經典科幻文學:《 再見 多謝你們的魚》第8章2

Oh, hello, Arthur Dent here. Look, sorry I haven’t been in for six months but I’ve gone mad.
Oh, not to worry. Thought it was probably something like that. Happens here all the time. How soon can we expect you?
When do hedgehogs stop hibernating?
Sometime in spring I think.
I’ll be in shortly after that.
Rightyho.
He flipped through the Yellow Pages and made a short list of numbers to try.
Oh hello, is that the Old Elms Hospital? Yes, I was just phoning to see if I could have a word with Fenella, er… Fenella Good Lord, silly me, I’ll forget my own name next, er, Fenella isn’t this ridiculous? Patient of yours, dark haired girl, came in last night…
I’m afraid we don’t have any patients called Fenella.
Oh, don’t you? I mean Fiona of course, we just call her Fen…
I’m sorry, goodbye.
Click.
Six conversations along these lines began to take their toll on his mood of vigorous, dynamic optimism, and he decided that before it deserted him entirely he would take it down to the pub and parade it a little.
He had had the perfect idea for explaining away every inexplicable weirdness about himself at a stroke, and he whistled to himself as he pushed open the door which had so daunted him last night.
Arthur!!!!
He grinned cheerfully at the boggling eyes that stared at him from all corners of the pub, and told them all what a wonderful time he’d had in Southern California.

“哦，你好，我是阿瑟.鄧特。呃，抱歉我六個月沒在，而且我瘋了。”
“哦，別擔心。明白了，大概就是這麼一回事。這兒總是發生這種事。我們什麼時候能見到你回來？”
“刺蝟什麼時候停止冬眠？”
“春天吧，我想。”
“我在那之後很快就會回去。”
“啊哈。”
他翻着黃頁，列出了一小張可以嘗試的號碼的單子。
“哦，你好，是老榆樹醫院嗎？是的，我打來問問是不是能夠查到一個叫芬妮拉的，呃……芬妮拉——老天啊——我真笨，我下次就該忘了自己的名字了，呃，芬妮拉——這是不是很荒謬？您的病人，深色頭髮的女孩，昨晚到的……”
“恐怕我們沒有任何叫芬妮拉的病人。”
“哦，沒有？當然，我指得是菲奧娜，我們只是叫她芬……”
“抱歉，再見。”
咔嗒。
六個相似的對話開始消磨掉了他的活力和樂觀，他決定在那些東西消磨完之前先去趟酒吧並炫耀一下。
他有個完美的點子來把他身上的一切無法解釋的詭異事情一勞永逸地糊弄過去。他一邊吹着口哨一邊打開了昨晚讓他畏縮的那扇門。
“阿瑟！！！！”
他對着從酒館各個角落裏盯着他的躊躇眼神陽光地咧嘴笑着，並告訴那些人他在南加州度過的時光有多麼美好。