經典科幻文學:《宇宙盡頭的餐館》第3章5
Aboard the Vogon ship, Prostetnic Vogon Jeltz was puzzled. He had expected a chase, he had expected an exciting grapple with tractor beams, he had expected to have to use the specially installed Sub-Cyclic Normality Assert-i-Tron to counter the Heart of Gold’s Infinite Improbability Drive, but the Sub-Cyclic Normality Assert-i-Tron lay idle as the Heart of Gold just sat there and took it.
A dozen 30-Megahurt Definit-Kil Photrazon Cannon continued to blaze away at the Heart of Gold, and still it just sat there and took it.
He tested every sensor at his disposal to see if there was any subtle trickery afoot, but no subtle trickery was to be found.
He didn’t know about the tea of course.
Nor did he know exactly how the occupants of the Heart of Gold were spending the last three minutes and thirty seconds of life they had left to spend.
Quite how Zaphod Beeblebrox arrived at the idea of holding a seance at this point is something he was never quite clear on.
Obviously the subject of death was in the air, but more as something to be avoided than harped upon.
Possibly the horror that Zaphod experienced at the prospect of being reunited with his deceased relatives led on to the thought that they might just feel the same way about him and, what’s more, be able to do something about helping to postpone this reunion.
Or again it might just have been one of the strange promptings that occasionally surfaced from that dark area of his mind that he had inexplicably locked off prior to becoming President of the Galaxy.
“You want to talk to your great grandfather?” boggled Ford.
“Yeah.”
沃貢飛船上，沃貢·傑爾茲感到迷惑不解。按他的估計，這應該是一場追捕，是一場牽引光束之間令人興奮的格鬥，是用專門安裝的常態持續循環亞粒子加速器和黃金之心號的無限非概率驅動器一決雌雄。可實際情況卻是，常態持續循環亞粒子加速器無所事事地躺在那裏，因爲黃金之心號根本沒有啓動。它停在原地，似乎等着他們來抓捕。
三十級高殺傷力高精度光輻射炮火繼續傾瀉在黃金之心號上，它仍然停在那裏，承受着。
他檢查了自己控制檯上的每一個傳感器，想找出對方是不是暗藏着什麼詭計，卻沒有發現一絲端倪。
當然，他不可能知道那杯茶的事。
他同樣不可能知道黃金之心號上的人如何度過他們生命中的最後三分三十秒。
贊福德自己也說不清楚，爲什麼會在這個時候冒出舉行一次降神會的念頭。
死亡的主題自然瀰漫在空氣中，但這個主題是需要極力迴避的，而不是喋喋不休地討論。
也許是這個原因：贊福德看到了和他那些死去的親戚們重聚的前景，由此產生了強烈恐懼。於是他將心比心，認爲他那些已逝的親戚們也同樣畏懼與他重逢，說不定能做點兒什麼，以推遲這種重聚。
或者，這又是那種偶爾從他腦子裏的黑暗區域浮現出來的奇怪念頭，這一區域早在他成爲銀河系總統之前就不可理解地鎖閉了。
“你想和你的曾祖父交談？”福特猶豫着問。
“是的。”
