《喜乐与我》——爱是最纯真的坚持.docx

《喜乐与我》——爱是最纯真的坚持《喜乐与我》——爱是最纯真的坚持 菲琳丝雷诺兹那勒(Phyllis Reynolds Naylor，1933～)，美国著名女作家，以擅长写作儿童小说和青少年小说而闻名到目前为止，她已出版了七十余本书《喜乐与我》(Shiloh) 是那勒最出名的儿童小说，讲述了小男孩马提(Marty)如何救出一只受虐待的小狗喜乐(Shiloh)的故事小狗喜乐的原型是那勒在西弗吉尼亚参观时遇到的一只小狗，小狗可怜的模样令她无法忘却，于是她便创作了这本脍炙人口的小说该小说荣获了1992年“纽伯瑞儿童文学奖”金奖，与之后的《喜乐季节》(Shiloh Season)以及《拯救喜乐》(Saving Shiloh)组成了“喜乐”三部曲，广受好评和喜爱，还被搬上了银幕 下文节选自该书最后一章，讲述的是马提按照约定为贾德(Judd)干活并最终留住了喜乐的故事 精彩片段 I just look straight through him. "You and me made a bargain," I say, "and I aim to keep my part of it. What you want me to do today?" Judd just points to the sledgehammer1) again and doubles over2) laughing, like it"s the biggest joke he ever played on somebody in his life. I can feel the sweat trickle3) down my back and I ain"t even started yet. Four o"clock comes, and I finally finished all that wood, but Judd pretends he"s asleep. Got his head laid back, mouth half open, but I know it"s just another way he"s got to trick me. Wants me to sneak4) on home; then he"ll say I never kept to my part of the bargain. So I go in his shed5), put the sledgehammer back, take out the sickle6), and go tackle the weeds down by his mailbox. "Sickle"s getting dull, Judd. You got a whetstone7) around, I could sharpen it for you." He studies me a good long while. "In the shed," he says. I go get it, sit out on a stump8), running the whetstone over the blade. "Past five o"clock," says Judd. "I know," I say. "I ain"t going to pay you one cent more," he says. "It"s okay," I tell him. Never saw a look on a man"s face like I see on his. Pure puzzlement is what it is. Thing I decide on when I head for Judd"s again the next day is that I got no choice. All I can do is stick to my side of the deal and see what happens. Only sign in this world we"re making progress is the water Judd puts out for me. This day it even has ice in it, and Judd don"t say one more word about a witness. In fact, when I"m through working and sit down on his porch to finish the water, Judd talks a little more than usual. Only bond we got between us is dogs, but at least that"s something. I decide to say something nice to Judd. Tell him how good-looking his dogs are. Giving a compliment to Judd Travers is like filling a balloon with air. You can actually see his chest swell up9). "Forty, thirty, and forty-five," he says, when I tell about his dogs. "Those are their names now?" "What I paid for them," he says. "If they had a little more meat on their bones, I figure they"d be the best-looking hounds10) in Tyler County," I tell him. Judd sits there and says, "Maybe I could use a bit more fat." "When"d you first get interested in hunting?" I ask him. "Your pa take you out when you was little?" "Once or twice," he says. "Only nice thing about my dad I remember." It"s the first time in my life I ever felt anything like sorry for Judd Travers. When I thought on all the things I"d done with my own dad and how Judd could only remember hunting, well, that was pretty pitiful for a lifetime. Thursday, when I get there, Judd"s meanness has got the best of11) him again, because I can see he"s running out of work for me to do, just giving me work to make me sweat. Dig a ditch to dump his garbage in, he says. Hoe12) that cornfield again, scrub13) that porch, weed that bean patch. But close on to five o"clock, he seems to realize that I"m only going to be there one more time. I"d worked real hard that day. Did anything he asked and done it better than he asked me to. "Well, one more day," Judd says when I sit down at last with my water and him with his beer. "What you going to do with that dog once he"s yours?" "Just play," I tell him. "Love him." We sit there side by side while the clouds change places, puff out14), the wind blowing them this way and that. The last day I work for Judd, he inspects every job I do, finds fault with the least little thing. Keeps pestering15) me, making me hang around, do my work over. When it"s time to go, I say, "Well, I guess that"s it then." Judd don"t answer. Just stands in the doorway of his trailer looking at me, and then I get the feeling he"s going to tell me I can take that paper he signed and use it for kindling16). Tell me I can call the game warden17) if I want, there"s not a trace of that deer left. The two weeks of work I put in for him was just long enough for rain to wash away the blood, for the field grass to spring back up again where the deer was shot. He still don"t say anything, though, so I start off for home, chest tight. "Just a minute," says Judd. I stop. He goes back inside the trailer, me waiting there in the yard. What am I going to say, he tries that? What am I going to do? And then Judd"s back in the doorway again, and he"s got something in his hand. Comes down the steps halfway.。