第78天

Chapter 10

The Family Begins to Starve

2

The cruel weather went on and on.

And every day, Charlie Bucket grew thinner and thinner. His face became frighteningly white and pinched. The skin was drawn so tightly over the cheeks that you could see the shapes of the bones underneath. It seemed doubtful whether he could go on much longer like this without becoming dangerously ill.

And now, very calmly, with that curious wisdom that seems to come so often to small children in times of hardship, he began to make little changes here and there in some of the things that he did, so as to save his strength. In the mornings, he left the house ten minutes earlier so that he could walk slowly to school, without ever having to run. He sat quietly in the classroom during break, resting himself, while the others rushed outdoors and threw snowballs and wrestled in the snow. Everything he did now, he did slowly and carefully, to prevent exhaustion.

Then one afternoon, walking back home with the icy wind in his face (and incidentally feeling hungrier than he had ever felt before), his eye was caught suddenly by something silvery lying in the gutter, in the snow. Charlie stepped off the kerb and bent down to examine it. Part of it was buried under the snow, but he saw at once what it was.

It was a fifty-pence piece!

Quickly he looked around him.

Had somebody just dropped it?

No — that was impossible because of the way part of it was buried.

Several people went hurrying past him on the pavement, their chins sunk deep in the collars of their coats, their feet crunching in the snow. None of them was searching for any money; none of them was taking the slightest notice of the small boy crouching in the gutter.

Then was it his, this fifty pence?

Could he have it?? Carefully, Charlie pulled it out from under the snow. It was damp and dirty, but otherwise perfect.

A WHOLE fifty pence!

He held it tightly between his shivering fingers, gazing down at it. It meant one thing to him at that moment, only one thing. It meant FOOD.

Automatically, Charlie turned and began moving towards the nearest shop. It was only ten paces away . . . it was a newspaper and stationery shop, the kind that sells almost everything, including sweets and cigars . . . and what he would do, he whispered quickly to himself . . . he would buy one luscious bar of chocolate and eat it all up, every bit of it, right then and there . . . and the rest of the money he would take straight back home and give to his mother.

中文翻譯

嚴酷的天氣仍然一天天繼續(xù)下去。

查理眼看著一天天瘦下去。他的臉色蒼白，完全萎縮了，瘦得皮包骨頭?？磥硭僖渤惺懿涣肆?，再這樣下去他準會生一場大病。

十分奇怪，在極其艱難的日子里，孩子們似乎時常會十分聰明地加以應(yīng)付，查理也是如此，他十分平靜地開始一點點改變了自己做事的方式，盡量少消耗自己的體力。每天早晨，他提早十分鐘就離開了家，這樣可以慢慢地走到學校，不必因時間匆忙而奔跑。課間休息時，別的孩子都沖到教室外面扔雪球，在雪地里摔跤，可他卻安靜地坐在教室里，讓自己得到充分休息?，F(xiàn)在他做每件事都十分仔細，動作遲緩，以免過多消耗體力。

一天下午，他頂著打在臉上的刺骨寒風走回家去，他不時感到比以往更加饑餓難忍，突然，他一眼看見了在積雪的街溝里，有一塊白閃閃的東西。查理跨過街道鑲邊石，俯下身去看看究竟是什么。盡管這塊東西一半埋在雪里，但他立時看清了這是什么。

是一枚五十便士的硬幣！

他迅速打量了一下四周。

是不是有誰剛掉下？

沒有──這是不可能的，因為這枚硬幣一半都給雪埋住了。

幾個行人匆匆從他身旁的人行道經(jīng)過，臉頰都深深埋在大衣領(lǐng)子里，腳下的雪踩得吱嘎直響，沒人在找錢，也沒人注意這個蹲在街溝邊的小男孩。

這么說，這枚五十便士的硬幣是他的了？

他能拿嗎？

查理小心翼翼地從雪里撿出了這枚硬幣。硬幣又濕又臟，可它是—枚完整無缺的硬幣。

一枚完好的五十便士硬幣！

他用哆嗦的手指緊緊捏住這枚硬幣，瞪大眼瞧著。此刻，這枚硬幣對他來說不是別的，它就是食物。

查理不由自主地轉(zhuǎn)過身朝最近的商店走去。只有二三十英尺遠……那是一家書報文具店，也就是那種幾乎什么都賣的商店，也出售糖果和雪茄……他該買什么呢，他迅速地悄悄問自己……他可以買一塊美味的巧克力，把它一點不剩地吃光，當場吃掉……剩下的錢他就帶回去給媽媽。