They were everywhere. They slept six in a bed, all their pee mixing together in the night as they wet their beds each in his own candy-and-potato-chip dream. In the long, hot days, they idled away, picking plaster from the walls and digging into the earth with sticks. They sat in little rows on street curbs, crowded into pews at church, taking space from the nice, neat, colored children; they clowned on the playgrounds, broke things in dime stores, ran in front of you on the street, made ice slides on the sloped sidewalks in winter. The girls grew up knowing nothing of girdles, and the boys announced their manhood by turning the bills of their caps backward. Grass wouldn't grow where they lived. Flowers died. Shades fell down. Tin cans and tires blossomed where they lived. They lived on cold black-eyed peas and orange pop. Like flies they hovered; like flies they settled. And this one had settled in her house. Up over the hump of the cat's back she looked.
她们无所不在。她们在马路牙子上和教堂里成排地挤坐着，占据了穿着整齐利索的有色孩子的位置；她们在操场上出洋相，在便宜商店里碰坏商品，在马路上连跑带跳，到了冬天则在人行道结冰的斜坡上滑行。女孩子到了成年也不知束腰为何物，男孩子则把帽檐朝后戴以表示他们已长大成人。他们居住的地方寸草不生，花木凋岑，阴影笼罩，而罐头盒和汽车轮胎则生长繁茂。他们吃黑豆喝冷饮长大，像苍蝇一样成群结队地飞行，像苍蝇一样散落下来。其中之一就落到了她家，她正从弓着的猫背后朝她望着。
Get out, she said, her voice quiet. "You nasty little black bitch. Get out of my house."
“出去，”她说道，嗓音低沉，“你这讨厌的小黑丫头，从我家滚出去。”
The cat shuddered and flicked his tail.
那只猫抖动了一下，摇了摇尾巴。
Pecola backed out of the room, staring at the pretty milk-brown lady in the pretty gold-and-green house who was talking to her through the cat's fur. The pretty lady's words made the cat fur move; the breath of each word parted the fur. Pecola turned to find the front door and saw Jesus looking down at her with sad and unsurprised eyes, his long brown hair parted in the middle, the gay paper flowers twisted around his face.
佩科拉倒退着出了门，眼睛一直看着住在金绿两色的漂亮房子里、透过猫毛跟自己说话的漂亮的浅棕色皮肤的太太。那位漂亮太太说话时嘴里冒出的热气使猫毛抖动、分开。佩科拉转过身去找到前门，看见耶稣正用伤感但又极其冷静的目光看着她。他长长的棕色头发从中间分开，脸的四周围着一圈纸花。
Outside, the March wind blew into the rip in her dress. She held her head down against the cold. But she could not hold it low enough to avoid seeing the snowflakes falling and dying on the pavement.
屋外，三月的风吹进她裙子的破裂处。在冷风里她低着头。可是即使低着头，她还是看见了飘落的雪花，雪花落在地上，随即消失。
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