世紀文學經典:《百年孤獨》第2章Part 6

For several weeks José Arcadio Buendía let himself be overcome by consternation. He took care of little Amaranta like a mother. He bathed and dressed her, took her to be nursed four times a day, and even sang to her at night the songs that úrsula never knew how to sing. On a certain occasion Pilar Ternera volunteered to do the household chores until úrsula came back. Aureliano, whose mysterious intuition had become sharpened with the misfortune, felt a glow of clairvoyance when he saw her come in. Then he knew that in some inexplicable way she was to blame for his brother's flight and the consequent disappearance of his mother, and he harassed her with a silent and implacable hostility in such a way that the woman did not return to the house.
Time put things in their place. José Arcadio Buendía and his son did not know exactly when they returned to the laboratory, dusting things, lighting the water pipe, involved once more in the patient manipulation of the material that had been sleeping for several months in its bed of manure. Even Amaranta, lying in a wicker basket, observed with curiosity the absorbing work of her father and her brother in the small room where the air was rarefied by mercury vapors. On a certain occasion, months after úrsula's departure, strange things began to happen. An empty flask that had been forgotten in a cupboard for a long time became so heavy that it could not be moved. A pan of water on the worktable boiled without any fire under it for a half hour until it completely evaporated. José Arcadio Buendía and his son observed those phenomena with startled excitement, unable to explain them but interpreting them as predictions of the material. One day Amaranta's basket began to move by itself and made a complete turnabout the room, to the consternation of Auerliano, who hurried to stop it. But his father did not get upset. He put the basket in its place and tied it to the leg of a table, convinced that the longawaited event was imminent. It was on that occasion that Auerliano heard him say:
"If you don't fear God, fear him through the metals.
Suddenly, almost five months after her disappearance, úrsula came back. She arrived exalted, rejuvenated, with new clothes in a style that was unknown in the village. José Arcadio Buendía could barely stand up under the impact. "That was it!" he shouted. "I knew it was going to happen." And he really believed it, for during his prolonged imprisonment as he manipulated the material, he begged in the depth of his heart that the longed-for miracle should not be the discovery of the philosopher's stone, or the freeing of the breath that makes metals live, or the faculty to convert the hinges and the locks of the house into gold, but what had just happened: úrsula's return. But she did not share his excitement. She gave him a conventional kiss, as if she had been away only an hour, and she told him:
"Look out the door."
José Arcadio Buendía took a long time to get out of his perplexity when he went out into the street and saw the crowd. They were not gypsies. They were men and women like them, with straight hair and dark skin, who spoke the same language and complained of the same pains. They had mules loaded down with things to eat, oxcarts with furniture and domestic utensils, pure and simple earthly accessories put on sale without any fuss by peddlers of everyday reality. They came from the other side of the swamp, only two days away, where there were towns that received mail every month in the year and where they were familiar with the implements of good living. úrsula had not caught up with the gypsies, but she had found the route that her husband had been unable to discover in his frustrated search for the great inventions.

霍·阿·布恩蒂亞苦惱了好久。他象母親一樣照拂小女兒阿瑪蘭塔。他給她洗澡、換襁褓，一天四次抱她去奶媽那兒，晚上甚至給她唱歌（烏蘇娜是從來不會唱歌的）。有一次，皮拉·苔列娜自願來這兒照料家務，直到烏蘇娜回來。在不幸之中，奧雷連諾神祕的洞察力更加敏銳了，他一見皮拉·苔列娜走進屋來，就好象恍然大悟。他明白：根據某種無法說明的原因，他哥哥的逃亡和母親的失蹤都是這個女人的過錯，所以他用那麼一聲不吭和嫉惡如仇的態度對待她，她就再也不來了。
時間一過，一切照舊。霍·阿·布恩蒂亞和他的兒子自己也不知道，他們究竟是什麼時候回到試驗室裏的，他們打掃了塵上，點燃了爐火，又專心地忙於擺弄那在一堆肥料上放了幾個月的東西了。阿瑪蘭塔躺在一隻柳條籃子裏，房間中的空氣充滿了汞氣；她好奇地望着爸爸和哥哥聚精會神地工作。烏蘇娜失蹤之後過了幾個月，試驗室裏開始發生奇怪的事。早就扔在廚房裏的空瓶子忽然重得無法挪動。工作臺上鍋裏的水無火自沸起來，咕嘟了整整半個小時，直到完全蒸發。霍·阿·布恩蒂亞和他的兒子對這些怪事都很驚訝、激動，不知如何解釋，但把它們看成是新事物的預兆。有一天，阿瑪蘭塔的籃子突然自己動了起來，在房間裏繞圈子，奧雷連諾看了非常吃驚，趕忙去把它攔住。可是霍·阿·布恩蒂亞一點也不驚異。他把籃子放在原處，拴在桌腿上面。籃子的移動終於使他相信，他們的希望快要實現了。就在這時，奧雷連諾聽見他說：
“即使你不害怕上帝，你也會害怕金屬。”
失蹤之後幾乎過了五個月，烏蘇娜回來了。她顯得異常興奮；有點返老還童，穿着村裏人誰也沒有穿過的新式衣服。霍·阿·布恩蒂亞高興得差點兒發了瘋，“原來如此！正象我預料的！”他叫了起來。這是真的，因爲待在試驗室裏進行物質試驗的長時間中，他曾在內心深處祈求上帝，他所期待的奇蹟不是發現點金石，也不是哈口氣讓金屬具有生命，更不是發明一種辦法，以便把金子變成房鎖和窗子的鉸鏈，而是剛剛發生的事——烏蘇娜的歸來。但她並沒有跟他一起發狂地高興。她照舊給了丈夫一個樂吻，彷彿他倆不過一小時以前才見過面似的。說道：
“到門外去看看吧！”
霍·阿·布恩蒂亞走到街上，看見自己房子前面的一羣人，他好半天才從混亂狀態中清醒過來。這不是吉卜賽人，而是跟馬孔多村民一樣的男人和女人，平直的頭髮，黝黑的皮膚，說的是同樣的語言，抱怨的是相同的痛苦。站在他們旁邊的是馱着各種食物的騾子，套上閹牛的大車，車上載着傢俱和家庭用具——一塵世生活中必不可缺的簡單用具，這些用具是商人每天都在出售的。這些人是從沼澤地另一邊來的，總共兩天就能到達那兒，可是那兒建立了城鎮，那裏的人一年當中每個月都能收到郵件，而且使用能夠改善生活的機器。烏蘇娜沒有追上吉卜賽人，但卻發現了她丈夫枉然尋找偉大發明時未能發現的那條道路。