Chapter 5 chapter Five

Going with Dr. Trelawney to the forest in search of sea creatures turned stones has been the happiest time of my life.Doctor Trelawney is an Englishman who came to our shores in a shipwreck on a bordeaux barrel.He has been a ship doctor all his life, and has made many long and dangerous journeys, some of which were with the famous Captain Cook, but he has never seen any scenery of the world, because he always plays "three sevens" in the cabin. ".When the refugee came to us, he quickly became attached to the wine called "Cancarone", which is the bitterest and thickest wine we have here. Carrying such a full jug on his shoulder.He farms in Teralba and becomes our medical cow, but he doesn't care about the patients, but is busy with his scientific discoveries, and I accompany him running around the fields and forests day and night.He was first fascinated by the disease of crickets, a minor ailment that occurs to only one in a thousand and does not cause any harm.Dr. Trelawney had to find all the sick crickets and work out the proper treatment.Then there was an interest in what remains of the sea when it covered our land.So we went to carry back those stone blocks and silica flakes, and the doctor said they were originally fish.Finally, the newly obsessed phosphorous fire.He wanted to find a way to get and keep the phosphorous fire, so we ran around the cemetery at night, and when we waited for the erratic fluorescent light to flash from the weeds of the tomb, we tried to lead it to us. Running after us, catching it again, putting it in a container to keep it from extinguishing, we experimented with various containers again and again: cloth bags, pot-bellied bottles, glass jars stripped of the straw , hand stove, and colander have all been used to hold phosphorous fire.Dr. Trelawney lived in one of the huts on the edge of the cemetery, which had formerly been the dwelling of the morticians, a profession which in times of famine, war, and pestilence required a man dedicated to.The doctor set up his experimental treasure there, in which there are various glass bottles used to hold phosphorous fire, small nets like fishing nets used to catch phosphorous fire, and to study why the soil in the cemetery and the decay of corpses emit The distiller and pot that come from the green firefly light.It's a pity that he is not a person who can concentrate on his own research for a long time. He quickly gave up, walked out of the laboratory, and invited me to hunt for new natural phenomena together.

I am as free as the air, because I have no parents, neither servant nor master.I am a member of the Talalba family, recognized only later, but I do not take their last name, and no one bothers to raise me.My poor mother is the daughter of the Viscount Ayolfocao, sister of Medardo, but she has disgraced the family name by running off with a pig-stealer, who is my father.I was born in a hut that poachers pitched on a wasteland in the middle of the forest.Not long after, my father was killed in a quarrel, and my mother was killed by sorghum red spot disease. She lay alone in that desolate shabby house.At that time, because of my grandfather Ayulfo's compassion, I was taken in in the castle and brought up by the great nurse Sebastiana.I remember when Medardo was a teenager, I was not that old, and sometimes he would let me play in his games, as if we were on equal footing.Later, the gap increased with our age, and I stayed in the slave group.Now I see Dr. Trelawney as a partner I never had.

The doctor is sixty years old, but he is as tall as me.He had a face as wrinkled as a dried chestnut, with a three-cornered hat and a wig; and his legs, because of the leather boots that went up to the middle of the thigh, were extremely long, as disproportionate as the legs of a cricket.The strides were big, too; he wore a gray dove-coloured tailcoat trimmed with red, and carried his jug of Cancarone. He was so fascinated by will-o'-the-wisps that we trekked long distances at night to our quarters in other nearby towns, where we sometimes saw more colorful and larger fires than our deserted cemetery.But it would be bad luck if our rash behavior was discovered by the locals.They mistook us for grave robbers. Once, a group of people with machetes and three-pronged forks chased us for several miles.

We ran to the edge of the cliff facing the river, and Dr. Trelawney and I jumped up the rock quickly, but we heard the angry villagers rushing up from behind.In a place called "Sage with a Grim Face", there is a bridge raised by towers of tree trunks over a bottomless abyss.The doctor and I didn't cross the bridge, and hid under a boulder that just volleyed above the abyss.We just hid ourselves.They came one after another.They couldn't see us and they yelled, "Where are those two bastards?" They filed and ran up the bridge.With a bang, several people screamed and fell down, swallowed by the rushing water below.

Trelawney and I panicked about our fate, lessened by our escape from danger, but then we were terrified by the terrible fate of our pursuers, and we only dared to put our heads out a little and look down, the villagers in the dark The Abyss single disappeared.We looked up to see the bridge that still stood.The trunks were still closely connected, but each section was cut off in the middle, as if sawn; no other explanation could explain why such a thick piece of wood should have such a straight break. "I know whose hand it was," said Dr. Trelawney, and I knew it too. Sure enough, he heard the sound of galloping horseshoes, and a horse and a cavalier half wrapped in a black cloak appeared beside the mountain stream.This is Viscount Medardo, with a sneer on his triangular mouth, silently watching the tragic success of the premeditated plan.He himself probably didn't expect it to be so: he must have tried to kill us both, and saved our lives instead.Trembling with terror, we watched him ride away on that scrawny horse.The horse was bouncing on the rocks like a calf born to a ewe.

My uncle was always riding around in those days.He asked master Piet Lochiodo, who made the pannier, to make a special saddle, which could firmly tie his body to one pedal with a belt, and fix the other pedal with a weighing hammer. body.On one side of the saddle hung a sword and a cane.So the Viscount could ride, wearing a wide-brimmed hat with feathers on his head, half buried in his ever-fluttering cloak.People ran away at the sound of his horse's hooves, more panicked than Galateo the leper walked by, and took away children and livestock, and worried about the crops in the field, because the Viscount has a bad heart and never takes it easy Letting anyone go, the most unpredictable and incomprehensible behaviors may be made anytime and anywhere.

He was never sick and therefore never needed Dr. Trelawney's attention.But I don't understand how the doctor can escape his clutches under such circumstances.The doctor tried to avoid my uncle as much as possible.Don't even listen to others talking about him.Whenever the Viscount and his cruelty were mentioned to him, Dr. Trelawney would shake his head and purse his lips and mumble, "Oh, oh, oh! . . . tsk, tsk, tsk!" , as if people said things to him that they shouldn't.And, in order to divert the subject, he talked at length about Captain Cook's travel stories.Once, I tentatively asked, in his opinion, why my uncle survived with such a serious disability.The Englishman didn't know what else to say, he just kept saying to me: "Oh, oh, oh!... Tsk, tsk, tsk!" It seems that from a medical point of view, my uncle's case can't cause any problems at all. doctor's interest.So I guess he became a doctor just to obey the arrangement of his family or seek benefits, not because he valued this science at all.Perhaps his career as a ship's doctor was only based on his superb skills in playing three-seven cards. Those famous navigators and Captain Cook, who is second to none among them, took a fancy to his specialty and kept him on board for a game of cards. partner.One night Dr. Trelawney was netting phosphorous in the old cemetery when he saw Medardo of Terralba before him, grazing his horse on the graveyard.The doctor was terrified and bewildered, but the vicomte told him to come closer, and asked him in a very indistinct enunciation with his half-open mouth: "Are you looking for butterflies at night, doctor?"

"Call, my lord," the doctor replied, his voice as thin as a gossamer, "oh, oh, it's not a butterfly, my lord...it's a phosphorous fire, do you know? Phosphorous fire..." "Yes, Phosphorus. I've often wondered where it came from, too." "It's been a question I've been working on for a long time, with no results, my lord..." said Trelawney.He was a little emboldened by the kindness of the Viscount's tone. Medardo's skinny half of his head-skin taut like a skeleton twitched and smiled. "You are worthy of all kinds of help as a scholar." He said to the doctor: "It is a pity that this cemetery has been abandoned for a long time and is no longer a good place for phosphorous fire. But I promise you that I will help you tomorrow. "

The next day was the prescribed law enforcement day, and the viscount sentenced ten peasants to death.Because according to his calculation, they did not pay in full the amount of harvest that should be paid to the castle.The dead were buried in the public cemetery, and a large number of will-o'-the-wisps appeared every night on the grave.Dr. Trelawney was paralyzed by the help, although it was useful to his research. Under such deplorable circumstances, Maestro Pietrochiodo perfected the art of making the gallows.The things he made, not only the gallows, but also the tripods, winches and other instruments of torture for the viscount to torture the accused, are all masterpieces of carpentry and mechanics.I often go to Pietrochiodo's shop.Because it was interesting to me to see him work so deftly and with such vigor.But the anguish that dared not speak out hurt the heart of this former packer master.What he made was a guillotine for the execution of innocent people.He thought, "How can I get him to send me to build something else, with the same workmanship, but for a different purpose? What's my favorite new machine to build?" Get rid of these thoughts in your mind, and try to make the most beautiful and practical instrument of torture. "You ought to forget what they're useful for," he continued to tell me. "You just think of them as machines. Look how pretty they are!"

I looked at the contraptions of beams, hoisting ropes, chain winches, and pulleys, and tried not to think of the tormented bodies upon them.But the harder I try, I don't want to.The more I have to think.I asked Pietrochiodo: "What shall I do?" "Like I do, boy," he replied, "Like I do, okay?" Painful and frightening as those days were, they had their moments of joy.The most beautiful moment is when the sun rises, watching the golden waves of the sea, listening to the hen clucking and laying eggs, and the leper blowing the horn along the path.He came every morning to beg for the hours of his unfortunate companions.His name was Gadratio, and he wore a hunting horn around his neck, and he announced his arrival to people from afar.When the women heard the sound of the horn, they would put eggs, loofahs, or tomatoes in the corner, and sometimes a peeled rabbit, and hide with their children.For no one should remain in the street when a leper passes by, and leprosy is contagious without contact, and it is dangerous even to see him.Galateo walked slowly along the deserted path, leaning on a long stick in his hand, and threw his tattered gown to the ground.He had long, curly yellow hair, and a round, pale face, somewhat eroded by leprosy.He collected alms items, packed them in a pannier, and shouted his thanks to the houses of the peasants he avoided, with sweet words, always tinged with a bit of a joke or a wry pun.

At that time, leprosy was a common disease in the coastal areas. Next to our village, there was a small village called Bratofonge, which lived exclusively for leprosy patients. Those things that go. Once a man contracted leprosy on a ship or in the country, he left his relatives and friends to live out the rest of his life in Bratofonge, waiting to be consumed by the disease.It is said that every time a new patient is welcomed, a grand celebration is held there, and the sound of playing, playing and singing from the leprosy staff can be heard all night long. There are many legends about Bratofonge, although no healthy person has ever been there.But everybody said living there was endless carnival.Before it became a leprosy colony, it had been a whorehouse visited by sailors of all races and religions, and the women there seemed to have retained their former profligacy.The leper does not farm, but has only a garden of strawberries.They drank homemade wine all the year round, always in a slightly drunk state.The first priority of the lepers is to play the weird musical instruments they invented themselves. There are many small bells hanging from the strings of their harps; .They put jasmine garlands on their deformed faces, and lost themselves in the softest music, thus forgetting the world from which their disease had separated them. No doctor has ever been willing to treat lepers, but when Dr. Trelawney came to live with us, it was hoped that he would apply his skills to this local ulcer.I too had such hopes, naively, for a long time I wanted to go to Bratofonge to watch the party of lepers, and if the doctor wanted to test the efficacy of medicine on these unfortunate people, it might sometimes be possible. Allow me to accompany him to the village.But such a thing will never happen.No one seemed more afraid of contagion than Dr. Trelawney, who fled as soon as he heard Galateo's horn.On several occasions when I tried to ask him the nature of the disease, he gave me vague and vague answers, as if the mention of the word "leprosy" made him uncomfortable.After all, I don't know why we insist on him being a doctor.For livestock, especially for small animals, for stones, and for a mass of natural phenomena, he is full of concern.But he was filled with loathing and fear of men and their diseases.He was afraid of blood and only touched the patient with his fingertips.When he was critically ill, he covered his nose with a silk handkerchief soaked in acetic acid.He was as shy as a girl and blushed when he saw naked bodies.If he was treating a woman, he would not dare to look up at her, and would stutter when speaking.During his long journey across the ocean, he seems to have never made friends with any woman. Fortunately, at that time, it was the midwife's job to deliver babies here. Otherwise, I really don't know how he could perform his duties.My uncle remembered arson.Suddenly, at night, a poor peasant's hayloft catches fire, or a mature tree, or even a whole forest.So we had to form a long line to pass the buckets and put out the fire, often until dawn.It was always those who had quarreled with the Viscount, who complained that his regulations were becoming harsher and unreasonable, or accused him of doubling the taxes.He burned his belongings and did not get rid of his hatred, so he started to set fire to the house.He seemed to have slipped to the side of the house at night, threw the lit tinder on the roof, and rode away.But no one ever caught him on the spot.Once burned two old people to death; once burned a boy's head as badly as if it had been skinned.Hatred against him rose among the peasants.His sworn enemies were the Huguenots who lived in Cole Gebido's farmhouse.There the men took turns standing guard all night in case of fire. Without any plausible reason, one night he ran to the eaves of the Bratofon Pavilion.Those houses had thatched roofs, and he poured pine oil on the roofs and lit them on fire.Lepers have the advantage of being burned without burning pain, and if they are burned while sleeping, they will certainly not wake up again.But as the viscount fled on horseback, he heard the sound of a violin solo in the village.It turned out that the residents of the Bratofon family were not sleeping, but were playing hard.They were all burned, but not in pain, which seemed funny to them.They quickly put out the fire.Their houses, probably also infected with leprosy, were not much destroyed by fire. Medardo also ruined his property: setting fire to the castle.The fire was burning from the side where the servants lived, and in the midst of the blazing flames one of the victims was crying for help at the top of his lungs. The Viscount ignored it and rode out into the field.He intentionally killed his nurse and second mother, Sebastian Gina.Women want to maintain perpetual authority over the children they have raised, and Sebastiana has to blame every bad thing the Viscount has done, even when everyone agrees that his nature has become cruel When it came to the point where it could be cured, she still had to teach him a lesson.When Sebastiana was rescued from the charred walls of the house, she was so badly burned that she had to stay in bed for many days, waiting for the wound to heal. One night the door of the room where she lay was opened, and the Viscount stood by her bed. "Nurse, what are those spots on your face?" Medardo said, pointing to the burn. "The traces of your sins, child." The old woman said with serenity. "Your skin is uneven and uneven, what's wrong with you, nurse?" "My child. If you don't repent, what awaits you is going to hell. In comparison, my pain is nothing." "You should get well as soon as possible. I don't want my neighbors to know that you're sick like this..." "I'm not married, so I don't need to worry about my appearance. As long as my conscience is still there, it's fine. This is also suitable for you." "Your groom is still waiting for you, he wants to take you away, don't you know?" "Son, your youthful beauty has been damaged, so don't make fun of older people." "I'm not joking. Listen, nurse, your fiancé is playing under your window..." Sebastiana listened carefully, and heard the leper blowing the horn outside the castle. The next day, Medardo sent for Mrs. Trelawney. "A suspicious blotch appeared for some reason on the face of one of our old maids," he said to the doctor. "We are all afraid that it is a leprosy. Doctor, we depend on your knowledge." Dr. Trelawney bowed and stood, muttering: "My lord, my duty... is to always obey your orders, my lord..." He turned and went out, slipped out of the castle with a small cask of Cancarone, and disappeared into the forest.I haven't seen him for a week.When he reappeared, Sebastiana had been sent to a leprosy village. She left the castle one evening when the sun was setting.She was dressed in black, with a veil on her head, and on her arm was a bundle of clothes.She knew her fate was sealed; she could only go to Bratophon Court.She came out of the room where they had kept her locked up until then, and the corridor and the room were empty.She went downstairs, across the courtyard, and out of the house.No one was seen anywhere, and wherever she went people hid.She heard the muffled hunting horn of only two notes: in the path ahead Galateo was lifting the mouth of his instrument to the sky.The nurse moved slowly; the path meandered towards the setting sun ahead.Galateo walked far ahead of her, stopping now and then as if to watch the wasps buzzing among the leaves, and raised his horn and blew a mournful note.The nurse looked at the field and the river bank that she was about to leave forever, and felt that people were hiding from her behind the fence, so she walked on.Alone, she followed Galateo, who was far ahead of her, to the Pavilion of Bratophon.As the village gate closed behind her, the violin began to play. Dr. Trelawney has disappointed me very much.He didn't try to keep old Sebastiana from being declared leprosy and sent to the leprosy village, he didn't help at all-knowing that her scars were not caused by leprosy.This is a sign of cowardice.For the first time, I became disgusted with the doctor.Also, knowing that I was a good squirrel-catcher and raspberry-picker, and of great use to him, he escaped into the woods without me.Now I don't like to follow him to find will-o'-the-wisps like I used to. I often wander around alone, looking for new partners. The people who fascinate me most now are the Huguenots who live in Cole Jabido.They had escaped from France, and the king of France had ordered that all who served their religion should be chopped up to a pulp.They lost their scriptures and jewels while crossing the mountains, and now there is no Bible to read, no mass to say, no carols to sing, no prayers to say.Like all those who, after being persecuted, emigrated among heathens, they mistrusted others, and would not receive any other scriptures, nor would they listen to any advice concerning the conduct of their religious ceremonies.If anyone seeks them out, call them Huguenot brothers.Fearing that he was a spy of the Pope in disguise, they closed the door without a word.They labored together from morning till night, men and women, in the hope that God had favored them, tilling the hard soil of Cole Gebido.They don't know much about crime, and they have made many rules and regulations in order not to make mistakes.They spy on each other with stern eyes, prying out the subtleties of other people's malicious intentions.They vaguely remembered the controversies in their churches, and never brought up God or other religious subjects, for fear of committing sacrilege by saying the wrong thing.So they have no canons to follow, and they dare not create new ideas on the issue of belief, but they have a serious look on their faces, as if they are thinking about these issues all the time.On the contrary, over time, their laborious agricultural work system has achieved the status of canon, forcing them to develop the habit of diligence and thrift, and the advantages of women who are good at housekeeping. They were a big family, full of children and grandchildren, many daughters-in-law, and everyone was tall and muscular.They also wore black frock coats buttoned neatly when they worked in the fields, wide-brimmed hats for the men and white turbans for the women.The men have long beards and always carry shotguns on their shoulders when they go out, but I heard that they never shoot except for shooting sparrows, because there is a precept against hunting. In the calcareous mountainous terrain, some low-quality grapes and low-yielding wheat are growing with difficulty, and the voice of the old man Ezekiele resounds from time to time.He raised his fists to the sky, his white goatee was shaking, his eyes rolled under the funnel hat, and he kept shouting: "Plague and plague! Plague and plague!" He was bending over to work. The family shouted: "Jonah, hoe quickly! Suzanne, pull out that grass! Tobia, you remove the manure!" and reprimand.Every time after assigning the various tasks necessary to keep the land from being desolate, he set to work himself, driving the people to work separately, cursing, "God of plague, plague!" His wife never spoke aloud, and seemed to stand out, as if she believed in some secret religion of hers, strict in the minutiae of many things, but she never preached.She just stared at people with wide eyes and said with tight lips: "Do you think it is appropriate, sister Lacaille? Do you think this is appropriate, Brother Aronne?" can make the smile that is rarely seen on other people's faces disappear from their mouths. , regaining a stern and attentive expression.One evening, while the Huguenots were saying their prayers, I came to Cole Jabido.They didn't say anything, they didn't raise their hands together, they didn't kneel down, but they stood in a straight line in the vineyard, the men on one side, the women on the other, and Ezeki with the long beard and drooping chest at the head. Old man Yelle.They stared straight ahead, lowered their muscular arms, and clenched their fists, appearing to be very attentive, but they did not forget what was around them. Tobia reached out to catch a caterpillar on the vine, and Lacaille used the sole of his shoe to catch a caterpillar. A snail was trampled to death by a nail, and Ezekiele suddenly took off his hat to frighten the sparrows that flew to the wheat field. Then they sang hymns.They don't remember the lyrics, they just hum the music score, the tune is not accurate, sometimes some people get out of tune, maybe everyone always sings wrong, but they never stop, and they sing one after another.Never sing lyrics. I felt someone tugging at one of my arms, it was little Esau, and he was gesturing to me to be quiet and to follow him.Esau was my age; he was the youngest son of Kauezechiele; he had only the gritty and strong facial expressions of his parents, but he was very cunning and a perfect little rascal.As we crawled out of the vineyard, he said to me; "They have to pray for half an hour. How annoying! Come and see my hole." Esau's cave is secret.He hid there so that his family could not find him, so they could not send him to herd the sheep or catch snails in the vegetable garden.He hid in there for days without work, while his father howled in the fields looking for him. Esau had stockpiled some tobacco leaves, and hung two long flowered ceramic pipes on one of the cave walls.He filled a pipe and let me smoke.He taught me to light the cigarette pot, and then he smoked heavily. I have never seen a child smoke so greedily.It was the first time I smoked, and I felt uncomfortable immediately, so I stopped smoking.To refresh my spirits, Esau brought out a bottle of strong drink and poured me a glass.The wine made me cough again and burned my stomach.He is like drinking water. "I want to get drunk," he said. "Where did you get that thing you put in the hole?" I asked him.Esau moved his fingers in a pickpocketing motion, and said, "It was stolen." He led a group of Christian children to steal in the four townships.Not only did they steal the fruit from the tree, but they also went into the house to steal things and touched the chicken coop.They cursed harder and more often than Maestro Pietrochiodo.They knew both Christian and Huguenot abuse, and they cursed at each other. "I have done many other evil things," he told me, "I gave false testimony, I forgot to water my peas, I disrespected my parents, and I came home late. Now I will do all the evil things in the world, and I will Do bad things that you haven't grown up to understand." "Do all the bad things?" I said to him, "kill people too?" He shrugged his shoulders: "It's not suitable for me to kill people now, and I won't get any benefits." "My uncle kills. They say he kills for fun." I said this to find something to counter Esau. Esau spat. "An idiot's hobby," he said. Then there was thunder, and it began to rain outside the cave. "The family is looking for you," I said to Esau.Nobody ever looked for me, but I've seen other kids always have their parents, especially when the weather turns bad, and I thought maybe it was something important. "We'll just wait here for the rain to stop," Esau said, "playing dice while we wait" He took out dice and a pile of money.I don't have any money, I bet on whistles, knives, and slingshots, and I lost them all. "Don't be discouraged," Esau said to me at last; "you must understand that I cheated." At this time, there was thunder and lightning outside, and it was raining heavily.The cave of Esau was flooded.He started salvaging his tobacco and other things, and he said to me, "It's going to rain—all night. We'd better run home and get out of the rain." When we ran into old Ezekiele's house, we were drenched and covered in mud.The Huguenots were sitting around a table, under the light of a small oil lamp, trying to recall a certain passage in the "Bible", earnestly repeating some inaccurate meanings and facts, it seemed It seemed as though they had actually read it in the past. "The god of plague and disaster!" Ezekiele saw his son Esau and I appear in the doorway, and he punched the table violently, causing the oil lamp to go out. My upper and lower teeth started to bump into each other.Esau shrugged.Outside the house, it seemed as if all the thunder and lightning in the world were concentrated in Cole Gebido and radiated.They relighted the oil lamps, and the old man shook his fist and recounted his son's faults, as if they were the worst deeds a man could commit, when he knew only a fraction of them.His mother was silent and listened quietly.The other sons, sons-in-law, daughters, daughters-in-law, and grandchildren all hooked their heads, put their chins on their chests, covered their faces with their hands, and listened to the teachings.Esau gnawed at an apple, almost as if the sermon had nothing to do with him.And I, trembling like a rush, amidst the thunder and Zeequiele's scolding.A few guards came in dripping wet with sacks on their heads, and they interrupted its leader's reprimand.The Huguenots stood guard all night, armed with shotguns, machetes, and pitchforks, against the Viscount's surprise attack, whom they had declared an enemy. "My lord! Ezequiele!" said the Huguenots. "It's such a bad day to-night. The lame man won't come. May we retreat home, my lord?" "Is there no sign of the one-armed man nearby?" Ezekiele asked. "No, my lord, only the burning smell of lightning. This is not the time for blind men to run about." "Then you stay home and change out of your wet clothes, the storm has brought peace to that half and us." Lame, one-armed, blind, and half-man are all nicknames the Huguenots use for my uncle.I never heard them call him by his real name.In these conversations, they showed that they were very familiar with Jue, as if he was their old enemy.They winked and chatted happily, and they understood each other's meaning in just a few words: "Hey, hey, one-armed... that's it, half-deaf..." It seemed that they knew all the insane behaviors of Guidardo well, and they could predict in advance get. They were talking lively when they heard a fist beating on the door amidst the sound of wind and rain. "Who is knocking at the door at this hour?" said Ezekiele. "Quickly, go and open the door for him." They opened the door, and on the threshold stood the Viscount standing on one leg, huddled in his black dripping cloak, his feathered hat soaked with rain. "I have tied up my horse in your stables," he said, "and please take me in too. To-night is a rough day for a man who is away from home." Everyone looked at Ezekiele.I hid under the table so that my uncle would not find out that I was visiting his enemy's house. "Come and sit by the fire," said Ezechiele, "guests are always welcome in this house." Medardo lay down and fell asleep on the pile of sheets used for harvesting olives under the tree by the threshold. In the darkness, the Huguenots gathered around Ezekiel. "Father, now the lame man is in our hands!" they murmured, "Should we let him go? Should we let him hurt innocent people again? Ezequiela, Isn't it time for this assless man to pay his blood debt?" The old man raised his fist and knocked on the ceiling: "Plague God and Calamity!" He shouted hoarsely. If a person speaks with all his strength but hardly makes a sound, he can also be said to be shouting, "Anyone No guest should be wronged in our house. I will stand guard personally to protect his sleep." He stood beside the lying viscount with his shotgun in his arms.Medardo's monoeye opened. "What are you doing here, Mr. Ezekiele?" "I put you to sleep, guest. Many people hate you." "I know," said the Viscount, "I don't sleep in the castle because I'm afraid the servants will kill me while I'm asleep." "Mr. Medardo, you may not be loved in my family. But you will be respected tonight." Yu Jue was silent for a moment, then said: "Ezekiele, I want to convert to your religion." The old man said nothing. "I am surrounded by untrustworthy people," Medardo went on, "and I will send them all away and call the Huguenots into the castle. You, Mr. Ezequiele, will be my minister. I will declare Terralba a Huguenot domain, and begin war with the Christian principalities. You and your family will be the head. Do you agree, Eucciele? Will you accept me? ?” The old man stood still with his gun in his chest; “I have forgotten too much about our religion, so how dare I persuade others to join it! I will stay on my land and live according to my conscience. Stand up for your faith in your domain." The viscount sat up from the ground with one elbow: "Ezekiele, do you know that I haven't considered judging the heretics that appear in my territory yet? If I give us your heads Bishop, you will immediately receive the favor of the Holy See." “我们的头还在脖子上长着哩，先生，”老人说道，“而且还有比脑袋更难从我们身上移动的东西!" 梅达尔多跳立起来并打开大门。“我不愿在敌人家里，宁肯睡在那棵栎树下面。”他冒雨蹒跚而去。 老人对大家说：“孩子们，圣书上写着瘸子首先来拜访我们。现在他走了，来我们家的小路上空无一人了。孩子们，不要灰心，或许某一天会来一个更好的过客。” 所有留长胡子的胡格诺男教徒和披着头巾的女人都垂下了头。 “即使没有人来，”埃泽基耶莱的妻于补充说，“我们也永远留在自己的土地上。” 就在那时一道电光划破天空，雷声震动了屋顶上的瓦片和墙里的石头。托比亚惊呼：“闪电落到栎树上了!现在烧起来了。"他们提着灯笼跑出去，看到大树的半边从梢顶到根底都被烧得焦黑了，另外半边却完好无损。他们听见一匹马在雨中远去的蹄声，在一个闪电之下，看见裹着斗篷的骑士的细长身影。“你救了我们，父亲，”胡格诺教徒们说道，“谢谢，埃泽基耶菜。” 东方天空泛白，已是拂晓时分。 埃萨乌把我叫到一旁：“我说他们都是些蠢货。”他悄悄地对我说，“你看我在那时候干了什么。”他掏出一把亮晶晶的东西，“当他的马拴在马厩里时，我把马鞍上的金扣钩全都取下来了。我说他们是笨蛋，都没有想到。” 埃萨马的这种做法我不喜欢，他家里的人的那些家规却今我敬畏，那么我宁愿自己一个人呆着。我到海边去拾海贝和逮螃蟹。当我在一块礁石顶上起劲地掏洞里的一只小螃蟹时，看见我身下的平静的水面映出—把利剑，锋刃正对准我的头，我惊落海里。 “抓住这儿。”我舅舅说道。原来是他从背后靠拢了我。他想叫我抓住他的剑，从剑刃那边抓。 “不，我自己来。”我回答道。我爬上一块大石头，它与那堆礁石隔着一臂宽的水面。 “你去捉螃蟹吗?”梅达尔多说，“我逮水螅。”他让我看他的猎获物。那是一些棕色和白色的又粗又肥的水螅。它们全被一劈为二，触角还在不停地蠕动。 “如果能够将一切东西都一劈为二的话，那么人人都可以摆脱他那愚蠢的完整概念的束缚了。我原来是完整的人。那时什么东西在我看来都是自然而混乱的，像空气一样简单。我以为什么都已看清，其实只看到皮毛而已。假如你将变成你自己的一半的话，孩子，我祝愿你如此，你便会了解用整个头脑的普通智力所不能了解的东西。你虽然失去了你自己和世界的—半，但是留下的这一半将是千倍地深刻和珍贵。你也将会愿意一切东西都如你所想象的那样变成半个，因为美好、智慧、正义只存在于被破坏之后。” “哟，哟，”我说，“这儿螃蟹真多!"我假装只对找螃蟹这事情感兴趣，为的是远离舅舅的剑。我一直等到他带着那些水螅走远了才回到岸上。可是他的那些话老在我的耳边回响，搅得我心神不安。我找不到一个可以躲开他那疯狂地乱劈乱砍的避难处。不论我去找谁，特里劳尼．彼特洛基奥多，胡格诺教徒，还是麻风病人，我们大家统统都处于这个半边身子的人的威力之下，他是我们服侍的主人，我们无法从他手中逃脱。