小王子 Le Petit Prince‧Chap24

我的飛機意外在沙漠裡迫降到今天已經第八天了，我一邊聽著小王子講完商人的故事，一邊喝完我僅剩的最後一滴水。

我對小王子說：「啊！你的回憶真棒，但是我還沒修好我的飛機，連喝的水也沒了，如果我現在能夠從容的走向一池泉水，我也會很高興阿！」

小王子告訴我：「我的朋友狐狸...」

「我的小人兒，狐狸怎樣都沒關係了！」我說。

「為什麼？」小王子問。

「因為我們快要渴死了。」我說。

小王子不懂我的論點，他回答我說：「就算快要死了，但有個朋友總是好的，就像我，我很高興能跟狐狸成為朋友....。」

我想小王子沒辦法瞭解危機是什麼，他從不曾饑餓、口渴，他所冀望的只是一點兒陽光就夠了...。

但是小王子堅定的看著我，像是讀出了我心思似的說：「我也口渴了...我們去找井吧...」

我露出疲累的模樣！要在這個浩瀚的沙漠裡去找一口井真是荒謬，僅管如此我們還是動身了。

我們一言不發地拖著沉重的步伐走了好幾個小時，夜幕低垂，星星出來了。我因感到口渴而發燒，那些星星就像是在夢裡看到的一樣。

小王子的話在我的記憶裡迴旋...。

我問小王子：「你口渴嗎？」

他沒有回答我的問題只說：「水對心靈也許是有益的。」

我不明白他的回答，但也沒再問...我很清處不該追問，他累了。

小王子坐了下來，我在他身旁坐下。沈默一會兒之後，他說：「那些星星很美，因為有一朵花在那裡，只是我們看不見...」

我回答：「當然了。」接著默默地望著月光下的沙丘。

「沙漠很美。」小王子說。

這倒是真的，我向來喜歡沙漠。獨自坐在沙丘上面看不到也聽不到什麼，然而俱寂中卻有些東西在發光、跳動......

小王子說：「我想沙漠之所以美，是因為它在某個地方藏了一口井....」

這個沙漠裡神祕的亮光，讓我我突然恍然大悟。小時候，我住在一個古老的房子裡，傳說這屋子裡藏有寶藏。當然，從來沒人知道怎麼找到寶藏，也許也從沒有人去找過它，可是這個傳說卻讓這個房子充滿了神祕，我的房子深處隱藏了一個祕密....

我說：「是阿。不管是房子、星星或沙漠，他們之所以美麗，其實是因為看不見的東西！」
小王子說：「我很高興，你同意了我的狐狸的話。」

小王子睡著了，我把他抱在懷裡走了點路。我深深受到感動，彷彿抱著一件脆弱的寶物，甚至覺得地球上沒有任何比他更脆弱的東西。我在月光下凝視著他蒼白的前額，他雙眼緊閉、頭髮在風中顫動，我對自己說：「我所看到的只不過是外在而已，最重要的東西是看不見的...」

當他嘴唇半啟，好像露出微笑的時候，我又自言自語說：「我之所以感動，是因為他對一朵花的真誠，即使他睡著了，那朵玫瑰花的影像，還是像燭光一樣照映著他....。而這讓我我覺得他更加地脆弱，因為燭火只要一點微風就足以將他熄滅....」

然後我就這樣走著，在天將破曉時，我找到了一口井。

It was now the eighth day since I had had my accident in the desert, and I had listened to the story of the merchant as I was drinking the last drop of my water supply.
"Ah," I said to the little prince, "these memories of yours are very charming; but I have not yet succeeded in repairing my plane; I have nothing more to drink; and I, too, should be very happy if I could walk at my leisure toward a spring of fresh water!"
"My friend the fox--" the little prince said to me.
"My dear little man, this is no longer a matter that has anything to do with the fox!"
"Why not?"
"Because I am about to die of thirst . . ."
He did not follow my reasoning, and he answered me:
"It is a good thing to have had a friend, even if one is about to die. I, for instance, am very glad to have had a fox as a friend . . ."
"He has no way of guessing the danger," I said to myself. "He has never been either hungry or thirsty. A little sunshine is all he needs . . ."
But he looked at me steadily, and replied to my thought: "I am thirsty, too. Let us look for a well . . ."
I made a gesture of weariness. It is absurd to look for a well, at random, in the immensity of the desert. But nevertheless we started walking.
When we had trudged along for several hours, in silence, the darkness fell, and the stars began to come out. Thirst had made me a little feverish, and I looked at them as if I were in a dream. The little prince's last words came reeling back into my memory:
"Then you are thirsty, too?" I demanded.
But he did not reply to my question. He merely said to me:
"Water may also be good for the heart . . ."
I did not understand this answer, but I said nothing. I knew very well that it was impossible to cross-examine him.
He was tired. He sat down. I sat down beside him. And, after a little silence, he spoke again: "The stars are beautiful, because of a flower that cannot be seen."
I replied, "Yes, that is so." And, without saying anything more, I looked across the ridges of sand that were stretched out before us in the moonlight.
"The desert is beautiful," the little prince added.
And that was true. I have always loved the desert. One sits down on a desert sand dune, sees nothing, hears nothing. Yet through the silence something throbs, and gleams . . .
"What makes the desert beautiful," said the little prince, "is that somewhere it hides a well . . ."
I was astonished by a sudden understanding of that mysterious radiation of the sands. When I was a little boy I lived in an old house, and legend told us that a treasure was buried there. To be sure, no one had ever known how to find it; perhaps no one had ever even looked for it. But it cast an enchantment over that house. My home was hiding a secret in the depths of its heart . . .
"Yes," I said to the little prince. "The house, the stars, the desert--what gives them their beauty is something that is invisible!"
"I am glad," he said, "that you agree with my fox."
As the little prince dropped off to sleep, I took him in my arms and set out walking once more. I felt deeply moved, and stirred. It seemed to me that I was carrying a very fragile treasure. It seemed to me, even, that there was nothing more fragile on all Earth. In the moonlight I looked at his pale forehead, his closed eyes, his locks of hair that trembled in the wind, and I said to myself: "What I see here is nothing but a shell. What is most important is invisible . . ."
As his lips opened slightly with the suspicion of a half-smile, I said to myself, again: "What moves me so deeply, about this little prince who is sleeping here, is his loyalty to a flower--the image of a rose that shines through his whole being like the flame of a lamp, even when he is asleep . . ." And I felt him to be more fragile still. I felt the need of protecting him, as if he himself were a flame that might be extinguished by a little puff of wind . . .
And, as I walked on so, I found the well, at daybreak.

註：《小王子》是法國童話，法文原書名為Le Petit Prince，作者是聖艾修伯里，1943年在紐約出版，被譯成超過 180種語言，銷售量超過8千萬冊，還有拍成電影和動畫片、改編成話劇和音樂劇演出。
圖片出處：http://www.odaha.com