【荆棘鸟】第四章 08

After the bolts of cloth Fee had ordered came on the mail, she sat down at the donated sewing machine and began to make loose dresses in light cotton for herself and Meggie, light trousers and overalls 1 for the men, smocks for Hal, curtains for the windows. There was no doubt it was cooler minus layers of underwear and tightly fitting outerwear.
 
  Life was lonely for Meggie, only Stuart at the house among the boys. Jack 2 and Hughie were off with their father learning to be stockmen-jackaroos, the young apprentices 3 were called. Stuart wasn't company the way Jack and Hughie used to be. He lived in a world all his own, a quiet little boy who preferred to sit for hours watching the behavior of a throng 4 of ants than climb trees, whereas Meggie adored to climb trees and thought Australian gums were marvelous, of infinite variety and difficulty. 
Not that there was much time for tree-climbing, or ant-watching for that matter. Meggie and Stuart worked hard. They chopped and carried the wood, dug holes for refuse, tended the vegetable garden and looked after the fowls 5 and pigs. They also learned how to kill snakes and spiders, though they never ceased to fear them. The rainfall had been mediocrely 6 good for several years; the creek 7 was low but the tanks were about half full. The grass was still fairly good, but apparently 8 nothing to its lush times.
 
  "It will probably get worse," said Mary Carson grimly. But they were to know flood before they encountered a full-fledged drought. Halfway 9 through January the country caught the southern edge of the northwest monsoons 10. Captious 11 in the extreme, the great winds blew to suit themselves. Sometimes only the far northern tips of the continent felt their drenching 12 summer rains, sometimes they traveled far down the Outback and gave the unhappy urbanites of Sydney a wet summer. That January the clouds stormed dark across the sky, torn into sodden 13 shreds 14 by the wind, and it began to rain; not a gentle downpour but a steady, roaring deluge 15 which went on and on.
  They had been warned;
 

菲在接到邮购来的几匹布以后，就在别人赠送的那台缝纫机旁坐下来，开始用薄棉布为自己和梅吉缝制宽松的衣服，为男人们做轻便的裤子和外衣，为哈尔选做了件罩衫，还做了几个窗帘。脱去了内衣和紧身的外衣以后，无疑凉快得多了。
　　梅吉的日子过得很孤单，男孩子中只有斯图尔特留在家里。杰克和休吉跟着爸爸去学怎样当牧工了，也就是去当"杰十鲁"--这是人们对没有经验的小牧工的称呼。斯图尔特可不是杰克和休吉那样的伴儿，他生活的天地里似乎别无旁人；这么一个不大的男孩子，宁可几个钟头地坐着观察蚁群的活动，也不愿去爬树；而梅吉却喜欢爬树，她觉得澳大利亚的桉树十分奇伟，品种无穷，也很难爬。这倒不是说他们有很多时间去爬树，或者去看蚂蚁。梅吉和斯图尔特的活儿很重。他们得劈柴、搬木头、挖坑堆垃圾、管理菜园，还要照看家禽和喂猪。他们也学会了怎样消灭蛇和蜘蛛，尽管他们对这些东西一直都很害怕。
 
　　这几年里，降雨量一直不是太多，小河的水很浅，不过，水箱倒都是半满的。草长得还不错，但是，和它们茂盛肥美的时候相比，那就不可同日而语了。
 
　　"也许还会更糟糕呢，"玛丽·卡森夫人恶狠狠地说。
 
　　但是，还没来得及真旱，他们却遭了洪水。一月过了一半的时候，西北季风的南缘刮到了这个国家。阵阵大风简直是蛮不讲理，爱怎么刮就怎么刮。有时，它们只给大陆的北端带来一场夏季的透雨；有时，它们却远远地吹过内地，给温雅而不幸的悉尼送去一个潮湿的夏天。那年一月，暴风云遮暗了天空，又被风撕成了饱含着雨水的碎块。天开始下雨了，那可不是一场平平常常的大雨，而是一场连绵不断、经久不息的狂风暴雨。
　　他们已经得到了警报。