雙語(yǔ)名著·追風(fēng)箏的人 The Kite Runner(211)

12歲的阿富汗富家少爺阿米爾與仆人哈桑情同手足。然而，在一場(chǎng)風(fēng)箏比賽后，發(fā)生了一件悲慘不堪的事，阿米爾為自己的懦弱感到自責(zé)和痛苦，逼走了哈桑，不久，自己也跟隨父親逃往美國(guó)。

成年后的阿米爾始終無(wú)法原諒自己當(dāng)年對(duì)哈桑的背叛。為了贖罪，阿米爾再度踏上暌違二十多年的故鄉(xiāng)，希望能為不幸的好友盡最后一點(diǎn)心力，卻發(fā)現(xiàn)一個(gè)驚天謊言，兒時(shí)的噩夢(mèng)再度重演，阿米爾該如何抉擇?

故事如此殘忍而又美麗，作者以溫暖細(xì)膩的筆法勾勒人性的本質(zhì)與救贖，讀來(lái)令人蕩氣回腸。

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A STARLESS, BLACK NIGHT falls over Islamabad. It’s a few hours later and I am sitting now on the floor of a tiny lounge off the corridor that leads to the emergency ward. Before me is a dull brown coffee table cluttered with newspapers and dog-eared magazines--an April 1996 issue of Time; a Pakistani newspaper showing the face of a young boy who was hit and killed by a train the week before; an entertainment magazine with smiling Hollywood actors on its glossy cover. There is an old woman wearing a jade green shalwar-kameez and a crocheted shawl nodding off in a wheelchair across from me. Every once in a while, she stirs awake and mutters a prayer in Arabic. I wonder tiredly whose prayers will be heard tonight, hers or mine. I picture Sohrab’s face, the pointed meaty chin, his small seashell ears, his slanting bambooleaf eyes so much like his father’s. A sorrow as black as the night outside invades me, and I feel my throat clamping.
I need air. I get up and open the windows. The air coming through the screen is musty and hot--it smells of overripe dates and dung. I force it into my lungs in big heaps, but it doesn’t clear the clamping feeling in my chest. I drop back on the floor. I pick up the Time magazine and flip through the pages. But I can’t read, can’t focus on anything. So I toss it on the table and go back to staring at the zigzagging pattern of the cracks on the cement floor, at the cobwebs on the ceiling where the walls meet, at the dead flies littering the windowsill. Mostly, I stare at the clock on the wall. It’s just past 4 A.M. and I have been shut out of the room with the swinging double doors for over five hours now. I still haven’t heard any news.
The floor beneath me begins to feel like part of my body, and my breathing is growing heavier, slower. I want to sleep, shut my eyes and lie my head down on this cold, dusty floor. Drift off. When I wake up, maybe I will discover that everything I saw in the hotel bathroom was part of a dream: the water drops dripping from the faucet and landing with a plink into the bloody bathwater; the left arm dangling over the side of the tub, the blood-soaked razor sitting on the toilet tank--the same razor I had shaved with the day before--and his eyes, still half open but light less. That more than anything. I want to forget the eyes.
Soon, sleep comes and I let it take me. I dream of things I can’t remember later. SOMEONE IS TAPPING ME on the shoulder. I open my eyes. There is a man kneeling beside me. He is wearing a cap like the men behind the swinging double doors and a paper surgical mask over his mouth--my heart sinks when I see a drop of blood on the mask. He has taped a picture of a doe-eyed little girl to his beeper. He unsnaps his mask and I’m glad I don’t have to look at Sohrab’s blood anymore. His skin is dark like the imported Swiss chocolate Hassan and I used to buy from the bazaar in Shar-e-Nau; he has thinning hair and hazel eyes topped with curved eyelashes. In a British accent, he tells me his name is Dr. Nawaz, and suddenly I want to be away from this man, because I don’t think I can bear to hear what he has come to tell me. He says the boy had cut himself deeply and had lost a great deal of blood and my mouth begins to mutter that prayer again: La illaha il Allah, Muhammad u rasul ullah.They had to transfuse several units of red cells-- How will I tell Soraya?Twice, they had to revive him--I willdo _namaz_, I will do _zakat_.They would have lost him if his heart hadn’t been young and strong--I will fast.He is alive.
Dr. Nawaz smiles. It takes me a moment to register what he has just said. Then he says more but I don’t hear him. Because I have taken his hands and I have brought them up to my face. I weep my relief into this stranger’s small, meaty hands and he says nothing now. He waits.
THE INTENSIVE CARE UNIT is L-shaped and dim, a jumble of bleeping monitors and whirring machines. Dr. Nawaz leads me between two rows of beds separated by white plastic curtains. Sohrab’s bed is the last one around the corner, the one nearest the nurses’ station where two nurses in green surgical scrubs are jotting notes on clipboards, chatting in low voices. On the silent ride up the elevator with Dr. Nawaz, I had thought I’d weep again when I saw Sohrab. But when I sit on the chair at the foot of his bed, looking at his white face through the tangle of gleaming plastic tubes and IV lines, I am dry-eyed. Watching his chest rise and fall to the rhythm of the hissing ventilator, a curious numbness washes over me, the same numbness a man might feel seconds after he has swerved his car and barely avoided a head-on collision.
I doze off, and, when I wake up, I see the sun rising in a buttermilk sky through the window next to the nurses’ station. The light slants into the room, aims my shadow toward Sohrab. He hasn’t moved.
“You’d do well to get some sleep,” a nurse says to me. I don’t recognize her--there must have been a shift change while I’d napped. She takes me to another lounge, this one just outside the ICU. It’s empty. She hands me a pillow and a hospital-issue blanket. I thank her and lie on the vinyl sofa in the corner of the lounge. I fall asleep almost immediately.
I dream I am back in the lounge downstairs. Dr. Nawaz walks in and I rise to meet him. He takes off his paper mask, his hands suddenly whiter than I remembered, his nails manicured, he has neatly parted hair, and I see he is not Dr. Nawaz at all but Raymond Andrews, the little embassy man with the potted tomatoes. Andrews cocks his head. Narrows his eyes.

星光黯淡的黑夜降臨在伊斯蘭堡。過(guò)了數(shù)個(gè)鐘頭，我坐在走廊外面一間通往急診室的小房間的地板上。在我身前是一張暗棕色的咖啡桌，上面擺著報(bào)紙和卷邊的雜志——有本 1996年 4月的《時(shí)代》，一份巴基斯坦報(bào)紙，上面印著某個(gè)上星期被火車撞死的男孩的臉孔；一份娛樂(lè)雜志，平滑的封面印著微笑的羅麗塢男星。在我對(duì)面，有位老太太身穿碧綠的棉袍，戴著針織頭巾，坐在輪椅上打瞌睡。每隔一會(huì)她就會(huì)驚醒，用阿拉伯語(yǔ)低聲禱告。我疲憊地想，不知道今晚真主會(huì)聽(tīng)到誰(shuí)的祈禱，她的還是我的？我想起索拉博的面容，那肉乎乎的尖下巴，海貝似的小耳朵，像極了他父親的竹葉般瞇斜的眼睛。一陣悲哀如同窗外的黑夜，漫過(guò)我全身，我覺(jué)得喉嚨被掐住。
我需要空氣。我站起來(lái)，打開(kāi)窗門。濕熱的風(fēng)帶著發(fā)霉的味道從窗紗吹進(jìn)來(lái)——聞起來(lái)像腐爛的椰棗和動(dòng)物糞便。我大口將它吸進(jìn)肺里，可是它沒(méi)有消除胸口的窒悶。我頹然坐倒在地面，撿起那本《時(shí)代》雜志，隨手翻閱?？墒俏铱床贿M(jìn)去，無(wú)法將注意力集中在任何東西上。所以我把它扔回桌子，怔怔望著水泥地面上彎彎曲曲的裂縫，還有窗臺(tái)上散落的死蒼蠅。更多的時(shí)候，我盯著墻上的時(shí)鐘。剛過(guò)四點(diǎn)，我被關(guān)在雙層門之外已經(jīng)超過(guò)五個(gè)小時(shí)，仍沒(méi)得到任何消息。
我開(kāi)始覺(jué)得身下的地板變成身體的一部分，呼吸越來(lái)越沉重，越來(lái)越緩慢。我想睡覺(jué)，闔上雙眼，把頭放低在這滿是塵灰的冰冷地面，昏然欲睡。也許當(dāng)我醒來(lái)，會(huì)發(fā)現(xiàn)我在旅館浴室看到的一切無(wú)非是一場(chǎng)夢(mèng)：水從水龍頭滴答落進(jìn)血紅的洗澡水里，他的左臂懸掛在浴缸外面，沾滿鮮血的剃刀——就是那把我前一天用來(lái)刮胡子的剃刀——落在馬桶的沖水槽上，而他的眼雖仍睜開(kāi)一半，但眼神黯淡。
很快，睡意襲來(lái)，我任它將我占據(jù)。我夢(mèng)到一些后來(lái)想不起來(lái)的事情。有人在拍我的肩膀。我睜開(kāi)眼，看到有個(gè)男人跪在我身邊。他頭上戴著帽子，很像雙層門后面那個(gè)男人，臉上戴著手術(shù)口罩——看見(jiàn)口罩上有一滴血，我的心一沉。他的傳呼機(jī)上貼著一張小姑娘的照片，眼神純潔無(wú)瑕。他解下口罩，我很高興自己再也不用看著索拉博的血了。他皮膚黝黑，像哈桑和我經(jīng)常去沙里諾區(qū)市場(chǎng)買的那種從瑞士進(jìn)口的巧克力；他頭發(fā)稀疏，淺褐色的眼睛上面是彎彎的睫毛。他用帶英國(guó)口音的英語(yǔ)告訴我，他叫納瓦茲大夫。剎那間，我想遠(yuǎn)離這個(gè)男人，因?yàn)槲艺J(rèn)為我無(wú)法忍受他所要告訴我的事情。他說(shuō)那男孩將自己割得很深，失血很多，我的嘴巴又開(kāi)始念出禱詞來(lái)：惟安拉是真主，穆罕默德是他的使者。他們不得不輸入幾個(gè)單位的紅細(xì)胞……我該怎么告訴索拉雅？?jī)纱?，他們不得不讓他?fù)蘇過(guò)來(lái)……我會(huì)做禱告，我會(huì)做天課。如果他的心臟不是那么年輕而強(qiáng)壯，他們就救不活他了……我會(huì)茹素……他活著。
納瓦茲大夫微笑。我花了好一會(huì)才弄明白剛才他所說(shuō)的。然后他又說(shuō)了幾句，我沒(méi)聽(tīng)到，因?yàn)槲易テ鹚碾p手，放在自己臉上。我用這個(gè)陌生人汗津津的手去抹自己的眼淚，而他沒(méi)有說(shuō)什么。他等著。
重癥病區(qū)呈 L形，很陰暗，充塞著很多嗶嗶叫的監(jiān)視儀和呼呼響的器械。納瓦茲大夫領(lǐng)著我走過(guò)兩排用白色塑料簾幕隔開(kāi)的病床。索拉博的病床是屋角最后那張，最接近護(hù)士站。兩名身穿綠色手術(shù)袍的護(hù)士在夾紙板上記東西，低聲交談。我默默和納瓦茲大夫從電梯上來(lái)，我以為我再次看到索拉博會(huì)哭?？墒钱?dāng)我坐在他床腳的椅子上，透過(guò)懸掛著的泛著微光的塑料試管和輸液管，我沒(méi)流淚水?？粗男靥烹S著呼吸機(jī)的嘶嘶聲有節(jié)奏地一起一伏，身上漫過(guò)一陣奇怪的麻木感覺(jué)，好像自己剛突然掉轉(zhuǎn)車頭，在干鈞一發(fā)之際避過(guò)一場(chǎng)慘烈的車禍。
我打起瞌睡，醒來(lái)后發(fā)現(xiàn)陽(yáng)光正從乳白色的天空照射進(jìn)緊鄰護(hù)士站的窗戶。光線傾瀉進(jìn)來(lái)，將我的影子投射在索拉博身上。他一動(dòng)不動(dòng)。
“你最好睡一會(huì)?！庇袀€(gè)護(hù)士對(duì)我說(shuō)。我不認(rèn)識(shí)她——我打盹時(shí)她們一定換班了。她把我?guī)У搅硪婚g房，就在急救中心外面。里面沒(méi)有人。她給我一個(gè)枕頭，還有一床印有醫(yī)院標(biāo)記的毛毯。我謝過(guò)她，在屋角的塑膠皮沙發(fā)上躺下，幾乎立刻就睡著了。
我夢(mèng)見(jiàn)自己回到樓下的休息室，納瓦茲大夫走進(jìn)來(lái)，我起身迎向他。他脫掉紙口罩，雙手突然比我記得的要白，指甲修剪整潔，頭發(fā)一絲不茍，而我發(fā)現(xiàn)他原來(lái)不是納瓦茲大夫，而是雷蒙德?安德魯，大使館那個(gè)撫摸著番茄藤的小個(gè)子。安德魯抬起頭，瞇著眼睛。