下载掌阅APP，畅读海量书库
立即打开
Stanton Davies and Jim Wemple ceased from their talk to listen to an increase of uproar in the street. A volley of stones thrummed and boomed the wire mosquito nettings that protected the windows. It was a hot night, and the sweat of the heat stood on their faces as they listened. Arose the incoherent clamor of the mob, punctuated by individual cries in Mexican-Spanish. Least terrible among the obscene threats were: "Death to the Gringos!" "Kill the American pigs!" "Drown the American dogs in the sea!"
斯塔顿·戴维斯和吉姆·外姆普停止了谈话，听着街上的越来越大的吵闹声。一阵乱石敲打着保护窗户的金属网纱，发出隆隆的声响。这是一个燥热的夜晚，他们听着外面的声音，热得脸上布满了汗水。暴民断断续续的叫嚷此起彼伏，不时被某声带着墨西哥当地西班牙语腔调的叫喊声打断。在这些可恶的威胁中，最不那么糟糕的是：“外国佬，去见鬼吧！”“宰了这些美国猪！”“把这些美国狗丢到海里淹死！”
Stanton Davies and Jim Wemple shrugged their shoulders patiently to each other, and resumed their conversation, talking louder in order to make themselves heard above the uproar.
斯塔顿·戴维斯和吉姆·外姆普耐心地向对方耸耸肩膀，重新交谈起来。他们提高了声音，好盖过外面的喧嚣，让对方听见。
"The question is how," Wemple said. "It's forty-seven miles to Panuco, by river—”
“问题是怎么做，”外姆普说道，“坐船到帕努科河要47英里——”
"And the land's impossible, with Zaragoza's and Villa's men on the loot and maybe fraternizing," Davies agreed.
“走陆路根本不可能，会遇到萨拉戈萨人和维拉人的抢劫，他们可能正打得火热呢。”戴维斯表示同意。
Wemple nodded and continued: "And she's at the East Coast Magnolia, two miles beyond, if she isn't back at the hunting camp. We've got to get her—”
外姆普点点头，继续说道：“她如果没回狩猎营地，就是在东海岸马格诺利亚地区，也就是还要走两英里远。我们必须找到她——”
"We've played pretty square in this matter, Wemple," Davies said. "And we might as well speak up and acknowledge what each of us knows the other knows. You want her. I want her."
“我们在这件事上观点很一致，外姆普，”戴维斯说，“而且我们也可以坦诚相对，说说彼此知道对方了解多少。你想要她。我也想要她。”
Wemple lighted a cigarette and nodded.
外姆普点了一根烟，点了点头。
"And now's the time when it's up to us to make a show as if we didn't want her and that all we want is just to save her and get her down here.”
“现在，我们应该假装我们不想要她，我们只想救她并把她带到这来。”
"And a truce until we do save her—I get you," Wemple affirmed.
“在把她救出来之前，我们休战吧——我要征得你的同意。”外姆普声称道。
"A truce until we get her safe and sound back here in Tampico, or aboard a battleship. After that...?"
“我们一直停战到把她完好无损地救回坦皮科，或是把她送上战船为止。在那之后……”
Both men shrugged shoulders and beamed on each other as their hands met in ratification.
两个人都耸了耸肩，握手达成协议，向对方露出了笑脸。
Fresh volleys of stones thrummed against the wire-screened windows; a boy's voice rose shrilly above the clamor, proclaiming death to the Gringos; and the house reverberated to the heavy crash of some battering ram against the street-door downstairs. Both men, snatching up automatic rifles, ran down to where their fire could command the threatened door.
又一阵乱石砸在罩着铁丝的窗户上。一个男孩的声音在喧嚣声中刺耳地响起来，叫喊着让外国佬见鬼去。房子里回响着撞车在楼下撞击临街门的沉重响声。这两个人都抓起自动步枪，跑到火力可以控制这个受威胁的门的地方。
"If they break in we've got to let them have it," Wemple said.
“如果他们冲进来，我们就不得不让他们吃枪子儿了。”外姆普说道。
Davies nodded quiet agreement, then inconsistently burst out with a lurid string of oaths.
戴维斯点头表示无声的赞同，接着突然变了脸色，嘴里冒出一连串可怕的咒骂。
"To think of it!" he explained his wrath. "One out of three of those curs outside has worked for you or me—lean-bellied, bare-footed, poverty-stricken, glad for ten centavos a day if they could only get work. And we've given them steady jobs and a hundred and fifty centavos a day, and here they are yelling for our blood.”
“想想看！”他解释了自己的愤怒，“外面的那些杂种里，有三分之一给你或我干过活——他们饿着肚子，光着脚，受着穷，只要有活干，一天赚10分钱也很乐意。我们已经给了他们稳定的工作，还有一天150分的工资，而他们却在这里，叫喊着要我们的血。”
"Only the half breeds;" Davies corrected.
“这些人里有一半。”戴维斯纠正道。
"You know what I mean," Wemple replied. "The only peons we've lost are those that have been run off or shot.”
“你知道我是什么意思。”外姆普答道,“我们失去的雇工只是那些逃跑的或被枪毙的。”
The attack on the door ceasing, they returned upstairs. Half a dozen scattered shots from farther along the street seemed to draw away the mob, for the neighborhood became comparatively quiet.
对门的攻击停止了，两人就回到了楼上。从街上远处传来的零星的枪声似乎驱走了暴民，附近和之前相比变得相对安静些了。
A whistle came to them through the open windows, and a man's voice calling:
从敞开的窗户外面传来一声口哨，还有一个男人的声音：
"Wemple! Open the door! It's Habert! Want to talk to you!”
“外姆普！开门！我是哈伯特！我想和你谈谈！”
Wemple went down, returning in several minutes with a tidily-paunched, well-built, gray-haired American of fifty. He shook hands with Davies and flung himself into a chair, breathing heavily. He did not relinquish his clutch on the Colt's 44 automatic pistol, although he immediately addressed himself to the task of fishing a filled clip of cartridges from the pocket of his linen coat. He had arrived hatless and breathless, and the blood from a stone-cut on the cheek oozed down his face. He, too, in a fit of anger, springing to his feet when he had changed clips in his pistol, burst out with mouth-filling profanity.
外姆普下了楼，几分钟之后回来了，带回来一个50岁的美国人，大肚子、头发灰白、体格健壮。他和戴维斯握了手，一下子坐到椅子上，喘着粗气。尽管他从自己的亚麻外套的口袋里迅速地掏出了满满一夹子弹，也没有放开紧握的柯尔特式44口径的自动手枪。他来的时候没有戴帽子，气喘吁吁，血从他脸颊上的石头划痕中渗出来，沿着他的脸流下。同样地，他也在一阵狂怒中一跃而起，一边换上子弹，一边爆发出激烈的咒骂。
"They had an American flag in the dirt, stamping and spitting on it. And they told me to spit on it."
“他们把美国国旗丢进了垃圾堆里，踩它，还往上面吐唾沫。他们还让我也往上面吐唾沫。”
Wemple and Davies regarded him with silent interrogation.
外姆普和戴维斯用沉默的怀疑回应他。
"Oh, I know what you're wondering!" he flared out. "Would I a-spit on it in the pinch? That's what's eating you. I'll answer. Straight out, brass tacks, I WOULD. Put that in your pipe and smoke it.”
“哦，我知道你们在想什么！”他突然发起怒来，“我会往上面吐哪怕一小口唾沫吗？这就是你们为什么烦扰。我来回答。坦白地说吧，事实上，我会的。我会把国旗放进你们的烟斗里，然后把它当烟抽。”
He paused to help himself to a cigar from the box on the table and to light it with a steady and defiant hand.
他停了下来，自己从桌子上的盒子里拿出一支烟，镇定而轻蔑地点着。
"Hell!—I guess this neck of the woods knows Anthony Habert, and you can bank on it that it's never located his yellow streak. Sure, in the pinch, I'd spit on Old Glory. What the hell d'ye think I'm going on the streets for a night like this? Didn't I skin out of the Southern Hotel half an hour ago, where there are forty buck Americans, not counting their women, and all armed? That was safety. What d'ye think I came here for?—to rescue you?”
“该死的！——我猜附近一带都知道安东尼·哈伯特，你们可以放心，没人说他是懦夫。当然，必要时，我会往国旗上吐唾沫。那你们觉得，我在这样的夜里到街上是干什么去？难道我没有在半小时之前溜出南部宾馆？这个宾馆里有40个有钱的全副武装的美国人，如果不算上他们的女人的话。那才叫安全。你们认为我来这里干什么？——来救你们？”
His indignation lumped his throat into silence, and he seemed shaken as with an apoplexy.
他的愤怒堵住了喉咙，他不说话了，像中风一样发着抖。
"Spit it out," Davies commanded dryly.
“有话直说。”戴维斯冷冷地命令道。
"I'll tell you,' Habert exploded. "It's Billy Boy. Fifty miles up country and twenty-thousand throat-cutting federals and rebels between him and me. D'ye know what that boy'd do, if he was here in Tampico and I was fifty miles up the Panuco? Well, I know. And I'm going to do the same—go and get him.”
“我会告诉你们的,”哈伯特爆发了，“是比利·博伊。我和他之间隔着50英里，还有两万个互相要置对方于死地的联邦军和反叛者。如果他在这里，在坦皮科，而我在离帕努科50英里远的地方，你们知道那男孩会做什么吗？哦，我知道。而我就要去做一样的事——抓住他。”
"We're figuring on going up," Wemple assured him.
“我们正计划着去上游呢。”外姆普向他保证道。
"And that's why I headed here—Miss Drexel, of course?”
“这正是我来这里的原因了——当然是德雷克赛尔小姐了？”
Both men acquiesced and smiled. It was a time when men dared speak of matters which at other times tabooed speech.
两人默认了，露出了微笑。在这种时候，男人们敢于说一些平时不说的话。
"Then the thing's to get started," Habert exclaimed, looking at his watch. "It's midnight now. We've got to get to the river and get a boat—”
“那么首先我们要做的是，”哈伯特说着，看了看他的手表，“现在是午夜了。我们得去河边弄艘船来——”
But the clamor of the returning mob came through the windows in answer.
但是，归来的暴民的叫嚷声从窗外传了进来，作为回应。
Davies was about to speak, when the telephone rang, and Wemple sprang to the instrument.
戴维斯正要说话，这时电话响了起来，外姆普向电话冲了过去。
"It's Carson," he interjected, as he listened. "They haven't cut the wires across the river yet—Hello, Carson. Was it a break or a cut?... Bully for you... Yes, move the mules across to the potrero beyond Tamcochin... Who's at the water station?... Can you still phone him?... Tell him to keep the tanks full, and to shut off the main to Arico. Also, to hang on till the last minute, and keep a horse saddled to cut and run for it. Last thing before he runs, he must jerk out the phone... Yes, yes, yes. Sure. No breeds. Leave full-blooded Indians in charge. Gabriel is a good hombre. Heaven knows, once we're chased out, when we'll get back... You can't pinch down Jaramillo under twenty-five hundred barrels. We've got storage for ten days. Gabriel'll have to handle it. Keep it moving, if we have to run it into the river—”
“是卡森，”他一边听着，一边插话道，“他们还没砍断穿越河道的电线——你好，卡森。它是被弄破了还是被砍断了？……干得好……对，把骡子运到塔莫克勤那边的牧场上……谁在水站那儿？……你还能和他通上电话吗？……告诉他要让贮水池保持满满的，切断通往艾瑞口的总管道。另外，要坚持到最后一分钟，留一匹备好鞍的马，切断之后就逃命。在他逃走之前要做的最后一件事，就是他必须拔掉电话……对，对，对。当然。不要混血儿。让纯印第安血统的人负责。加夫列尔是个好家伙。天知道一旦我们被驱逐，我们什么时候能回来……2500个枪管可不能使哈拉米略降服。我们已经做好了10天的储备。加夫列尔将会处理这件事。让它继续移动，如果我们不得不把它开到河里去的话——”
"Ask him if he has a launch," Habert broke in.
“问问他有没有汽艇。”哈伯特插话道。
"He hasn't," was Wemple's answer. "The federals commandeered the last one at noon."
“他没有，”外姆普回答道，“联邦军中午征用了最后一艘汽艇。”
"Say, Carson, how are you going to make your get-away?" Wemple queried.
“说说看，卡森，你准备怎么逃跑？”外姆普问道。
The man to whom he talked was across the Panuco, on the south side, at the tank farm.
和他讲话的那个人正在帕努科对面正南方的油库里。
"Says there isn't any get-away," Wemple vouchsafed to the other two. "The federals are all over the shop, and he can't understand why they haven't raided him hours ago.”
“他说没有办法逃跑，”外姆普向另外两个人说道，“联邦军遍及工厂各处，他不明白为什么他们不在几小时前袭击他。”
"...Who? Campos? That skunk!...all right... Don't be worried if you don't hear from me. I'm going up river with Davies and Habert... Use your judgment, and if you get a safe chance at Campos, pot him... Oh, a hot time over here. They're battering our doors now. Yes, by all means... Good-by, old man.”
“……谁？坎波斯？那个卑鄙的家伙！……好吧……要是没有我的消息不要担心。我会和戴维斯、哈伯特一块去河边……你自己拿主意，要是你找到一个可靠的机会，毙了坎波斯……哦，这边日子难着呢。他们正撞我们的门呢。对，尽一切办法……再见，老兄。”
Wemple lighted a cigarette and wiped his forehead.
外姆普点燃了一根烟，擦拭着额头。
"You know Campos, Jose H. Campos," he volunteered. "The dirty cur's stuck Carson up for twenty thousand pesos. We had to pay, or he'd have compelled half our peons to enlist or set the wells on fire. And you know, Davies, what we've done for him in past years. Gratitude? Simple decency? Great Scott!”
“你们知道坎波斯，乔斯·H. 坎波斯吧，”他主动说起来，“这个肮脏的杂种已经为了两万比索支持卡森了。我们不得不付钱，否则他就会强迫我们一半的劳工入伍，或是把油井给点了。还有戴维斯，你知道，我们在过去这些年为他做了多少事。感恩？简单的礼貌？好家伙！”
It was the night of April twenty-first. On the morning of the twenty-first the American marines and bluejackets had landed at Vera Cruz and seized the custom house and the city. Immediately the news was telegraphed, the vengeful Mexican mob had taken possession of the streets of Tampico and expressed its disapproval of the action of the United States by tearing down American flags and crying death to the Americans.
那是4月21日的晚上。在4月21日的早上，美国的海军陆战队和水兵已经在维拉克鲁斯登陆，并且占领了海关大楼和整个城市。这个消息立即被拍成电报传了出去，复仇心重的墨西哥暴民占领了坦皮科的街道，并用撕毁美国国旗、咒骂美国人的方式来表达对美国政府行动的不满。
There was nothing save its own spinelessness to deter the mob from carrying out its threat. Had it battered down the doors of the Southern Hotel, or of other hotels, or of residences such as Wemple's, a fight would have started in which the thousands of federal soldiers in Tampico would have joined their civilian compatriots in the laudable task of decreasing the Gringo population of that particular portion of Mexico. There should have been American warships to act as deterrents; but through some inexplicable excess of delicacy, or strategy, or heaven knows what, the United States, when it gave its orders to take Vera Cruz, had very carefully withdrawn its warships from Tampico to the open Gulf a dozen miles away. This order had come to Admiral Mayo by wireless from Washington, and thrice he had demanded the order to be repeated, ere, with tears in his eyes, he had turned his back on his countrymen and countrywomen and steamed to sea.
除非他们自己懒惰懦弱，否则没有什么可以阻止这些暴民把他们的威胁化为现实。如果他们真的砸毁了南部宾馆，或其他的宾馆，或是像外姆普的住宅这种地方的大门，一场战争就将开始，数以千计在坦皮科的联邦军战士将会和他们的平民同胞一起，履行减少墨西哥这一地区的外国佬人数的光荣任务。本应有美国战船起到震慑作用的，但是由于某些令人费解的过分谨慎，或者出于战略安排，或是老天知道的什么原因，美国政府在下令占领维拉克鲁斯时，就已经十分小心地将它的战船从坦皮科撤到了十二英里外空旷的墨西哥湾。这一命令通过无线电从华盛顿传到了舰队司令马约那里，他三次要求重复命令，之后他眼含着泪水抛弃了他的国民，驶向大海。
"Of all asinine things, to leave us in the lurch this way!" Habert was denouncing the powers that be of his country. "Mayo'd never have done it. Mark my words, he had to take program from Washington. And here we are, and our dear ones scattered for fifty miles back up country... Say, if I lose Billy Boy I'll never dare go home to face the wife—Come on. Let the three of us make a start. We can throw the fear of God into any gang on the streets.”
“这些蠢驴，就这样把我们扔下不管！”哈伯特谴责着他的国家的当权者们，“马约决不会那样做的。听我说，他不得不听从华盛顿那边的命令。现在我们在这里，我们的亲友却散落在50英里之外……这么说吧，要是我没找到比利·博伊，我就永远不敢回家面对我的妻子了——来吧。我们三个动身吧。我们能够让街上的任何一帮歹徒胆战心惊。”
"Come on over and take a squint," Davies invited from where he stood, somewhat back from the window, looking down into the street.
“过来看一下。”戴维斯在他站着的地方说道，他稍稍从窗前退后，俯视着大街。
It was gorged with rioters, all haranguing, cursing, crying out death, and urging one another to smash the doors, but each hanging back from the death he knew waited behind those doors for the first of the rush.
街上挤满了暴民，都在大声地地训斥着、咒骂着、抱怨着，催促彼此把门打破，但是每个人都畏缩不前，因为他知道，在门后，等待着第一个冲上去的人的是死亡。
"We can't break through a bunch like that, Habert," was Davies' comment.
“我们不能从那样一群人中冲出去，哈伯特。”戴维斯发表了意见。
"And if we die under their feet we'll be of little use to Billy Boy or anybody else up the Panuco," Wemple added. "And if—”
“要是我们死在他们脚下，我们就对比利·博伊或者在帕努科的任何人没什么用了。”外姆普补充道，“要是——”
A new movement of the mob caused him to break off. It was splitting before a slow and silent advance of a file of white-clad men.
暴民的新举动让他打住不说了。一队白衣人缓慢而寂静地前进着，人们给他们让出一条道来。
"Bluejackets—Mayo's come back for us after all," Habert muttered.
“水兵——马约终于还是回来救我们了。”哈伯特咕哝道。
"Then we can get a navy launch," Davies said.
“那么我们可以得到一艘海军汽艇了。”戴维斯说。
The bedlam of the mob died away, and, in silence, the sailors reached the street door and knocked for admittance. All three went down to open it, and to discover that the callers were not Americans but two German lieutenants and half a dozen German marines. At sight of the Americans, the rage of the mob rose again, and was quelled by the grounding of the rifle butts of the marines.
暴民的骚乱渐渐平静了，在寂静中，水兵们来到街门前，敲门想要进来。三个人都下去开门，却发现敲门的不是美国人，而是两个德国中尉和六个德国海军陆战队士兵。看到了美国人，暴民的怒气再次高涨起来，海军陆战队士兵用来福枪的枪柄敲击地面，平息了他们的骚动。
"No, thank you;" the senior lieutenant, in passable English, declined the invitation to enter. He unconcernedly kept his cigar alive at such times that the mob drowned his voice. "We are on the way back to our ship. Our commander conferred with the English and Dutch commanders; but they declined to cooperate, so our commander has undertaken the entire responsibility. We have been the round of the hotels. They are to hold their own until daybreak, when we'll take them off. We have given them rockets such as these—Take them. If your house is entered, hold your own and send up a rocket from the roof. We can be here in force, in forty-five minutes. Steam is up in all our launches, launch crews and marines for shore duty are in the launches, and at the first rocket we shall start.”
“不，谢谢。”那位年长的中尉用尚可听懂的英语说道，拒绝了进入房间的邀请。当暴民的叫嚷声淹没了他的声音时，他漫不经心地让他的雪茄燃着。“我们是在回船上的路上。我们的指挥官已经与英国和荷兰的指挥官协商过了，但是他们拒绝与我们合作，所以我们的指挥官将全权负责。我们就在宾馆周围。他们将支撑到黎明，然后我们带他们离开。我们已经给了他们一些像这样的火箭弹——拿着它们。如果有人冲进你们的房子，你们要支撑住，从房顶发射一只火箭弹。我们能够在45分钟之内派大军赶到这里。我们所有的汽艇都已经准备好了，执行岸上任务的汽艇人员和海军陆战队士兵也已经在汽艇上了，看到第一个火箭弹，我们就出发。”
"Since you are going aboard now, we should like to go with you," Davies said, after having rendered due thanks.
“既然你们要到船上去，我们希望和你们一起走。”表达了应有的谢意之后，戴维斯这样说道。
The surprise and distaste on both lieutenants' faces was patent.
两个中尉的脸上露出了明显的惊奇和厌恶。
"Oh, no," Davies laughed. "We don't want refuge. We have friends fifty miles up river, and we want to get to the river in order to go up after them.”
“哦，不，”戴维斯笑了起来，“我们并不是想要避难。我们的朋友在上游50英里远的地方，我们想去河边找他们。”
The pleasure on the officers' faces was immediate as they looked a silent conference at each other.
两个军官的脸上立刻露出了高兴的表情，他们看了看彼此，沉默地交换了意见。
"Since our commander has undertaken grave responsibility on a night like this, may we do less than take minor responsibility?" queried the elder.
“既然我们的指挥官已经在这样一个晚上承担了重大的责任，难道我们可以连这点小小的责任都不承担吗？”年长的军官说道。
To this the younger heartily agreed. In a trice, upstairs and down again, equipped with extra ammunition, extra pistols, and a pocket-bulging supply of cigars, cigarettes and matches, the three Americans were ready. Wemple called last instructions up the stairway to imaginary occupants being left behind, ascertained that the spring lock was on, and slammed the door.
年轻的军官衷心赞成这个说法。不一会儿，再次上楼下楼一番之后，三个美国人准备好了。他们装备着大量的弹药和枪，还用雪茄、香烟和火柴把口袋塞得鼓鼓囊囊的。外姆普在楼上向假想中被留下的居住者呼喊了几声，确定弹簧锁已经锁住，然后砰的一声关上了门。
The officers led, followed by the Americans, the rear brought up by the six marines; and the spitting, howling mob, not daring to cast a stone, gave way before them.
军官们在前面带路，美国人在后面跟着，六个海军陆战队士兵殿后。吐着唾沫、咆哮着的暴民不敢朝他们扔石头，而是给他们让开了路。
As they came alongside the gangway of the cruiser, they saw launches and barges lying in strings to the boat-booms, filled with men, waiting for the rocket signal from the beleaguered hotels. A gun thundered from close at hand, up river, followed by the thunder of numerous guns and the reports of many rifles fired very rapidly.
当他们走到巡洋舰的通道旁时，他们看到了系在吊艇杆上的汽艇和驳船，上面都是人，等待着从被围攻的宾馆那边发出来的火箭信号。一声枪响在附近的上游响起，接着是许多声枪响和很多步枪快速射击的声响。
"Now what's the Topila whanging away at?" Habert complained, then joined the others in gazing at the picture.
“现在这些陶皮拉人在驱赶什么？”哈伯特抱怨道，然后和其他人一起观看着这景象。
A searchlight, evidently emanating from the Mexican gunboat, was stabbing the darkness to the middle of the river, where it played upon the water. And across the water, the center of the moving circle of light, flashed a long, lean speedboat. A shell burst in the air a hundred feet astern of it. Somewhere, outside the light, other shells were bursting in the water; for they saw the boat rocked by the waves from the explosions. They could guess the whizzing of the rifle bullets.
一束探照灯光，显然是从墨西哥炮艇上放射出来的，刺穿了河流中央的黑暗地带，照在河面上。移动着的光圈的中心穿过河面，照出了一艘瘦长的快艇。在它后面100英尺的地方，一颗炮弹在空中爆炸。在光线之外的其他地方，另有一些炮弹在水中炸开；因为他们看到船被爆炸引起的水波摇动着。他们可以想象步枪子弹发出的嗖嗖声。
But for only several minutes the spectacle lasted. Such was the speed of the boat that it gained shelter behind the German, when the Mexican gunboat was compelled to cease fire. The speedboat slowed down, turned in a wide and heeling circle, and ranged up alongside the launch at the gangway.
但是这一壮观的景象只持续了几分钟。船的速度如此之快，它躲在德国人的后面获得了庇护，而墨西哥炮艇只得停止射击。快艇放慢了速度，转了一个宽而横倾的圈，在舷梯口的汽艇旁边加入了队列。
The lights from the gangway showed but one occupant, a tow-headed, greasy-faced, blond youth of twenty, very lean, very calm, very much satisfied with himself.
从舷梯口射出来的光线只照出了一个船客，他的头发蓬乱如麻，满面油污，是个20多岁的金发年轻人，很瘦，很沉着，也对自己很满意。
"If it ain't Peter Tonsburg!" Habert ejaculated, reaching out a hand to shake. "Howdy, Peter, howdy. And where in hell are you hell-bent for, surging by the Topila in such scandalous fashion?”
“这不是彼得·唐斯伯格嘛！”哈波特突然叫道，伸出一只手去握手。“你好，彼得，你好。你这么拼命到底是要去哪儿啊？还被陶皮拉人弄得气喘吁吁，这么一副狼狈样子？”
Peter, a Texas-born Swede of immigrant parents, filled with the old Texas traditions, greasily shook hands with Wemple and Davies as well, saying "Howdy," as only the Texan born can say it.
彼得的父母是瑞典移民，他出生在德克萨斯州，脑袋里装满了德克萨斯的旧传统。他奉承地与外姆普和戴维斯握了手，一边说着：“你好。”只有出生在德克萨斯的人才这么说。
"Me," he answered Habert. "I ain't hell-bent nowhere exceptin' to get away from the shell-fire. She's a caution, that Topila. Huh! but I limbered'em up some. I was goin' every inch of twenty-five. They was like amateurs blazin' away at canvasback.”
“我，”他回答哈伯特，“我才没有拼着命要去哪里呢，除了要逃离这些炮火。它是一个警告，那条陶皮拉船。哼！但是我让他们中的一些人先热了热身。我足足走了25英里。他们就像业余猎手朝着一只帆背潜鸭连续射击一样。”
"Which Chill is it?" Wemple asked.
“这是哪个吉尔？”外姆普问道。
"Chill II," Peter answered. "It's all that's left. Chill I a Greaser—you know 'm—Campos—commandeered this noon. I was runnin' Chill III when they caught me at sundown. Made me come in under their guns at the East Coast outfit, and fired me out on my neck. "Now the boss'd gone over in this one to Tampico in the early evening, and just about ten minutes ago I spots it landin' with a sousy bunch of Federals at the East Coast, and swipes it back according. Where's the boss? He ain't hurt, is he? Because I'm going after him.”
“吉尔二号，”彼得回答道，“它是唯一剩下的东西。吉尔一号今天中午已经被一个油脂工——你们知道他，坎波斯——征用了。在日落时他们捉到我时，我架势的是吉尔三号。在东海岸的机构里，他们用枪指着我让我进去，又冲着我的脖子开枪把我赶出来。晚上早些时候，老板已经坐着这一艘转移到坦皮科，就在10分钟之前，我看到它带着一群联邦军在东海岸登陆，但仍旧朝它猛烈袭击把它赶了回去。老板在哪里？他没有受伤，是吧？因为我要去追他。”
"No, you're not, Peter," Davies said. "Mr. Frisbie is safe at the Southern Hotel, all except a five-inch scalp wound from a brick that's got him down with a splitting headache. He's safe, so you're going with us, going to take us, I mean, up beyond Panuco town.”
“不，你不用追了，彼得，”戴维斯说，“弗里斯比先生在南部宾馆很安全，除了一条被砖砸到的5英寸的伤口，让他头痛欲裂。他很安全，所以你要和我们一起走，我的意思是，带我们离开帕努科城。”
"Huh?—I can see myself," Peter retorted, wiping his greasy nose on a wad of greasy cotton waste. "I got some cold. Besides, this night-drivin' ain't good for my complexion.”
“哈！我很清楚自己，”彼得反驳道，一面用一团油腻的废纱头擦拭着他泛油光的鼻子，“我有点感冒。另外，这种夜间行驶对我的脸色没好处。”
"My boy's up there," Habert said.
“我儿子在那里。”哈伯特说。
"Well, he's bigger'n I am, and I reckon he can take care of himself.”
“哦，他比我都大，我想他能照顾自己。”
"And there's a woman there—Miss Drexel," Davies said quietly.
“可那里还有一位女士——德雷克赛尔小姐。”戴维斯平静地说道。
"Who? Miss Drexel? Why didn't you say so at first?" Peter demanded grievedly. He sighed and added, "Well, climb in an' make a start. Better get your Dutch friends to donate me about twenty gallons of gasoline if you want to get anywhere.”
“谁？德雷克赛尔小姐？开始的时候你们怎么不说啊？”彼得痛心地询问道。他叹了口气，接着说道：“哦，那爬上来，开始行动吧。如果你们想去什么地方，最好让你们的荷兰朋友给我加上大约20加仑的汽油。”
"Won't do you no good to lay low," Peter Tonsburg remarked, as, at full speed, headed up river, the Topila's searchlight stabbed them. "High or low, if one of them shells hit in the vicinity—good night!”
“坐低一点对你们没坏处。”彼得·唐斯伯格说道，同时全速驶向上游，陶皮拉船的探照灯照亮了他们。“无论高还是低，要是他们炮弹中的一个落到我们附近——我的天啊！”
Immediately thereafter the Topila erupted. The roar of the Chill's exhaust nearly drowned the roar of the guns, but the fragile hull of the craft was shaken and rocked by the bursting shells. An occasional bullet thudded into or pinged off the Chill, and, despite Peter's warning that, high or low, they were bound to get it if it came to them, every man on board, including Peter, crouched, with chest contracted by drawn-in shoulders, in an instinctive and purely unconscious effort to lessen the area of body he presented as a target or receptacle for flying fragments of steel.
紧接着陶皮拉船突然爆炸了。吉尔的排气装置的轰鸣几乎淹没了枪声，但是小船脆弱的船体被爆炸的炮弹来回摇晃着。一个子弹重重地落进，或是擦过吉尔船，发出砰的一声巨响。虽然彼得警告过大家，无论坐得高点还是低点，如果子弹冲着他们来了，他们肯定要完蛋。船上的每个人，包括彼得，都蹲伏了下来，收紧的肩膀紧抱着胸部，凭借着一种本能的和完全无意识的努力减少身体上能暴露在飞过的炮弹碎片之下的部分。
The Topila was a federal gunboat. To complicate the affair, the constitutionalists, gathered on the north shore in the siege of Tampico, opened up on the speedboat with many rifles and a machine gun.
陶皮拉船是一艘联邦军的炮艇。让事情变得更复杂的是，宪法主义者在北岸集合起来围攻坦皮科，在快艇上用大量步枪和一把机关枪开火了。
"Lord, I'm glad they're Mexicans, and not Americans," Habert observed, after five mad minutes in which no damage had been received. "Mexicans are born with guns in their hands, and they never learn to use them."
“上帝啊，我很高兴他们是墨西哥人，而不是美国人。”哈伯特说道，这疯狂的五分钟没有造成任何损失。“墨西哥人生下来手里就有枪，可是他们从不学习怎么用枪。”
Nor was the Chill or any man aboard damaged when at last she rounded the bend of river that shielded her from the searchlight.
当到达河口转弯处，避开了探照灯光时，无论吉尔还是船上的人，都没有受伤。
"I'll have you in Panuco town in less'n three hours,…if we don't hit a log," Peter leaned back and shouted in Wemple's ear. "And if we do hit driftwood, I'll have you in the swim quicker than that.”
“三个小时之内我会把你们带到帕努科城——要是我们不撞上原木的话，”彼得向后倾斜一下，冲着外姆普的耳朵大喊道，“要是我们真的撞上浮木，我会让你们游得比它更快。”
Chill II tore her way through the darkness, steered by the tow-headed youth who knew every foot of the river and who guided his course by the loom of the banks in the dim starlight. A smart breeze, kicking up spiteful wavelets on the wider reaches, splashed them with sheeted water as well as fine-flung spray. And, in the face of the warmth of the tropic night, the wind, added to the speed of the boat, chilled them through their wet clothes.
吉尔二号在黑暗中前行，由这个头发蓬乱的年青人驾驶，他对这条河了如指掌，凭借着在暗淡星光中若隐若现的河岸改变着航向。一阵微风在宽广的河面上吹拂起令人厌烦的浪花，拍打着层层水波和荡漾的浪花。而且即使热带的夜晚比较温暖，被船速增强的风仍然穿透了他们潮湿的衣服，让他们冷得够呛。
"Now I know why she was named the Chill," Habert observed betwixt chattering teeth.
“现在我知道这条船为什么叫‘吉尔’（译者注：‘吉尔’为Chill音译，意为‘寒冷’）了。”哈伯特说着，牙齿打着颤。
But conversation languished during the nearly three hours of drive through the darkness. Once, by the exhaust, they knew that they passed an unlighted launch bound down stream. And once, a glare of light, near the south bank, as they passed through the Toreno field, aroused brief debate as to whether it was the Toreno wells, or the bungalow on Merrick's banana plantation that flared so fiercely.
但是，在将近３个小时穿越黑暗的行程中，谈话失去了往日的活力。有一次，通过排气装置的震颤声，他们知道他们经过了一个固定在下游的没有照明的汽艇。还有一次，在南岸附近，他们经过托累诺牧场时，一束刺眼的灯光，引起了一阵短暂的争论，能够发出这么耀眼的灯光的是托雷诺油井还是梅里克的香蕉种植园。
At the end of an hour, Peter slowed down and ran in to the bank.
最后一个小时，彼得放慢了速度，向河岸驶去。
"I got a cache of gasoline here—ten gallons," he explained, "and it's just as well to know it's here for the back trip.” Without leaving the boat, fishing arm deep into the bush, he announced, "All hunky-dory.” He proceeded to oil the engine. "Huh!" he soliloquized for their benefit. "I was just readin' a magazine yarn last night. 'Whose Business Is to Die,' was its title. An' all I got to say is, 'The hell it is.' A man's business is to live. Maybe you thought it was our business to die when the Topila was pepperin' us. But you was wrong. We're alive, ain't we? We beat her to it. That's the game. Nobody's got any business to die. I ain't never goin' to die, if I've got any say about it.”
“我在这里藏了些汽油——一共10加仑，”他解释说，“同时知道我们要在这里返程也好。”彼得没有离开船，把胳膊深深埋进草丛里搜寻，然后宣布：“一切正常。”他去给发动机加油。“哈！”为了他们好，他独自说道,“我昨晚刚刚在杂志上读到一个故事。它的题目是《以死亡为职责的人》。而我想说的是：‘胡说八道’。一个人的职责就是活着。你们可能会想，要是陶皮拉的船不停地扫射我们，我们的职责就是去死。但是你们错了。我们还活着，不是吗？我们会打败它的。这就是游戏规则。没有人的职责是去死。如果我一定要说点什么的话，那就是我决不会去死。”
He turned over the crank, and the roar and rush of the Chill put an end to speech.
他翻转曲柄，用吉尔的咆哮和冲刺结束了演讲。
There was no need for Wemple or Davies to speak further in the affair closest to their hearts. Their truce to love-making had been made as binding as it was brief, and each rival honored the other with a firm belief that he would commit no infraction of the truce. Afterward was another matter. In the meantime they were one in the effort to get Beth Drexel back to the safety of riotous Tampico or of a war vessel.
外姆普和戴维斯没有必要进一步谈论他们最关心的事情了。他们之间因爱达成的停战协议和它的简明扼要一样有约束力，他们两个都以坚定地相信另一个人不会违反停战协议来向对手致敬。之后的事情就另当别论了。与此同时，他们在另一方面也是一致的，即努力把贝思·德雷克斯尔带回混乱的坦皮科城或者一艘战舰里的安全地带。
It was four o'clock when they passed by Panuco Town. Shouts and songs told them that the federal detachment holding the place was celebrating its indignation at the landing of American bluejackets in Vera Cruz. Sentinels challenged the Chill from the shore and shot at random at the noise of her in the darkness.
他们经过帕努科城的时候正好四点。叫喊声和歌声告诉他们，联邦军占领这一地区的分遣队正在发泄他们对美国海军登陆韦拉克鲁斯的愤慨之情。哨兵从岸上向吉尔船盘问，并在黑暗中朝着她的噪音的方向胡乱开了几枪。
A mile beyond, where a lighted river steamer with steam up lay at the north bank, they ran in at the Apshodel wells. The steamer was small, and the nearly two hundred Americans—men, women, and children—crowded her capacity. Blasphemous greetings of pure joy and geniality were exchanged between the men, and Habert learned that the steamboat was waiting for his Billy Boy, who, astride a horse, was rounding up isolated drilling gangs who had not yet learned that the United States had seized Vera Cruz and that all Mexico was boiling.
走了一英里之后，他们开进了阿普斯后都油田里，那里有一条燃着灯的内河汽船，冒着蒸汽停在北岸上。汽船很小，将近有200个美国人——男人、女人，还有孩子——挤在上面。男人们出于纯粹的开心和亲切相互说着脏话打招呼，哈伯特得知汽船正在等待着比利·博伊。比利·博伊这会儿正跨在马上，集合那些孤立的钻井工人，这些工人还不知道美国已经占领了韦拉克鲁斯，而且整个墨西哥都乱成了一团。
Habert climbed out to wait and to go down on the steamer, while the three that remained on the Chill, having learned that Miss Drexel was not with the refugees, headed for the Dutch Company on the south shore. This was the big gusher, pinched down from one hundred and eighty-five thousand daily barrels to the quantity the company was able to handle. Mexico had no quarrel with Holland, so that the superintendent, while up, with night guards out to prevent drunken soldiers from firing his vast lakes of oil, was quite unemotional. Yes, the last he had heard was that Miss Drexel and her brother were back at the hunting lodge. No; he had not sent any warnings, and he doubted that anybody else had. Not till ten o'clock the previous evening had he learned of the landing at Vera Cruz. The Mexicans had turned nasty as soon as they heard of it, and they had killed Miles Forman at the Empire Wells, run off his labor, and looted the camp. Horses? No; he didn't have horse or mule on the place. The federals had commandeered the last animal weeks back. It was his belief, however, that there were a couple of plugs at the lodge, too worthless even for the Mexicans to take.
哈伯特爬出了吉尔船，到汽船上等待比利·博伊并和它一起到下游去。留在船上的三个人得知德雷克赛尔小姐不在难民中间，就向着南岸的荷兰公司驶去了。这是一个大喷油井，每天可以生产从185000桶到公司的最大经营量。墨西哥对荷兰没有什么责难，所以当夜班警卫出去防止喝醉的士兵把大片的油田给点着时，负责人虽然醒着，但是表现得相当无动于衷。是的，他听说的最后消息是德雷克赛尔女士和她的弟弟正在回猎人小屋的途中。不，他没有发出任何警报，所以，他怀疑其他人发过。直到前一天晚上10点钟他才知道美军登陆韦拉克鲁斯的消息。墨西哥人听到这个消息，就变得杀气腾腾，他们已经杀死了帝国油井的迈尔斯·福曼，他从工地逃跑，还抢劫了营地。马？不，他在那个地方没有马或是骡子。联邦军数周之前就已经征用了最后的牲畜。但是，他认为在小屋里有一些插头，它们一点用都没有，连墨西哥人都不愿拿走。
"It's a hike," Davies said cheerfully.
“这可是一次远足。”戴维斯高兴地说。
"Six miles of it," Wemple agreed, equally cheerfully. "Let's beat it.”
“有六英里远，”外姆普同意他的说法，和他一样兴奋，“让我们拿下它。”
A shot from the river, where they had left Peter in the boat, started them on the run for the bank. A scattering of shots, as from two rifles, followed. And while the Dutch superintendent, in execrable Spanish, shouted affirmations of Dutch neutrality into the menacing dark, across the gunwale of Chill II they found the body of the tow-headed youth whose business it had been not to die.
他们把彼得留在船里，就在那的河面上传来了一声枪响，他们开始向岸边跑去。接着传来两把步枪零零散散的枪声。当荷兰的负责人用糟糕的西班牙语气势汹汹地在黑夜里大声宣布荷兰的中立态度时，他们发现那个头发蓬乱的年轻人的尸体俯在吉尔二号的舷缘上，那个其职责绝不是去死的年轻人。
For the first hour, talking little, Davies and Wemple stumbled along the apology for a road that led through the jungle to the lodge. They did discuss the glares of several fires to the east along the south bank of Panuco River, and hoped fervently that they were dwellings and not wells.
在开头的一个小时里，戴维斯和外姆普几乎没怎么说话，蹒跚地沿着一条勉强代替道路的小道行走，穿过丛林，来到了小屋前。他们确实讨论过在帕努科河南岸东部的一些光亮，热切地希望这光亮是来自居民区而不是油井。
"Two billion dollars worth of oil right here in the Ebaño field alone," Davies grumbled.
“光是埃瓦诺油田这里出产的油就能值20亿美元。”戴维斯抱怨道。
"And a drunken Mexican, whose whole carcass and immortal soul aren't worth ten pesos including hair, hide, and tallow, can start the bonfire with a lighted wad of cotton waste," was Wemple's contribution. "And if ever she starts, she'll gut the field of its last barrel.”
“一个醉醺醺的墨西哥人，他整个人和不朽的灵魂，包括他的头发、皮，和脂肪，加起来都不值10比索。他倒可以用一团点燃的废棉花把这里烧成灰烬，”外姆普补充道，“而且要是火烧起来的话，它将会吞没油田里的最后一桶油。”
Dawn, at five, enabled them to accelerate their pace; and six o'clock found them routing out the occupants of the lodge.
黎明在五点时分到来，使得他们能够加快脚步，六点时他们唤起了小屋里的人。
"Dress for rough travel, and don't stop for any frills," Wemple called around the corner of Miss Drexel's screened sleeping porch.
“穿些艰苦旅行时的衣服，别为那些没用的装饰浪费时间。”外姆普在德雷克赛尔小姐被遮起来的凉台的拐角处叫道。
"Not a wash, nothing;" Davies supplemented grimly, as he shook hands with Charley Drexel, who yawned and slippered up to them in pajamas. "Where are those horses, Charley? Still alive?"
她打着哈欠，穿着拖鞋和睡衣走过来，戴维斯和她握手，补充说“不要洗脸，什么都别干”。“那些马在哪里，查利？它们还活着吗？”
Wemple finished giving orders to the sleepy peons to remain and care for the place, occupying their spare time with hiding the more valuable things, and was calling around the corner to Miss Drexel the news of the capture of Vera Cruz, when Davies returned with the information that the horses consisted of a pair of moth-eaten skates that could be depended upon to lie down and die in the first half mile.
外姆普已经命令昏昏欲睡的劳工们留下来照看这个地方，用他们空余的时间来隐藏更为重要的事物。他正在拐角处告诉德雷克赛尔小姐韦拉克鲁斯被攻占的消息，这时戴维斯回来告诉大家，马队由一对被虫子咬的瘦骨嶙峋的马组成，十分可能不出半英里就倒地而死。
Beth Drexel emerged, first protesting that under no circumstances would she be guilty of riding the creatures, and, next, her brunette skin and dark eyes still flushed warm with sleep, greeting the two rescuers.
贝思·德雷克赛尔出现了，首先她抗议说在任何情况下她都不会骑马，她深色的皮肤和黑色的眼睛仍然由于睡意而泛红，就这样向两位救援者问好。
"It would be just as well if you washed your face, Stanton," she told Davies; and, to Wemple: "You're just as bad, Jim. You are a pair of dirty boys.”
“你洗洗脸也不碍事，斯塔顿，”她跟戴维斯这样说，然后对外姆普说道，“你和他一样糟糕，吉姆。你们就是一对脏兮兮的男孩。”
"And so will you be," Wemple assured her, "before you get back to Tampico. Are you ready?"
“你也将是这样，”外姆普对她说道，“在你回到坦皮科之前。准备好了吗？”
"As soon as Juanita packs my hand bag."
“等朱厄妮塔整理好我的手提包就行了。”
"Heavens, Beth, don't waste time!" exclaimed Wemple. "Jump in and grab up what you want."
“天啊，贝思，不要浪费时间了！”外姆普叫道，“快点行动，抓起你想要的东西，和我们走。”
"Make a start—make a start," chanted Davies. "Hustle! Hustle!—Charley, get the rifle you like best and take it along. Get a couple for us.”
“动身吧——动身吧，”戴维斯唱歌似的叫道，“赶紧！赶紧！——查利，带上你最喜欢的步枪。给我们也拿几把。”
"Is it as serious as that?" Miss Drexel queried.
“情况有这么严重吗？”德雷克赛尔小姐问道。
Both men nodded.
两个人点点头。
"The Mexicans are tearing loose," Davies explained. "How they missed this place I don't know.”
“墨西哥人正在毁掉一切。”戴维斯解释说，“我不知道他们怎么漏掉了这个地方。”
A movement in the adjoining room startled him. "Who's that?" he cried.
隔壁屋子里的一阵响动吓了他一跳。“是谁？”他叫道。
"Why, Mrs. Morgan," Miss Drexel answered.
“怎么，是摩根太太。”德雷克赛尔小姐回答道。
"Good heavens, Wemple, I'd forgotten her," groaned Davies. "How will we ever get her anywhere?"
“天啊，外姆普，我把她给忘了，”戴维斯呻吟道，“我们怎么把她带走呢？”
"Let Beth walk, and relay the lady on the nags."
“让贝思走路，换这位太太骑那些老马。”
"She weighs a hundred and eighty," Miss Drexel laughed. "Oh, hurry, Martha! We're waiting on you to start!”
“她有180磅重，”德雷克赛尔小姐笑着说道，“哦，快点，马莎！我们在等着你动身呢！”
Muffled speech came through the partition, and then emerged a very short, stout, much-flustered woman of middle age.
低沉的声音从隔墙里传来，之后一位慌张的矮胖中年妇女出现了。
"I simply can't walk, and you boys needn't demand it of me," was her plaint. "It's no use. I couldn't walk half a mile to save my life, and it's six of the worst miles to the river.”
“我就是不能走路，你们这些小伙子不用要求我这么做，”她诉苦道，“这是没用的。我就算走半英里路都会没命，况且这是到河边的路况最差的6英里。”
They regarded her in despair.
他们绝望地看着她。
"Then you'll ride," said Davies. "Come on, Charley. We'll get a saddle on each of the nags.”
“那么，你就骑马吧，”戴维斯说，“快点，查利。我们会在每匹马上都放一个马鞍。”
Along the road through the tropic jungle, Miss Drexel and Juanita, her Indian maid, led the way. Her brother, carrying the three rifles, brought up the rear, while in the middle Davies and Wemple struggled with Mrs. Morgan and the two decrepit steeds. One, a flea-bitten roan, groaned continually from the moment Mrs. Morgan's burden was put upon him till she was shifted to the other horse. And this other, a mangy sorrel, invariably lay down at the end of a quarter of a mile of Mrs. Morgan.
顺着穿过热带丛林的小路，德雷克赛尔小姐和她的印第安女仆朱厄妮塔在前面带路。她的弟弟带着三把步枪走在最后，戴维斯和外姆普则走在中间，努力应付着摩根太太和那两匹老马。一匹被跳蚤咬得遍体鳞伤的杂色马，刚刚背起摩根太太这一重负就呻吟个不停，直到她换了另一匹马才罢休。而另一匹长疥癣的栗色马，则总是载着摩根太太走上四分之一英里后就躺倒一次。
Miss Drexel laughed and joked and encouraged; and Wemple, in brutal fashion, compelled Mrs. Morgan to walk every third quarter of a mile. At the end of an hour the sorrel refused positively to get up, and, so, was abandoned. Thereafter, Mrs. Morgan rode the roan alternate quarters of miles, and between times walked—if walk may describe her stumbling progress on two preposterously tiny feet with a man supporting her on either side.
德雷克赛尔女士大笑着，开着玩笑，受到了鼓舞。外姆普则残忍地强迫摩根太太走完剩下的四分之三英里。一小时后，那匹栗色马断然拒绝再站起来，于是被扔在了路上。之后，摩根女士时不时地骑在杂色马上走一段，偶尔走路——如果可以用“走路”来形容她挪动着两只小得奇怪的脚，踉踉跄跄向前的样子的话，两边还各有个男人扶着她。
A mile from the river, the road became more civilized, running along the side of a thousand acres of banana plantation.
离河还有１英里的时候，道路也变得平坦一些了，旁边出现了数千亩的香蕉种植园。
"Parslow's," young Drexel said. "He'll lose a year's crop now on account of this mix-up.”
“是帕斯洛的。”查利说道，“因为这场混战，他这一年的收成就要没了。”
"Oh, look what I've found!" Miss Drexel called from the lead.
“哦，看看我发现了什么！”德雷克赛尔小姐在前面喊道。
"First machine that ever tackled this road," was young Drexel's judgment, as they halted to stare at the tire-tracks.
“这是经过这条路的第一辆车。”当他们停下来仔细观察轮胎印的时候，年轻的查利·德雷克赛尔判断道。
"But look at the tracks," his sister urged. "The machine must have come right out of the bananas and climbed the bank."
“但是看这些轮胎印，”他姐姐说，“这辆车肯定是从香蕉丛中出来，然后爬上了河岸。”
"Some machine to climb a bank like that," was Davies' comment. "What it did do was to go down the bank—take a scout after it, Charley, while Wemple and I get Mrs. Memple off her fractious mount. No machine ever built could travel far through those bananas.”
“能那个样子爬上河岸，这辆车还真不一般，”戴维斯说道，“它真正做的只是从河岸上开了下来——跟上它，查利，外姆普和我把摩根太太从她那匹脾气不好的坐骑上弄下来。没有车能穿过香蕉丛走太远。”
The flea-bitten roan, on its four legs up-standing, continued bravely to stand until the lady was removed, whereupon, with a long sigh, it sank down on the ground. Mrs. Morgan likewise sighed, sat down, and regarded her tiny feet mournfully.
那匹身上满是跳蚤的杂色马，用四条腿站着，勇敢地保持站立的姿势，直到摩根太太被架下之后，它才发出一声长叹，瘫倒在地上。摩根太太同样叹着气，坐了下来，伤心地盯着她的小脚。
"Go on, boys," she said. "Maybe you can find something at the river and send back for me."
“往前走吧，小伙子们。”她说,“或许你们能在河边找到什么东西，然后再回来接我。”
But their indignant rejection of the plan never attained speech, for, at that instant, from the green sea of banana trees beneath them, came the sudden purr of an engine. A minute later the splutter of an exhaust told them the silencer had been taken off. The huge-fronded banana trees were violently agitated as by the threshing of a hidden Titan. They could identify the changing of gears and the reversing and going ahead, until, at the end of five minutes, a long low, black car burst from the wall of greenery and charged the soft earth bank, but the earth was too soft, and when, two-thirds of the way up, beaten, Charley Drexel braked the car to a standstill, the earth crumbled from under the tires, and he ran it down and back, the way he had come, until half-buried in the bananas.
但是，他们还没能表达对这个计划的愤怒拒绝，就在那一瞬，一阵引擎的颤动声突然从他们脚下的大片绿色香蕉树中传出来。一分钟之后，排气管的噼啪声告诉他们消音器已经被卸下来了。叶片巨大的香蕉树在一个看不见的巨物的捶打下猛烈地摇摆着。他们能辨认出排挡的变换，它的反转和前进。五分钟后，一辆长而矮的黑色汽车突然从那堵绿墙中冒了出来，向岸边松软的土地冲去。但是土太松了，车走了三分之二的路程后就没法往前开了。查利·德雷克赛尔把车刹住，轮胎下的泥土被压碎了，他把车开了回去，就像他刚才开过来一样，直到半掩在香蕉树丛中。
"A Merry Oldsmobile!" Miss Drexel quoted from the popular song, clapping her hands. "Now, Martha, your trouble are over."
“多好的一辆奥尔兹莫比尔汽车啊！”德雷克赛尔小姐拍着手，引用一首流行歌曲说道，“马莎，现在你的麻烦结束了。”
"Six-cylinder, and sounds as if it hadn't been out of the shop a week, or may I never ride in a machine again," Wemple remarked, looking to Davies for confirmation.
“六缸发动机，听上去它从商店开出来还不到一周，要不是的话我这辈子都不会开车了。”外姆普作出评价，向戴维斯求证。
Davies nodded.
戴维斯点了点头。
"It's Allison's," he said. "Campos tried to shake him down for a private loan, and—well, you know Allison. He told Campos to go to hell. And Campos, in revenge, commandeered his new car. That was two days ago, before we lifted a hand at Vera Cruz. Allison told me yesterday the last he'd heard of the car it was on a steamboat bound up river. And here's where they ditched it—but let's get a hustle on and get her into the running.”
“这车是阿利森的，”他说,“坎波斯想向他勒索一笔私人贷款，然后——哦，你了解阿利森。他让坎波斯去下地狱。坎波斯为了报复，征用了他的新车。那是两天前的事情了，在我们不费吹灰之力占领韦拉克鲁斯之前。昨天阿利森告诉我，他最后听到有关车的消息，是它在一艘系在上游的汽船上。他们把车丢在了这里——但是让我们快点行动，让它跑起来吧。”
Three attempts they made, with young Drexel at the wheel; but the soft earth and the pitch of the grade baffled.
他们试了三次，查利·德雷克赛尔开着车，但是松软的土地和山坡的倾斜度使他们的努力都化作了徒劳。
"She's got the power all right," young Drexel protested. "But she can't bite into that mush.”
“这车动力很足，”查利·德雷克赛尔断言，“可它就是开不进那堆软土里去。”
So far, they had spread on the ground the robes found in the car. The men now added their coats, and Wemple, for additional traction, unsaddled the roan, and spread the cinches, stirrup leathers, saddle blanket, and bridle in the way of the wheels. The car took the treacherous slope in a rush, with churning wheels biting into the woven fabrics; and, with no more than a hint of hesitation, it cleared the crest and swung into the road.
到现在为止，他们已经把从车里找到的绳子全部在地上铺开。现在男人们把他们的外套也加了进去，为了增加牵引力，外姆普把马鞍卸了下来，把肚带、马镫皮带、马鞍座毯，还有缰绳都放在了车轮前面。车一下子冲上了不牢靠的斜坡，飞转着的车轮陷入了机织物里，然后，没有分毫的停顿，它跳过坡顶，开到了路上。
"Isn't she the spunky devil!" Drexel exulted. "Say, she could climb the side of a house if she could get traction."
“真是个活力十足的家伙！”德雷克赛尔欢呼道，“我说，要是有牵引力的话，它能爬上一座房子。”
"Better put on that silencer again, if you don't want to play tag with every soldier in the district," Wemple ordered, as they helped Mrs. Morgan in.
“要是你们不想和这个地区的所有士兵玩捉迷藏的话，最好把消音器装上。”外姆普命令道，同时他们帮助摩根女士上了车。
The road to the Dutch gusher compelled them to go through the outskirts of Panuco town. Indian and half breed women gazed stolidly at the strange vehicle, while the children and barking dogs clamorously advertised its progress. Once, passing long lines of tethered federal horses, they were challenged by a sentry; but at Wemple's "Throw on the juice!" the car took the rutted road at fifty miles an hour. A shot whistled after them. But it was not the shot that made Mrs. Morgan scream. The cause was a series of hog-wallows masked with mud, which nearly tore the steering wheel from Drexel's hands before he could reduce speed.
通往荷兰油井的道路使他们不得不经过帕努科城的郊区。印第安血统和混血的女人们麻木地盯着这辆奇怪的车，孩子们和狂吠的狗则吵闹着报道它的行程。有一次，在经过一长列用绳拴着的联邦军的马队时，一个哨兵盘问起他们，在外姆普“加大油门！”的叫声中，汽车以每小时50英里的速度在坑坑洼洼的道路飞奔起来。一记枪声在他们身后响起。但是让摩根太太尖叫的并不是这记枪声。摩根太太尖叫的原因是一群满身泥浆的猪，它们差点没把方向盘从查利·德雷克赛尔的手中扯下来——还没等他减缓车速呢。
"Wonder it didn't break an axle," Davies growled. "Go on and take it easy, Charley. We're past any interference.”
“轮轴没撞坏真是个奇迹。”戴维斯咆哮着说，“继续开车，不要紧张，查利。我们已经超越了任何障碍。”
They swung into the Dutch camp and into the beginning of their real troubles. The refugee steamboat had departed down river from the Asphodel camp; Chill II had disappeared, the superintendent knew not how, along with the body of Peter Tonsburg; and the superintendent was dubious of their remaining.
他们开进了荷兰的营地里，他们真正的麻烦也开始了。难民的汽船已经离开百合营驶向了下游；吉尔二号，带着彼得·陶斯伯格的尸体，已经失踪了，负责人不知道是怎么失踪的，而且怀疑它们还在这里。
"I've got to consider the owners," he told them. "This is the biggest well in Mexico, and you know it—a hundred and eighty-five thousand barrels daily flow. I've no right to risk it. We have no trouble with the Mexicans. It's you Americans. If you stay here, I'll have to protect you. And I can't protect you, anyway. We'll all lose our lives and they'll destroy the well in the bargain. And if they fire it, it means the entire Ebaño oil field. The strata's too broken. We're flowing twenty thousand barrels now, and we can't pinch down any further. As it is, the oil's coming up outside the pipe. And we can't have a fight. We've got to keep the oil moving.”
“我不得不为业主考虑。”他告诉他们，“这是墨西哥最大的油井，你们是知道的——日产185000桶油。我没有权利拿它冒险。我们和墨西哥人之间没有争执。和他们有过节的是你们美国人。要是你们待在这里，我就得保护你们。而无论如何，我不能保护你们。我们都会丧命，另外，他们还会毁掉油井。要是他们放火的话，那么整个埃瓦诺油田就没了。地层太破碎了。我们现在只输出20000桶油，而我们不能再减少出油量了。事实上，石油正从管道中流出来。我们也不能陷入战争。我们必须让石油保持流动。”
The men nodded. It was cold-blooded logic; but there was no fault to it.
人们点点头。这是个残酷的逻辑推理，但是本身并没有错误。
The harassed expression eased on the superintendent's face, and he almost beamed on them for agreeing with him.
负责人脸上厌烦的表情缓和了下来，由于大家同意他的观点，他几乎要冲着他们露出微笑了。
"You've got a good machine there," he continued. "The ferry's at the bank at Panuco, and once you're across, the rebels aren't so thick on the north shore. Why, you can beat the steamboat back to Tampico by hours. And it hasn't rained for days. The road won't be at all bad.”
“你们这辆车不错，”他接着说道，“渡船在帕努科的河岸，只要你们过了河，北岸的反叛者就不会这么多了。如何，你们可以在几小时之内把汽船开回坦皮科。已经很多天没下雨了。路一点也不会难走。”
"Which is all very good," Davies observed to Wemple as they approached Panuco, "except for the fact that the road on the other side was never built for automobiles, much less for a long-bodied one like this. I wish it were the Four instead of the Six.”
“路很好走，”他们往帕努科走时，戴维斯对外姆普说道，“除了另一边的路根本不是为汽车修的，更不是为像这辆车一样的长款汽车修的。我希望它是4汽缸的，而不是6汽缸的。”
"And it would bother you with a Four to negotiate that hill at Aliso where the road switchbacks above the river."
“它是4汽缸的话，要越过阿里森的山顶就是件麻烦事了，那里的道路在河流之上拐来拐去的。”
"And we're going to do it with a Six or lose a perfectly good Six in trying," Beth Drexel laughed to them.
“我们或是开一辆6汽缸的车走那条路，或是在尝试的时候失去一辆很棒的6缸汽车。”贝思·德雷克赛尔大笑着说道。
Avoiding the cavalry camp, they entered Panuco with all the speed the ruts permitted, swinging dizzy corners to the squawking of chickens and barking of dogs. To gain the ferry, they had to pass down one side of the great plaza which was the heart of the city. Peon soldiers, drowsing in the sun or clustering around the cantinas, stared stupidly at them as they flashed past. Then a drunken major shouted a challenge from the doorway of a cantina and began vociferating orders, and as they left the plaza behind they could hear rising the familiar mob-cry "Kill the Gringos!"
避开地面部队的营地，他们用车辙所能容忍的最大速度进入了帕努科，令人晕眩地转了个弯，掉进一群鸡的咯咯声和狗的吠声里。为了能坐上渡船，他们不得不从城市中心的大广场一边经过。雇佣兵们，在阳光中昏昏欲睡或是聚集在酒吧附近，傻傻地盯着他们飞驰而过。然后一个喝醉了的陆军少校在一个酒吧的门口向他们大声盘问了一句，开始大叫着命令他们，他们把广场丢到身后时，还能听到音调升高了的熟悉的暴民的呐喊：“杀了外国佬！”
"If any shooting begins, you women get down in the bottom of the car," Davies commanded. "And there's the ferry all right. Be careful, Charley.”
“要是开始动起枪来的话，你们女人就躲到车厢底部去，”戴维斯命令道，“那就是渡船了，一点也不错。小心点，查利。”
The machine plunged directly down the bank through a cut so deep that it was more like a chute, struck the gangplank with a terrific bump, and seemed fairly to leap on board. The ferry was scarcely longer than the machine, and Drexel, visibly shaken by the closeness of the shave, managed to stop only when six inches remained between the front wheels and overboard.
汽车直接冲到了河岸，穿过一个很深的切口，其实更像一个槽管，然后随着一下可怕的撞击落到跳板上，看起来相当像是在木板上跳跃。轮渡不比汽车长多少，德雷克斯尔，因为降落得如此准确而震惊不已，成功地在前轮和船外的距离只有６英寸的时候停了车。
It was a cable ferry, operated by gasoline, and, while Wemple cast off the mooring lines, Davies was making swift acquaintance with the engine. The third turn-over started it, and he threw it into gear with the windlass that began winding up the cable from the river's bottom.
这是一艘缆线渡轮，以汽油作为动力，外姆普解开系泊缆绳，戴维斯则快速地检查一下引擎。第三次翻转发动了渡船，他将它排上档，而起锚机则开始把缆绳从河底绞上来。
By the time they were in midstream, a score of horsemen rode out on the bank they had just left and opened a scattering fire. The party crowded in the shelter of the car and listened to the occasional ricochet of a bullet. Once, only, the car was struck.
当他们开到河中间时，一群骑兵冲到了他们刚刚离开的岸上，散乱地朝着他们开枪射击。大家挤在车子提供的庇护区里，聆听着子弹偶尔的弹跳声。汽车只被击中了一次。
"Here!—what are you up to?" Wemple demanded suddenly of Drexel, who had exposed himself to fish a rifle out of the car.
“到这里来！——你想要干什么？”外姆普突然向德雷克赛尔命令道，他暴露了自己，把步枪伸出了车外。
"Going to show the skunks what shooting is," was his answer.
“去让这些臭鼬们看看什么才是射击。”德雷克赛尔这样回答。
"No, you don't," Wemple said. "We're not here to fight, but to get this party to Tampico.” He remembered Peter Tonsburg's remark. "Whose business is to live, Charley—that's our business. Anybody can get killed. It's too easy these days.”
“不，你不能这么做，”外姆普说，“我们不是来这里打仗，而是把大家带到坦皮科的。”他还记得彼得·陶斯伯格的话。“以活下去为职责的人，查利——那才是我们的职责。任何人都可能被杀掉。在这些日子里这简直是太容易了。”
Still under fire, they moored at the north shore, and when Davies had tossed overboard the igniter from the ferry engine and commandeered ten gallons of its surplus gasoline, they took the steep, soft road up the bank in a rush.
仍旧处于枪火之中，他们在北岸系缆停好，戴维斯把点火器从渡船发动机上扔到了船外，拿走了剩下的10加仑汽油，然后他们急急忙忙地驶上了通往河岸的陡峭、松软的路。
"Look at her climb," Drexel uttered gleefully. "That Aliso hill won't bother us at all. She'll put a crimp in it, that's what she'll do.”
“看它爬坡的样子，”德雷克赛尔兴奋地说，“那座阿利森山一点都不会麻烦我们。它会征服它，这就是它将要做的。”
"It isn't the hill, it's the sharp turn of the zig-zag that's liable to put a crimp in her," Davies answered. "That road was never laid out for autos, and no auto has ever been over it. They steamboated this one up."
“不是山，而是之字路上的急转弯容易妨碍它。”戴维斯回答，“那条路不是为汽车设计的，而且也没有汽车曾经走完它。他们乘汽船绕过它。”
But trouble came before Aliso was reached. Where the road dipped abruptly into a small jag of hollow that was almost V-shaped, it arose out and became a hundred yards of deep sand. In order to have speed left for the sand after he cleared the stiff up-grade of the V, Drexel was compelled to hit the trough of the V with speed. Wemple clutched Miss Drexel as she was on the verge of being bounced out. Mrs. Morgan, too solid for such airiness, screamed from the pain of the bump; and even the imperturbable Juanita fell to crossing herself and uttering prayers with exceeding rapidity.
但是，他们还没到阿里森，麻烦就来了。道路突然陷进了一个差不多呈V字形的山谷的小缺口里，它的另一端向上拱了起来，形成了一个一百码深的沙渊。为了在经过了陡峭的V字形上坡之后，还能有足够的速度穿过沙地，德雷克赛尔不得不加速冲过V字形的底部。德雷克赛尔小姐几乎要被颠出去的时候，外姆普抓紧了她。摩根太太的身体太胖，没法这么轻快，颠簸的疼痛让她大声尖叫了起来。就连镇静自若的朱厄妮塔也开始在身上画十字，飞快地念着祈祷文。
The car cleared the crest and encountered the sand, going slower from moment to moment, slewing and writhing and squirming from side to side. The men leaped out and began shoving. Miss Drexel urged Juanita out and followed. But the car came to a standstill, and Drexel, looking back and pointing, showed the first sign of being beaten. Two things he pointed to: a constitutional soldier on horseback a quarter of a mile in the rear; and a portion of the narrow road that had fallen out bodily on the far slope of the V.
汽车越过了谷峰，冲进沙地里，走得越来越慢，翻转着、扭动着，从一边拐向另一边。人们跳出来，开始推车。德雷克赛尔小姐劝说朱厄妮塔出来，自己也跟在后面。但是汽车渐渐不动了，德雷克赛尔向后看了看，指出失败的第一个迹象。他指向了两个事物：一个在后面四分之一英里处的骑在马背上的宪兵，以及一段落在较远的V字形斜坡上的窄路。
"Can't get at this sand unless we go back and try over, and we ditch the car if we try to back up that.”
“我们不可能穿过这片沙地，除非我们再开回去试试，而要是我们试着回到那里的话，我们就得把车开进沟里了。”
The ditch was a huge natural sump-hole, the stagnant surface of which was a crawl with slime twenty feet beneath.
这条沟是一个巨大的天然集水坑，污浊的表面布满了烂泥，大约有20英尺深。
Davies and Wemple sprang to take the boy's place.
戴维斯和外姆普突然跳上前去接替了年轻人的位置。
"You can't do it," he urged. "You can get the back wheels past, but right there you hit that little curve, and if you make it your front wheel will be off the bank. If you don't make it, your back wheel'll be off.”
“你们做不来这个，”他急切地说，“你们能让后轮过去，但是在那里你们会撞到那个小小的弯道，就算你们顺利越过了弯道，前轮也会偏离河岸。而要是你们没成功的话，后轮就会偏离河岸。”
Both men studied it carefully, then looked at each other.
两个人认真考虑了一会儿，然后看看对方。
"We've got to," said Davies.
“我们不得不这么做。”戴维斯说道。
"And we're going to," Wemple said, shoving his rival aside in comradely fashion and taking the post of danger at the wheel. "You're just as good as I at the wheel, Davies," he explained. "But you're a better shot. Your job's cut out to go back and hold off any Greasers that show up.”
“而且我们就得这么做。”外姆普说着，像老大哥把他的对手推到一边一样，他坐在危险的驾驶座上。“你和我一样擅长驾驶，戴维斯，”他解释道，“不过你比我擅长射击。你的工作回去抵挡出现的任何润滑工。”
Davies took a rifle and strolled back with so ominous an air that the lone cavalryman put spurs to his horse and fled. Mrs. Morgan was helped out and sent plodding and tottering unaided on her way to the end of the sand stretch. Miss Drexel and Juanita joined Charley in spreading the coats and robes on the sand and in gathering and spreading small branches, brush, and armfuls of a dry, brittle shrub. But all three ceased from their exertions to watch Wemple as he shot the car backward down the V and up. The car seemed first to stand on one end, then on the other, and to reel drunkenly and to threaten to turn over into the sump-hole when its right front wheel fell into the air where the road had ceased to be. But the hind wheels bit and climbed the grade and out.
戴维斯拿起一把步枪踱了回来，脸上带着很不详的表情，于是那个骑兵用踢马刺策马，逃之夭夭了。摩根太太在众人的帮助下出了汽车，被送出了沙地的尽头，一路上独自蹒跚慢行。德雷克赛尔小姐和朱厄妮塔则和查利一起把外套和礼服铺到沙上，收集了一些小树枝、刷子和一抱干而脆的灌木，把它们摊开。但是三个人从他们的操劳中停了下来，注视着外姆普将汽车飞快地向后驶去，倒回到V字形的底部，然后再冲上来。汽车看起来就像先是停在一端，然后又停在了另一端，之后东倒西歪地蹒跚着，之后险些掉进集水坑——它的右前轮悬空在道路中断的地方。但是后轮咬住了斜坡，顺利地爬了出来。
Without pause, gathering speed down the perilous slope, Wemple came ahead and up, gaining fifty feet of sand over the previous failure. More of the alluvial soil of the road had dropped out at the bad place; but he took the V in reverse, overhung the front wheel as before, and from the top came ahead again. Four times he did this, gaining each time, but each time knocking a bigger hole where the road fell out, until Miss Drexel begged him not to try again.
外姆普不加停顿地加速冲下那个危险的斜坡，又冲上前面，比前一次的失败旅程在沙地里多走了50英尺。在路况糟糕的地段，大部分的淤积土已经掉落了。但是他倒转着走V字形，像刚才那样将前轮悬在半空中，然后从顶端再次冲了上来。他如是重复了四次，每次都比之前多走一段，但是也在道路落下的地方弄出一个更大的坑，直到德雷克赛尔小姐求他不要再试了。
He pointed to a squad of horsemen coming at a gallop along the road a mile in the rear, and took the V once again in reverse.
他指着他们后面一英里外的一队骑兵——他们正沿着路疾驰而来，然后再次倒转着驶向了V字路。
"If only we had more stuff," Drexel groaned to his sister, as he threw down a meager, hard-gathered armful of the dry and brittle shrub, and as Wemple once more, with rush and roar, shot down the V.
“要是我们人再多点就好了。”德雷克赛尔向他的姐姐叹息道，一边扔下一小抱干而脆的、难以聚起来的灌木，而外姆普则又一次疾速地冲下了V字形，汽车发出巨大的轰鸣声。
For an instant it seemed that the great car would turn over into the sump, but the next instant it was past. It struck the bottom of the hollow a mighty wallop, and bounced and upended to the steep pitch of the climb. Miss Drexel, seized by inspiration or desperation, with a quick movement stripped off her short, corduroy tramping-skirt, and, looking very lithe and boyish in slender-cut pongee bloomers, ran along the sand and dropped the skirt for a foothold for the slowly revolving wheels. Almost, but not quite, did the car stop, then, gathering way, with the others running alongside and shoving, it emerged on the hard road.
有那么一瞬间，这辆伟大的汽车似乎就要翻进集水坑里去了，但是下一秒钟它跑了过去。车给了洞底重重一击，弹了起来，竖起来攀爬着陡峭的斜坡。德雷克赛尔小姐，被灵感或是绝望攫住了，快速地脱下了她的短灯芯绒旅行裙，沿着沙地奔跑，把裙子扔下去给正在慢慢打转的轮子创造一个立足点。她穿着剪裁得很修长的茧绸灯笼裤，显得很轻盈，还有些男孩气。汽车几乎要停下来，但并未完全停住，然后开始加速前进，其他人则跑到一边推车。终于，汽车驶上了坚硬的道路。
While they tossed the robes and coats and Miss Drexel's skirt into the bottom of the car and got Mrs. Morgan on board, Davies overtook them.
他们忙着把礼服、外套和德雷克赛尔小姐的裙子扔到车底，并且让摩根女士上了车，这时戴维斯追上了他们。
"Down on the bottom!—all of you!" he shouted, as he gained the running board and the machine sprang away. A scattering of shots came from the rear.
“躲到车底，你们所有人！”他大喊道，一边踩下踏脚板，汽车冲了出去。散乱的枪声从后面传来。
"Whose business is to live!—hunch down!” Davies yelled in Wemple's ear, accompanying the instruction with an open-handed blow on the shoulder.
“以生存为职责的人！——弯下腰！”戴维斯朝着外姆普的耳朵大喊道，伴随着这声命令，同时在他的肩膀上狠狠拍了一下。
"Live yourself," Wemple grumbled as he obediently hunched. "Get your head down. You're exposing yourself.”
“你自己先活着吧，”外姆普嘟囔道，一边顺从地弯下腰。“把你的头也低下去。你正把自己给暴露了。”
The pursuit lasted but a little while, and died away in an occasional distant shot.
追击持续了不久，之后渐渐平息，在不时传来的几声遥远的枪响中停止了。
"They've quit," Davies announced. "It never entered their stupid heads that they could have caught us on Aliso Hill."
“他们已经撤退了，”戴维斯宣布道，“他们这些愚蠢的脑袋里从来就没想过能在阿利森山抓到我们。”
"It can't be done," was Charley Drexel's quick judgment of youth, as the machine stopped and they surveyed the acute-angled turn on the stiff up-grade of Aliso. Beneath was the swift-running river.
“那是不可能做到的。”查利·德雷克赛尔以年轻人快速的判断力说道，这时汽车停了下来，他们观察着阿里森陡峭的上坡上呈锐角的转弯。下面是湍急的河流。
"Get out everybody!" Wemple commanded. "Up-side, all of you, if you don't want the car to turn over on you. Spread traction wherever she needs it.”
“大家都出来！”，外姆普命令道，“大家都上去，要是你们不想汽车翻到你身上的话。在它需要时给它一些牵引力。”
"Shoot her ahead, or back—she can't stop," Davies said quietly, from the outer edge of the road, where he had taken position. "The earth's crumbling away from under the tires every second she stands still.”
“让它疾速前进，或者疾速后退——总之它不能停下来，”戴维斯占了路的外缘的位置，沉静地说道，“只要汽车静止不动了，那轮胎下的泥土就会碎掉。”
"Get out from under, or she'll be on top of you," Wemple ordered, as he went ahead several yards.
“从下面出来，不然车子会压到你们身上。”外姆普命令道，他走在前面几码远的地方。
But again, after the car rested a minute, the light, dry earth began to crack and crumble away from under the tires, rolling in a miniature avalanche down the steep declivity into the water. And not until Wemple had backed fifty yards down the narrow road did he find solid resting for the car. He came ahead on foot and examined the acute angle formed by the two zig-zags. Together with Davies he planned what was to be done.
但是，在汽车停了一分钟之后，干而轻的泥土再次在轮胎下渐渐破裂粉碎，沿着陡峭的斜坡滚落到水中，就像一场小型的雪崩。直到外姆普在这条窄路上后退了50码之后，他才发现了干硬的可以停车的地方。他走上前来，检查着两条之字形路构成的锐角。他跟戴维斯计划着接下来要做什么。
"When you come you've got to come a-humping," Davies advised. "If you stop anywhere for more than seconds, it's good night, and the walking won't be fine.”
“你过来的话就得不停地向前移动，”戴维斯建议道，“要是你停在一个地方超过几秒钟，那就意味着死亡，而且走路也不好走。”
"She's full of fight, and she can do it. See that hard formation right there on the inside wall. It couldn't have come at a better spot. If I don't make her hind wheels climb half way up it, we'll start walking about a second thereafter.”
“车子充满了战斗力，它能做到的。看那里内壁上的坚硬岩层。它不可能到比这更好的地点了。要是我不能让它的后轮爬到半山腰，大约一秒钟之后我们就将开始步行了。”
"She's a two-fisted piece of machinery," Davies encouraged. "I know her kind. If she can't do it, no machine can that was ever made. Am I right, Beth?”
“它是一辆性能良好的汽车，”戴维斯鼓励道，“我知道这种车。要是连它也不能做到的话，那么迄今为止造出来的任何车都不能做到。我说的对吧，贝思？”
"She's a regular, spunky she-devil," Miss Drexel laughed agreement. "And so are the pair of you—er—of the male persuasion, I mean.”
“它是一个合格的、生机勃勃的女魔鬼，”德雷克赛尔小姐大笑着表示同意，“你们两个也是——呃——我指的是男魔鬼。”
Miss Drexel had never seemed so fascinating to either of them as she was then, in the excitement quite unconscious of her abbreviated costume, her brown hair flying, her eyes sparkling, her lips smiling. Each man caught the other in that moment's pause to look, and each man sighed to the other and looked frankly into each other's eyes ere he turned to the work at hand.
对于他们两人来说，德雷克赛尔小姐看起来从未像这时那样迷人。在兴奋之中，她完全没有注意到自己超短的服装、飘动着的棕色头发、发出光芒的眼睛和微笑着的嘴唇。两个男人发现对方在那一刻都停下来看着她，他们向对方叹了口气，坦然地看进对方的眼睛里，然后转向手头的工作。
Wemple came up with his usual rush, but it was a gauged rush; and Davies took the post of danger, the outside running board, where his weight would help the broad tires to bite a little deeper into the treacherous surface. If the road-edge crumbled away it was inevitable that he would be caught under the car as it rolled over and down to the river.
外姆普又开始了他惯例的冲进，但这是一次经过校准的冲进；戴维斯占据了危险的位置，在外侧的踏脚板上，在那里他的体重能够帮助宽大的轮胎更深地咬进不牢靠的路面。要是路沿崩塌了，当汽车翻滚着落向河里时，他就肯定会被压在下面。
It was ahead and reverse, ahead and reverse, with only the briefest of pauses in which to shift the gears. Wemple backed up the hard formation on the inside bank till the car seemed standing on end, rushed ahead till the earth of the outer edge broke under the front tires and splashed in the water. Davies, now off, and again on the running board when needed, accompanied the car in its jerky and erratic progress, tossing robes and coats under the tires, calling instructions to Drexel similarly occupied on the other side, and warning Miss Drexel out of the way.
他们前进然后倒退，又前进，又倒退，只停顿很短的时间来换挡。外姆普后退到内岸上的坚硬岩层，直到汽车看起来像是竖起来了，然后他向前猛冲，直到外沿的泥土在前胎下碎裂开来，溅落进水里。戴维斯在需要时跳下或再次踩上踏脚板，在汽车不平稳的前行中伴随着它，把礼服和外套放在车胎下面，并命令德雷克赛尔在另一边同样这么做，同时警告德雷克赛尔小姐让开些。
"Oh, you Merry Olds, you Merry Olds, you Merry Olds," Wemple muttered aloud, as if in prayer, as he wrestled the car about the narrow area, gaining sometimes inches in pivoting it, sometimes fetching back up the inner wall precisely at the spot previously attained, and, once, having the car, with the surface of the roadbed under it, slide bodily and sidewise, two feet down the road.
“哦，你们这些可爱的老朋友，你们这些可爱的老朋友。”外姆普大声地念叨着，就像在祈祷一样，一边在这块狭窄的区域与汽车搏斗。他有时在移动汽车时前进几英里，有时又退回到内壁上先前走到的地点，还有一次，让车带着下面的路基表面，整个地侧向下滑了两英尺。
The clapping of Miss Drexel's hands was the first warning Davies received that the feat was accomplished, and, swinging on to the running board, he found the car backing in the straight-away up the next zigzag and Wemple still chanting ecstatically, "Oh, you Merry Olds, you Merry Olds!"
德雷克赛尔小姐的鼓掌是戴维斯收到的第一个信号，标志着这项壮举已经完成了。他跳上踏脚板，发现汽车正在笔直地走向下一个之字形路口，而外姆普仍然在狂喜地吟诵着：“哦，你们这些亲爱的老朋友，你们这些亲爱的老朋友！”
There were no more grades nor zig-zags between them and Tampico, but, so narrow was the primitive road, two miles farther were backed before space was found in which to turn around. One thing of importance did lie between them and Tampico—namely the investing lines of the constitutionalists. But here, at noon, fortune favored in the form of three American soldiers of fortune, operators of machine guns, who had fought the entire campaign with Villa from the beginning of the advance from the Texan border. Under a white flag, Wemple drove the car across the zone of debate into the federal lines, where good fortune, in the guise of an ubiquitous German naval officer, again received them.
在通往坦皮科的路上再也没有陡坡和之字形路了，但是这条粗糙修建的道路太过狭窄，汽车还要后退两英里，才能找到可以转弯的地方。在到达坦皮科之前的确还有一件重要的事情——那就是立宪主义者的包围圈。但是在这里，中午的时候，命运之神以三个持机关枪的美国雇佣兵的形式伸出了援手。他们从德克萨斯州边境的前进开始，打完了和维拉的整场战争。举着一面白色的旗子，外姆普开车经过争论地带，驶入了联邦的国境线。在那里，命运之神又装成一个无所不在的德国海军军官，再次接待了他们。
"I think you are nearly the only Americans left in Tampico," he told them. "About all the rest are lying out in the Gulf on the different warships. But at the Southern Hotel there are several, and the situation seems quieter."
“我想你们差不多是唯一留在坦皮科的美国人了，”他告诉他们，“其余的人大都在海湾上的不同军舰里露宿呢。但是在南部宾馆还有一些美国人，而且形势也比较平静了。”
As they got out at the Southern, Davies laid his hand on the car and murmured, "Good old girl!" Wemple followed suit. And Miss Drexel, engaging both men's eyes and about to say something, was guilty of a sudden moisture in her own eyes that made her turn to the car with a caressing hand and repeat, "Good old girl!"
当他们在南部宾馆下车的时候，戴维斯把手放在车上，低语道：“好老妹！”外姆普照着他的样子做了。德雷克赛尔小姐看着两个男人的眼睛，想说些什么，但是眼中突然蒙上了一层水雾。她歉疚地转向汽车，抚摸车身，同样重复着说：“好老妹！”
[1914]
[1914］