描写山水的诗词小径分岔的花园 The Garden of Forking Paths
作者：〔阿根廷〕博尔赫斯 Jorge Luis Borges
To Victoria Ocampo
In his A History of the World War (page 212), Captain Liddell Hart reports that a planned offensive by thirteen British divisions, supported by fourteen hundred artillery pieces, against the German line at Serre-Montauban, scheduled for July 24, 1916, had to be postponed until the morning of the 29th. He comments that torrential rain caud this delay一which lacked any special significance. The following deposition, dictated by, read over, and then signed by Dr. Yu Tsun, former teacher ofEnglish at the Tsingtao Hochschule, casts unsuspected light upon this event. The first two pages are missing.
…and I hung up the phone. Immediately I recollected the voice that had spoken in German. It was that of Captain Richard Madden. Madden, in Viktor Runeberg's office, meant the end of all our work and搭桥过河游戏规则一展板制作though this emed a condary matter, or should have emed so to
失意的诗句me一of our lives also. His being there meant that Runeberg had been arrested or murdered.② Before the sun t on this same day, I ran the same risk. Madden was implacable. Rather, to be more accurate, he was obliged to be implacable. An Irishman in the rvice of England, a man suspected of equivocal feelings if not of actual treachery, how could he fail to welcome and ize upon this extraordinary piece of luck the discovery, capture and perhaps the deaths of two agents of Imperial Germany
I went up to my bedroom. Absurd though the gesture was, I clod and locked the door. I threw mylf down on my narrow iron bed, and waited on my back. The never changing rooftops filled the window, and the hazy six o'clock sun hung in the sky. It emed incredible that this day, a day without warnings or omens, might be that of my implacable death. In despite of my dead father, in despite of having been a child in one of the symmetrical gardens of Hai Feng, was I to die now
Then Ireflected that all things happen, happen to one, precily now. Century follows century, and things happen only in the prent. There are countless men in the air, on lan
简笔画菠萝d and at a, and all that really happens happens to me…The almost unbearable memory of Maddens long horface put an end to the wandering thoughts.
In the midst of my hatred and terror (now that it no longer matters to me to speak of terror, now that I have outwitted Richard Madden, now that my neck hankers for the hangman's noo), I knew that the fast-moving and doubtless happy soldier did not suspect that I possd the Secret一the name of the exact site of the new British artillery park on the Ancre. A bird streaked across the misty sky and, abntly, I turned it into an airplane and then that airplane into many in the skies of France, shattering the artillery park under a rain of bombs. If only my mouth, before it should be silenced by a bullet, could shout this name in such a way that it could be heard in Germany…My voice, my human voice, was weak. How could it reach the ear of the Chief The ear of that sick and hateful man who knew nothing of Runeberg or of me except that we were in Staffordshire. A man who, sitting in his arid Berlin office, leafed infinitely through newspapers, looking in vain for news from us. I said aloud, I must flee.
I sat up on the bed, in nless and perfect silence, as if Madden was already peering at me. Something一perhaps merely a desire to prove my total penury to mylf一made me empty out my pockets. I found just what I knew I was going to find. The American watch, the nickel-plated chain and the square coin, the key ring with the uless but compromising keys to Runeberg's office, the notebook, a letter which I decided to destroy at once (and which I did not destroy), a five shilling piece, two single shillings and some pennies, a red and blue pencil, a handkerchief一and a revolver with a single bullet. Absurdly I held it and weighed it in my hand, to give mylf courage. Vaguely I thought that a pistol shot can be heard for a great distance.
In ten minutes I had developed my plan. The telephone directory gave me the name of the one person capable of passing on the information. He lived in a suburb of Fenton, less than half an hour away by train.
扶贫人物事迹
I am a timorous man. I can say it now, now that I have brought my incredibly risky plan to an end. It was not easy to bring about, and I know that its execution was terrible. I did not
只的词性do it for Germany 一no! Such a barbarous country is of no importance to me, particularly since it had degraded me by making me become a spy. Furthermore, I knew an Englishman一a modest man一who, for me, is as great as Goethe. I did not speak with him for more than an hour, but during that time, he was Goethe.
枪械I carried out my plan becau I felt the Chief had some fear of tho of my race, of tho uncountable forebears who culmination lies in me. I wished to prove to him that a yellow man could save his armies. Besides, I had to escape the Captain. His hands and voice could, at any moment, knock and beckon at my door.
