英文原版

Chapter 34
The sun came out and beamed cheerfully at them. A bird sang. A warm breeze wafted through the trees and lifted the heads of the flowers, carrying their scent away through the woods. An insect droned past on its way to do whatever it is that insects do in the late afternoon. The sound of voices lilted through the trees followed a moment later by two girls who stopped in surprise at the sight of Ford Prefect and Arthur Dent apparently lying on the ground in agony, but in fact rocking with noiseless laughter.
“No, don’t go,” called Ford Prefect between gasps, “we’ll be with you in a moment.”
“What’s the matter?” asked one of the girls. She was the taller and slimmer of the two. On Golgafrincham she had been a junior personnel officer, but hadn’t liked it much.
Ford pulled himself together.
“Excuse me,” he said, “hello. My friend and I were just contemplating the meaning of life. Frivolous exercise.”
“Oh it’s you,” said the girl, “you made a bit of a spectacle of yourself this afternoon. You were quite funny to begin with but you did bang on a bit.”
“Did I? Oh yes.”
“Yes, what was all that for?” asked the other girl, a shorter round-faced girl who had been an art director for a small advertising company on Golgafrincham. Whatever the privations of this world were, she went to sleep every night profoundly grateful for the fact that whatever she had to face in the morning it wouldn’t be a hundred almost identical photographs of moodily lit tubes of toothpaste.
“For? For nothing. Nothing’s for anything,” said Ford Prefect happily. “Come and join us. I’m Ford, this is Arthur. We were just about to do nothing at all for a while but it can wait.”
The girls looked at them doubtfully.
“I’m Agda,” said the tall one, “this is Mella.”
“Hello Agda, hello Mella,” said Ford.
“Do you talk at all?” said Mella to Arthur.
“Oh, eventually,” said Arthur with a smile, “but not as much as Ford.”
“Good.”
There was a slight pause.
“What did you mean,” asked Agda, “about only having two million years? I couldn’t make sense of what you were saying.”
“Oh that,” said Ford, “it doesn’t matter.”
“It’s just that the world gets demolished to make way for a hyperspace bypass,” said Arthur with a shrug, “but that’s two million years away, and anyway it’s just Vogons doing what Vogons do.”
“Vogons?” said Mella.
“Yes, you wouldn’t know them.”
“Where’d you get this idea from?”
“It really doesn’t matter. It’s just like a dream from the past, or the future.” Arthur smiled and looked away.
“Does it worry you that you don’t talk any kind of sense?” asked Agda.
第三十四章
太阳钻了出来，照耀着他们。一只鸟在歌唱，温暖的微风轻拂过树林，抬起花朵们的头，把它们的芬芳播撒在林间。一只昆虫嗡嗡地行进在它的路上，去做昆虫们在午后应该做的事情，林间跳跃着人声，伴随人声而来的是两个女孩，她们惊讶地停了下来。只见福特长官和阿瑟·邓特躺在地上，初看似乎痛苦不堪，再看时，这两人原来正笑得打滚。
“不，别走，”福特长官在喘气的间歇喊道，“我们来和你们作伴。”
“出什么事了？”其中一个女孩同道。她是个子较高、较苗条的那一个，在高尔伽弗林查姆上，她曾经是一个下级人事官员，但地并不喜欢那份工作，
福特控制住自己的情绪。
“请原谅，”他说，“你们好。我和我的朋友正在思考生命的意义。只是无关紧要的思维练习而已。”
“哦，是你啊，”女孩说，“你今天下午可箅出了风头。刚开始时你挺滑稽的，不过后来却发火了。”
“我发火了，噢，是的。”
“是啊，为什么要发火呢”另一个女孩问。她个子矮点儿，脸圆圆的，在高尔伽弗林查姆上曾经是一家小广告公司的艺术导演，无论现往这个世界有哪些匮乏，每天晚上睡觉时她都会深深地感谢命运——不管早上起来时她必须面对什么问题，这些问题绝不会再是一百张几乎一模一样的牙膏广告照片。
“为什么，什么也不为，”福特长官快乐地说，“来加入我们吧，我叫福特，这是阿瑟。我们正准备什么也不做地待上一会儿。”
女孩们怀疑地看着他们。
“我叫阿姬达，”高的那个说，“这是梅托。”
“你好，阿姬达；你好，梅托。”福特说。
“你会说话吗，”梅拉问阿瑟。
“哦，当然，”阿瑟笑着说，“不过没有福特话多。”
“很好。”
一阵短暂的沉默。
“你是什么意思，”阿姬达问，“说只有二百万年了’我不明白你在说什么。”
“噢，那个呀，”福特说，“别管它了。”
“意思是，这个世界将被毁灭，目的是给一条超空问通道腾地方。”阿瑟耸了耸肩，“不过那是二百万年以后的事了，只是沃贡人在干身为沃贡人必须干的事而已。”
“沃贡人？”梅拉问。
“是的，你们不会知道他们的。”
“所有这些事情，你们足从哪儿知道的，”
“这无关紧要，真的，这就像来自过去的一场梦，或者来自未来。”阿瑟看着远处，笑着说。
“你的话疯疯癫癫的，你不担心吗？”阿姬达问。

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