children in town so that they could play in the house. He would appear with them at siesta time and have them skip rope in the garden, sing on the porch, and do acrobatics on the furniture in the living room while he would go among the groups giving lessons in good manners. At that time he had finished with the tight pants and the silk shirts and was wearing an ordinary suit of clothing that he had bought in the Arab stores, but he still maintained his languid dignity and his papal air. The children took over the house just as Meme’s schoolmates had done in the past. Until well into the night they could be heard chattering and singing and tap-dancing, so that the house resembled a boarding school where there was no discipline. Aureliano did not worry about the invasion as long as they did not bother him in Melquíades?room. One morning two children pushed open the door and were startled at the sight of a filthy and hairy man who was still deciphering the parchments on the worktable. They did not dare go in, but they kept on watching the room. They would peep in through the cracks, whispering, they threw live animals in through the transom, and on one occasion they nailed up the door and the window and it took Aureliano half a day to force them open. Amused at their unpunished mischief, four of the children went into the room one morning while Aureliano was in the kitchen, preparing to destroy the parchments. But as soon as they laid hands on the yellowed sheets an angelic force lifted them off the ground and held them suspended in the air until Aureliano returned and took the parchments away from them. From then on they did not bother him.
The four oldest children, who wore short pants in spite of the fact that they were on the threshold of adolescence, busied themselves with Jos?Arcadio’s personal appearance. They would arrive earlier than the others and spend the morning shaving him, giving him massages with hot towels, cutting and polishing the nails on his hands and feet, and perfuming him with toilet water. On several occasions they would get into the pool to soap him from head to toe as he floated on his back thinking about Amaranta. Then they would dry him, powder his body, and dress him. One of the children, who had curly blond hair and eyes of pink glass like a rabbit, was accustomed to sleeping in the house. The bonds that linked him to Jos?Arcadio were so strong that he would accompany him in his asthmatic insomnia, without speaking, strolling through the house with him in the darkness. One night in the room where ?rsula had slept they saw a yellow glow coming through the crumbling cement as if an underground sun had changed the floor of the room into a pane of glass. They did not have to turn on the light. It was sufficient to lift the broken slabs in the corner where ?rsula’s bed had always stood and where the glow was most intense to find the secret crypt that Aureliano Segundo had worn himself out searching for during the delirium of his excavations. There were the three canvas sacks closed with copper wire, and inside of them the seven thousand two hundred fourteen pieces of eight, which continued glowing like embers in the darkness.

霍·阿卡蒂奥回到父母家里差不多只过了一年，就变卖了银制的枝形烛台和一只装饰着徽记的便盆——老实说，这便盆上只有徽记才是金的，——他唯一的消遣就是在房子里集合起一些野男孩，并给他们充分的自由，在最热的晌午时刻，他让他们在花园里跳绳，在长廊上大声唱歌，在安乐椅和沙发上翻筋斗，他自己却在这一伙跟那一伙之间转来转去，教他们各种礼节。这时，他已经脱掉牛仔裤和真丝衬衫，穿了一套从阿拉伯人小店里买来的普通西服，不过还继续保持着倦怠的神态和教皇的风度。孩子们象从前梅梅的女伴们一样，很快就熟悉了整座房子。每到深夜，都能听到他们的饶舌声、唱歌声、打红雀声——整座房子好象一所寄宿学校，住着一群放荡不羁的孩子。奥雷连诺·布恩蒂亚并没发现这一点，可是小客人们不久就闯到梅尔加德斯的房间前面。有一天早晨，两个野男孩猛地拉开房门，不由得吓了一大跳，只见一个肮里肮脏、头发蓬乱的人坐在桌子旁边钻研羊皮纸手稿。男孩们不放贸然进去，但从此却对这个古怪的陌生人发生了兴趣。他们在门外唧唧咕咕，不时往锁孔里窥视，把各种脏东西从气窗扔进房间，有一次还拿洋钉从外面把门窗钉死，奥雷连诺。 布恩蒂亚只好花上整整半天工夫给自己开辟一条出路。由于没有惩罚孩子们玩的把戏，姑息了他们，他们的胆子更大了。有一次，趁奥雷连诺。布恩蒂亚在厨房的时候，四个男孩钻进他的房间，企图毁掉羊皮纸手稿。不想他们刚一抓起发黄的稿卷，一股无形的力量一下子把他们提了起来，把他们一个个悬在空中，直到奥雷连诺·布恩蒂亚回来，从他们手里夺回了羊皮纸手稿。从那天起，他们再也没有打扰过他了。
这四个男孩已经进入少年时代，可是还穿着短裤，霍。 阿卡蒂奥的外表就由他们装扮。早晨他们比别人来得早，给他刮胡子，用热毛巾给他摩擦身子，给他修剪和磨光手指甲、脚趾甲，给他洒花露水。当他仰面朝天地漂在浴池里、思念阿玛兰塔的时候，他们偶尔也爬进浴池去，从头到脚给他洗澡，然后用毛巾给他擦干身子，扑点滑石粉，给他穿上衣服。在这四个男孩当中，有一个男孩长着淡褐色头发，眼睛象兔子似的，仿佛用粉红色玻璃制成，平时还留下来过夜。这孩子对霍。 阿卡蒂奥依依不舍，在霍·阿卡蒂奥因气喘病失眠时，都不离开他，陪着他在一个个漆黑的房间里走来走去。有一天半夜，在乌苏娜的卧室里，他们忽然发现水泥地面的缝隙里冒出一道奇异的金光，似乎有个地下太阳把卧室的地面变成了闪闪发亮的橱窗。为了弄清这是怎么回事，根本无需点灯，他们只是在乌苏娜床铺的角落里，在升起的光最亮的地方，稍稍揭起几块裂缝的石板一看；石板下出现一个地窖，原来这就是奥雷连诺第二那么苦恼而又顽固地寻找的地窖。地窖里放着三只帆布袋，用一条铜丝拴着，里面总共七千二百四十个金币，它们在一片漆黑中光采熠熠，犹如一块块烧红的炭。