【荆棘鸟】第二章 03

Roderick Armstrong could no more have gone off into his escape leaving his tormentors intact or quickly dead than he could have reconciled himself to being a convict. With the rum and bread and jerky they took from the troopers, the eleven men fought their way through miles of freezing rain forest and came out at the whaling station of Hobart, where they stole a longboat and set off across the Tasman Sea without food, water or  sails. When the longboat washed ashore 1 on the wild west coast of New Zealand's South Island, Roderick Armstrong and two other men were still alive. He never spoke 2 of that incredible journey, but it was whispered that the three had survived by killing 3 and eating their weaker companions. That was just nine years after he had been transported from England. He was yet a young man, but he looked sixty. By the time the first officially sanctioned settlers arrived in New Zealand in 1840, he had hewn lands for himself in the rich Canterbury district of the South Island, "married" a Maori woman and sired a brood of thirteen handsome half-Polynesian children. And by 1860 the Armstrongs were colonial aristocrats 4, sent their male offspring to exclusive schools back in England, and amply proved by their cunning and acquisitiveness that they were indeed true descendants of a remarkable 5, formidable man. Roderick's grandson James had fathered Fiona in 1880, the only daughter among a total of fifteen children. If Fee missed the more austere 6 Protestant rites 7 of her childhood, she never said so. She tolerated Paddy's religious convictions and attended Mass with him, saw to it that her children worshipped an exclusively Catholic God. But because she had never converted, the little touches were missing, like grace before meals and prayers before bed, an everyday holiness.
  Aside from that one trip into Wahine eighteen months before, Meggie had never been farther from home than the barn and smithy in the hollow. On the morning of her first day at school she was so excited she vomited 8 her breakfast, and had to be bundled back into her bedroom to be washed and changed. Off came the lovely new costume of navy blue with a big white sailor collar, on went her horrid 9 brown wincey which buttoned high around her little neck and always felt as if it were choking her.
  "And for heaven's sake, Meggie, next time you feel sick, tell me! Don't just sit there until it's too late and I've got a mess to clean up as well as everything else! Now you're going to have to hurry, because if you're late for the bell Sister Agatha is sure to cane 10 you. 
 

罗德里克·阿姆斯特朗是不会不去触动那些折磨他的人或者让他们尽快死去而逃之夭夭的，就像他决不会当个顺从的犯人那样。这11个人带着他们从骑警那里得到的朗姆酒、面包和干牛肉，艰难地穿过了几英里的寒冷的雨林地带，出现在霍巴特的一家捕鲸场里，他们从那里偷了一艘长艇，在没有食物、没有水也没有帆的情况下，就启航漂渡塔斯曼海。当这艘长艇被冲上新西兰南岛的荒蛮的西海岸时，罗德里克·阿姆斯特朗和另外两个人还活着。他从来没有谈起过那次令人难以置信的旅程，但隐约听说，这三个人是靠杀害同伴中的弱者而生存下来的。
 
    这是发生在他被遣送出英国以后仅仅九年的事。他依然是个年轻人，可看上去却像60岁了。头一批由官方批准的移民于1840年到达新西兰的时候，他已经在南岛的富饶的坎特伯雷区开垦出了土地，和一个毛利女人“结了婚”，生了13个漂亮的半波利尼西亚血统的孩子。到1860年，阿姆斯特朗家成了移民贵族，他们把男孩子送回英国，在名牌学校念书，他们以自己的诡诈和贪得无厌充分证明了他们不愧是这位非凡的、令人生畏的人的地地道道的后裔。1880年罗德里克的孙子詹姆斯生了菲奥娜。她是他15个孩子中唯一的女儿。
    如果说非奥娜依然怀恋她童年时代那较为严格的新教徒的教仪的话，那她也从来没有说明过。她容忍了帕迪的宗教信仰，和他一起去做弥撒，注意叫孩子们去朝礼至高无上的天主教的上帝。可是，由于她从来没有皈依天主教，因此有些日常敬神的细微末节也就免去了，譬如饭前的祈告和睡前的祈祷。
    梅吉除了在18个月以前至韦汉的杂货店里去过一次以外，还从来没到过比洼地里的库房和铁匠铺离家更远的地方呢。在她上学的第一天早晨，她激动得直恶心，把饭都呕了出来，这使她不得不急急忙忙地回到卧室里，又是洗脸，又是换衣服。她脱下了那件有又大又白的海员领的漂亮的海军蓝新衣服，穿上了她那件棕色的、不入眼的棉绒衬衫，这件衣服的领子很高，围着她那小小的脖子，好像要把她闷死似的。
    “梅吉，看在老天的份儿上，下回你觉得要吐的时候，别光坐在那儿，等到吐出来才说话，我有一大堆东西要收拾，还有好多别的事要干呢！现在，你得赶快啦，要是你赶不上打钟，迟到了，阿加莎嬷嬷会用藤条揍你的。