經典科幻文學:《宇宙盡頭的餐館》第3章14

“Can this guy,” muttered Ford quietly to Zaphod, “actually in fact help us?”
“Nobody else can,” whispered Zaphod.
Ford nodded despondently.
“Zaphod!” the ghost was saying, “you became President of the Galaxy for a reason. Have you forgotten?”
“Could we go into this later?”
“Have you forgotten!” insisted the ghost.
“Yeah! Of course I forgot! I had to forget. They screen your brain when you get the job you know. If they’d found my head full of tricksy ideas I’d have been right out on the streets again with nothing but a fat pension, secretarial staff, a fleet of ships and a couple of slit throats.”
“Ah,” nodded the ghost in satisfaction, “then you do remember!”
He paused for a moment.
“Good,” he said and the noise stopped.
“Forty-eight seconds,” said Ford. He looked again at his watch and tapped it. He looked up.
“Hey, the noise has stopped,” he said.
A mischievous twinkle gleamed in the ghost’s hard little eyes.
“I’ve slowed down time for a moment,” he said, “just for a moment you understand. I would hate you to miss all I have to say.”

“這傢伙，”福特輕聲衝贊福德嘀咕道，“真的能幫我們嗎？”
“反正也沒別的人能幫我們了。”贊福德耳語道。
福特沮喪地點了點頭。
“贊福德！”鬼魂突然說，“你成爲銀河系總統是有目的的。你忘了嗎？”
“我們能晚點兒再討論這個問題嗎？”
“你忘了嗎？”鬼魂堅持問道。
“是的！我當然忘了！我必須忘掉。在得到這個職位時，他們會審查你的腦部，這你也知道。如果他們發現了我的頭腦中滿是陰謀詭計，我會馬上被重新扔到大街上，什麼也得不到，除了一大筆撫卹金、一個祕書班子、一支艦隊以及兩副破嗓子。”
“哦，”鬼魂滿意地點了點頭，“你到底還是記起來了！”
他停頓了片刻。
“很好。”他說。這時，噪音停止了。
“四十秒。”福特說。他看了看錶，拍打它了兩下，然後擡起頭來。
“嘿，噪音已經停止了。”他說。
鬼魂的小眼睛裏閃着光，惡作劇地眨巴着。
“我已經暫時把時間放慢了。”他說，“這段時間剛好夠你理解我說的話。我討厭你把我必須說的一切通通當成耳邊風。