《最後一戰》第34期:老鷹帶來的消息(4)

After the King came Eustace and Poggin the Dwarf. Poggin was telling Eustace the names of all the Narnian trees, birds, and plants which he didn't know already. Sometimes Eustace would tell him about English ones.

After them came Puzzle, and after him Jill and Jewel walking very close together. Jill had, as you might say, quite fallen in love with the Unicorn. She thought- and she wasn't far wrong - that he was the shiningest, delicatest, most graceful animal she had ever met: and he was so gentle and soft of speech that, if you hadn't known, you would hardly have believed how fierce and terrible he could be in battle.

"Oh, this is nice!" said Jill. "Just walking along like this. I wish there could be more of this sort of adventure. It's a pity there's always so much happening in Narnia."

But the Unicorn explained to her that she was quite mistaken. He said that the Sons and Daughters of Adam and Eve were brought out of their own strange world into Narnia only at times when Narnia was stirred and upset, but she mustn't think it was always like that. In between their visits there were hundreds and thousands of years when peaceful King followed peaceful King till you could hardly remember their names or count their numbers, and there was really hardly anything to put into the History Books. And he went on to talk of old Queens and heroes whom she had never heard of. He spoke of Swanwhite the Queen who had lived before the days of the White Witch and the Great Winter, who was so beautiful that when she looked into any forest pool the reflection of her face shone out of the water like a star by night for a year and a day afterwards. He spoke of Moonwood the Hare who had such ears that he could sit by Caldron Pool under the thunder of the great waterfall and hear what men spoke in whispers at Cair Paravel. He told how King Gale, who was ninth in descent from Frank the first of all Kings, had sailed far away into the Eastern seas and delivered the Lone Islanders from a dragon and how, in return, they had given him the Lone Islands to be part of the royal lands of Narnia for ever. He talked of whole centuries in which all Narnia was so happy that notable dances and feasts, or at most tournaments, were the only things that could be remembered, and every day and week had been better than the last. And as he went on, the picture of all those happy years, all the thousands of them, piled up in Jill's mind till it was rather like looking down from a high hill on to a rich, lovely plain full of woods and waters and cornfields, which spread away and away till it got thin and misty from distance. And she said:

"Oh, I do hope we can soon settle the Ape and get back to those good, ordinary times. And then I hope they'll go on for ever and ever and ever. Our world is going to have an end some day. Perhaps this one won't. Oh Jewel wouldn't it be lovely if Narnia just went on and on - like what you said it has been?"

"Nay, sister," answered Jewel, "all worlds draw to an end, except Aslan's own country."

"Well, at least," said Jill, "I hope the end of this one is millions of millions of millions of years away - hallo! what are we stopping for?"

The King and Eustace and the Dwarf were all staring up at the sky. Jill shuddered, remembering what horrors they had seen already. But it was nothing of that sort this time. It was small, and looked black against the blue.

走在國王后面的是尤斯塔斯和小矮人波金。波金正在把尤斯塔斯還不知道的納尼亞的一切樹木、飛禽、農作物的名字告訴他。有時尤斯塔斯也把它們的英文名字告訴波金。

他們的後面是驢子迷惑，驢子後面是吉爾和獨角獸珍寶，他們靠得很攏地一起行走。你可能要說，吉爾已經相當鍾情於獨角獸了。她認爲——她想得也不算太錯——它是她所遇到的最傑出的、最嬌嫩的、最雅緻的野獸，而且它又是那麼文質彬彬、柔聲細語，如果你對它不熟悉，你簡直無法相信它在戰鬥中會那樣兇猛可畏。

"啊，這樣愉快極了!"吉爾說，"就像這樣的一路漫步過去。我倒希望有更多類似這樣的冒險哩。可惜納尼亞國土上老是出很多亂子。"

但獨角獸給吉爾解釋，說她完全搞錯了。它說只是在納尼亞發生動亂或是被顛覆的時候，亞當和夏娃的子子孫孫才從他們自己的奇異世界裏給送到納尼亞來的，但她不能認爲納尼亞老是這樣亂糟糟的。在他們的兩次來訪之間，隔着幾百年乃至上幹年的時光，當年和平的國王一個接着一個，簡直沒法兒記住國王的名字、點清國王的數目，歷史書中也確實沒有什麼記載。它繼續講到她從未聽說過的、老的女王們和英雄們。它講起出生在白女巫和永恆嚴冬稱王稱霸時代之前的白天鵝女王，她長得那麼美麗，她朝樹林裏隨便哪一個池塘裏瞧瞧，她的臉兒的倒影，便會從水裏發出光輝，像黑夜裏的明星一樣，從此發光一年零一天。它講起野兔蒙伍德長着一對神奇的耳朵，坐在大鍋淵雷鳴般的大瀑布下，竟可以聽到凱爾帕拉維爾人們的竊竊私語。它講起弗蘭克一世的第九代孫子、國王加爾，如何遠航東海，從惡龍手裏把孤獨羣島解救出來，作爲報答，人家又把孤獨羣島獻給他，永遠劃爲納尼亞國土的一部分。它講到整整幾個世紀裏，納尼亞全國是那麼幸福，惟一能記得的事情，就只有著名的舞蹈和宴會，或者至多再加上比武大會了，而今天總比昨天好，這個星期總比上個星期好。獨角獸繼續講下去時，所有這些幸福歲月的圖畫，成千上萬張圖畫，都在吉爾的腦子裏堆積起來了，終於彷彿是站在高山上俯瞰一大片富饒而美麗可愛的平原，平原上充滿森林、河流和小麥田，連綿不斷地往遠處延伸，終於遠得淡化了，模糊了。她說"

"啊，我真希望我們不久就能解決無尾猿問題，重新恢復那些美好而尋常的時代。然後這些美好的時代會永遠永遠繼續下去。我們自己的世界總有一天要完結的。也許這個世界不會完結。珍寶啊——如果納尼亞繼續存在下去——像它從前(如你所說的)那樣幸福美好地存在下去——豈不美妙嗎?"

"不然，小妹妹，"珍寶答道，"所有的世界都要完結的，不在此列的只有阿斯蘭自己的世界。"

"哦，至少，"吉爾說，"我希望這個世界要在億萬年以後才完結——喂!我們爲什麼停步不走啊?"

國王、尤斯塔斯和小矮人都在仰望天空。吉爾哆嗦，她想起剛纔已經看到過的恐怖事物。但這一回可不是這類東西了。它是小小的，映襯着藍天，看上去是黑色的。