"What sort of things does he try to say?"

"I don't know. He never gets far enough. But there's more than that. One night - it was last night in fact - as I was going past the foot of the attic-stairs on my way to bed (and I don't much care for going past them either) I'm sure I heard a yell."

"Perhaps he keeps a mad wife shut up there."

"Yes, I've thought of that."

"Or perhaps he's a coiner."

"Or he might have been a pirate, like the man at the beginning of Treasure Island, and be always hiding from his old shipmates."

"How exciting!" said Polly, "I never knew your house was so interesting." .

“他想说什么事情啊？”

“我不知道。他从来不出远门。但奇怪的是，一天晚上，当然其实就是昨天晚上，当我从阁楼的楼梯下经过（我很不喜欢从那里走的），准备回房间睡觉的时候。很清楚地听到了大叫声。

“也许他把了一个疯婆子关在那里。”

“对，我也这么认为。”

“也许，他是个造假币的。”

“也许他可能是个海盗，就像‘金银岛’那本书上，开始呆在岛上的那个人，总是在想办法避开原来和他一起的那些水手们。”

“真带劲！”波丽说，“真不知道你们家这么有趣。”

"You may think it interesting," said Digory. "But you wouldn't like it if you had to sleep there. How would you like to lie awake listening for Uncle Andrew's step to come creeping along the passage to your room? And he has such awful eyes."

That was how Polly and Digory got to know one another: and as it was just the beginning of the summer holidays and neither of them was going to the sea that year, they met nearly every day.

“也许你觉得这很有趣。“迪格瑞说，”但如果换成你住在那里，你就不会喜欢了。有谁会想听见，安德鲁舅舅悄悄地沿着过道，走向你房间的脚步声啊。

Their adventures began chiefly because it was one of the wettest and coldest summers there had been for years. That drove them to do indoor things: you might say, indoor exploration. It is wonderful how much exploring you can do with a stump of candle in a big house, or in a row of houses. Polly had discovered long ago that if you opened a certain little door in the box-room attic of her house you would find the cistern and a dark place behind it which you could get into by a little careful climbing. The dark place was like a long tunnel with brick wall on one side and sloping roof on the other. In the roof there were little chunks of light between the slates. There was no floor in this tunnel: you had to step from rafter to rafter, and between them there was only plaster. If you stepped on this you would find yourself falling through the ceiling of the room below. Polly had used the bit of the tunnel just beside the cistern as a smugglers' cave. She had brought up bits of old packing cases and the seats of broken kitchen chairs, and things of that sort, and spread them across from rafter to rafter so as to make a bit of floor. Here she kept a cash-box containing various treasures, and a story she was writing and usually a few apples. She had often drunk a quiet bottle of ginger-beer in there: the old bottles made it look more like a smugglers' cave.

他们的冒险也就由此开始了，因为那年暑假是多年来最潮湿最冷的一个暑假，因此两个人只能进行室内活动，也可以称为室内冒险。在一排房子里，或是一间大屋子里，举着一截大蜡烛进行冒险，是多棒的一件事啊。波丽早就发现，如果打开她家里阁楼储藏室的某个小门，就会发现一个水箱。而只要小心地爬过去，就能到达水箱后面那个很黑的地方。这个地方像个通道，是由砖墙和倾斜的屋顶构成的。在屋顶的石板间，会有一些的光亮透下来。这个通道没有地面，要想过去，只能在一根根椽木上走过。在椽木之间涂着石灰，如果不小心踩上去，结果就是你会从房顶上摔下去。波丽以前把水箱旁的这个通道当作走私犯的藏宝山洞。她把一些旧箱子的碎片、厨房里破损椅子的座板、等等这些东西带到通道里，将它们铺在椽木之间形成地板。她在这里还藏了个小箱子在那里，通常用来放她的各种各样的宝贝和一些苹果，还有她正在写的一个故事。在通道里，她还经常喝上一瓶生姜味的啤酒，因为走私犯的藏宝洞里要是没有旧瓶子，那可就不是他们的藏宝洞了。

Digory quite liked the cave (she wouldn't let him see the story) but he was more interested in exploring.

"Look here," he said. "How long does this tunnel go on for? I mean, does it stop where your house ends?"

"No," said Polly. "The walls don't go out to the roof. It goes on. I don't know how far."

"Then we could get the length of the whole row of houses."

"So we could," said Polly, "And oh, I say!"

"What?"

"We could get into the other houses."

"Yes, and get taken up for burglars! No thanks."

"Don't be so jolly clever. I was thinking of the house beyond yours." ,

"What about it?"

THE MAGICIAN'S NEPHEW

BY

C. S. LEWIS

魔法师的外甥

C.S.路易斯

CHAPTER ONE

THE WRONG DOOR

This is a story about something that happened long ago when your grandfather was a child. It is a very important story because it shows how all the comings and goings between our own world and the land of Narnia first began.

In those days Mr Sherlock Holmes was still living in Baker Street and the Bastables were looking for treasure in the Lewisham Road. In those days, if you were a boy you had to wear a stiff Eton collar every day, and schools were usually nastier than now. But meals were nicer; and as for sweets, I won't tell you how cheap and good they were, because it would only make your mouth water in vain. And in those days there lived in London a girl called Polly Plummer.

第一章

开错的门

这个故事发生在很久以前，那时你的爷爷还是个小孩。同时，这个故事也非常的重要，因为它告诉了我们，我们生活的这个世界和纳尼亚大陆之间，一开始发生的所有事情。

在那个时候，大侦探福尔摩斯还住在贝克街，巴斯特伯一家人正在路易斯汗路上寻找宝藏。在那个时候，如果你是个小孩，那就必须要穿着硬的让人难受的，伊顿公学式样的假衣领，并且那时的学校大部分比现在的差。但是，那时的饭菜比现在的可口；至于说到糖果，真不想告诉你们。因为就算说出来，想到那么便宜和那么好吃的糖果，也只能是流流口水而已。同时在那个时候，在伦敦居住着一个叫波丽×普朗莫的小女孩。

She lived in one of a long row of houses which were all joined together. One morning she was out in the back garden when a boy scrambled up from the garden next door and put his face over the wall. Polly was very surprised because up till now there had never been any children in that house, but only Mr Ketterley and Miss Ketterley, a brother and sister, old bachelor and old maid, living together. So she looked up, full of curiosity. The face of the strange boy was very grubby. It could hardly have been grubbier if he had first rubbed his hands in the earth, and then had a good cry, and then dried his face with his hands. As a matter of fact, this was very nearly what he had been doing.

她住的那条街，房屋都是一家紧靠着一家。一天早晨，她去后院时，一个男孩从花园爬上了邻居家的墙，把他的脸凑了过去。波丽为此十分吃惊，因为到目前为止，那个人家还没有一个小孩出现过。那里面只有一对叫，科特利先生和科特利小姐的兄妹居住着，而且他们俩还都没有结过婚。因此她充满好奇地抬头望过去。那个陌生小男孩的脸非常的脏。就算是他先用手去玩泥巴，然后大哭一场，最后再用那玩过泥巴的手去擦干眼泪，也要比现在这样看上去干净。而实际上，这个猜测差不多是准的，他之前就做过这样的事情了。

"Hullo," said Polly.

"Hullo," said the boy. "What's your name?"

"Polly," said Polly. "What's yours?"

"Digory," said the boy.

"I say, what a funny name!" said Polly.

"It isn't half so funny as Polly," said Digory.

"Yes it is," said Polly.

"No, it isn't," said Digory.