經典科幻文學:《生命 宇宙及一切》第21章1

The sensation, when he allowed himself to be aware of it, was so quietly ecstatic that he could not bear the thought of losing it, perhaps for ever. With this worry in mind he bobbed upwards a little again, just to try the feel of it, the surprising and effortless movement of it. He bobbed, he floated. He tried a little swoop.
The swoop was terrific. With his arms spread out in front of him, his hair and dressing gown streaming out behind him, he dived down out of the sky, bellied along a body of air about two feet from the ground and swung back up again, catching himself at the top of the swing and holding. Just holding. He stayed there.
It was wonderful. And that, he realized, was the way of picking up the bag. He would swoop down and catch hold of it just at the point of the upswing. He would carry it on up with him. He might wobble a bit, but he was certain that he could hold it.
He tried one or two more practice swoops, and they got better and better. The air on his face, the bounce and woof of his body, all combined to make him feel an intoxication of the spirit that he hadn’t felt since, since well as far as he could work out, since he was born. He drifted away on the breeze and surveyed the countryside, which was, he discovered, pretty nasty. It had a wasted ravaged look. He decided not to look at it any more. He would just pick up the bag and then… he didn’t know what he was going to do after he had picked up the bag. He decided he would just pick up the bag and see where things went from there.
He judged himself against the wind, pushed up against it and turned around. He floated on its body. He didn’t realize, but his body was willoming at this point. He ducked down under the airstream, dipped and dived. The air threw itself past him, he thrilled through it. The ground wobbled uncertainly, straightened its ideas out and rose smoothly up to meet him, offering the bag, its cracked plastic handles up towards him.
Halfway down there was a sudden dangerous moment when he could no longer believe he was doing this, and therefore he very nearly wasn’t, but he recovered himself in time, skimmed over the ground, slipped an arm smoothly through the handles of the bag, and began to climb back up, couldn’t make it and all of a sudden collapsed, bruised, scratched and shaking in the stony ground. He staggered instantly to his feet and swayed hopelessly around, swinging the bag round him in agony of grief and disappointment.
Ten minutes later, drifting idly through a cloud, he got a large and extremely disreputable cocktail party in the small of the back.

他提醒自己別再想下去，但這念頭始終揮之不去。也許他將永遠不能再飛。他腦子裏滿是憂思，所以又向上浮了一點點。他想記住這種感覺，這種驚人的、輕軟無力的動作。他漂啊浮啊，還試了試俯衝。
俯衝很成功。他兩手往前一劃，頭髮和睡袍都向後揚起，他便從空中潛回地面。劃出了一條弧線，又滑向了天空。在上滑的途中輕輕一剎，便停住了滑翔。剎住了。他浮在那兒了。
非常好。他想。這就是撿起它的辦法。只要向下俯衝，再在順勢向上滑之前、抓住它就行。這樣就能把它帶走了。也許會飛偏一點兒，但他肯定自己能抓住。
他又試衝了幾次，動作完成得越來越好。拂過臉龐的風，身體的躍動，讓他感到了靈魂的沉醉——自從——嗯，就他能表達的而言，自從他出生以後——頭一次這般沉醉。他在清風中飄蕩，眺望四野，這裏的景色——非常難看，一片破敗景象。他便不再想看了，現在只求撿回旅行包，然後……他也不知然後怎樣，總之撿了再說吧。他御風而行，隨風浮起，順勢轉身。阿瑟也許沒有意識到，他此時正是在“潙拉”呢。
他迎着風兒。他在氣流中彎了彎腰，試了試“水”，然後縱身潛了下去。輕風拂過身體，他打了個寒噤。地面像是搖晃了一下，隨後平靜下來，慢慢朝他迎上來——帶着那個旅行包迎上來，帶着它那開裂的塑料把手迎上來。潛到一半的時候，他突然生出一個危險的念頭——不相信自己真的在飛。果然，他立刻往下掉了。他竭盡全力驅逐此念，輕瞥地面，伸手一撈，穿過把手，試圖再浮上去——卻終於失敗，猛地摔了下來。舯了肉，傷了皮，倒在堅硬的岩石上痛苦掙扎。
他踉蹌着爬起來，急得跳腳，把旅行包掄來掄去，傷心，絕望。他的雙腳，突然又變回以前那樣，緊緊粘住地面。他的軀體，像一袋笨重的土豆，在地上跌跌撞撞；他的心，更好似灌了鉛一般，沉到了最底下。阿瑟無力地垂下頭，搖着頭，渾身痠痛，痛得腦袋發昏。他想跑起來，可雙腿癱軟無力。他絆了一下，快要跌下去時，正好想起——包裏不僅有罐希臘橄欖油，還有一瓶免稅的松香葡萄酒。欣喜之下，他走神了大約十秒鐘，回過神來時，已經又在飛行了。
十分鐘後，他悠閒地穿過雲層時，即將迎來的將是一場盛大而臭名昭著的雞尾酒派對。